Rising from the Ashes: How to Reclaim your Life after a Traumatic Childhood

By Emily Cleghorn

Do you feel powerless? Are you over it? Are you ready to stop acting as a doormat and start speaking up for yourself? Do you feel like there's something more that you're missing in your life? Are you ready to discover a joy for life that you've never felt before and create the life you really want? Sound like you? This tiny book is filled with life changing lightbulb moments that you won't want to miss!

• Language: English
• Publisher: Emily Cleghorn
• Release date: Feb 20, 2021
• ISBN: 9781777551612

Emily Cleghorn

Emily Cleghorn is a wife, mom, educator, certified health and life coach, sewing enthusiast and Pinterest guru. She discovered early on that with a little grit and determination nothing is impossible. She is an emerging boss babe owning her life-- body, mind and Pinterest and she's passionate about helping other women do the same!

Book preview

The Journey

1

That Kid

My gut pulsed as my stepbrother's fist rebounded. The tears started streaming down my face, and pain spread through my gut.

There. Just what you deserve, stupid, he muttered.

I tried to remain strong and not show how much he bothered me. Sometimes it worked… other times not so much.

This had become a daily occurrence, although it wasn’t always a punch; sometimes it was a kick or a smack.

It didn’t take me long to learn that I needed to make sure I wasn’t alone with him to prevent him from hurting me, but every so often I couldn’t avoid it.

Getting ready for school, walking to the bus stop, getting in the car, playing with my toys in my bedroom were things that I had to be careful doing. If I let my guard down, it could be bad — and it would be my fault. Or that’s how it felt.

His mother had a deep-seated hate for me that I didn’t understand. I was a six-year-old child. I knew that I must have done something to make her hate me, but I couldn’t figure it out.

It seemed to me that there was some sort of law against her saying my name. My stepmother would call me by anything BUT my name. Her, she or that kid were common.

I remember one day, specifically, when I was getting ready to go play outside and overheard my stepmother and my dad talking. My stepmother was blaming something on that kid (me) and my dad stopped what he was doing, looked her square in the eyes and said, That kid has a name, and it’s Emily. That was the first time in a long time that I felt special.

See, it hadn’t always been like this. Until I was five, my dad and I lived with my grandparents. We were happy. We would go on trips for ice cream and play at the park. My dad and I had what I would view as a normal father/daughter relationship.

Then he started seeing my future stepmother and things changed. He was around less, and so I spent less time with him. Every now and then, I would get to go with him when he was doing something with her and her son, but even as a young child I could tell that I didn’t fit.

When my dad married her, I wanted to live with him, so that’s what I did. It didn’t take very long before it became clear that living there was a mistake, but I was scared. I didn’t want to say anything because I believed that it was my fault.

I was rotated from house to house on weekends since my stepmother couldn’t handle me. Not that I was a difficult child; I mean, I hardly spoke. My aunt's house, my grandparents' house or my mom’s house. Sure, it was a break from the hell that was my home life, but as a six-year-old, I missed my toys.

I was only allowed one serving at mealtime, whether I wanted more or not. My eyes were sunk into my head, and I looked generally unhealthy. When I went to another house on weekends, the first thing I would do was head for the fridge to find something to eat. I was in a constant state of hungry.

This went on, day in and day out, for about eighteen months of my life — until one Sunday afternoon when I was at my mom's house. I was told to go pack up my things so I could go home, and something inside my child-self snapped. I decided that I wasn’t going back to that hell. Instead, I was going to hide.

I packed my bag, crawled under my sister’s desk, and put the bag in front of me so I wasn’t visible. I crouched in that space for what seemed like forever. I could see my sister come into her room, look around, call my