Is this child a demon?

"No, I really mean it, the child never sleeps, but she has so much... energy... every morning, night, and day." My mom wavered into the phone, exhausted, depleted. No body believed her yet she was right. I slept a mere hour, when I did, and yet I bounded to life at sight of the sun each day as if living on a heavy dose of meth each day, alike my bio mom.

"No, I'm not over reacting, every time I check on her she's awake! When does the girl get rest?" She was getting exasperated, this was likely the second person today to dismissed her findings, poor dear. It must have been terribly difficult to be dismissed each day in such a way. I didn't understand it at the time and would galivant my days away within my own imagination.

"Okay, let's say she sleeps when I do," she murmured leaning against the pillar next to our corded phone. "I still don't sleep enough for a child that young...She's growing." She was being worn thin, worn into wondering if she could possibly be imagining things, but she wasn't. She was well within her right mind, the child had endless energy afforded to her by the enormous levels of Cortisol gifted to her by her PTSD. The child had never been taught she was truly safe from her traumas at her bio mom's house.

"Okay, but she also doesn't eat, she will go a whole week without food!" She was now nearing the edge where she would rip her hair out. Moments from running to a long shower, running to the safety to cry in peace, away from the gripping hands of her child. She wanted so badly to to well by the child who was dropped on her doorstep one day, and she did amazingly. She was up against traumas upon traumas given to a child upon the day of her birth. The new mom did better than anyone could have asked her to have, leaving the child feeling the weight of love in her heart.

"No, John can attest, she really goes without for that long! I'm worried" She was near tears with her love for the child, knowing well it would not be enough alone. Nobody around her believed the near supernatural tales, however true they may be. Feeling her worries gone dashed on the rocks as her heart broke for the child she had not born herself. She felt a deep need to protect a child who thought herself indestructible, because she knew well that the child was in fact holding it together by a thread. She knew this despite never being told, she could simply feel it in the soul she loved so much it could weigh on her so.

"Okay, it's great she eats for you, but she's usually here with us, where she doesn't eat!" The feeling of dread bubbled up her throat like a case of terrible indigestion, she would not be believed. Again. As she slid down the pillar she leaned against, she allowed herself a cleansing sigh. "Yeah, I love you too, talk to you later." She signed off absently as her child bounded up and down the stairs in a fictitious battle. Neither of them had slept in three days and her child hadn't eaten in as long.

"Why don't you come in here and have something, anything to eat?" She called through the back door, only to be greeted with a hearty NO. She allowed herself a single moment to sob, hoping to dear god her child could find homeostasis some day. It would later be found that the child lay claim to several bowel diseases, which were not aided by her bio mother, who whispered endlessly in her ear over how fat she would become. Exclaiming fat to be bad to her overly young child. Her bio mom did not so much as wait for her to be out of diapers to starve the helpless dear.

Were it not for the kindness and love of my "step"-mom, I am not certain I would be here to this day. She was astoundingly loving, and provided me with the coping skills I use to this day.