So this is [Part 3] of the story, if you haven't done so already please read [Part 1] & [Part 2] then come back to [Part 3] But I must issue this warning:

IF YOU ARE PRONE TO VIOLENT OR EMOTIONAL OUTBURSTS DO NOT READ ANY FURTHER! YOU HAVE BEEN WARNED!

(My Mother)

Summer Vacations (Continued):

Once we got back to my Godfather's in Atlanta, GA I don't really remember seeing my mom for the next year. It turned out to be quite nice too. However, just as I was starting to think she was gone and I could have a normal life she shows up out of the blew; ready to take me on another Summer Vacation to Florida....different boyfriend this time. So down to Florida we go again, I reckon I was 8 or 9 at this time. I don't remember ever meeting this dude, which is probably why the next part of this story will churn your stomach and enrage you to no end.

We had been there a few days and no boyfriend in site. Sandy (mom's #2 personality) was getting madder by the second. Finally, on a Friday (I think) night she puts me in the car and drives to a bar, telling me to stay in the car....It is hot as "two rats jacking off in a wool sock" in Florida in the summertime, especially in a car with all the windows up and no motor/ac running; but I did as I was told. At some point I passed out from the heat and didn't wake up until late that night/early the next morning. Apparently, Sandy couldn't find anyone to fuck because she had her "kid" with her so when she came out of the bar (hammered like a railroad spike) she was the maddest I think I have ever seen her. I was expecting the beating of my life when we got home; what I got (or rather was forced to do) was far far worse than any beating she ever gave me.

As soon as we walked into the house she went and grabbed her loaded 357 (actually my dad's but he had to leave with nothing) and ordered me into the bedroom. When I walked in she was in bed, as naked as a newborn with her legs spread as wide as she could get them. While staring at the gun cocked and pointed at me I was informed it was my fault she didn't get laid and that I had 3 seconds to get in the damn bed and satisfy her. I was a smart kid, but even I had no fucking idea what would "satisfy her". After what seemed like days (actually only hours) I had had enough and reigned myself to death by gun at the hands of my mother. I raised up and told her "no more" and started to get out of the bed. Before I could get out of reach she backhanded me with the but of the gun and knocked me out cold. When I woke up I was shoved down between the bed and the wall (bed was in a corner) and being screamed at not to "move a damn inch or I will get my brains blown out". So I waited until she fell asleep and then I slid under the bed and then sneaked out to my bed.

The next thing I remember, we were back in Atlanta. Mom was around a little more often and for longer periods of time now. When she was around she was dragging me to every bar in Atlanta.

Learning to Drive:

Of course as soon as she started dragging me to the bars with her things went from bad to worse in a hurry. Now I not only had to worry about getting the hell beat out of me by her, but I had to worry about what else she would do or allow others to do. Among other things she had me learn to shoot pool (I was really really good) and as soon as she saw how good I was she started demanding I hustle money for her alcohol and drugs. I was 9 motherfucking years old and was paying for my mom's booze and drugs, out of sheer terror of what would happen if I didn't. When I wasn't able to find someone to "hustle" she would sale my body (rent me out) to whoever for whatever. Most of the time it was rather benign and I was just tasked with running errands, fetching drinks, cleaning puke out of drunk bastards cars, etc. There were, however, the occasional "other times".

On more than one occasion I was sent into the bathroom to find "friends of my mom" there waiting for me. I don't remember any guys, but I know there were more than a few women. It would seem that even at that young age I had other gifts if you know what I mean. I had no damn clue, mind you, but they seemed to enjoy themselves.

The real adventures started when we would leave the bars. By the time they kicked us out I was having to carry mom to the car. She was always bound and determined to drive and was convinced she was capable of doing so. Usually with in the first couple miles or half dozen red lights she was out like a burned out light bulb. It never seemed to happen while we were stopped, either. Needless to say I learned how to hold her upright with one arm and drive with the other while sitting in the middle of the car.

During one of these adventures we lived almost 70 miles west of Atlanta and I was way too tired (been bar hopping for 3 days straight) to drive that far....especially considering she kept waking up and fighting with me. So I was heading to my Grandparents house on the Southwest corner of Atlanta when mother wakes up, grabs the wheel and swerves down a side street (with the intent of going back to the bar); of course she does this right in front of a cop, almost hitting him head on in the process. By the time he recovers and pursues us I am already pulling over. He arrests my mother on the spot, but much to my surprise allows me to follow him to the East Point police station in the car, which happened to belong to my Grandparents. When my grandfather finally arrived to pick me up the officer told them to "bring me back tomorrow morning". I was shitting bricks the size of Buicks all night....convinced that cop was trying to figure out if he could arrest me for something. 

Then the next morning we walk into the police station and the officer immediately escorts me to Booking. I had seen enough jails by this point to know exactly what the hell happens when you go to Booking. I am shaking so bad they can't get my picture, after about 10 tries they finally get one that doesn't look like I am demon possessed or shifting out of phase with this reality. He then escorts back to the lobby to "wait" with my grandfather. About an hour later, he walks out with something in his hand....as he reaches out towards me he says "here you go young man, be safe out there" and hands me a Driver License. It was a hardship license but it was a drivers license....at 10 years old. I found out later that he had seen me driving earlier and had circled around and was coming back to see if he "saw what he thought he saw".

Not long after that my mom started her disappearing act again, only coming around when she needed something from my Godfather or Grandparents (ie - money). She would routinely threaten to take me away, kill me or worse to get what she wanted. My grandparents wound up buying her a Horse, Horse Trailer and Pickup truck around the time I was turning 11. I had spent quite a bit of time around Timberridge Stables in Douglasville, GA when my mother was around in the years prior and had learned to break, train and compete horses.

Mom's trying to be normal:

So we are starting to spend more and more time together, and she is Mom more than anyone else. We begin riding together and I even trained one of her prized horses (who later won 7 National Championships and went to the Olympics). However, at the age of 10, while training a pony for Mr. Mac (the owner of Timberridge Stables) the horse got spooked and took off so fast I went sliding right off his ass. I had always been told, "never let go of the reins" so I held on for dear life. In the process of trying to pull myself back on the horse the reins got tangled around my right elbow. My elbow was shattered in over 100 pieces by the time they got the pony stopped almost an hour later....yes I got drug around a 1.5 acre arena for an hour.

Mom took me to the hospital in Douglasville, which at that time was barely more than a Walk-in Clinic. When they couldn't help she took me to another, much larger, hospital in Lithia Springs, GA. They wanted to replace my elbow but mom refused, even though my grandparents would have gladly paid for it. She demanded they put a cast on it so I could go back to work (breaking horses - especially ones that she wanted or already owned).

So for the next 6 months my arm was in a cast at a 40 degree angle from my shoulder all the way to the tips of my fingers. When they cut the cast off and took xrays of my arm they said it had healed back fused and they had to re-break my arm and cast it for another 6 months.

The day I got the cast off the second time I went back to Timberridge Stables and Mr. Mac asked me if I would finish breaking that pony, it turned out no one else could even get on it, much less ride it. So off to the barn I went, I opened the stall door and stepped and as soon as I did that pony spun around and kicked me in the collar bone so hard I flew through a double 2X10 oak plank wall. I got up, walked back to Mr. Mac and with tears running down my face and a big shoe print on my shirt said "give me your damn pistol". He had never heard me cuss, but did not hesitate to hand it over. I walked back to the barn and shot that damn horse right between the motherfucking eyes. Now I am not condoning cruelty to animals in anyway, but that horse was about as off in the head as my mother and since I couldn't shoot her (legally) I shot the horse. Before I could even walk back to the main arena to give Mr. Mac his gun back he had already found Fred (the stable hand) and told him to go dispose of the dead horse in the long barn. He, like me, knew that if I couldn't break that horse no one could and that sooner or later it would kill someone. We never spoke of it after that and no one ever told my mother what I did that day. Oh and just so everyone knows, that was 33 years ago and my collar bone is still broken, I couldn't get it fixed because that would mean Mother finding out what I had done; so I hid the pain and never said anything.

So much for normal:

Not long after that I am back staying with my Godfather and mom is, who the hell knows where. A few months pass and she shows up one day in her pickup, so drunk she can't even get out of the truck. She just sits there blowing the horn at 6 am on a Saturday until my godfather and I go outside. She demands I get in the truck with her....I think she was planning on "renting me out" again. My godfather was trying to talk some sense into her when she back handed me with the keys in her hand. It laid my forehead open almost from temple to temple. She then pushed my head down into the floorboard and sat a cup on my back and told me it better be still sitting there when she came back. Well as soon as I heard the front door of the house close, I jumped out of the truck and took off running down the street. I couldn't see a damn thing and was soon grabbed by a man about 2 blocks away. A neighbor lady had already seen me running down the street and called and ambulance. Thankfully it arrived before my mother found me. The police arrived at the hospital within a minute or two of me, before they had starting drugging me or stapling my head back together and when he heard what had happened from me he called a judge at home and got a temporary custody order issued. A few hours later my grandparents (with the blessing of the court) picked me up from the hospital.

I was only with them a few days before mom showed up, drunk with guns loaded, demanding I tell the court it was all a lie; or else "she would kill my grandparents". So a few days later when my granddad took me to court I perjured the shit out of myself and was immediately released back to my mother.

Sometime after that, it wasn't long though. I get suspended from school and don't tell mom. When the school catches me hiding on the playground they call her....even after I told them the hell she had put me through they called her. Before we even made it out of the school I was being carried because of the beating I got. Of course, as soon as we got home I got more beating, for hours and hours and hours. When she tired she called my grandparents and said they had one hour to come get me and bring $5,000 or I would be dead when they arrived.

I am not how they did it, because my grandfather never got into a hurry but he made it in time. They had to carry me to the car. They wouldn't take me to a hospital for fear of what my mom might do if the courts got involved again so to there house I went. I was in such bad shape this time I didn't move off the couch in the family room for 3 months without help....wasn't by choice either....I couldn't move, stand....hell I couldn't even sit up leaning back on the couch...I was so weak every time I tried I face planted into the floor. When I finally did recover they had to put me into a private school (Southern Baptist Christian School)....I could learn more standing in the middle of a busy intersection watching cars go by and don't even get me started on the "God did this" and "God did that" they forced down your throat.

Other than the school things were pretty good with my grandparents for about a year. My grandfather was a Southern Baptist preacher at a small church in Fairburn, GA. One day during Sunday morning service a black family walked in and sat near the middle of the Chapel. He immediately stopped preaching and just stood there staring at them til they got up and left. A few minutes later they snuck back in and sat in the otherwise empty back row. Other than me, my grandfather was the only one that saw them so he kept preaching. As soon as the service was over, I did what I always did and went and introduced myself and thanked them for coming. My grandfather chose that moment to let me see him get mad, the one and only time I ever saw him get mad. He grabbed me by the arm and drug me to his study, locking the door behind me and began beating the "devil" out of me. The deacons of the church had to break the door down to stop him. I think he was intent of killing me and I was glad they rescued me. He wound up loosing half his congregation that day.

Ward of the state:

By the age of 12 I was back living with my mom on a Pig/C0w farm near Dallas, GA. We had several horses and she had gotten into Competitive Horse Racing....where you race other horses/riders through the woods and get judged on you, your horse and how well you work together. So while training for a ride she decided I wasn't learning fast enough and took a 12' horse whip and beat me until I ran my horse in a perfect figure 8. Just to spite her I won't the damn horse race that weekend which lead to another beating when we got home. I turned 13 that weekend so Monday when I went back to school, during home room I got a pass and went to see my Counselor. As soon as I walked in her office I started undressing and stating "you won't believe me if you don't see it". Before I could finish getting undressed she had the police and local judge called. Thirty minutes later I was undressing in a court room. The judge asked me what I wanted and I told him that I was now 13 and that I understood at that age I could sign myself into State Custody, he affirmed that was correct on a 30 day temporary basis and had the clerk draw up the paperwork. That afternoon I went to my first foster family.

  *** I am going to have to extend this yet again. You have no idea how taxing it is to write this story and sadly what's to come in [Part 4] will not be much better. Please follow me and check back for more of the story! ***