Lindsey Altom
Bio
For me, writing runs in the blood. I've written songs, poems and short stories ever since I was a little girl. I mostly like to write about my life experiences mixed with a little fiction or just things that come off the top of my head!
Stories (96)
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My hopes, dreams, future...
This past year has been so full of change and growth for me and my children and Vocal has been one of my biggest inspirations. You see, in September of 2022 I broke up with my narcissistic alcoholic now ex-husband, and since I had been with him for 8 years my brain had forgotten who I was anymore. I thought I knew but honestly, I had no clue. However, at some point in my healing journey I found Vocal...again. I discovered something that I had long since forgotten because according to Vocal I had joined in 2017. I discovered a world of writers much like myself here and more importantly, a place to express myself and not be judged. Here on this platform are my people. The forgotten in society, the swept under the rug, the creators, the artists, those of us who fight for the light but know sometimes you must know the dark well to appreciate the light... we're all here. I've worked for almost a year now on Vocal honing the writing skills that I once used so often and was so proud of but had all but forgotten thanks to my ex-husband and life. The challenges that Vocal provides have provided me with both a new and exciting challenge to both grow and expand my talent and excitement at trying something new. I haven't won a challenge yet but I plan to keep trying as that is one of my goals for this year. I did recently have my first Top Story which I was extraordinarily excited about...https://shopping-feedback.today/families/fort-mother. Finally creating a story that achieved Top Story on Vocal seriously made my week and I can only imagine what winning a challenge would do for my excitement levels. I am simply a struggling single mother of two like many others who is just trying to achieve my dreams for both myself and my children. This year I have already enrolled in college and am taking an English Comp class to start with so I can better hone my writing skills, I've joined a domestic violence survivors group which I am so thrilled about and I have several plans for here on Vocal as well. This year I have a couple of stories still lingering in my Drafts folder that I plan to finish. One is about a girl who is just trying to broaden her horizons by moving from California to Arizona and in doing so she finds herself on a journey that she did not expect nor did she invite, she almost dies and the other is about a woman in a domestic violence situation who fled and in doing so killed her husband or so she thinks and now she has to start over in a brand new town that she knows nothing about and everyone is suspicious of her. I also hope within this year to keep writing on this platform as much as possible as my schedule is very full and to take what I can from the writings of others. If I were to win this challenge or any other challenge I enter I would use that money to go towards a better future for myself and my children. I would use the money to pay off some debts, put food in my children's bellies, and save some if I could. I hope to one day be able to use my writing as a side job/passion to be able to make money from my writings and save that money so my children can go to college or wherever they want to go in life and live a brighter life than I have at times. I have made mistakes as we all have but I am trying and learning every day. I hope to one day live a life of comfort and travel. No, I do not want to live lavishly only comfortably and I believe that I can achieve some of these dreams through Vocal. Vocal has been such an inspiration to me as you can tell and I'm not just saying this, it truly has...so thank you for reading this and any other of my work that you've read.
By Lindsey Altom2 years ago in Writers
Hate.... Content Warning.
I left my toxic and abusive ex-husband over a year ago at this point and I've done a lot to try to heal and recover from not only that trauma but my childhood trauma as well. I've worked hard over the past three years to look at every aspect of myself and notice not only where I was damaged and broken but where I went wrong too. I've tried very hard to own up to my faults and take responsibility where it was mine to take. That being said I know that everything I did in the toxic relationship with my ex was not perfect because for one it's called reactive abuse. You can only take it for so long before you start giving it back. The next thing is that I am human and I am prone to making mistakes and my decisions and thought patterns were not always the greatest. However, everything I did and/or said or didn't say had a reason and most people only know the tip of the iceberg when it comes to what happened between my ex and myself. Also, that's just it, isn't it? No one except who was in the house truly knows what happened. I have my story which I've told and I have a right to tell and he has his. The abuse that I and my children suffered in that home was real and was not made up by any means. I don't have to explain this to anyone I know but because of poor mental health and comments like this I for some reason feel as if I need to explain. This comment I'm assuming was taken down either by Vocal or the author herself yesterday but I got to read it through my emails. This is from my ex-sister-in-law and this is called victim blaming/shaming. I was already feeling stressed due to the holiday season and the financial burden that it puts on one especially when you have children and then I read this. I just can't help but wonder why. Why as another woman would you intentionally seek out another woman to tear her down? I mean I would never. I feel as women we should always be building each other up because being a woman is hard enough as it is so even if you don't like said woman then just don't say anything but don't intentionally seek her out to try and destroy her. Also, as a Christian, I do not feel I have the right to tell another Christian that they are being hypocritical or "need Jesus." Everyone's journey is different and you calling into question their walk with Jesus is just not right in the least little bit. I'm not saying I'm perfect or was the perfect wife to her brother or the perfect stepmother to her nephews but I did try my best and no, I did not blatantly to their faces call the children mean names such as saying they were fat. Most of the time, the boys called themselves that and I told them not to do that. When you only have one side of the story it's hard to see the whole picture but I suppose it's also hard to see the whole picture when you just don't want to. I know nothing I say will matter and everything I say will just go in one ear and out the other because you've already picked your villain and that's fine but all I want is to be left alone. I'm trying to heal over here, I'm trying to find my peace, I'm trying to not stare at every red truck in town afraid that it might be him ready to run me down, I'm trying to not start shaking violently, and getting sick to my stomach every time his name or any of his family's name comes up because the fear lives just beneath the surface edge so please just go away. If you have any sort of decency about you at all please just leave me alone and I will leave you alone as well. I'm not sharing your name, but things like this? This is part of my domestic violence story and I will share it. You were right about one thing though, I'm not a victim- I'm a survivor.
By Lindsey Altom2 years ago in Humans
Lenora...
I am thirty-six years old and yet I feel I have lived several lives in just this one life. I started as this scared, timid little girl who was afraid of her own shadow at times but loved to play and explore. Oh, the hours upon hours I spent with my cousins from both sides of my family, both father and mother playing in the woods or the fields on my great grandparents' farm. It was in those woods and fields that I truly started to learn about myself. It was there that I started to learn I was more than just a shy, timid child. I liked to explore and learn things, I liked fire(yes, I was a bit of a pyromaniac and still am if truth be told), the woods were a great place to listen and to be heard by God, I loved to imagine a world in which things were different from my world and the woods and those fields were my place to do that. Things at home were complicated so I spent as much time as possible with my cousins. My parents had divorced by the time I was three and I honestly don't even remember much about them even being together other than the fighting. My mother started dating and then married my stepfather shortly thereafter when I was eight. My mother and my relationship has been rocky from the very beginning of my memories. It was not all her fault and I know that now. My stepfather intensified her already anal and narcissistic personality even though at the time he looked to me like a savior because he would intervene on my behalf at times. She was also very young and immature and unfortunately did not know better. I spent my childhood with her remembering very few good times and mostly with memories of yelling, arguing, her never understanding or accepting me for me, and raising my little sisters which came when I was eleven and then thirteen years old. It took quite a few years to work through all this trauma and some days I'm still working on it. My life with my father on the other hand was not all that bad. We would hang out, and watch TV, he taught me a love for weather and storms as we would chase tornados every time they got close to home, he also taught me a love for backroads as we would drive up and down the backroads most weekends, a love for cooking as we would cook together and a love for cemeteries as he would take myself and my cousin to all the local cemeteries to see if they were haunted. However, all that fun meant that he was the fun dad and he didn't handle my developing attitude as I got older very well. My snarky, smart-alek comments would be funny one moment; the next I was getting punished for being disrespectful. He and my mother argued and fought all through my childhood and treated me as if I were a rubber band to be played with; I never wanted to disappoint either of them but it seemed that no matter what I did someone always got their feelings hurt. It was a lot of pressure for a little girl. That is one version of me that I don't like to remember. The shy little girl turned into the angsty, resentful, bitter, depressed teenage girl but in that teenage girl, I found out more about myself. Around the same time I turned into a teenager, I also started dating my first love, Jay, and then found my two best friends whom I now consider sisters, Alisha and Mia. I also found a few other friends at this time. They would become my pack of friends and people that would get me through my teenage years which were some of my hardest years to live. I had no clue who I was, all I knew was that I was pissed and I wanted out of my mother's house. This pack of friends and Jay, my would-be lover taught me that I was someone to be loved and gave me a reason to get up every day. I learned that life could be very dark and I saw and learned all the ways it could be or at least I started to learn that. I also learned that my love for God was the only thing keeping me alive and I shared that as best I could. Once again, the woods were my reprieve. Myself and my friends went to the woods just to explore and be ourselves, to love and be loved, and to simply run away from our own miserable lives. I learned I loved to draw and write poetry and songs, I learned that I was fairly good at this and that made me happy. I began to explore my creative side in a whole new way. I learned to lean into that anger but also how to express and release some of it. Since the first thing I wanted to do when I got out of high school was get away from my overbearing mother, I moved in with my grandmother and went to technical school for a year with my cousin Candace. After that, I used Jay as my escape ticket and we married and I had my son within a year after that. Then, my new life as Army wife emerged as Jay joined the National Guard to take care of his growing family. We went through Basic training, AIT training, countless weekends away, and then a year of deployment. I rather enjoyed my life as an Army/National Guard wife. Jay and I tended to fight and argue if left to our own for too long so having him away at times meant that left us with just enough longing to be together that we didn't fight too frequently. I loved his uniform and found it very attractive that he was fighting for our country. It made him into more of a stand-up man and often in the harsh reality of civilian life, he let me down more times than I care to remember. I was left to pay the bills, figure out where that money was going to come from, and take care of the house plus our son. Jay would help out when and if he could and when and if he felt like it. However, when he put on that uniform things were different. He took things seriously when normally he did not, he was proud of his work in the National Guard and wanted to serve his country in any way he could, and he was proud to say that he was a warrior. I also enjoyed visiting all the different Army bases, having to have a military ID, visiting the commissary, and stopping to salute the flag every day when we were on the military bases; it all came with such prestige and I soaked every bit of it up. Soon, all that dried up though as Jay simply couldn't be the man I needed him to be at home and was dragging us both down. Our marriage ended and I was left with a little boy and pregnant with our second, a little girl. I was terrified as I knew I couldn't keep the home that we had just gotten by myself and he was supposed to help me but had bailed so now I had to figure this out alone. Instead, I found another man to help me and although that seemed like a Godsend at first it ended terribly with him just adding more narcissistic trauma to my background. I became a domestic violence victim along with my children of verbal, emotional, and mental abuse. The very things I suffered through as a child. This caused me to take a long, hard look at myself and decide what do I want the rest of my life to look like. In 2020, I started the road to figure that out. I began therapy. I decided that I was tired of being angry and depressed at everything that had ever happened to me and everything that continued to happen to me and I decided that the one thing I wanted and needed most in this world was peace. I also decided to take back some control of my life as I realized through therapy that my life is all about my choices. What do I choose to live with and what will I not accept? I learned about boundaries and enforcing those boundaries to keep my space safe. I learned and am still learning how to go back and reparent myself. I'm giving that shy, scared little girl and that angsty, angry, depressed teenager what she always wanted and needed- love and attention. In every situation that causes me distress, I ask her, what do you need in this moment? We're in this together she and I. It's been three years and we're never going to stop learning. I divorced my abusive spouse in 2022 and have never looked back after that. It took a lot for me to do so, two years of therapy in fact but I did it and I'm still going. I've enforced boundaries in my life with those people who have caused me trauma in my past and will continue to enforce those for my well-being because she deserves this. This is my life and I choose how this story will end.
By Lindsey Altom2 years ago in Confessions
My Best Friend.... Content Warning.
The first words I ever heard you say were a warning. You called to me, I went to my mother twice thinking it was her but then she told me to ask if it was you if I heard my name again. And Oh! Your still, small, sweet voice as it told me that something was coming but do not be afraid. I would be fine, everything would be fine. You would be there. A couple of weeks later, as my mother's car tossed and turned with us inside I knew this was it. You had warned me and I was calm because I knew, I knew that I would be fine and so would my mother. I closed my eyes and prayed that you would hold my hand. Next, you came to me in a dream...asked me to make a choice. You said that I would need protection to go through this life and all it had in store for me, I would need to choose. Would it be your army or Lucifer's that would offer me this protection? I whole heartedly chose your army to stand by my side. That has been almost 30 years ago and my oh my what a glorious few battles we've been through.
By Lindsey Altom2 years ago in Writers
Grandma's Beef Stew
My grandma's beef stew is something that I feel most all of us women in the family know how to cook. Well, any one of us that has ever taken any amount of time to learn it that is. I was first given the recipe when I was just 19 years old and marrying my highschool sweetheart. My aunt had decided to do a special activity at my bridal shower where all the women wrote down recipes and any advice they may have for me as I embarked on this new journey in life. My grandma wrote down a couple of recipes that day for me that she knew I held dear to my heart that were from her kitchen but this one has always been able to make a rainy day seem bright and even a sunny day brighter. It is put together with love, care and all the aspects of a good cook. I believe every single one of us probably cook this dish a little differently, each adding our own flare to it but also somewhat sticking to the original recipe. My grandma likes to say that this dish is about emptying out your pantry and your freezer, anything that needs to be cooked can have a chance to get cooked within this dish. This dish is about family....So, without further pause you will need..
By Lindsey Altom2 years ago in Feast
Holy Water...
This story is inspired by the song Holy Water by Michael Ray. I do hope you enjoy. Well, this is one story that I do not plan on telling my grandkids one day but it is a story and so I'm gonna tell you then I'm gonna deny I ever said anything about it. I used to go to this small little church in my hometown in southern Mississippi. The pastor there, his name was Timothy, he was a real stand-up man. He took good care of his congregation and cared a lot about us and that church. He'd come to us with about 20 years experience pastoring, had just lost his wife and little girl in a car crash the year prior and so he'd taken a year off to get himself right.
By Lindsey Altom2 years ago in Fiction
How Things Went From Wonderful to Terrifying.... Content Warning.
The following couple of months were a living nightmare with Wade as if it wasn't already. I immediately started taking steps to end the marriage and going through my counseling which was intense and for C-PTSD at this point and severe current trauma. I was told by my attorney that we would have to give Wade 30 days from the point of filing for divorce before we could force him to leave the house. Unfortunately, I was unable to get that money together right away and it took almost a full month to get the funds from my father finally and trust me I had to hear about using my daddy's money and how not everyone had daddy's money. Wade had said that this time around we would not be sharing an attorney as he wasn't planning on spending any money towards this divorce. He said that if I planned on divorcing him that I would be footing the bill this time. Last time, we had both agreed that divorce is pretty well where we were headed and had somehow been able to come up with an agreed divorce plan and use the same attorney but now that those documents had been dismissed it was up to me. Which ultimately was in my favor little did he understand because even though it would cost more it meant that I drew up the paperwork to match my wants/needs and if he wanted to contest any of it he'd have to fork out the money for his own attorney. I do not think Wade ever truly understood or wanted to understand that this is how it worked as he kept acting as if myself and my attorney were there to suit to his needs/wants as well. Everything that was discussed during these two months with Wade came to me with nothing but mockery, bitterness, anger, he made a large deal and an argument out of absolutely nothing and it seemed no matter what I did to try to calm things down or diffuse the situation Wade was just a fireball waiting to light a fire wherever and however he could. He would mock everything I said with such a distaste for me on his tongue it made me wonder if he ever truly loved me. At first, I would have a sarcastic response because at this point I was over it. I was over him, his abuse and his childish and outlandish attitude and I just frankly didn't give a damn anymore. I figured if I was going to get abused anyway I might as well go down fighting but that made him worse so eventually I stopped and tried to focus on keeping him calm. That didn't help either; it seemed his goal was to ignite and fight. He loved to fight, always had and I supposed he always would. Eventually, I went still and quiet. Did you know if you walk so quietly in your own home only going to and from your bedroom and to the kitchen for food never staying in one room long enough to really be noticed people sometimes forget your even there? Myself and my children suddenly excelled at being wall flowers in our own home. We would come inside from work and school and go straight to our bedrooms. Wade had moved downstairs with his boys at this point so Rayne and myself would stay locked in my bedroom and AJ in his room only occasionally coming to my room to visit myself and his sister. We would eat quick meals that did not require a lot of prep so as to get back to our bedrooms quicker, we would eat in our rooms often times together in one or the others room watching some TV show or a movie and then it was off to sleep behind our locked bedroom doors. I bought a taser and some pepper spray during this time and Wade questioned why that was on my purse? I told him it was because I was Doordashing and as I could tell the implied reasoning I assured him it was not because of him. How silly... "Yeah, that would be ridiculous. How stupid would you have to be to think you'd need that for me?" he'd said. I'd lied...again. I was terrified of him and I didn't know what he'd do one day to the next. This much I did know... he hated me perhaps once loving me in his own way but he hated me now. I had also picked up on a strong dislike for women in general and a sense of him feeling women were somehow beneath him and I didn't want to know what underlying issues such as that could do possibly. I chose to protect myself and my child and not find out if possible. I'd heard the slurs he'd thrown at me either under his breath or to my face, "All women want is money.; Your all money whores.; Washing dishes and the house chores are for you to figure out, you and the kids.; I work ungodly hours which is something you will never understand.; etc." I also caught him one time speaking with NJ downstairs when they had no idea I was upstairs listening and what I heard was Wade telling the child that he hated that I'd ever gotten my job working as a legal secretary because now I was acting as if I was some hot shot and at least when I worked in my uncle's grocery store I knew my place. NJ just agreed with his father as any obedient child would.... and all I could do was back away slowly so they wouldn't notice that I'd ever been there hearing those evil words. Keep me in my place as if I were nothing more than some subservient help staff and not his wife? I was shook by his words. I thought a husband was suppose to want to build up his wife and not tear her down. I thought a husband was suppose to praise her accomplishments and not say that he hated she ever accomplished them. Thankfully, he ended up agreeing eventually to the divorce papers after being demeaning and demanding to not only myself but my attorney's secretary. He honestly didn't have much that he could argue about though and I did that on purpose. I made the divorce paperwork as much to his liking as I could not so much to appease him but to keep him quiet and happy. Also, I'll be honest, in hopes that this would give him an out to just slip away if he so chose to do so. Despite everything, I was still trying so hard to have a relationship of some kind with NJ and LJ and so I was still trying to spend time with them and include them when I could. It was on a trip back home from I believe it was my grandmother's house one day that I was telling AJ and NJ about how I had actually been diagnosed with autism as a child but first I had been diagnosed with ADD and about my journey with that and the different medications that my mother had me try and how difficult that whole process had been for me. I'm not sure why we had started this conversation but I think it was pertaining to bullies at school and people with disabilities or learning limitations and how important it was and is to treat those people nicely and with respect because you never know what they're going through or may have went through. A few days later, in the midst of yet another argument, he asked me suddenly, "I'm not trying to start anything but(he liked to say this before an insult as if it somehow softened the blow to come), do you think all the medications that you were on as kid is what is wrong with you now?" There was also an incident with LJ where there was a stray dog that had followed him home from a bike ride one day and this dog that I had no idea was not in fact a stray but belonged to his friend down the road did not get along with my dog that I had brought home for myself, AJ and Rayne to have as our protector dog. That afternoon when I got home from work I tried to get my dog out of her pen to go inside and when I did the "stray" dog ran inside and started eating her food. She went inside and tried to eat her food and that other dog started to growl. At that point, they both got aggressive towards each other and started to fight, during the midst of it all Rayne got knocked over. I could tell that these two dogs on my property was going to be more than I could handle so I did have an impulse decision and I loaded up said stray in front of LJ so he was aware and I said that I was just going to take said stray down the road a piece far enough away that hopefully it wouldn't come back to our house but maybe be able to find it's home. LJ wasn't happy that I was loading up the dog and taking it off as he claimed my dog was the aggressive one but never the less I told him that the two dogs needed to be separated. I took the dog maybe 3/4 of a mile down the road and when I returned LJ was going on and on about how that dog was his friends dog and where did I dump it and how could I do that? At no point had he mentioned this dog being his friend's beforehand so we fussed back and forth for a minute or two before I told LJ he was being disrespectful and I wasn't listening to this in my home. This created a nightmare situation as LJ quickly then told Wade and Wade starts going off on me. Things were escalating quickly and I could tell it was going to be one of those nights so I told Rayne to quickly grab some toys and get in the car. As I was attempting to leave Wade yelled at me the whole time telling me things such as I better not ever yell at LJ again, how dare I mess with his child and I tried to explain that I was trying to protect Rayne which is also "his child" but he wouldn't listen and kept cussing me and then the cherry on top as I was shutting my door he tells me to never wish him a happy birthday again as this all happened on his birthday and I had sent him a text earlier in the day wishing him well and then, "Your dead to me!!" and my beautiful little girl asks me when I get done crying a few miles down the road, "Mommy, why did daddy say dead?" Well, I was a hypocrite, I was bipolar, I was the worst Christian ever...basically daddy wants me dead. Of course, I didn't tell her that. When we tried to sell the house although he signed the paperwork agreeing to the appointments and he knew that we had 30 days from the signing of the divorce paperwork to sell the house he claimed that I was trying to put him and what was worse two teenage boys out on the street. Although, he had agreed to all the terms and conditions of both the divorce and the selling of the home when it came time for the appointments for people to come see the home he refused to let people inside stating he needed his rest from working nights. Our relator tried to work with both myself and Wade but Wade was not happy no matter the circumstance. We could not have showings in the mornings, we could not show it in the afternoons or the evenings. Finally, the relator called me and stated that since Wade had verbally assaulted another relator and a potential buyer that she wouldn't be able to sell our home until he moved out because it was embarrassing and frankly unsafe. I ended up filing a temporary order of protection against Wade on October 21, 2022 and he was served and moved out on October 25, 2022. I could breath again praise be to God! I felt the air lighten in my home immediately. Before Wade had moved out I felt as if I constantly had an elephant on my chest but now still with some paranoia but with him at least out of the house it only felt as if perhaps a large horse were on my chest instead and with time that lightened too. I started to move the chair from underneath the doorknob at night and just sleep with my taser and pepper spray by my side and eventually, occasionally I would leave the taser and pepper spray out of my bedroom for the night. The order of protection was unfortunately only good for 21 days. We went to court on November 8, 2022 and at that point the Judge found that we could come to an agreement in terms of Rayne by ourselves and stated that we should do our drop off/pick up's of said child at the jail where there are cameras and stay away from each other other than that. I, at that point, wanted the order of protection at least modified to where Wade could have his guns because I mean that was what he was going to school for and I didn't want to completely destroy his life and the Judge agreed to this but what I did not realize was that this would nullify the case altogether. I thought we were simply modifying the order. So, without an order to hold Wade back the abuse continued. I had thrown him and the boys out on the street. He thought I loved the boys but this had shown otherwise. I mean I just assumed he would've went to his mother's house but apparently I had all but thrown them in cardboard boxes on the street. Every time almost that Rayne went to Wade's house after that which he did finally manage to obtain an apartment she would say that Wade would fight and argue with mostly NJ and LJ and that she did not like the yelling. She stated they were always fighting. Wade claimed that I had turned her against him and the boys and I was so evil for doing that. He said that I was the reason that she never wanted to come over because I was spreading lies about him. In fact, I will admit to speaking with adults about him in front of her a time or two but I always tried to keep it light in her presence and when speaking to her directly I would always tell her that her daddy loved her. Daddy is just angry with mommy right now I would say and I would assure her that it had nothing to do with her or NJ, LJ or AJ. Hate and anger is such an ugly and scary thing. On December 2nd, 2022, Wade and NJ cornered me in the Food Giant parking lot as I had come to pick up Rayne after a visit with Wade had not gone well. She had gotten upset about getting hurt while wrestling with LJ and was promptly told by Wade after she started to cry to "stop crying...you are fine!!" to which she cried harder. Wade was never able to handle her tears. He saw them as a waste of time and energy and the same it was to comfort her for more than 30 seconds. It would make her weak he thought. After putting Rayne into my car that night, Wade said "I don't want her to hear this but I'll just get out of y'alls lives so just you can do what you want and I'll just go, that's what you want anyway." I told him that was not what I was saying as we had argued previously over the phone. He claimed that I was feeding her to hate him and I told him that I wanted her to have him in her life but she didn't like his outbursts they scared her. He just said that a lot of people could see what I was doing(I guess he meant his family since by this time I had received hate texts from both his mother and his sister to which I did not respond). I told him if he chose to leave then that would be his choice and he claimed that due to my actions I would be taking him away from her. At this point NJ had pulled up behind Wade and they both started coming at me telling me "Your evil. Your just so evil. Your the most evilest witch ever. How could you do this to Rayne...your such a horrible mother..." I didn't stick around to hear much or to find out what would happen when they both got to me. I got into my vehicle and sped off, noting that there was a policemen that had just parked and thanking God that had things went differently that officer would've been there. After that Wade spoke to us for about another couple of weeks then went MIA for about a month. For Christmas, we got ourselves a new house! It was and is the fresh start that we all needed. Around the time of LJ's birthday in February Rayne had sent him a birthday gift and suddenly, Wade was back in our lives for a time. Rayne also started therapy in late February and by June of this year, 2023 she had learned how to voice her thoughts to Wade. The last we heard from Wade four months ago was in response to her texting him that she didn't like it when he yelled and he said simply and curtly, "Ok Rayne, I'm at work right now and about to start driving so I'll talk to you later. I love you." She was not happy with the response and did not respond back. We have not heard from him since, Rayne is currently working on establishing a relationship with her birth grandmother and her birth father and life is good and peaceful. Wade or the demons within him, I feel learned me well enough that he knew just what strings to pull and just where and how to hurt me the worst and he did just that. He knew all of my weaknesses and all of my past traumas and he used every single one of those to his advantage and to accomplish his goal of dissolving me into a puddle of misery. What he did not count on was the fact that there is a light inside of me and a resilience that will not let me die and I always come back a stronger and better person. Out of the ashes and into a diamond... I do not know if Wade will eventually come back into our lives but as of today we are all still working on our recovery but enjoying not having to live our lives in chaos and constant panic and that is what means the world to me.
By Lindsey Altom2 years ago in Chapters