At 2 weeks, hands unknown to me removed me from a mentally
ill mother and placed me in a foster home.
The same mother had two children bore before me, they two were taken
from her arms, and all three of us separated to different homes. When she would get sick, those hands would
take us, separate us. when she became well, those hands uprooted us once again, reunited us..and deemed that for now it was safe to be with Mom again. Most times we
would be in different places with different families. Sad as it sounds until about age 6, I really didn’t
know the difference. That was my life.
After age 6 I did know the difference, and I have distinct
memories of my brother and sister and I piling furniture in front of the doors
when we knew mom was so sick they would be coming for us soon. We piled the furniture up because the hands
that took us away, also took us away from each other. It could months even months, several homes,
and years before we would see each other again.
None of us, not a one grieved for our mom, only each other.
Visitation was not allowed between siblings. Although they
did force all of us to go to the building full of rocking people, screaming
voices, and erratic behavior in the social room my mom was in at our visits.
The caseworkers assigned to us, lied and told each of us that the other sibling
was moving on with their life and did not want contact.
So at age 12 when I ran away and hitch hiked across the
country, I really had no one that cared I was alive or dead. Only a mother who drew on walls, hung strings
of conspiracy from magazine pages, and memory after memory of abuse from men
that came to me in the night at homes the state placed me in to keep me safe
from my mother.
I was found in Florida and sent back to the west coast. On the plane the woman next me had wine. I stole her bottle, put it in a satchel the
airline stewardess gave me. When I
reached the end of the runway and saw the eyes of the caseworker I knew who
lied to me over and over again. The
worker who placed me with those men. The
worker whose voice I could hear as the firemen tore down the barricade my
brother and sister created to keep their hands away from us…that worker. I took the satchel, jumped on top of her and
began pounding her face.
When the arms tore me off her I ran as fast I could. Only to get caught by the police outside of
the airport. Months of juvenile detention and charges of assault later, I sat in courtroom in a chair in front of a
judge. Across the room a
caseworker. The caseworker. This caseworker was making recommendations I
put in juvenile prison. For the first
time in my life I saw justice. The judge
told her she could not remain caseworker and in charge of my family anymore as
she now was a victim. For her to make
recommendations as to what was best for me was now biased.
I left that courtroom that day and preceded to go to another
17 homes before the state finally emancipated me. It was their opinions at age 15 I was ready
to be on my own. I was not opposed for I
had learned the homes they put me in were worse than the sick confines of insanity.
Justice or just us.
Fast forward a life time later I look at this incident in my
life as one of 4 instances that are the foundation of my belief that there
really is only Just us, not justice. I
will write about the other times in blogs to come.
But I affirm now even with the knowledge of the other
instances, that even if the truth is only in just us, I will never stop
fighting for justice. Because in the end even if the truth is not discovered. I
know I did everything in my power to bring it out of the darkness. The fact that I can speak and use my voice
even it is goes unheard. The justice is
that I did not let it die in silence.
I am just. I am not
responsible for what was done to me. I
am accountable for who I am today. Today
I am the beautiful innocent human being that sat in that courtroom. I am beautiful, I am just. I have been heard.
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