Chapter 14: Losing the Farm

Okay it wasn't a farm, but it was my childhood home. I remember winter, I was fifteen, and mother wasn't very good with words. Unless she was screaming them drunkenly back at equally drunk father.

I am at a time in my life where I thought being pretty and having a boyfriend were the most important things in a girl's life. I would picture the type of boy I wanted. Someone who would never yell at me, who wouldn't mind laying in the damp grass at night to star gaze.

A boy who could communicate his emotions with a single look, who couldn't get enough of my touch or taste, a boy who would keep me at the exact center of his universe. All the things my parents were never to each other.

I don't remember the family vacations, just seen pictures. I don't remember family dinners, or my parents looking at each other with nothing but love, though my oldest sister insists it happened. I do remember the screaming arguments, living with my mothers and her lover for six weeks, the sex tape the lover's creepy daughter showed me, his house that was filled with the ghost of his son who had taken his life the previous year.

In those six weeks I remember noticing the body fat that wasn't there before, my clothes stopped fitting, couldn't fit into her clothes, had to wear some of her brother's, because mother wasn't allowed back into father's house(the one we'll end up losing) and she wouldn't let me go home.

Dad took mom back so we could be a family again. But there was no more vacations, or camping trips. Just the sound of breaking glass and various electronics smashing. A phone left in the backyard or microwaves thrown into the garage.

At fifteen I hated my body, wasn't good at anything, and the only boyfriend I had to show for I dated for two months and had just as many innocent kisses with no tongue. He had also came out as gay shortly after we broke up. Oh, and we lost the house.

My eldest sister joined the army when I was five, my older sister graduated and immediately moved in with a boyfriend. My parents had stopped screaming and were now fully avoiding one another. Meaning they were avoiding the house. Meaning they were avoiding me. If it wans't for my friend's parents, I was practically an orphan.

No support at band concerts, sports games where I sat the bench, or greetings when I got home. No family dinners, just a fridge drawer filled with slim fast.

Why wait until the middle of your book to explain your trauma? Well, up until this point, I've obviously written about my journey as a madly successful author, who wrote this with the intention of guiding and inspiring other writers.

My trauma is not what made me who I am, I get the credit fully for that. My trauma is what made me frail, weak, and susceptible to an addictive personality. I fought hard to be a motivated, driven person who never gave up on her goals.

The price for great writing, I think, for me, is that I need to feel all my emotions. The good, the bad, the ugly, alongside the fulfilling and joyful emotions. It's imperative to my writing to feel everything, to let the inspiration fill me even on my bad days when it's weighed down by anxiety, stress, or failure to regulate my emotions like a normal person.

My life hans't been as bad as it could have been, but it most certainly hasn't been good. I've struggled to forgive and sometimes miss the presence of a parent as if they're dead, even though they are alive. I struggle with things that some may not, but I suppose that's the beauty of human existence.

But most importantly, the beauty of story telling.