The Struggle and Will to Survive

By Patty Belsito

There can be no greater worldly love than a mother's love, for a mother's love surpasses even time and eternity. The Struggle and Will to Survive is a tale of a mother's love for her son who was supposedly suffering from Shwarchman-Diamond syndrome. Her family's struggle regarding her son's condition is a heartbreaking journey that they all have to go through. This book aspires to bring hope to all families and individuals who may have to endure a similar case. It is never easy to care for a lov

• Language: English
• Publisher: Page Publishing, Inc.
• Release date: Feb 16, 2015
• ISBN: 9781634172356

Book preview

Acknowledgments 

As always, I relied on the knowledge of friends and family while writing this book, and here I’d like to thank them all: my mom Janet Rabidou, my best friend Marie Ferris, my sister Donna Beauregard, my mother-in-law Donna Belsito, my sisters-in-law Darleen Boia and Brenda Pellitier, and my three loving children Billy, Jessica, and Angelo, for which the book is named after. 

The Struggle and Will to Survive 

I was only seventeen years old going to a wedding with a friend when I saw a handsome man at his sister’s wedding party. His name was Ronald Contois. He was so handsome with dark brown hair and deep brown eyes. We got introduced at the after party at his parents’ house. I told him that I was eighteen, and he was twenty-two, but the age difference did not scare him or me. I was still in high school and he had graduated in 1979. 

I came from a middle class Catholic family. I was a quiet Catholic Irish girl and yes still a virgin. Ronnie was very aware of everything when we started dating. Our parents were not pleased mostly because of the age difference, and also the fact that I was still a student in high school. Believe me, my parents tried to keep us apart, but we only lived up the street from one another. We used to write love letters to each other when we were apart from one another. When I was not with him, I missed him so much when we were apart. So one night I made it look like I was in my bed, that there was a person in my bed then I jumped out my bedroom window to go meet him in the church’s parking lot. That was the half way point for both of us. We would hug and kiss each other and exchange our love letters; it was only for a brief moment but it felt so good to be with him even if it was for only a few minutes. Then I would latterly run back home, then when I tried to get through the bedroom window. There was one small problem, it was locked (yes, locked), so I got busted by my dad. My lovely younger sister told on me, she was laughing at the fact that I got grounded. See we shared a bedroom, so she was always telling me for something. I must say that I did spend a lot being grounded because I never listened, and I was always pushing my curfew. I was never on time, I was always late unlike my sister who was the good one and never did anything wrong unlike me. I was always getting into trouble, and I was from my mother’s first marriage and my sister was from her second marriage. I was always the one breaking my curfew, talking back, and always doing what Patty wanted to do. After six months of running around, I ran away one summer night with Ronnie. I never called my parents to let them know were I was, and that I was all right. They thought that something really bad had happened to me. My poor mother was a total mess. She was up all night long crying. How could I have done that to her? I was so scared myself, I was just a kid. My dad called the local family doctor to come over to the house to check on Mom. She needed to be sedated. Ronnie and I were over to his sister Kate’s house a few towns over. There was a damn good reason for that. I had just found out that I was pregnant. I had absolutely no clue how to tell the two of them. I was more scared on what was going to happen to Ronnie, not so much about me. 

When I did return back to high school, I was in my junior year. I went to my guidance counselor Mr. Steven Stornoff; he helped me to break the news to my mom. My mom was devastated, I was trying to find words to tell my dad even though he was my stepdad. He was my dad to me. I was raised by him from the age of two years old till the time of his death in 2002. Miss you, Dad, love you bunches. See my real dad was a real scumbag that had raped me when I was only seven years old. I was just a little girl, and the man was my daddy. I remember telling my mommy. At first she did not want to believe me, so she took me to see a child therapist, and I remember playing with dolls. One doll was the Patty doll, and the other doll was the daddy doll. The therapist asked me to show her what the daddy doll did to Patty, so I did. I showed Dr. Goldsboro what had happened, and I even told her what he said to me. After Dr. Goldsboro told my mom what had happened to me, she said, See, when you are so young and so little, no one wants to believe you especially if you say that it’s your daddy. I taught all my kids at an early age the difference between good touches and bad touches and to never be afraid to tell mommy or daddy. Not long after I told the doctor, I did not have to ever see him again until some twenty-four years later when I found out that he passed away from cancer. I showed up at the wake, walked up to the coffin, and looked in to see that he was in that box so he could not hurt anyone else like he did to me. I spat on him then just turned and walked away. I hope that he is burning in hell right now for all the rotten things that he had done. 

I later found out that I had a half-sister named Sara, and she was given that name because it was my scumbag father’s mother’s name. And I had yet to meet Sara then there was a half-brother named William Billy O’Brien, named after his dad. Poor kid, I feel for you. I did have the pleasure of meeting him about five years ago. He was aware of what happened between me and my dad. 

Let me share with you what my visitation was like when my daddy would take me for a weekend. He would show up at my mom’s house in his cab that he drove. He worked for a local cab company for many years. My mom would place me in the back seat of the cab, and when the cab would stop at the end of the street, he would say, Patty, come here honey, and sit next to daddy. Then he would take his hand and grab my hand and place in between his legs. He told me that if I ever told my mommy that he would beat up my stepdad, who I loved more than my own father, if that’s what you want to call him because I sure don’t. 

Then there were thunderstorms Grammy Lois, I called her dude. I told her what happened one night when I went with my daddy for a weekend. She believed me and never doubted me for one minute. I have always been close to my grandmother, who I miss dearly. She lost to a very long battle with Parkinson’s disease that did in the end take her life. I miss and love you every day. 

Well, my stepdad did not take me getting pregnant very well. He did not speak to me for weeks. But I decided that I was big enough to play, and I am big enough to pay and that is just what I did. So here I was, a junior high school who screwed around with her boyfriend and got caught even though we did use a condom. It truly did break. People till this day say, Yeah, right, but it’s the truth. I was sitting while getting ready to plan a wedding to be held on August 11, 1984. We had a small but beautiful wedding. I was still attending high school; the kids were starting to become really mean to me. They would stare and whisper when I passed by, and some of my classmates even went as far as hanging Alice Cooper’s Dead Baby Tour stickers on the outside of my locker at school. Then I began to start showing, and some of my girlfriends that I thought were my friends stopped hanging with me because I began to start to show that I was carrying a baby in me. So what, they were being were two-faced stuck-up bitches that thought they were all that, but they screwed everyone else and just never got caught. It was a matter of time before their life was going to change. 

January 9, 1985, I had just given birth to a beautiful little boy, and we named him William Paul Contois. He was named after both of his grandfathers, who are both no longer with us. They have passed on but thanks for all the most wonderful memories. Billy entered the world at six pounds and twelve ounces and was twenty-two inches long. Welcome, William. I took a little time away from school after the birth then I returned. I never dropped out; it was never an option for me because I was not and never will be a quitter. So I was a wife, a mother, and a student. And I graduated with the Class of 1985 in Auburn, Massachusetts, at Auburn High School number fifty-six in my class of 137. The day that I received my diploma, I held it up high to my mom, dad, sis, and son; and I said, I did it! Ronnie and I continued to live in Auburn after I graduated, we moved to a town called Worcester. Unfortunately, the marriage only lasted a year and a half, but we would forever share a son who is truly special to both Ronnie and I. We love you, Billy, and we always will. 

I filed for a divorce, and I moved in with my parents so that I could save up some money and so that I could get my own place for me and my son. Trust me, I hated asking if I could come back home even if it was only