The Heart of a Survivor

Dear Momma, Why? Some people may look at me, and think that they know me. Some may judge me before they get to know me, and many people may even hate me, because of their own insecurities and jealousy issues. Let no one judge a book by its cover; I do not look like what I have been through. Sometimes you need to open the book and read the chapters in a person’s life to be able to understand why a person acts a certain way. Never hate someone who is different because they may be protected by the blood of God. I have learned that God is a jealous God and the best revenge comes from God. God’s revenge is greater than you and I could ever imagine. My life has not been easy and has never been a walk in the park. Sometimes, I look at other people’s lives and families and see how happy they are and I wonder why God has made me walk through difficulties in my life. My life has had too many bad, experiences, and when I tell other people about my story they find it hard to believe. That is because they are looking at me from the outside and cannot see the pain on the inside. Since the age of three, my life has involved death, pain, and hurt. There was certainly no love, no hugs, no kisses, and no mother or father. Truth is, I have been hurt so many times that I have tried to kill myself, several times. I thought that if I took my life, then my boys would not end up being like me. I suffer from Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD), which makes me sometimes have outbursts to the point that people find themselves not wanting to be around me. My belief was that if I killed myself, the tears would stop flowing, my heart would stop beating, and my soul would stop screaming out. Then the devil would leave me alone, because when the devil comes, he does not just come by himself; he brings his evil-spirited friends with him. I realize at an early age that no one heard my cries—nobody but God. I do not remember my mom, but I heard that she went through a lot of abuse growing up with her father. When my mom was a teen, she ran away and so did her brothers and her sister, because her father (my grandfather) was an abusive alcoholic. She got pregnant with me at fifteen in a group home called Cindy Hurst, where she met my father, who was one of the workers. At eighteen, she joined the military so she could provide for me. When she came home from the military, she moved back in with her father and so did her boyfriend at the time, who was also in the military. Her father (my grandfather) forced her to get married, because he told her that a man and a woman should not live together without being married. A little later after she was married, my mom and I moved to Atlanta where my stepfather and his family were from. This was also where my first big tragedy in life happened. My mom’s life, along with the baby she was carrying, ended shortly after moving with my stepfather. As the story was told to me, my mom’s husband whose name was Charles Kendal, was abusive and used to beat her. The night before my mom died, she had called home and talked to her stepmom who was married to my mom’s father at the time. During their conversation, my mom said that Charles had been beating her, and she asked her stepmom to buy her and me a plane ticket back to my mom’s hometown. We never made it on the plane because the next day, my mom went into a coma. Charles had beaten her when she got off the phone that night right in front of me, and she went to use the bathroom where she fell over onto the floor. I was the one who found her lying on the floor and went upstairs and knocked on Charles mom’s door, who lived in the same apartment building. I told his mom that something was wrong with my mom, and she came down and called 9-1-1. After Charles, had beaten her, a blood vessel busted in her brain, which was an aneurysm waiting to happen, and my mom went into a coma. I was also told that the hospital found nitroglycerin pills in her body. Nitroglycerin is used for circulatory disorders including angina, pulmonary hypertension, and congestive heart failure. My mom did not have any of these disorders, but her husband’s mom did have heart failure. I believe that my mom probably took the pills attempting to commit suicide. I do not judge my mom if she tried to commit suicide. I have found in life that pain can hit so hard that it can make you want to lie down and die. Pain can distort a person’s thinking to the point that people feel their loved ones will be better off without them, but that is just the devil trying to keep you from your destiny. It appears that no time was wasted on pulling the plug on my mom. I believe that if my grandfather had prayed and given her to God, God would have brought her through. I say this because I have been blessed to see God’s miracles. Years later after my mom passed away, my grandmother ironically suffered two aneurysms and went into a coma. My grandmother died at the age of seventy-two, and my mom died at nineteen, and maybe if my grandfather had not pulled the plug on my mom’s life-support systems, maybe my mom would not have died on Christmas Eve, along with my unborn sibling inside her. Charles was never seen again after my grandfather got to the hospital, and he was never charged with my mom’s murder. I do not even think he was even questioned by the police about what happened to her. Charles never came to Mom’s funeral, but he cashed in on her insurance policy and I never saw a dime of that money. My grandfather sent me back to Louisville on the airplane with his third. My life changed from that day forth. The only real memory I have of my mom is her lying in a casket in the front of the pulpit at St. Family Christian Church, but my heart never stopped missing and loving her.