Jewels in Her Crown

By Susie Wyatt-Clemens

Many books have helped me over the years, and listed are just a small handful. I have learned to think outside the box. I have learned how to search for my passion and live in the now. I have also discovered a path of spirituality that has given me the freedom to forgive and find my joy. They all in some way helped me discover, me. All I had to do was want a change, to change the programing, and start thinking through my choices and decisions. To find my purpose, and maybe, just maybe, to help you find yours too.

• Language: English
• Publisher: AuthorHouse
• Release date: Feb 10, 2012
• ISBN: 9781468529081

Susie Wyatt-Clemens

Susie Lives with her brother, Les, and there dog-person, Jack, in Payson Az. She grew in Spokane, Wa., and moved from there in 1996. I guess you could say that her passion is her hobbies. Sewing, card-making, photography, hiking, just to name a few. But her real passion is speaking in public and sharing her story. As Susie has said many times, and in many different groups, “You don’t have to have HIV/AIDS define who you are and you don’t have to carry all that guilt and pain any more. There is another way!”

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Jewels In Her Crown

SUSIE WYATT-CLEMENS

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AuthorHouse™

1663 Liberty Drive

Bloomington, IN 47403

www.authorhouse.com

Phone: [phone]

© 2012 by Susie Wyatt-Clemens. All rights reserved.

No part of this book may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted by any means without the written permission of the author.

First published by AuthorHouse 01/16/2012

ISBN: 978-1-4685-2881-7 (sc)

ISBN: 978-1-4685-2908-1 (ebk)

Library of Congress Control Number: 2011962581

Printed in the United States of America

Any people depicted in stock imagery provided by Thinkstock are models, and such images are being used for illustrative purposes only.

Certain stock imagery © Thinkstock.

This book is printed on acid-free paper.

Because of the dynamic nature of the Internet, any web addresses or links contained in this book may have changed since publication and may no longer be valid. The views expressed in this work are solely those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the views of the publisher, and the publisher hereby disclaims any responsibility for them.

CONTENTS

Acknowledgments

Quotes

Chapter 1

Chapter 2

Chapter 3

Chapter 4

Chapter 5

Chapter 6

Chapter 7

Chapter 8

Chapter 9

Chapter 10

Chapter 11

Chapter 12

Chapter 13

Chapter 14

Chapter 15

Chapter 16

Chapter 17

Chapter 18

Chapter 19

Chapter 20

Chapter 21

Chapter 22

Chapter 23

Chapter 24

Chapter 25

Chapter 26

Chapter 27

Chapter 28

Chapter 29

Chapter 30

Chapter 31

Chapter 32

Chapter 33

Chapter 34

Chapter 35

Chapter 36

Chapter 37

Chapter 38

Chapter 39

Chapter 40

Chapter 41

Chapter 42

Chapter 43

Chapter 44

Chapter 45

Chapter 46

Chapter 47

Chapter 48

Chapter 49

Chapter 50

Chapter 51

Chapter 52

Chapter 53

Chapter 54

Acknowledgments 

To all of those who have encouraged me to put word to paper, and then to print, thank you so much. With your continual love and support, you are all special to me and have left your foot print on my heart.

A few shout outs are very much in order.

To my friend, Linda Linderggard. We walk this path together, thank you so much for being in my life.

To Steven Farnsworth. Without you in my life, the life I have with my special friend and adopted brother, Les, well let’s just say, the life I have would not be! Thank you Steven for being my friend.

To Richard and Roseann Lasater. Your protection and unconditional love for me has no bounds. Your friendship over the years is precious to my soul. Thank you for always and always being in my life.

To my friend Sharon Blackburn: You truly are a friend who would give your last dollar away to help me. You were there during the crying time, and have never left. Thanks girlfriend for standing by me and with me, even in the ugly stuff!

To my grandfather, Leonard Malby: Without your inheritance, I would never have had the monies to buy our computer, and this book would never had been written.

To my friend here in Beaver Valley, Lois Johnson: Without your help with this computer and how to set up my book, how to save it, how to send it, well, all the little things that didn’t come naturally to me, a great big THANK YOU!

And to my Very Special Friend and co-author of Rachel’s Eyes, Helen Littrell: Your continual encouragement, your love for me, the laughs and giggles we have had along the way, and the editing of this very personal story, Thank You just doesn’t really say enough. So I will say, I love you so much friend. Your friendship is on my heart and in my life… . Namaste.

Dedicated to three very special and unique

people in my life

To my daughter:

Thank you sweetheart for choosing me as your mom! For all I put you through, your soul turned them all into Jewels for your crown. Wear them with confidence, you have earned them. How very special you are in my life and always will be.

To Swamii Ty:

You always made me find my own answers to my questions, but always by my side to make sure that what I found, I landed softly and safe. Your knowledge and guidance on my spiritual journey, has molded me into the woman I am today and the strength to write my story, warts and all!

To my very special brother, and friend,

Les Pascoe:

Where do I begin? Ah, there is so much! Thank you for showing and helping me live outside the box! To have the courage to be authentic, and walk in truth! To live my daily life in harmony and most of all, Bro, thank you for the life I live, with all the trimmings. We have an awesome life! Don’t we?

Peace To All

Quotes 

Behind every dark cloud, is a silver lining, you

just have to look.

My mom, Betty Malby-Wyatt

With each full circle in your life, a jewel is put in your crown, to be placed On your head when you reach heaven.

My grandmother, Agnes Malby

Being a victim, limits you in fear.

Being a survivor gives you the courage and strength to change the world!

My friend, Gayle Nelson

Help in the beginning.

National Aids Hotline

Spokane Aids Network

Thank you so much for being there. You case managed me, pointed me in the direction of help for paying my bills, food banks, paying for prescriptions, councelling. Most of all for your support, for being there. What ever my needs were you would find the answers, even a new and safe place for my daughter and I to live.

Strength for the Journey Retreats

Wow! Thank you for being there. Boy, look how far I have come! Without these retreats, I know, I wouldn’t be where I am today. You really did give me the strength to live my life, and this book wasn’t written without thinking of you, often. So Please, continue on, You not only changed my life but many, many more you don’t even know!

I live here in Payson Az., now, and there is even a Strength for the Journey retreat week here. So, I ask all of you to support the Strength for the Journey retreats, in care of the United Methodist Church. Make donations ear marked for the retreats. Thank you so much.

WABA, women affected by aids. Created by Helen Bonzer.

Wow Helen, it seems like a lifetime ago, oh, that’s right, it was! So much thanks for having you in my life and for all you have done for us women.

Blessed are you, my friend.

Book List.

Many books have helped me over the years, and listed are just a small handful. I have learned to think outside the box. I have learned how to search for my passion and live in the now. I have also discovered a path of spirituality that has given me the freedom to forgive and find my joy. They all in some way helped me discover, me. All I had to do was want a change, to change the programing, and start thinking through my choices and decisions. To find my purpose, and maybe, just maybe, to help you find yours too.

The Laws of Spirit

By Dan Millman

Published by H. J. Kramer and New World

Library, 1995

ISBN 0-915811-93-6

The Diamond Light

By Djwhal Khul: Channeled through Violet Starre

Published by Light Technology Publishing

Flagstaff Az. 2000

ISBN 1-891824-25-2

Journey of Souls

By Michael Newton, Phd

Published by Llewellyn publications

Woodbury, Mn. 1994

ISBN 10: 1-56718-485-5

Destiny of the Soul

By Michael Newton, Phd

Published by Llewellym Publications

St. Paul Mn. 2004

ISBN 1-56718499-5

And these books below, put it all together for me

Your Souls Plan

By Robert Schwartz

Publoshed by Frog Books and distributed by North Atlantic Books, 2007 and 2009

ISBN 13: 978-1-58394-272-7 and ISBN 10: 1-58394-272-6

A New Earth, by Eckhart Tolle

Namaste Publishing Book

Published by the Penguin Group

New York, N.Y, 2005

ISBN 978-0-452-28996-3

The Power of Now by Eckhart Tolle

Published by New World library, Novato Ca.

Namaste Publishing Vancover B.C. Canada 2004

ISBN 1-57731-480-8

All of Dr. Wayne Dryer’s book and Louise L Hay, Heal your Body.This little book not only opened up the physician within all of us to heal, but the courage to try, this list could go on and on, so thank you all for helping me grow and change, and hopefully this book can help others too.

Chapter 1 

It was on the Fourth of July, 1992 when I overheard Joe’s mother say to his sisters, Oh no, Joe has known for years he has AIDS! I’d just started to walk from the hallway into the kitchen when I realized what she was saying. What! I thought to myself, he’s known for years? He knew when I met him? He knew the first time we made love? He knew last September when he was in the hospital, when he told me he’d just found out he was HIV positive? What!! What!!!

Quickly, before his mother or sisters could see me, I turned around in the doorway, ran down the hall, and made it to the bathroom just in time to throw up my life! Everything I had been told was a big fat lie… I had to get a grip on myself and get out of here. To a safe place, to home. When I finally left the bathroom, I went back into the kitchen and informed his mother that I must have the flu and was going home. An, oh by the way, I told her, Joe should stay with her for a few days until I felt better… HE KNEW? HE KNEW? Oh God, he knew, and it wasn’t an accident that I had HIV… he knew all along…

Ten Months Earlier

It was in September of 1992 that Joe went to the hospital with pneumonia. A few days later while still confined to his hospital bed, he’d told me he had just learned that he had HIV. I’m so sorry Susie, I had no idea. You need to go get checked. I’m so sorry, I love you with all my heart. Are you going to stay with me? I won’t blame you if you don’t. Please don’t leave me.

Oh God! Oh God! OH GOD!!!! Even almost twenty years later, I still recall every single detail as vividly as if it were yesterday. The shock, pain, hurt, anger, embarrassment—all the above! The only adjective that isn’t there is—forgiveness. And that wasn’t to come for many years.

I remember going to Dr. Ruark (my personal doctor) and telling him what I had just found out, and that I needed THE TEST. I had just been there in his office a couple of weeks previously to get some medication for the flu that was going around. I’d worked at the hospital in Spokane, Washington, for the past several years and minor flu epidemics were not that uncommon. When he called me into his office a week later to go over the test results, he informed me that they had been inconclusive and that I would need to be retested in about three months to be sure of the results. In the meantime he told me I should practice safe sex and described in detail exactly what that meant.

Well, I didn’t leave Joe. Why? Because I couldn’t just bail on him… He loved me, he needed me. Or so I thought. And what if I am positive!!! Who will want me?? . . . I just have to tough it out and see what happens in a few months

Toward the end of September I had an accident on the job at the hospital. With my Operating Room paper booties on, I had missed the last rung on a ladder, fallen, and then slipped on the floor. When they examined me in the Emergency Room, they told me that I’d ripped the muscles along my spinal cord. Oh boy, did that hurt. I ended up on the hospital liability and industry (L&I) insurance with my income now cut in half. I was in horrible pain and with Joe twenty-four/seven. He’d moved in with me to take care of me… and I was very grateful. Boy, did he ever love me!!!

It wasn’t until January of 1993 that I went in for my second HIV test. Several days later the doctor’s office called, asking me to come in and go over the results. Dr. Ruark was one of those doctors who was just awesome—always with a smile and a hug for his patients. I got to know his ‘hospital’ side when I worked there and everyone loved him. He was also my mom’s doctor, and when she was dying of cancer in the first part of 1992 I saw the obvious hurt and pain in him as well as his concern for all of us. He was truly one amazing human being!

The moment Dr. Ruark came into the exam room I knew immediately what my test result was. I saw the pain in his face and the tears in his eyes, and before anything was said we were both crying… . This can’t happen to someone like me… I-I-I-I’m a nice person! I’m not a prostitute! I’m not a drug addict! I’m not gay! . . . I’m a white, heterosexual, 40-year-old single mother of three with one child still at home… . This can’t be happening to me! Oh God! What am I going to do"? All the time I was crying buckets of tears into my doctors hug… .

Eventually I made it home that day, still not sure exactly how—maybe on the wings of an angel. I told Joe the minute I walked in. Actually he could tell by just looking at me. I cried all over again with Joe, while he was saying over and over again how sorry he was, that he would never leave me—LEAVE ME! Well, of course not! That had never crossed my mind. After all, I didn’t leave him when he told me! But he also began telling ME not to tell anyone!!! Your friends will leave you and your family will not be there for you. Don’t tell anyone, ever… I’ll be here for you, I will never leave you, you can count on me!!! It was a mantra that he repeated over and over until I became numb to the sound of his voice.

By now, several months later, our relationship had become volatile with the mix of alcohol into it. I didn’t leave the relationship, even in the mist of the physical abuse,but why? Why did I think this was okey? I needed his money (because I was still on L and I from my injury at work). I reminded myself, who else will want me? I can’t tell anyone what I am really going through… . they might tell someone else and then the whole world will know… What am I going to do??? Most of all, I was just plain scared.

I was still undergoing physical therapy for my back, and now I began to add HIV therapy to the regimen. Mostly I was just numbly going through the motions, not really doing anything, just existing. It wasn’t long into the New Year before my punches, black eyes, and bruising began to become obvious. And of course, he was always sorry, oh so sorry. I didn’t figure it would continue, but it did and it began to get progressively worse. Why do people stay in relationships like this? I only had to play the mantra that Joe had drilled into my head—I love you, I’m so sorry, please don’t leave me, I won’t leave you, and oh by the way, did I tell you how much I love you?

The wording began to change, and soon it was, If you tell anyone, ANYONE, I will kill you, and maybe I’ll even kill your daughter. Don’t even think of us not being together.

How the hell, am I going to get out of this; or am I? Sometimes you are so afraid, you just do nothing. You take the path of least resistance and you become numb. But there is one thing I did and that was to send Marie, my thirteen year-old daughter, to go live with her dad. He lived in the same school district, and could make sure she got to school. Still recovering from my back injury, I couldn’t drive her and there were no buses that came our way. I didn’t realize it at the time, but this was a gift in disguise since she wasn’t exposed to the violence. Still I’m sure she didn’t believe the lies I told about how I got the bruises she was starting to notice. And no way did she know I had HIV.

Throughout my life I grew up with my mom saying, Behind every dark cloud, there is a silver lining, and I lived my life with that saying driving me. There were always lessons to learn, and sometimes it took a long long time to find that lining. My kids used to tell me they were going to put it on my headstone when I died. So they grew up with it too! But it’s the driving force behind my life, and it’s also what got me through a lot of garbage, heartache, and finding the reason why I was going through this. After all, things like this don’t happen to nice people, do they? I mean, not this? Right?

Chapter 2 

Joe was on parole from prison when I first met him. I didn’t know that for several weeks. One day he comes by my home and says, I have to go check in with my parole Officer, and I would really like him to meet you. A Parole Officer? What for? So Joe sits down and tells me his story of why he is on probation. He’d been selling black tar heroin back in 1989. He had lost his job, and knew he could make money at it. The way he told it sounded a lot different, but that was the gist of it. He got caught, was found guilty, went to prison in 1991 for 19 months and came out a changed man. So he said. And oh, by the way, he said,