Phoenix Rising From the Ashes

By Justin Cloud

Phoenix Rising from the Ashes tells of a man's journey from a dark seemingly endless pit of addiction into the light. Draw inspiration from his struggles and discover how he, after having stumbled onto a path of self-destruction, got up on his feet and walked onward to recovery. Read, witness, and realize how there will always be hope even in the bleakest of moments and the most desperate of times.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Page Publishing, Inc.
• Release date: Jul 2, 2014
• ISBN: 9781628386967

Book preview

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I’m sorry, Momma! I never meant to hurt you! I never meant to make you cry, but tonight I’m cleaning out my closet.

—Eminem

Before I was born, my dad was already on his way to prison. He robbed a pharmacy, and the man he sold the drugs to overdosed and died. The man’s girlfriend knew my dad was the one who sold him the drugs, and she turned him in. My mom left him then, to protect me from him. I was born on July 18, 1974, in Sioux City, Iowa, into an all-American family. In my mom’s family, there are six kids. Their names are Raymond, Roy, Roger, Robert, Renee, and Rita. Rita, Roger, and Roy are the good kids. My mom’s name is Renee.

Because my mom wanted me to have a last name, she married a guy named Dennis Cloud, who adopted me, and my name became Justin Ray Cloud. Their marriage didn’t last very long. At some point in time, she married a man we will call Napoleon, and they had my brother and sister, Destiny and Dennis. Destiny was born on May 11, 1976, and Dennis was born August 3, 1977. By the time I was three years old, I had a brother and sister.

Before I was a year old, Uncle Robert had done a string of armed robberies, one of which he got caught for was robbing a pharmacy in South Dakota and pistol-whipping the pharmacist. He took thousands of dollars in cash and drugs, all of them class A pharmaceuticals such as Dilaudids, morphine, Demerol, Quaaludes, black beauties, etc. He knew exactly what to look for because he had been studying a PDR (Physicians’ Desk Reference). He got away with this robbery. His partner in crime got caught for forging checks. He told on my uncle for doing robberies, to get out of his own trouble for the robberies, and to clear his name for the checks. During the time between committing the robbery and getting caught for it, Uncle Robert committed further robberies, one of which he used my mom unwittingly for as the getaway driver for. He got $1,200 in change, several thousand in cash, and all kinds of his favorite pharmaceuticals. I was a newborn baby in the car with my mom. She didn’t know he was going to commit the robbery, but forgave his using her for the getaway with her baby in the car, because he gave her $500 in change from the robbery.

During another drug store robbery that my Uncle Robert did with my Uncle Raymond and one of their buddies, they had a hard time getting the cash register open. They took turns trying to get the cash register open, and while this was going on, the gun they were using to commit the robbery got slammed onto the counter. As soon as the gun hit the counter, it accidentally fired. The gunshot ended up hitting my Uncle Robert in the butt! Ha! It didn’t prevent them from finishing the robbery though. They were getting what they came for regardless of what happened. After the robbery was finished, it was obvious that Uncle Robert needed medical attention. Good thing that he had the pharmaceuticals; they just took in the robbery to self-medicate the pain. They knew Uncle Robert could not go to a local hospital due to gunshot wounds were required by law to be reported. My Uncle Robert and his crime partner knew a friend in another state who was a physician assistant. So both my uncles and their friend drove out of state, so Uncle Robert could get treated for the gunshot wound. Uncle Robert was with their doctor friend while my Uncle Raymond and their partner in crime kept a lookout. Somehow the nurse on duty found out about the gunshot wound and called the police to report it. My Uncle Raymond observed this and went to the examination room to tell Uncle Robert the cops were being called. He still had the bullet in his butt but had no choice except to get up and get out of the hospital before the cops arrived. To this day, he still has the bullet lodged in his butt! Ha!

When the cops caught up to him on a robbery due to his partner snitching on him, he ended up getting one to twenty years indeterminate. While waiting to get sentenced for this armed robbery charge, he attempted to escape from county jail in Elk Point, South Dakota, and was caught so they transferred him to a more secure county jail in Vermilion, South Dakota. While in jail in Vermilion, he did escape and was caught a day and a half later. He waited for a deputy to bring in a new inmate by hiding above the cells. Once the deputy had his back turned, he jumped off the top of the cells and put a pillowcase around his head, tied him up, and then took his keys and escaped. He called my mom to come and get him. She was supposed to go and get him, but she never showed up. He hid in some bushes over night and ended up talking to some teens about getting a ride back home to Sioux City, Iowa. They said okay and dropped off one of their friends at home who ended up calling the cops on my uncle right away, and the cops were on him with guns pulled before they even got out of town. They left him a reminder of what he did wrong by beating his butt.

In 1975, he began his prison sentence. In 1976, he escaped from prison in Sioux Falls, South Dakota and was on the run for a day and a half but never made it out of Sioux Falls. Someone at the house he was hiding at turned him in, and he got five more years for escape.

My Uncle Raymond also went to prison for armed robberies. Stuff like that was normal in my all-American family.

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Any skeletons, any misfortunes, any skeletons, hiding in the closet…

—Anthrax

My earliest memories don’t include Napoleon because he and my mom were already divorced by then. I can remember as a toddler hiding in a coffee table and closing the doors behind me to play hide-and-seek from my babysitter. I accidentally fell asleep inside that coffee table, and my babysitter couldn’t find me. I woke up to my mom yelling and screaming, so I came out of the coffee table. It speaks volumes that my earliest memory was yelling and screaming, setting the stage for the rest of my early childhood.

My Grandpa Ray was involved in the early part of my life. I remember going to his farm. I remember walking next to him, holding his big finger. He enjoyed taking me places on the farm, just he and I. I liked to go see the geese, even though they scared me when they honked at me, and it made my grandpa laugh. He would call me his little Pollock. I still don’t know if that was a compliment or not. Ha! My grandpa enjoyed football. I would sit on his lap in the recliner, watching his favorite team play, the Pittsburgh Steelers.

My Grandpa Ray and Grandma Darlene got a divorce. They were married about fifteen years and grew apart. He got custody of the kids and raised them alone.

In about 1980, my Grandpa Ray got lung cancer and died. Little did I know, I lost a major person that was in my corner. Rest in peace, Grandpa Ray.

Around this same time period, I had a female babysitter who molested me multiple times. I couldn’t understand why I had to take my naps with her. She would burn my food if I refused to nap with her. To this day, I can’t stand my food being burnt. During those naps was when she molested me. I’m still embarrassed by it. Who doesn’t want to be molested by a woman? I didn’t! I was only a little boy. When I tried to tell my mom, she didn’t believe me; she got mad at me for telling stories about her friend, so this continued for some time. One day, she wasn’t my babysitter any longer.

Around this time period was when I remember my mom fighting a lot with her boyfriend. Sometimes I would go to the neighbor’s house when this happened. I can also remember when my mom spanked me. She would come to me later and hug me and tell me she loved me. This always made me feel better, and I would quickly get over getting spanked. I did a lot of the things kids my age did. I played football, rode my bike, and watched TV. My love for football, I believed I got from my special times with Grandpa Ray, sitting on his lap watching the Pittsburgh Steelers play. Riding my bike was lots of fun but I couldn’t ever leave the yard, so I would ride in circles around a semi tire in our front yard. I wore a pretty good bike path around that tire! I also liked watching TV and because of my age, about five or six years old, one of my favorite shows was Sesame Street. During one episode of Sesame Street, they taught about fires and to call 911 if there was a fire. Well that seemed like a good idea to me, so I called 911 to report a fire! Only problem was that there was no fire to report, and I just lied and said there was a fire. The difficulties began when they asked where the fire was. The only address that I knew was my own, so I told them across the street from my house and gave them my address. They wanted lots of information from me that I wasn’t prepared to be asked, like my name and address. So I just hung up on them. In my head, the situation was over as soon as I ended the call. So I went back to watching Sesame Street and just forgot about it. Before long, my mom was yelling at me! I can’t remember what my mom was yelling about. I can only remember thinking, How did she find out I called 911? I did not know anything about tracing phone calls. I was still a little boy, but by the end of my childhood, I would have a good education about the things the authorities could do.

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This life that I forsake been cheated of my youth… Anger, misery you’ll suffer unto me.

—Metallica

During this same time period, my mom was with a man named Mike. It seemed like the whole time they were together, I was in trouble. Mike was a very smart and creative man when it came to disciplining me. It was amazing how much thought he would put into my future and me with his punishments. My punishments ranged from getting spanked to standing in the corner to not being able to go anywhere. Getting spanked was probably the least hurtful punishment. Mike didn’t spank me too hard because he was a smart and creative man and knew he could get into trouble for that. Standing in the corner was a very effective punishment for him to give to me. He would literally make me stand in the corner for hours. On more than one occasion, my Aunt Rita would happen to come by for a visit and see me in the corner. She would ask how long I had been there, and the answer was usually hours! Mike was a smart and creative man, and he only treated me that way because he loved me. That’s why he would have me stand in the corner with my hands in the air, holding the biggest can of pork and beans in the house above my head. He showed his love by having me do this until I couldn’t hold my arms up any longer. I would drop the can of beans and cry, I can’t do it anymore with tears rolling down my face. He would then show me some more love by spanking me and yelling at me to get back in the corner and don’t let the can of beans fall again. This is how I spent a lot of my time away from school. I didn’t realize this wasn’t love that Mike showed me because my mom allowed it, and she loved me so it must be normal to treat kids this way. Maybe if I would just learn to be a good five-year-old, he would be nice to me. It had to be my entire fault.

Grade school was easy for me. I really enjoyed school. I made friends easily and my teachers liked me. I got good grades and school was fun. I never got yelled at or hit or put in the corner with my hands in the air at school. It was safe there. I wasn’t allowed to have friends over or go to their houses, so school was the place to be to play with other kids. We moved around a lot, rarely did I go to the same school for more than one semester. I learned how to make friends easily. I got lots of practice from all the schools I went to. I lived with various family members, and I don’t know why. I think it’s because my mom realized the men she was with couldn’t be good to me, so it was easier to get rid of me than to get rid of them. Regardless of the reason, none of my relatives ever kept me long. I was just a bad boy that no one wanted. At least my relatives were good to me and as long as I was living with them, I was treated well. I lived with my Grandma Darlene, Uncle Roger, Great Uncle Peewee, and my Uncle Roy. It seemed like I spent as much of my childhood not living at home, as I did living at home.

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The head nurse spoke up, and she said leave this one alone. She could tell right away, that I was bad to the bone.

—George Thorogood

While living with Grandma Darlene, it was peaceful, I went to school every day, and my Grandpa Martin would play with me. Grandma Darlene was the educator, and Grandpa Martin was my playmate. We lived on a farm in Nebraska. One of my memories of living with them was when I was playing with Grandpa Martin. I took his hat off his head and threw it in the pigpen. I thought it was funny. I thought he thought so too. He told me to get his hat. He told me again and came toward me. I stepped back. He came toward me again. I took off running and tried to crawl underneath a fence. He jumped the fence faster than I could crawl under it, grabbed me with one hand while pulling his belt free in one motion, and whooped my butt. That was okay, though, because I knew I had it coming. We continued to be buddies.

My grandma would check my homework every day. My teachers allowed us to check our own homework, making corrections as we went along. I learned I could just put 100 percent at the top of each homework assignment, but when my grandma discovered what I was doing, she raised hell with the school. No more checking my own papers. I loved living with my Grandma Darlene and Grandpa Martin. They loved me, and they showed it. There was one thing missing, though, and that was my mom. I would get to missing her and sometimes cry because it would be so long in between each time of her coming to see me. I was about six or seven years old at the time. I missed my mom, and I missed my sister, Destiny, and my brother, Dennis. Even though home with my mom was chaotic, she was still my mom and I was a little boy who missed his mom. I can remember calls to my mom and I would ask when she would come to see me. She would set a day she would come, but most often something would come up. Looking back, this was good practice because in the years to come, I would truly find out what it was like to be away from your loved ones. At least Grandma Darlene and Grandpa Martin were good to me. It made it easier to be a little boy who missed his mom. Finally I got to live with my mom again, but it was only a matter of time before I was gone out of the house again. I don’t know why it was so hard to keep me anywhere. I was just a bad boy that was not wanted.

Next I went to live with my Uncle Roger. Uncle Roger was a hard worker who started his own business, cutting down trees, called RB Tree Service. He was a big, strong, tanned man, from hard work in the sun all the time. He loved me and truly wanted the best for me. He knew I had it hard at home and couldn’t stand the men that were beating on me because he knew they were beating on his sister also. He felt bad for me from the beginning because of how I was always left in the room in a crib a lot. I know this to be true not because I remember it happening, but because I was told by Uncle Roger and other family members. Even as a baby, I learned how to deal with solitary confinement! Ha! Uncle Roger’s wife was a woman named Mary. Uncle Roger and Aunt Mary were great to me. I loved them both and respected them for their efforts with me and for not being mean to me. They did discipline me but were never mean to me about it. If I got in trouble, I deserved it. The only problem was that by the time I went to live with them, I had already been exposed to way too much! I went to live with Uncle Roger when I was about seven or eight years old. I actually lived with him on a couple of occasions. He had a big oversized ping-pong paddle with my name written on it. Over the course of time, he wore my name off that paddle, using it on me. I didn’t know how to listen.

He used to tell me I was going to end up in Eldora (juvenile prison) and prison, but I believed this would never happen to me. He would try to talk to me and ask me why I did the things I did, but I had no answer. I was just a bad boy! While living with Uncle Roger, every Friday night, he and his wife, their two kids, Sharon and Shawn, and I went out to eat. We kids got to pick where we went.

Rogers’s wife, my Aunt Mary, was good to me also. She made sure I got love and attention, and made sure all my needs were met. The one thing she didn’t do well was cook chicken. Burnt on the outside, bloody on the inside, was my Aunt Mary’s special. Ha! She made sure I got swimming lessons, learned how to roller-skate; she was just plain good to me.

I don’t have eventful memories of living with my Uncle Peewee. It was just a period of time that was neither good nor bad.

One of the things I remember most as a child was that my mom was always gone. I always wished I had a dad, and always wished my Aunt Rita was my mom. My cousin Travis, Aunt Rita’s son, was nine hours older than me, and he always wished he had my mom.

As a little boy, my mom took me up to the Sioux Falls State Penitentiary to visit my Uncle Robert. It was so huge and looked just like an old castle! It was scary, intimidating, and exciting to me all at the same time. On one visit, my Uncle Robert invited one of his friends to come sit at the picnic table and visit. His friend’s name we will call Tiny. A big man with a necklace made out of chicken bones that liked to talk about Satanism and stuff like that. He was in there for murder, something about a