A Light at the End of the Tunnel

I CAN DO ALL THINGS THROUGH CHRIST WHO STRENGTHENS ME PHILIPPIANS 4:13 This is the true story about my life from what I was told happened to me at birth, my growing up, suffering both physical and sexual abuse, and emotional abuse as well. It is a story of my survival and how I thought that as a child, I was to blame. I didn’t know at the time that this was abnormal behavior or that what was happening to me as a little girl was wrong on so many levels. All I knew was that I was broken, I didn’t trust and I certainly did not tell. As I continued to grow, the abuses changed but by now, I realized just how wrong everything was but I didn’t know who to believe. I had been told so many different things, who could I go to for answers? So I went to the only person who I thought would tell me the truth, that was my birth mother but the words she always said to me didn’t add up, it never did feel genuine and only after her death did I learn the real truth. Life was a constant storm, one after the other as I grew, and married and had a family of my own, how I vowed as a teenager that if or when I had my own children, they would never endure the many ways in which I was so wrongly treated. This is a story of survival, one of abuse, a life lived in a home full of dysfunction, alcoholism, depression. I had feeling of despair, anger, betrayal, pain, yet I also had feeling of determination, resolve and hope for a better future. I was a child of God and I trusted and believed that a better life lay ahead for me and my children. My biggest issue of all was not trusting. At a certain point in my life I had built walls so high, it was my way to protect myself from anyone ever hurting me again. It took years for that wall to be chipped away, little by little until I was able to find love again and learn that as broken as I thought I was, I was still loveable. 35 years, 6 months and 19 days after the birth of my son Andrew Scott, when his life came to a sudden and tragic end, my life ended too in ways I could not imagine. Life had been so good. I was so happy to be back home to Southern California. I could not possibly comprehend what was happening any more. Never in my wildest imagination could I believe I was now the parent of a child who had died. My world exploded into an emotional madness that nearly destroyed me until I received a book from an unknown person, who had read my posts on Facebook of my loss and she reached out to me by sending me a book written by Sandy Peckinpah, a book about loss, a book about surviving the worst that could happen and she knew exactly what she was writing about because she too, had lost a son at 16 years old. There were 5 words in that book that just jumped off the page and made me decide then and there that I would HONOR MY CHILD BY HEALING. I was only a few weeks into this Grief Storm, one that would take me back to my childhood, reliving the abuses I endured as a child, the feelings of being abandoned, abused, unloved, unwanted, broken and insecure. Never feeling that I was ever good enough or worthy of being loved. But those 5 words made me realize it was time to tell my story, as well as my beloved son because he left a legacy that needed to be told. This is my story, others may disagree with some of what has been written within these pages, but everyone is entitled to their own opinions but I promise one thing, nobody knows what it feels like to lose a child, unless they have been where I’ve been. The hope I have with writing this book is that others like me, and I know there are thousands and thousands who have suffered like I have or who have lost a child like I have, there is hope, there is life after loss. I may never be healed from the loss of my child but I will move forward and live my life the best that I can. Life was denied to Andy and it’s my, our responsibility to honor Andrew and a life that was cut short in his prime. I know he wouldn’t want it any other way. Resiliency, that is the word that best describes me now, I have learned I am a survivor and am capable of surviving the worst things ever in life because I already have. God will never give me more than I can handle but sometimes I think He has more confidence in me than I’ve had in myself. I have survived the unthinkable, the loss of a child and here I am, moving forward. They say when the going gets tough, the tough get going and I guess that would describe me. I hope that you, my reader will find the courage to tackle the demons that are working to keep you down, beat them back and stand up and fight back, take back the control of your life. If I did it, and who am I? I’m just like you, a wife, mother, grandmother, great grandmother who has survived the worst that life can throw at me, if I could do it, so can you. Just believe in yourself, you are worthy of love. ~Sally