Round Trip Weekend

This weekend I traveled 170 plus miles in a borrowed van (since my car is still not repaired) to see my teen at the facility she is staying in. She got transferred from the regular juvenile facility, thank goodness and went onto this more of a residential in-house treatment for neglected and/or abused kids; not that she was abused here in my home, but was verbally, psychologically, and (? sexually) at her Dad's residence. They have a great program there to help build her self-esteem, finish schooling, and learn coping life skills. I am hoping she will have gained something valuable by this experience.

In case some of you are just now tuning in to this saga, the teen decided Memorial Day weekend that she wanted "out of here!" but calling the cops three times landed her in the local juvenile facility, not exactly where she had intended to go. Battering me to the point of ripping my shirt and putting bruises on me, over a 3-day period, did not help her case when she called the cops. Yep, she shot herself in the foot, but she also had her Dad egging her on. I figured she was back talking to him, as her behavior demonstrates this oh so well. I will save you the long story of custody battle and other such ugliness that has festered over the years. If you're interested in reading that history, click here. My girlfriend tells me this is a better drama than the lifetime movie, and tells me to write this novel, but I told her I'd probably end up just taking it to Oprah cause I'm too damned tired to care anymore.

Anyway, being able to see her smile was worth all the miles I traveled on Saturday. She seems genuinely sorry for this to have happened, and I do feel she is ready to come home before her actual court date of July 7th. Laying eyes upon her, she is indeed a beautiful girl, but still troubled underneath all that, and was surprised to see me as she didn't know I was coming! She has worked hard to get all her credits to be a senior while in this facility and I am proud of that. I am hoping this experience will have helped her gain some respect for me, for herself.

I did pick up on her anxiety over how she feels the court date will turn out, despite my trying to alleviate her fears as did the staff there. She also asked me to call her father and let her know where she was and what happened... uh...yeah, over my dead body! I know it was Father's Day this weekend, but he is no father, he is an abuser. She was only six, a baby, when the court decided she should live with him, so dysfunction and abuse is all she has known. It was truly sad, a deep heart wound that still brings me to tears.

Getting her to go to school all year has proved fruitless due to her Dad's arrest, incarceration, and still impending trial set for July 20th. There seems to be little doubt, based on Bobbi's behaviors since separating from his residence, that she in all probability was sexually molested as well. She says not, but she cannot remember events from her childhood. While he was verbally and psychologically abusive, controlling, and manipulating of everyone in his life, it certainly took away the innocence of her childhood. Not too long ago, my sister told me something she learned from mother. I know this may sound a little weird to some of you who don't believe in spirits or mediums or psychics. Mother has been dead since 2004 but through a medium (which was happenstance through my niece who was visiting with this medium and sparked her curiosity to ask her) it was told to my niece from my mother that my ex started abusing Bobbi as a game when she was only three years of age.

When she told me this, I nearly vomited; it all fits perfectly, all his abuse towards me, all his efforts at separating my daughter from her own family and even from me, lying to get custody and making me look crazy, his trying to hide it, her anger with having to live with it and now as a teen having social and behavioral problems from all his control, abuse and manipulation; God! what a nightmare the last 10 years have been. That sick bastard. Nobody knows unless they've lived with evil. Lord help my baby girl get through all of this.

His trial starts July 20th. He is accused of 12 counts of rape and sodomy of a child under 12. I pray that there will finally be closure from the deep heart wounds that he has caused me and my children.