The Comeback Kid: How I Survived the Loss of My Daughter, Who Is Still Alive

By Lisa Marie King

You do not know me, but you will, I am like you. I thought I had it all. The family, the preverbal picket fence, and a baby, the icing on my cake. She was incredibly bright and the light of my life, the embodiment of my dreams. She is the reason for this story, for what has become my story, of my COMEBACK. There were doctors, behavioral hospitals, and court visits. Throughout this book you will discover that I eventually lost my daughter again and again. You will have to read on to understand how that could happen, but it did.

I have walked through the fire with my God by my side as he always promised. Thanks to friends, my church, and my family I have COMEBACK. From the pit of devastation, I have COMEBACK. I want to be a cheerleader, a source of strength, a hope for the future to anyone who reads this book. This book is an affirmation to the power of faith and not giving up. I hope to help you to carry on through your loss, to COMEBACK. I have tapped into strength I never knew I had, faith I never dreamed of, and a different life without my daughter that is now something I can embrace. There is a way back from the pain, it comes through helping others. Strength is Contagious. Catch a case of the COMEBACK KID.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Christian Faith Publishing, Inc.
• Release date: Jan 12, 2022
• ISBN: 9781685176099

Book preview

Chapter 1

The Intro

Ihave a nickname that no one else has known about until now. It’s a nickname I gave to myself, sort of as an inside joke with myself. I have always had this trait in my soul that I believe God put there to help me on my way. I believe He gives us the tools we need to survive this life long before we know when we will need them. I have always had a strong resolve that no one and no thing is going to break me. I almost always feel stronger the bigger the problem gets, and I won’t let anything hold me back or keep me down—except myself, of course. I am a master at holding myself back. Hence, I am now forty-six years old and still t rying to finish my first book (hopefully of many)! The resolve to carry on is not as much inner strength as it is stubbornness. I will not let them get the best of me. I will come back. That’s what life and this book are all about.

I first started calling myself the Comeback Kid around sixteen. I was naive and dating a boy I thought I was going to marry. He was a couple of years older than me and was going to be a musician, I think a piano player. He was going to move to California (I grew up in Ohio) and send for me when he became famous. Those words set my young heart on fire. I just knew he was the one. Why would he not be?

I was working in the dry cleaners at the time when he grew tired of me. It was Thanksgiving weekend, and I had to work that Saturday. I called him in the early evening to see what he wanted to do that night.

He said, I don’t think we should see each other.

Oblivious to what he was saying, I answered, Yeah, you’re right. You have your relatives visiting from out of town. We should wait until next weekend.

Quietly he said, No, I don’t think we should see each other at all.

Oh… and there it was, a lump in my throat that took away my voice. I have never had a lump like that before or since, seriously. It took me a few seconds of complete silence, but I finally managed to say, I have to go or something to that effect. After I got off the phone, I think I cried a little and then made plans to go out with three of my guy friends that night. The Comeback Kid was fine.

As the Comeback Kid, I am always fine until I get a common cold and can’t breathe then I am dying. One of my four best friends and I have a running joke about that. We are always fine.

She once said to me, "Remember that scene in the movie Saving Private Ryan where the soldier’s arm gets blown off, and he just picks it up and keeps going? That’s us."

When I tripped and fell in a parking lot several years ago, I could hear my skull hit the concrete. It made a loud thudding sound. I told everybody I was fine despite the huge knot that was forming on my forehead. One of my friends told me I was bleeding.

I said, No, I’m fine.

She said, You are bleeding, the way you would say it to someone who was unable to comprehend, louder and slower.

Again the Comeback Kid said, I am fine, to which my friend literally touched me on the arm and showed me my own blood. Guess I wasn’t as fine as I thought. Sometimes the wounds are visible especially when they turn into two black eyes two days later, but sometimes they are invisible; only you know that they are there.

I have a hole in my heart, one that will never close. The doctors will tell you my heart is fine, and physically, they are right. This hole is one you cannot see. It doesn’t show up on x-rays or tests, but I can assure you it is there. It is a hole that has made me stronger than I ever thought I could be and more weak than I care to admit. Each person I have loved in my life has made an imprint on my heart in their image. I have one for my parents, family, and friends. When someone leaves my life, the imprint becomes a hole. The biggest one is for my daughter, Ella. That hole will never close. I have to rely on strength (both internal and external) to continue to survive. She has been gone for over five years now, and I have been strengthened through the pain. She is always with me, and she is nowhere at the same time. At least she is getting mostly A’s at school. Yes, my daughter is still alive. I am grieving the total loss of someone who still lives no more than fifty miles away from me—just fifty miles.

I have always had dark-brown, almost jet-black hair. Not bad, I guess, but when I was in elementary school, I always thought the perfect hair color was a light golden brown with blonde highlights and loose curls. When I was in middle school, I used to put hydrogen peroxide on my hair in the summer for highlights. In high school, a friend put blonde highlights on the sides of my hair, in our senior year. In my attempts to get that specific hair color, I realized how unnatural it looked on me. When my daughter was born, she actually had jet-black hair too at first. As she grew into an older baby and then a toddler, her hair became lighter, and she had bouncy little curls that would rest on her shoulders. She had it, my hair, this beautiful, beautiful hair. I just recently realized that the hair I dreamed of in elementary school was on my own child’s head. So even from the beginning, she was meant to be mine. I have to remember that as she hasn’t lived with me since she was twelve. It has been over three years since I have even seen or heard from her at all. The hole in my heart has gotten even bigger. Don’t worry, I have become stronger. I know where my hope and strength comes from, and it’s a never-ending supply.

Most kids move out when they reach early adulthood to go to college or live away from Mom and Dad. Ella moved out at twelve to live with her dad because of her depression, more on that to follow. I got report cards around every six weeks or so from her school. They started sending them to me when she was still living with her dad. I was asked by a friend if getting Ella’s report cards were too much of a reminder of her. My answer on the spot was this: I have many reminders of her. She is everywhere and nowhere all at once. My answer now, upon reflection, would be more refined. I think of what happened with Ella and compare it to someone who had to have their right arm cut off. I don’t think you would ever forget that you had a right arm, but eventually, you stop reaching with your right. My Ella always stays with me. She lives in my mind. She is now a vision, a ghost of a person that I used to know.

At sixteen, the Department of Children and Family Services moved her into the fosters home (again, more on that later)—that’s what I call them. The DCFS reports say they have asked about their checks. I guess at least they are not crazy or negligent; that’s what the reports say about me. I am not going to defend myself right now. You will need to read on and make a decision for yourself. She may be right; I may be crazy, but I am not negligent. Okay, I guess I am defending myself. And as for crazy, I am not that either. See for yourself. Even so, I am bothered by the fact that these people have my daughter—the child I dreamed about. I never stopped loving my daughter. I would lay down my life for her even now, no questions asked. I’m not sure I could do that for anyone else without having a personal debate with myself. I wondered if the fosters would lay down their lives for her. Not that she needs anyone to lay down their life for her, but it’s nice to know they would protect her. That’s all I can ask of them.

They say truth is stranger than fiction. It’s true. As vivid as the human imagination can be, we have nothing on fate. If you would have told me five years ago that I would be the biological mom to a foster kid, I would have laughed right in your face. It’s often said about the truth that you can’t make this stuff up. My thought on that is who would want to. All I know is the real truth has a way of making itself known. As to what the real truth really is, I guess you will have to judge that for yourself.

You have to let the truth guide you. The storms of life pull on us and drive us to places we never expected to go. We find the things we lost by losing the things we thought we had gained. We grow when we let go of our preconceived notions for our lives and let god guide us. He has a plan for each one of us. I learned to appreciate God’s plan when I learned to give up control over everything I thought I wanted (my house, my family, my daughter) and accept my responsibility for what I never knew I needed (a stronger faith, a stronger relationship with Him, and a true love of myself). It’s true (at least to me), but I have to tell you a long story to get you to see it the way I do.

Part of me wishes I could go back and redo my life, make different choices. I am sure you have thought that way too. This book is about reaching people in their times of struggle and being a voice to help bring them through it. I feel I can do that better if I actually address you as, well, you. One of the ways this makes sense to me is if I can reach out to you and make you stronger. You see, it’s already made me stronger, and I want to share that strength with you. Yes, I am talking to you, dear reader. In film, they call it breaking the fourth wall. It has always been one of my favorite techniques in film. I love the classic way Matthew Broderick broke the fourth wall in the fantastic Ferris Bueller’s Day Off. The movie captures the audience by bringing them into the action. We actually feel like we are ditching school with Ferris. I want to bring you into my story, my mistakes, my heartaches, and my triumphs in just continuing to go on when it seems hopeless. I know you know what hopelessness feels like; you must, or you would not have picked up this book. I want to show you your own inner strength. You are more brave than you know.

The passage of Jeremiah 29:11–13 tells us:

For I know the plans I have for you, declares the Lord, plans to prosper you and not to harm you, plans to give you hope and a future. Then you will call on me and come and pray to me, and I will listen to you. You will seek me and find me when you seek me with all your heart.

How often do we actually seek God’s way? I know personally I tried to start out that way. Christian or not, most of us need to feel that sense of control. The need for a sense of control was stronger than my desire to seek God’s plan for me. We need to make plans and goals and work toward them. We teach our children this, don’t we? We work so hard to make a life for ourselves that we get caught up in the process of making it happen. We forge ahead, and when things go according to plan, we smile to ourselves and allow that sense of pride to sneak in. We don’t think anything can go wrong until the phone rings in the middle of the night. Believe me, when the daughter you loved all her life is now gone for real, it is hard to not be angry and to know where to turn.

Some stories are so hard to believe, you know, really out there; the kind of story that leaves you shaking your head, saying, Really? There are stories that seem impossible. I know what you are thinking: This can’t be that weird of a story, and I understand why you think that way. I even forgive you for what you will be saying to yourself after you read this book because it is nothing I haven’t already heard:

That can’t be right. Is she making this up?

That doesn’t make any sense.

How can this happen?

Yes, I have heard it all. This is one of those stories that I would be skeptical of too, if I didn’t live it myself, which I did.

This story is about you—yes, you, the one holding this book or reading it on your tablet or whatever. I don’t know the details of your life at this moment, but I know there is pain. You have been through something, a loss that has made a hole in your heart. You probably aren’t in the same situation that I was, but you may be going through a grieving process just the same. I am writing this book for you because no matter how deep the hurt is, life does get better, but only if you keep going. Don’t stop going. Always keep getting up. You can rest, cry, be angry (I found crying and screaming in my car can be very healing except for the sore throat). That is okay! But do get up. Get off the couch. Get out of bed. Don’t bury yourself in your grief. Deal with it, and keep going. I have learned the value of dealing with my pain. It has strengthened my very soul. The events in my life have made me a better me—the hard way. I know as you learn to deal with your pain. It is shaping you into a better you, although I am sure it doesn’t seem that way right now. My goal is to be a voice in your ear that encourages you to keep going by sharing my story.

This story is about a child who grew up too soon; a kid who was treated like an adult instead of a child; a family that split apart too soon; a child who, when she was born, was my daughter, the reason for me to breathe again; a child who, when she was less than two, would have conversations with me in her own language, which I am sure she thought I could understand since I always replied back. The memories are literally all I have now. Some days they seem to get fainter; I sometimes watch our home movies to keep them from fading away altogether. At other moments, the memories pour down on me like an acid rain, and the sense of loneliness causes me to burst into floods of tears that leave me gasping for air.

This story is also about me, obviously. I grew up learning to please others at a very young age. The praise I would get from being kind, even when I was young, was like a drug, and it fueled me. I needed it; I depended on the praise of others to make me feel worthy and loved. It was not a feeling I could give myself. Like a vampire sucking on blood, I had to suck out the praises of others to survive. I had an overwhelming sense of guilt, I think, just for breathing. I never knew what I was guilty of, I just felt this heavy coat of guilt wrapped around me. It was my own form of codependency. Codependency can be as powerful as alcoholism and just as hard to live with. Just like alcoholism, you need to remove yourself from the situation or remove the situation from you. So when my daughter moved out at twelve to go live in Hollywood with her dad, she gave me a gift—one it took me a long time to appreciate. This gift is the ability to love myself and survive life on my own terms, in other words, relying on myself and God (not others). Through the storms of the last few years, it has developed in me like a butterfly in a cocoon.

At forty-six (what can I say, I am a late bloomer), I have learned through many sessions with qualified therapists that you are never too old to change your career. One told me recently of a colleague of hers who recently changed to a career in therapy. The lady was sixty-seven when she started her internship. You see, I work in the mortgage business now. I have a decent job that pays the bills, but I am not cut out for it. These past several years have shown me what I really want to do. I want to write and reach out to you. I want to reach you right now in your grief. Maybe your journey through the storm has just begun. If it has, I am sorry. You see, I know what that journey though the storm is like. I have come out of it, and yet I still live with it every day. The storm is part of me. I have gained what I can out of it, and it is still not done with me; I have more to learn from it. There are still days when I don’t know if I can do this, and then I realize I am doing it; I am making it through. I have learned that just waking up is a step toward victory. Strength is not in moving mountains; it is getting out of bed in the morning. Strength is smiling through tears or with that lump in your throat. Strength is not giving up even though that may seem like the easier option. Strength is realizing that giving up is never an option.

I think the Comeback Kid was partially born out of my codependency. I never thought about what I needed, so I was always fine. Besides, it was easier to just say I’m fine than to sit and figure out what I needed. I never knew I had needs until I lived alone. I have been on my own for a few years now, but I was