A Shelter in the Midst of a Storm: A True Life's Testimony

By Ayana LaSon D'Argan

Abandoned at six months and left to die, raised in a family of ten, where you're the only child who is an orphan, abused in every sense of the word, living in a world where sex, drugs, and alcohol is your only escape from yourself, death becomes an obsession to you and you live your life trying yo achieve just that. Will it ever get any better?

• Language: English
• Publisher: Xlibris US
• Release date: Sep 29, 2020
• ISBN: 9781664131606

Book preview

Copyright © 2020 by Ayana Lason D’argan.

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or by any information storage and retrieval system, without permission in writing from the copyright owner.

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

Certain stock imagery © Getty Images.

Rev. date: 09/18/2020

Xlibris

844-714-8691

www.Xlibris.com

812565

CONTENTS

About The Author

Dedication

Introduction

Chapter 14 Homeward Bound II

In Conclusion

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

I was born in the MYA Women’s Hospital MA on April 21st, 1964. My biological mother’s name is Stella D and my father, till this day, is still a mystery to me. I have two biological brothers of which we have the same mother but different fathers. My two brothers and I were abandoned by our mother in the projects in the Poll District. I was only six months old at the time. This would be the beginning of a very hard and traumatizing life. For those of you who are reading my book I want you to know that I pray that it is an inspiration to you. My purpose of writing about my life is to help those that are in or were in the same situations that I have been. When I was a kid I use to always love to read adventurous books like The Adventures of Tom Sawyer and Huckleberry Finn, The Autobiography Of Miss Jane Pitman and A Tale Of Two Cities, but it will be my own adventurous spirit that would lead me to a very dangerous and exciting life. The names in this book have been changed to protect the innocent and the guilty but I hope that you can overlook that and just get into the story.

English have always been my favorite subject and writing has always been my desire in life. I am a new creature in Christ, an inspired writer/author and a struggling single mother today. Not only have I been struggling with raising my children alone but I have been struggling with this disease of addiction for over thirty years. I have been in and out of recovery for about eighteen years. I believe that God is the Alpha and Omega and he is the ruler and creator of all things, seen and unseen. If it weren’t for My Father in heaven I wouldn’t be here to encourage others to never give up no matter what situation you may be trapped in. Just trust in God and believe that he will pull you through and it will be so. I truly believe that he has brought me all this way just to write my book and poems to encourage and inspire others. If I can help only one person with any of my creative writing, than God has achieved his work through me. I feel that he had blessed me with a testimony that can save teenaged girls and adult women that feel lost, inadequate, insecure and lonely. No, I am not where I should be, far from that, but I’m not where I use to be. There is plenty that I still have to learn. But prayfully; as I continue to write to try to help others, I will continue to write to help myself and learn more about me so that I can love myself as Christ loves me.

DEDICATION

This book is dedicated to my lovely eldest daughter, Tasha, and my athletically inclined son, Nathan, who is my middle child. Although my youngest daughter Cassandra did not have to live through none of our hardships in Los Angeles, I still dedicate this book to her also because she had to go through her own hardships in life and fight her own demons. In which I take full responsibility and admit to playing a role in that.

From the first day that I felt you move inside of me, I loved you! I knew that God has blessed and entrusted me with one of his most precious and valued creations. But I could have never known the great responsibility and hardship that lied ahead of me in raising you. I couldn’t have possibly conceived how drastically you would have changed my whole out look on life. But once you came and I looked down into your screaming face, coming into this world screaming and crying and fussing I knew that we would be fighting. The instant they placed you in my arms and I grabbed your little hand and a noticeable peace and joy came over the both of us, I knew that no matter what, it was going to be o.k. I also realized that this relationship was going to be based solely on sacrifice, me sacrificing myself for you. It took me a while to grasp that concept but eventually I got it.

This is the confession of your mother’s heart:

I never professed to be perfect but at times claimed to be right when my judgment might have been a little off. I get upset easily when I know that your not living up to my expectations but that’s only because I want you to be your best at all times. I want you to do more for yourself than I have done for myself. After all, mothers know best and that’s only because we’ve been through it already. Many times I chastise you by rod or by mouth because I see you going down the wrong path, doing the wrong things, making bad decisions for yourself and I strongly feel the need to re-direct you. It’s just my natural, animalistic instinct that if I see you wandering off into a dangerous situation, my maternal impulse is to re-direct you back to the safety of my arms. That’s just the way God has created me. I look back at the mistakes I made in life and refuse to allow you to make the same ones. In truth, I might be doing you more harm than good by sheltering you, but I do it with the best of intentions. We may not always agree. In fact, we mostly disagree. But whenever or however we disagree, I always made it a point to end that disagreement in love. And a lot of times when I yell…I yell because I’m tired or scared or angry. And because of my ancient ruins that has been passed down from generation to generation, that’s the only way I know how to express those emotions and will sadly admit that I haven’t been able to break free from that yet. But I will tell you…that I’m working on it: The one thing that you haven’t heard me say yet was that, I’m sorry. But those words are only spoken when one feels they’ve done wrong. But as I exist here today, through these words, I say that I am extremely grateful and blessed that Our Father has blessed us with the life that he has given us because it makes us who we are today. You are strong, intelligent, beautiful children who, I pray; one day would live a God-fearing life and I pray you leave this earth serving the God that saw us through all these years.

I can see the morals and values I struggled so hard to instill in you evident in your daily walk and talk. But I will tell you this, my parents made mistakes in raising me. I made mistakes in raising you. And you will make mistakes in raising yours when it’s your turn. That’s just a fact of life. That is why I am here today, unashamed, admitting to you, that I made plenty of mistakes and made a lot of wrong decisions and choices in my life. But I also made some wise ones as well. The greatest one was giving you three to Christ. I wanted to make sure that you were introduced to Jesus as his children so that you will always have him there in life. Know that, you are his children and whenever you need him, just call on his Holy name and he will be there to save you. Because he loves you for whom you are… HIS!!!! No matter how far you stray, as his sheep, he is your shepherd and he will always come looking for his lost sheep and bring them back to where you should be. I am a witness to that! I thank God for teaching me his way and for opening up my eyes, showing me that this is the greatest gift any mother can ever give to herself as well as her children, the knowledge, wisdom and freedom of salvation. It wasn’t always easy, my hearts, but it wasn’t always bad. Please believe me when I say that I love you…. with all my heart…I love you. And that I raised you the best I knew how. And through Christ our King who has made us more than conquerors we made it this far. And through his love, mercy and grace we will continue to move forward.

In conclusion; my prayer for you today is that when you get older and become a parent yourself, that you don’t just look back on all my faults, downfalls, sins, iniquities and shortcomings, that you don’t judge me to be something that my heart is not. But that you remember the times we played together and the times we prayed together, the times that we comforted and supported each other, the times that we laughed together and learned together. The times we strived to survive together and grew in Christ together. These are great times, my children, which I hope you share with your offspring. Don’t just learn from my mistakes but shine in our joyous times as well. And remember…a mother’s love runs deeper than the bluest ocean and is never-ending like the space and time of infinity…no matter what!!!

Love Mom!

INTRODUCTION

In society everyone judges everyone. Although we may not admit it…we judge! Rather it may be how someone lives, looks, dresses, walks, talks or breathe; what a person may have or may not have; handicapped, completely sane, rich and famous or mentally ill. No… most of us will not admit it, it might make us look bad. But individually in our hearts…we judge. The problem with that is we do it without thought and it inflicts pain on the ones we do it to like a dagger in the heart. The bible states that the tongue is a two-edged sword. Words can destroy a weak person’s life to the point of suicide. Words can speak reality into someone’s life. When we see something or someone we don’t quite understand we tend to assume the worse. We don’t know what that person has been through in life or what kind of childhood that person has lived. We don’t know what emotional, physical, sexual, psychological or mental abuse they may have encountered. We don’t realize, at the time we’re judging them, the trauma that they had in their childhood that may have affected them and the way they deal with society or life as they live it today. They themselves are victims of the monsters that created them. How can we ever know, when we sit on a bus or walking down the street or driving in our cars, that this human being we see on the street sleeping in a box or pushing a buggy in front of us is just a lazy, good for nothing bum that doesn’t want to work and chooses to be homeless? Or how about that neighborhood you drive through where the brothers are standing on the corners and you lock your doors because they look like a danger to you because they’re wearing their pants sagging off their hips and a big baggy shirt, a colored du-rag on his head and ear rings in his ears: Or maybe this kid who has dyed his hair five different colors, has piercing all over and through his face, maybe he’s wearing black eyeliner thickly applied around his eyes and his jeans seemed to be ripped in many places: Why do we instantly judge them because of the way they look and fear consumes our shallow minds? We don’t think that maybe this one’s step-dad use to get a thrill out of beating him and torturing him with all kinds of devices. Or maybe that one was molested by his uncle or maybe this one was belittled by his father and never accepted by him. Maybe there was no male mentor or father figure in those young men lives at all. Never do we even contemplate that when we look outside of our car windows the drug-addicted prostitute on the street that we see was robbed of her childhood innocence by every male member of her family, from her father to her grandfather. Do we even think that when a child is abused in such a way that all their hopes, aspirations, and dreams become vaporized by the abuse they endured and replaced with horrid wicked nightmares. They become lost, confused and cold-hearted at a young age. Many of us who are ostracized from society and labeled as menaces have very traumatizing past and have been hurt in the worst kind of ways as children by the people we loved and trusted the most. Many have been scarred so deeply that there is no return from that trauma we endured. That same society that judges us came from that same society that made us. As scary as it may seem let the truth be told. It’s a vicious cycle that continues to plague our generations and the laws seem to be on the predators’ side. People abused children in ways that those who look down on us couldn’t even imagine living through. Then they want to call us rebels, crazy, criminals, black sheep, aliens, thugs, prostitutes, gangsters, menace to society and much more. The question that I have to ask is why? Why do we feel the need to point the finger at others when we are just as much the blame as the abuser? When we decide to turn our head and put blinders on when it comes to crimes against children. Is it just so we can say to ourselves, …at least I’m not as bad as that person…. Maybe we do it to make ourselves look and feel better. When we determine who we are by what or who somebody else is or is not. We often seek out the worse in people to make ourselves look good. It’s sad, but the truth. Maybe it’s just easier to just look the other way. Or maybe…just maybe…we do it so that we don’t have to look at ourselves at all. The sad thing about it is that we treat child abuse as if it’s like some minor crime like stealing a candy bar from a convenient store or something of that sort. When in actuality we are stealing the innocence and freedom of our future. Those who are caught and convicted of child abuse and are treated with a slap on the wrist don’t realize that this is our future generation they are contaminating, they are the generations of our future that will eventually rule and run this earth. This is the future of our country we are throwing down to the seawards. More and more adults that were victims as children are becoming lost and violent and wind up caught up in the system for committing even more violent crimes than what were done to them because we let them down when the crimes were committed against them as children. They become a prisoner in their own minds at very young ages when they should be free, free and happy…having spirits and souls of angels.

But the children that are victimized by these sick, weak, cowardly predators become the total opposite of just that. They become their predators and worse!!! So, people, if our beautiful country is becoming less and less liberated and we don’t have enough leaders in this country to lead us to the greatness God intended for us, it is our own fault. For letting our children slip through the hands of predators and not protecting them. This is supposed to be the times of the new millennium. But what’s so new about it? Definitely not the laws! When are we going to get the senate to gather together and rewrite the laws to where the victim has more rights than the criminals? Because today, we live in a society where the criminal have more rights than the victims. For instance, someone who has been arrested and went to jail for the sexual assault on a two-year-old gets released early because there isn’t enough room in the prisons so certain non-violent criminals get lucky and get an early release. Talking about your twisted realities…take that in your mouth, chew it and attempt to swallow it. Because I have a hard time swallowing that! Until then, we have to start protecting the children in the home.

Single mothers, stop bringing strange men into your homes just because your afraid to be alone or you don’t want to get up off your lazy behind and work so you allow a man, a stranger to your children, to move into your house because he can provide. Meanwhile; he’s helping himself to your children in the sickest ways. Parents…when your five year old comes to you and tells you that they have been assaulted or violated in a way that you know they have no business knowing about, believe them. Why would a five year old create a lie like that? When your twelve year old tells you that Uncle Jimmie kept fondling them…believe them. Believe…then take action! Eventually, there will be a time when we all have to take responsibility and be held accountable for the decisions and choices that we’ve made in life and that time is called the Judgment Day. Until then, there comes a point and time in our lives when we have to analyze ourselves and take responsibility for the choices that we’ve made in life now. When we get sick and tired of all the crap, the lies, the personas’, the blame games and the masks, a time when you look in the mirror and don’t like the person that you see starring back at you, a person with a conscious. Then you feel the need to get to know the real you. Hi! My name is Ayana and it’s my time to do just that. This is my life’s story, so welcome to my world!!! And remember our children are the future of this country…let’s stand up for those who can’t stand up for themselves and fight for their freedom of mind.

(1.)

I don’t quite remember when it all started. All I know is that I subconsciously blacked out some parts of my life. They say when you block out some of your memories it must of been the most traumatizing points of your life. The problem is…when they start coming back to you, little by little, in bits and pieces, it could drive a person mad. But let me start at where I do first remember. Most of my child hood that I do remember is pleasant. I was raised in a small town outside of Blitztown named Old Ken. In an area we called at the time Second Avenue, we lived in a small two-bedroom shack. It was my stepfather and stepmother, Julio and Christine Ramirez. My stepfather got together with my step-mom when he had me and my two brothers, Brother 1 who is the eldest of us all and brother 2 our youngest brother. He was the second eldest child in the house hold. Brother 1, brother 2 and I had the same birth mom and my brothers had the same dad which was Julio. My father is unknown. My step-mom already had my two sisters, sister 1 and sister 2, when she got together with Julio. My step-mom was only seventeen years old when they got married combined they had five children and she was pregnant with her first biological child between the both of them. Next to us, on the left lived my Aunt and Uncle and my two cousins and then next to them was our other cousins. Well as you can tell we have a very big family and that’s not even a portion of them. To try to introduce them all to you at once would be boring and take up the whole first chapter. And I definitely don’t want to bore you because you would be missing out on one of the most interesting stories of your life. In our household, from the outside, people use to think we had the perfect little family, like the Brady Bunch or something. But on the inside, it was totally different. My dad was in the service for a while and when he got out he brought the military home with him.

Not saying anything was wrong with that because when you think about it, if you had to manage five kids, a wife, house and a job in which you had to work a lot of over time to provide for them all, I would say that he did the best that could do without going insane. My dad would leave early in the morning to go to work and when he got home at midnight we would already be in bed. My mother ran the household all day from morning till night. My dad would make out the list of each of our daily chores and hang them by the door each Sunday. And those would be our chores for the week. Our daily routine for the day, Monday through Friday when we get up, eat breakfast, walk to school, come home, do homework even if you didn’t have none there was no such thing, make homework, do chores, eat dinner and by time we finished all that, there was just enough time to bath and go to bed. Then when Saturday morning came we could go outside and play. My sisters and brothers and I couldn’t wait for Saturday morning. We would jump out of bed throw on some clothes and hit the door while mom and dad was still sleeping. Second Avenue at the time was so much fun. There was the chemical plant some ways behind us which was closed on the weekends and we would go there and climb onto the mountains of red and black powdered substances, then go down to the railroad tracks, climb over the fence to where all the fruit trees were; like peach trees and apple trees and fill up on those. Then my brothers would separate from us girls and us girls would go to the railroad tracks and play house and make mud pies and things. We felt so care free and happy. The only time that would interrupt our fun was when mom would call us in for dinner. All would be well until dad would come home and someone wouldn’t have done their chores correctly. I don’t want to get into details about the abuse that occurred in the household, just know that there was a lot of abuse that occurred. There were many nights when we all cried ourselves to sleep. All in all, my dad had a lot of stress and a lot of pressure in his life and I guess he had to relieve it some way! My family was a yours, mine and ours family. For those of you who don’t know what that is, before my dad and step-mom met, it was like this! Brother 1 and brother 2 and myself belonged to my dad Julio and our real mother Stella. I have been told so many different stories about who my father is or isn’t that I don’t know what to believe. I choose to not believe that Julio is my father. It helps me to cope more with the abuse he have done to me. Sister 1 and sister 2 belonged to my step-mother and their fathers. Then they met and had Sister 3, who was their first child together, and under me. They went and had two other girls after sister 3 in which we will call sister 4 and sister 5. I always thought that the parents that had raised me and my sibblings were my parents until one day sister 2 and I got into a little argument in the yard about nothing. Then suddenly these words came out of sister 2’s mouth, …She ain’t even your real mom she’s my mom. Talking about someone hurt. I ran in the house screaming for my mother, crying like someone just stabbed me in the heart and told my mom what sister 2 had said. Sister 2 got sent to our room. All of the children shared this huge room that was right at the top of the steps. The boys slept in bunk beds on one side of the room and us girls slept on the other side of the room. My mom sat me down and told me that some people from Blitztown was coming to get me and my brothers to take us to our real mother’s funeral. Well I ran away screaming and crying that I was not going, that she WAS my mother and I’m staying here. Unfortunately; a day or two later, I found myself sitting by my brothers in the back of a car with strangers, peering back at me saying how much I look just like my mother while my older brother 1 tried to comfort me. The people were pleasant and very sweet to us. We received lots of hugs and kisses and got all dressed up and went to church. My father and brothers and myself was seated in the very front. I remember not understanding any of this. I remember the beautiful, pale gray-faced colored woman with the beautiful jet black hair in the box, I remember looking down at my dad and brothers and they all had their faces in their hands, crying and were very sad, and I remember pretending to cry like them. I just didn’t understand why I was there and what was going on. Still no one explained to me. I remember going to someone house, I believe they said it was my grandma’s and grandpa’s house where there was lots of good food, especially the fried chicken and potatoes salad. While everyone was walking around having conversations I was grabbing some fried chicken until I noticed bother 1 leaving in a car with my cousin and I chased them down at the car and begged him to take me but they shoved me away and told me that I couldn’t go. I was devastated and ran in the house, ran into an empty bedroom and threw myself on the bed and wept. My grandfather called me out and I went to him. As he sat me on his lap in the lazy boy rocking chair, he tried to comfort me assuming that I was crying about my mother. But I couldn’t hear a word he was saying. All I knew at the time was that I wanted my brothers and I wanted to go home…home to the only mother I knew I had. Funny thing is at that moment being held in my Grandfather’s arms as he was rocking me and talking to me…that was the first time I can remember feeling completely and utterly loved. These people… my mother’s family…gave me affection and love, something that I didn’t feel at home. But as a child it was unfamiliar to me and I didn’t know how to take it. The day my Grandma and Grandpa Wilson asked me and my brothers if we wanted to stay with them, I remember my father being very angry and upset when we all had that discussion with my mother’s family. They wanted us to stay with them forever. Although they were very kind to us, they were strangers and unfamiliar. So I ran to our dad and hugged his legs and said that I wanted to go home. My brothers took place by his side and told them that they are going with their dad. Too this day, I regret being afraid of the unfamiliar.

We were overjoyed to be back home to our family. Although sister 1 was mean to me at times because I would follow her around like a little lost puppy, we were the same age and the best of friends. We hung out together terrorizing the neighborhood like partners in crime. There was this older Italian lady who lived in front of our house. Our porch and her porch were face to face and we had to share this huge yard that lay in between. In our part of the yard was our family dog Queen. In her part of the yard was a beautiful garden with sweet ripe tomatoes that was always irresistible to two seven or eight year olds. Whenever given the chance we would sneak into her garden and her short, overweight dog who we always thought needed a shot of penicillin because it had permanent laryngitis, would come running after us on it’s chain with his horsed bark and we would throw the tomatoes at him and taunt him by acting like we were trying to bark but our throats hurt. Then the Italian woman would come out after us waving her finger at us and yelling for us to get away. She use to say… what-a-matta-you, what-a-matta-you? I’m-a telling you a-mama and a-papa…, then sister 1 and I would run away laughing. One time I was ripping and running around with my two brothers and a couple of our cousins. They hated when I would always try to hang with them because I was a girl. But one day they fixed me. A couple of blocks down the street was this huge dog behind a fence to this house. We stopped by the fence and they began to throw rocks and tease the dog that I thought wasn’t a very good ideal, so I continued to walk away. Now mind you the dog was unleashed and the fence was kind of low and I knew we were headed for trouble. Well the next thing I knew my brothers and cousins flew pass me telling me to run and I did without hesitation. But being that they were bigger, older and faster than me they left me in the dust. When I turned around to see where the dog was, it had its mouth open and right on my trail. I screamed the loudest I could as I kept running and when I looked back again he had stopped chasing me and was just looking at me. Then I saw that my brothers and cousins was standing in front of me with our big German Shepherd dog, Queenie. Queenie was pulling my brothers who had her by the collar barking viciously at the dog. Well let me tell you, that dog didn’t want any parts or Queenie and turned around and ran home. Later in the summer, Queenie had gotten pregnant by one of the neighborhood mutts. She just had her puppies and was very protective of them as any parent is. Queenie was under the porch cleaning her puppies and we were all outside, watching from a distance, admiring our new extended family. Our cousin wanted to see the puppies and ran into the yard. We tried to tell him to stay back because she would bite him but he wanted to see the puppies for himself. Before we knew it, Queenie had ran from underneath the porch and tackled our cousin to the ground and had his arm tightly between her teeth. My mom and brothers tried to get Queenie off of him but she turned around and bit my mother. By this time our cousins mom had came into the yard and tried to help but Queenie also bit her in the leg. Finally we got Queenie away from them and put her into the house. I loved Queenie dearly but from then on I had made the decision that when I grew up I would never own a dog.

One day on the weekend we were all sitting in the living room watching TV. It must have been the weekend because my father was home. He and my mother were sitting on the couch. Sister 3, the youngest of us at the time, was running around in a t-shirt and diaper playing with brother 1, jumping on his back. She was about a year old and already showing traits of being a Ramirez clan. Bad as hell! Well there was a knock at the door. It was a late afternoon that I will never forget. My dad goes to answer the door. We heard men talking with him as he asked them to come in. I peeped into the kitchen as they were being seated and I saw two white men in blue suits, white shirts and ties and one had on glasses, he was the one holding the briefcase. My dad sat down to talk with them then a little later he called my mom into the kitchen. She got them some coffee and sat down as they talked in such a low manner it almost sounded like they were whispering. Finally they all rose up, shook hands and the two strangers left never to be seen by us again. We were all very curious, looking at each other and all. Wondering what was going on. We knew something was going on but never knew that seeing those two strange men this day would be the beginning of a change in our lives forever.

(2.)

Things became very intense in the Ramirez household after that. We had to do a lot of cleaning, a lot of washing, and a lot of packing. Everyone was very excited to learn that we were going to move. As a matter of fact the whole neighborhood was moving. Come to find out that big steel company needed the whole entire area to build a steel mill and gave every family a substantial amount of money to move to bigger and better neighborhood. The day we went to view the house my mom and dad had bought, it appeared to us to be a mansion. We all ran around the house like wild animals released from a zoo. We’ve never seen a home so big with so many rooms. Well we finally got moved in and situated. My dad even had enough money left over to buy us nice used furniture for all the rooms. We moved from a four-room shack on Second Avenue to a thirteen-room house on 2nd St., in the upper-middle class part of Old Ken. We were the only black family on the block. Things became very militant in the house to keep things organized and clean. My dad would make out a chore list every week for all of us to do. If he came home from work and your chores weren’t done than you were getting woke up by a butt whooping and made to get up and do that chore with him standing over you.

Fort Prayton, the elementary school that we were going to attend, was just around the corner. Our cousins who we grew up with next door to us only lived a couple blocks up from us. This definitely was a big change for the better and we all loved it. I was attending third grade when school started and was not very happy about attending a new school at all. First of all, my mother got sister 1, myself and sister 2 all dolled up the night before. Straightening and curling our hair, which was torture to have to sit still while your mother burned your hair and the melting grease scalded your scalp. Lord knows you better not move or else she’d just lay the hot comb onto your scalp. Then the next morning to find a dress…A DRESS laid out on my bed for me to wear the first day of school. I loathe dresses!! I moped around all morning, dreading to have to go to school. But as she walked us in the front door of my classroom and headed back down the hallway, the fear of the unfamiliar hit me once again and I ran out of the classroom all the way down the hall screaming and grabbing my mother’s legs, begging her not to leave me. My mom walked me back into the class and sat down next to me until I felt comfortable and when she left I was just fine. My third grade teacher was a very nice and sweet lady. Kids use to make fun of her because she was a very big lady. But I didn’t see that part of her because she was so nice to me. Whenever any of her kids did well on any of her test, she would pick two or three of them to go out to dinner with her. I remember going out to dinner with her a lot. All in all, I think that I was one of her favorites. I graduated from her class with all A’s and moved onto fourth grade.

Mrs. Zen was my fourth grade teacher. Here is where my troubles began. Things started to be a little different at home and changed my whole perspective on life. Well…my dad…he had to take on a second shift at work to keep up the household bills. My brothers were acting up in school. Brother 2 was in Jr. High School and fighting with everyone, teachers included, getting suspended and stealing from his peers. My dad was drowning in a world of stress and pressure and had sister 1, sister 2 and myself going around the neighborhood delivering papers, shoveling walks, raking leaves or cutting grass for money; pending on what season it was, so we didn’t have no time to play. I guess he was loosing it. Whatever the reason may be, my sisters and I became his stress relievers. On the weekends my mother would take the three youngest with her to where ever and leave me, sister 1 and sister 2 with my dad. My brothers would be out playing. I remember him calling us into the downstairs bathroom one at a time. The bathroom only consisted of a sink and a toilet. Sister 1 would always be first to be called into the bathroom with him. Shortly after, I would be called. I can’t say what he had them do to him because we never spoke of it until later, when we got older, but…I can say that my mouth went to a place on a man that no eight year old girl’s mouth should ever have to go. It was completely disgusted and it made me sick. I can remember crying and begging him, telling him … no daddy please… before getting smacked across my face. Afterwards; I would run to the upstairs bathroom and brush my teeth and tongue until I threw up, trying to wash that nasty taste out of my mouth. Believe me when I say that my daddy put the fear of him in us long before he had us pleasing him. We feared him so much that I was afraid of thinking what I was thinking. I wanted him dead. I wanted to bite it off. Hell! I didn’t even know what the hell it was. All I know is that I had this deep down feeling in the pit of my gut that it was wrong and that I wished that it would stop…but it didn’t, it just got worse. The Ayana that the teachers knew in third grade died over the summer. The following year, I became complacent, emotional and restless. I was full of rage and anger and didn’t care about my grades. I always thought that sister 1 was naturally mean spirited and confused, well now I knew why. I now believe that he was doing things with sister 1 and sister 2 way before he started with me. I became the biggest bully in school. I use to love to terrorize the weak white girls in school. It made me feel like somebody. It made me feel important plus I was getting the attention I so longed for. Rather it be good attention or bad, hell, I didn’t care. I finally was being noticed. We were some of the first black kids that attended Fort Prayton. There was just a handful of us blacks and the movie roots had just came out, so that had them naturally afraid of us. All the other black students in Old Ken attended JFK, the school up in the projects. But we ran Fort Prayton. My three Victims that I terrorized the most were Lisa, Dolly and Lisa. Before I start telling you about this I need to let you know that I am in no way bragging about this or am proud of it. I regret having to mention this part of my childhood. But to deny it ever happened would be like denying a part of me because this became a big part of my character as an adult because of the abuse I endured as a child. Besides I think that this is a significant part of the change that went on in my life. Now where was I? I victimized the three girls mentioned above because they were the weakest ones in our school. I could make them cry so easily. I don’t know why, but I got a rise out of making them cry. I would pull their hair, beat them up and take their money for no reason at all. Maybe because my life was a living hell and I was completely powerless and weak at home that it made me feel better to have some power at school. I am ashamed to say and it truly embarrasses me to admit, but I became a big cowardly bully.

One day, I remember being called to the office from the classroom after recess. Lisa was walking out of the office as I was walking in. Apparently; she was in so much distress the day before that after school her parents had called the principle and sat up a meeting about me threatening and taking Lisa’s money at recess the other day. As Mr. Jeffrey was interrogating me my mother walked in with the belt in her hand. I sat up straight and uncrossed my arms and pretended to be innocent. But being that this was not the first time that she was called to the office, it didn’t work. I denied the accusations a thousand times, as always, until my mother asked Mr. Jeffrey to leave us in his office alone. She said that she would give me one more chance to confess and of course, stupid me, denied it! She pulled the blinds down and had me strip from head to toe, except my panties and socks. She looked at my socks and said those too, I took off the one sock that didn’t have the money in it and handed it to her. She said I’m waiting, and I handed her the other sock. She found the $5 in it, she jumped up so fast, threw her purse down and got to whaling on me. That was the first time she had ever given me a whooping at the school but definitely wasn’t the last. After that Lisa became so afraid to walk home from school, and with good reason, that her parents had to come and pick her up everyday even though they only lived a couple of blocks from the school. Then Dolly and Lisa’s parents asked Lisa’s parents to pick them up also so I couldn’t beat them up anymore. Later on that year Lisa and Dolly’s family both moved out of town. Not at the same time of course but around the same time. As I grew older I thought about it more and more. I regret bullying them and made myself a promise that if I ever seen them again that I would give them a sincere heartfelt apology. Lisa became our friend because she had ten brothers that threatened us if we didn’t leave her alone. At that time, I didn’t understand why I was doing what I was doing or the person that I was becoming.

I don’t want you to think that everything was all doom and gloom for me at home. There were some good times also with my siblings. One winter, school was cancelled because of a huge snow storm. I mean, there was so much snow that we could dive off the porch roof into the snow and not get hurt. Well the following morning my sisters and I were woke up by our brothers who was all excited, and they had us hurry up and get dressed in our warmest winter gear and come out side. Well, while we were sleeping, they decided to build a tunnel out of snow that started from the front of the house, around to the side, and half way to the back. Now mind you we lived in the biggest house on the block. It was amazing. Some of the neighborhood kids came by, only the ones we liked, and we played in that tunnel almost all morning. Later that afternoon someone from the Valley News Dispatch came and interviewed my brothers and the next day we were on the front page of the local News Paper, which was pretty cool. It only collapsed one time on sister 2 because she had a big head and brother 2 had to go in the opposite way and fixed it. After that the tunnel stayed up most of the remaining winter until the weather got warm and it slowly melted away. Till this day we still reminisce about that tunnel.

As the sexual and physical abuse continued and progressed at home, the more I became that way at school. Mrs. Zen had us, the class; line up our desks in two’s, side by side, to do a project together. I was in the back corner where my desk stayed so that I wouldn’t disturb the other kids, and this chubby kid named Jon was my partner. Well, we started showing each other our body parts as Mrs. Zen left the room. I lifted up my shirt then pulled it down, and he pulled out his pickle. When she returned back to the class Jon and I started writing nasty notes to each other and giggling. She reprimanded us a few times but we could tell that she was not happy with us at all. When class ended, she dismissed everyone except Jon and me. She asked us for the notes that we had in our desk and I became very angry and afraid and jumped up out of my seat and became immediately defensive towards her. She persisted and Jon gave in and gave the notes that I gave him that were in his desk.

I continued to be stubborn and pulled the little notes out, ripped them up, threw them on the floor and ran out of the room into the girl’s room. I never felt so humiliated in my life. By this time I knew that she knew. I liked Mrs. Zen and did not want her to see this part of me. I locked myself in the bathroom stall and began crying with my head buried in my knees. Shortly after Mrs. Zen came in the bathroom calling my name.

She was speaking in a tone unexpected. Very gentle and caring, I can tell that she was concerned for me. But I didn’t answer her I just kept crying. She talked very sweetly with me and promised me that if I came out that she wouldn’t tell anyone. Not even Mr. Jeffrey or my mom and dad. I came out with my head down, completely and utterly embarrassed, and she took me back to her room and sat down and talked to me with the door closed. I know that she just wanted to help me but I was too afraid of my father to say anything about what really was going on. On occasion, he would beat us on certain days and tell us, … This is just incase you even think about telling…! So we knew not to say anything. I just kept my head down on the desk, sobbing, too ashamed to even look at her.

Fifth grade was pretty much the same. It started out with me trying to hang around with sister 2 and and her friends but this time I had an initiation. This time to be able to hang with them I had to go to Silverman’s, the local drug store, and steal one of those huge, square Hershey candy bars at recess and bring it back to them before recess was over. I ran all the way there, went inside, found the chocolate, picked it up and started to run back out when I heard a man yell hey, bring that back…, before he could finish saying what he was saying I was out of there. I was the fastest girl runner in school and could out run most of the boys, so before the man could reach the outdoors I had already disappeared. Fifth grade is when my interest for track and field had started. My gym teacher, who was also one of my favorite teachers, noticed my speed and talent just as she did my brothers and asked me did I want to attend the track meet for all the elementary schools in our regent. I was overjoyed and ran home excited to tell my mom that I was going to be in the Olympics. The next day my dad told me that I couldn’t be in the Olympics until I start acting right at school and I went to school that day highly upset. Here’s something positive coming along in my life and could definitely help my self-esteem and make me happy for once in life, and my father says no. When I went to my gym teacher and told her the bad news she acted like she didn’t understand. They never gave me any problem when your brother first ran for me, she exclaimed. So it was a surprise to me to see her show up at my mom and dad’s door to talk to them. Next thing I knew, I was training for the School Olympics. That year I won first place in every event that she entered me in and she placed me in every event that consisted of running for the gold. I was good. No, I was damn good. I was tall and skinny and it seemed that speed ran in our family. Both of my brothers were also in the Olympics and were also first place winners in all of their events. I felt proud to follow in their footsteps. Every year after that, I ran in the Olympics and won first place in every event. Years later when I ran into my Elementary school gym teacher I asked her has any girl ever been able to beat my records. And she said, Till this day I haven’t found anyone as fast as you, Ayana. I smiled and we went our separate ways. Lisa was now my friend. I would go over her house and play. Truth be told, she had the finest Italian brothers in the world. Kurt was in the sixth grade with my sister 1, and Mike, the youngest of all eleven, was in the fourth grade, one grade under me. I had a crush on both. I would rush home and do my homework and chores just so I can go bike riding with Mike. We made this tree house in the School field where there were two huge trees by the fence. But it was secluded and it may not have been much of a house but it was good enough for us. I remember playing house with Mike, doing what my daddy taught me to do best, give head. Mike loved playing with me so much that on days that I didn’t want to play he’d call out …Mr. Ramirez…, and threaten to tell my dad what we’ve been doing every time we met. Then I would have no other choice but to go, because if my dad ever found out that I was doing that he would have killed me. Seems crazy I know. Here he would make me give him head, but we weren’t aloud to do anything outside of perfect anywhere else. We had to keep this we are the happy little Brady Bunch outlook in life, just to make our neighbors think that. But inside we were being tortured and tormented. It was twisted, the way that man thought. How could it be okay for him to have us for his sex toys but not others? And if he weren’t being the one who stole our innocence and teaching us these things than we wouldn’t have been able to be teaching others. Talk about your psychological abuse.

One day there was this girl and her friend who jumped my big sister 1. I ran to the house to get our brother 2. As soon as he heard of the situation he ran down to the school and punched one of the girls so hard that she hit her head on the cement and was unconscious. Needless to say that later on the police came to our house once again to take brother 2 to juvenile and my mom and dad had to bail him out again. My brother 2 was crazy. Everyone knew it. At home when he would get mad he would bang his head on the wall as hard as he could until it bled. Nobody messed with my brothers. When ever I would get to the school that brother 1 attended, it seemed like the teachers already knew what to expect out of me. The sad thing about brother 2 was that he was very gifted when it came to drawing and I was gifted with creative writing. But because we had so much going on inside of us we just both let it go to waste. By the time sister 2 and I got to the sixth grade, we not only ran the school, but during recess we had kids leaving the schoolyard, running to Silverman’s stealing candy for us. If they got caught, they better not have even mentioned our names or else they would get jumped by all three of us. My brothers were getting it worse than anybody at home. When they were bad