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After she passed, I was forced to attend her funeral…I told the foster program and my foster mother that I prefer not to go, that I didn’t want to be around my fake biological family and their antics…

Everyone knew that I didn’t and still don’t like being around anyone for an extended time. I have anxieties and ptsd flare ups..but overall I’m just an extremely introverted person.

Amongst other things that weren’t in accordance to my beliefs. I was threatened immediate removal if I didn’t go.

I felt pressured but went. This has never been an ideal placement, but the later option …the unknown was more frightening.

I was exhausted.

So I went. It was a very traumatic experience for me. I was more angry than sad.

When It was my turn at the casket, I saw that she was prepared in accordance to whom she might have been in younger years, or maybe their ideal of her. Not her current self.

She never wore makeup, and she had a full face of heavy makeup,l understand some makeup would be applied as default…but this was too much. She had thin, brittle hair that was falling out. She was embarrassed and self conscious about that and had worn hair pieces and sometimes wigs. They prepared her with her natural hair on full display.

She didn’t wear dresses and dressed very casually. They had her in a suit dress and pumps on. I was very angry and kept saying this isn’t my mother.

People thought that I was saying that out of denial about her death. I wasn’t in denial. She was gone. This wasn’t the version of my mother I had ever known.

So, I left early still fuming and feeling very uncomfortable because people kept coming up to me expressing condolences, telling me how she was a great friend and that she’d be missed… People that I’ve never met before.. people that apparently knew of her past struggles with herself and raising us… But never tried to help. Help as in support, encourage, etc …

Then my biological family proceeded their “our family is a strong unit, we’ll get through this together and always be here for her children”, etc …act… Which was making me very angry…

So I left early, before the burial. Bad enough that I had to ride to and from with a cousin that kept acting like she had always been in my life and would establish contact soon. Telling of how she wanted to see me more and have me at her home. That I was welcome to any time.

I just wanted to get away…from everything.

I was outside once and the neighborhood guy told me he was sorry for my loss.

He then soon after on another day raped me again.

When I entered high school I was automatically isolated and bullied. I was use to it. I have been bullied and isolated ever since I entered school ..even in kindergarten.

In kindergarten the kids use to call me names and never wanted to interact with me .

1st-2nd was the same. During recess I use to stand by the adults because the kids made fun of me, pushed me down, called me dirty, weird, hit me with gym balls and wire jump ropes.

The adults were sick of me hanging around them and forced me to interact with the kids. I started getting into trouble and not doing my homework so that I could be punished by the teacher and made to stay indoors during recess.

She soon caught on to what I was doing and made me go back outside during recess. She told me she didn’t want me taking up her free time. That I would just have to wait it out.

So I use to stand by the front gates, almost out of sight by everyone during recess by myself.

We didn’t live far from school. So sometimes my mother started coming by and talking to me from the gate. She knew that I was having a difficult time, so she came. Sometimes she wasn’t able to make it. My oldest brother still was expelled from schools and she made sure to be there for him too.

During Valentine’s Day in elementary the teachers would have a class party and allowed children to exchange gifts and cards. Everyone was supposed to get a card. …everyone did, excluding me.

The kids excluded me, and would pass me by. The teachers would force them to give me a card and candy. I was humiliated and embarrassed. I would tell the teachers it was okay, they didn’t have to.. but they would make them do it.

One time I ran out of the classroom when one boy was forced and he grew angry. He told the teacher that he paid for them and he could give them to who ever he wanted to. He told the teacher they’re his to give. That he didn’t want to give me one because I’m weird, I smelled, and I was ugly.

In the cafeteria I sat alone, or with staff. They would make the students make room for me on the bench. When the staff wasn’t watching ..everyone would leave and sit away from me.

Soo in high school..it was no difference.

Students use to make fun of my clothes, the way that I spoke, being quiet. They use to take my glasses off and take my belongings, and would laugh at me trying to find both.

My youngest brother didn’t live far, and we went to the same school together. I didn’t like that. He felt the need to protect me from the bullying, which made things worse.

He is extroverted and outgoing..and people would flock around him listening to his stories, and he would fix things and gave them advice. He wasn’t popular, but was respected and liked by many.

One time I caught him in the library telling of our past struggles to random kids at school. One who bullied me in junior high, now high school. He was telling them I was having a hard time because of our mother’s recent death and being shuffled about in the system. I got really angry and felt extremely violated. I told him that it was my life and it was my decision to share or not share. I said that if he wanted to talk about his history, leave my parts out of it.

He didn’t understand what the big deal was. I started to avoid him even more.

I never liked attending school together. I always wanted my separate identity..not one strictly associated with being his sister. I just wanted to get through school alone and by minimizing myself as I’ve always done.

Sometimes he would search the building for me, and when found would tell me that he was going to unalive me like he should have done years ago..that I had ruined everything. That everything was my fine until I was born..that it was all my fault. I started avoiding him until he graduated.

In the 9th grade, foster program made me attend an after school program because they were trying to to force me to be a social person… something I’m not.

I was still going through a lot and didn’t need additional stress. I would arrive home from school, eat a little, and within a half an hour the van would pick me up. It was from 5pm until 8pm…Monday to Friday.

I naturally stayed to myself and found a secluded space to tuck myself into. Most of the children were in elementary school, and I was ignored by staff and kids. I didn’t mind.

I would come home and would stay up long hours finishing homework.. that would ask to explain in paragraph details ..that teachers never read nor checked answers. They would just tell us to pull out our completed assignments the next day …and would walk up and down the classroom isles , putting a red checkmark on the pages.

It was all too much.

After being in the after school program a few months, I was threatened to be more social or face removal. So I was removed due to the influence of someone.

During my younger schooling years …a young girl suddenly found me fascinating…and began to bully me. She would abuse me, often hitting, slapping, punching, pinching me. She would threaten me as well.

She developed an obsession with me and personally vowed to destroy my life.

When we first met, we were both age 6..

This lasted untill I went into foster care. When my mother and brothers moved, suddenly she was in my class resuming the behavior and threats…

One time I was admitted to the mental health facility for children, she was there as well. Same things happened..

In middle school, she had been there briefly.

I hadn’t seen her in years…but she suddenly was in the after school program with me, and tried to resume the abuse, until I started trying to defend myself physically.

It has been years, and we were both 14. The day that she came, the staff had to exit the room for a few minutes…and it was just the two of us.

She cornered me in the room, and started saying how everyone always thought I was the “nice” one, the “sweet” one, and that she was finally going to put an end to it. She was going to show everyone I wasn’t. She told me she was going to turn everyone against me, get rid of me and takeover my life.

She would tell me that no one would believe me over her. She would say such frightening and hateful stuff towards me.

She had always been a charismatic and charming person.

Sure, enough. The next day her influence got me kicked out. The staff suddenly reprimanded me for being antisocial. They had been so kind previously.

Before I was kicked out, they gave me the choice of staying and working with my stalker (she told them we were really good friends) with helping out the younger kids, or to leave. I choose the later.

They told the foster program that I was antisocial, disrespectful, mouthy, and disruptive.

I was glad to be removed, but very frightened.

My last time seeing her was when we were 24. I had been noticing for two weeks a car that would park and sit for a few hours before leaving.

I’m not an outdoors person, and the only time I usually go outside to collect packages and take out garbage.

It was garbage day, I was taking it out early..when the car door opened…to reveal my stalker. She didn’t come closer…she just stood there staring at me for a few minutes. I was paralyzed with fear ….and she got back into the car and tried to run me over.

Haven’t seen her since. I remain very paranoid about any future visits.

I wonder if she monitors me and I’m just unaware.

During 9th grade neighborhood guy and I attended the same high school. When he saw me he would make fun of me and laugh.

One day I was outside by myself, and a young girl around our age (14) came up to me and said aren’t you Laven? I didn’t respond.. she said well I heard D raped you…

I was frightened and ran back into the house….when I turned away, I heard her pleading with me to stay, and I heard her say that D did the same thing to her ..and that she just wanted to talk..
She sounded exhausted, sad, like she didn’t know where or where else to turn.

I wish that I would have stayed and listened. I wish I could apologize to her for running off. It still haunts me.. I’ve thought about contacting her via social media…but I don’t want her to relive something that she may have moved forward from. She perhaps doesn’t remember me… I wouldn’t want her contacting D in case they are still in contact for some reason. ..perhaps I will always will be haunted…. She needed to talk, and I needed to run..

In the 9th grade D was arrested and sentenced to 10 years in jail..5 for good behavior.

Someone came forward with rape allegations and pressed charges. He was found guilty. I wonder if it was the same young lady, and if she had wanted me to testify.

His grandma denied the allegations…and said that the girl was just jealous because he wasn’t paying her attention and she liked him.

So he only served 5 years…during that time he started writing me letters…apologizing and overall trying to manipulate me. He would ask how I was doing and tell me that when he got out he was going to marry me and do “right” by me.

Then he started asking me favors. He started asking me to relay messages to his grandma, send money, send stamps, send provocative pictures, he wanted me to contact someone and ask them to write to him(it probably was his victim).

I stopped writing…then he wrote me a threatening letter. In the letter he told me that he’s going to rape and abuse me some more. That this would be nothing compared to when we were kids. He said to stop acting tough, because I’m not. That if he was there, I wouldn’t say anything…that he wouldn’t make me come out of my panties and there wouldn’t be anything that I could do about it. He closed the letter by saying that I should be a good girl and cooperate.

The next letter he sent me was that of an apology letter.. Saying that it’s very hard in there, that he was under stress because everyone had abandoned him. That his grandma or mother wouldn’t respond to his letters, that he found out he had diabetes, that he was constantly placed in isolation for days because the other guys were “framing” him, etc …

I never wrote back, I was too frightened to. I contacted the jail and told them about the letters ..they told me that they only monitor incoming mail, not out going. That I could only press charges and get a restraining order ….I decided against it. I didn’t want to make things worse…also a piece of paper won’t stop someone committed to harming..jail won’t either…

Soon after that he was released….

TBC..

Ty