RUNNING BUT NOT HIDING/ A TRUE STORY WRITTEN BY MY DAUGHTER EMILY

Running But Not Hiding

You know I came from Domestic Violence alittle over 2 Years ago.
I had enough,The pain and Torture was just to much for me to continue my life the way it was. If I did not get out then I knew some one would wind up dead or in Jail.
I had to make a decision and make it fast and stick to it.
Theres so many things that Keep victims where there at but it takes alot of courage to get out and stay out.
You have no real mind left from all the years of abuse so any thing you do or say is not really you.
I had a real eye opener. after I left and started to rebuild my life piece by piece my Daughter had to write a story for her English paper for a final. Needless to say she did not tell me she wrote it,her teacher called me absolutely horrified over it.
He sent it to me and boy when I read it I cryed for hours knowing that this story is through the eyes of a babe.
The impact that we put our children through will devaste their lives forever.
The memories and the feelings seeing things,hearing things will haunt them for ever. I just hope I have built some kind of foundation that they can over come the horrible things we lived through.
Here is my Daughter Emilys Story.
Running but Not Hiding
"Why does this have to happen to me?" I whisper to myself as I'm curled up into a corner on top of my bed.
Smeared make-up burns my cheeks as the black eyeliner and mascara trickles down slowly making its way to my pillows and blankets.
" I don't think I can take much more of this. I can't stand to live here anymore. It's just getting too bad."
" God, please help me? Just help me get out of here, make my life better. I will do anything if you help me God, ANYTHING." I say this looking up at the ceiling, only hoping that God is listening, hoping that God will answer my prayers, and that God will listen to me.
All I hear in the background is my dad yelling.
"You are worthless, you are ugly and fat, I hope you die you fucking slut." those words jumble in my head as I think about what just happened.
There's nothing much that I can do except lay in my bed and cry.
I hear, Rick, my dad, yelling at my mom and the sound of my moms' painful screams as he throws punch after punch at her.
I sit here and cry and only hope she will be ok when he gets done with her. I'm not strong enough to fight against him. He will hurt me worse then I could possibly imagine, but I can't stand to sit here and let him hurt my mom like that. What am I supposed to do? Thousands of things race through my head at once, flash back after flask back, ideas, memories, pictures, people, everything.
The phone startles me as I hear my favorite ring tone, Summer Nights by Lil Rob, and I look over at the caller id and I see that its my best friend, Jessica. An instant smile emerges from my teary face. Jessica has always been my best friend. We have been best friends since before I could possibly remember. She's the one
person that has always made me happy. I answer the phone and she immediately responds with " HEY LOVE! How are you?"
She knows something is wrong when I don't say a word and she can hear me crying in the background. "Emily, what happened? Talk to me. You're scaring me." My eyes overflow with tears and just pour out. It's something I can't control but I don't want Jessica to worry.
" I'm coming right now Emily, everything's going to be ok, I love you," replies Jessica.
I lay on my bed squeezing my teddy bear that Jessica got me for Christmas as I think about how grateful I am to have such a wonderful best friend like her to help me get through these rough times in my life. She's more like a sister to me. She has always been there for me, through thick and through thin; I can always count on her. Jessica lives down the street approximately five minutes away. Over all the yelling at my mom from Rick, I hear the doorbell ring. I'm worried about how Rick will react to Jessica coming over. I peek out my bedroom door and just briefly get a glimpse of Jessica at the door.
"What do you want?!" says Rick
"I would like to talk with Emily real fast."
"Well she is not available right now, so you can't see her. Come back later maybe."
"Well it's really important sir, my mom needs me to ask her something."
"What do you need to ask her? I will pass it on to her."
" Well see sir, it's kind of private."
" NOTHING is private in my house. LEAVE THIS INSTANT!" Rick yells as loud as he can.
I burst into tears at this point. "Why does Rick have to make my life like this? Why is he such a horrible person? Why did this have to happen to me? WHY ME?"
I learned to try not to disobey Rick or I will get beat and that's one thing I can't take. I can't take him beating me and calling me bad names and the cursing. It kills me inside. I hear my phone ring again and I answer it and it is Jessica.
"Emily, tell me what happened NOW!"
"Well he was really drunk and he came in my room to talk to me. Then he started talking nasty to me telling me how I'm a foxy girl and how I have great boobs and legs and that is when my mom comes in and she yells at him to get out. He says to my mom, "You're lucky I haven't raped her yet." My mom was furious and flipped out on him for saying that about me. Then he started beating her. I watched him beat my mom. I watched her suffer and I know there wasn't anything that I can do about it. All I hear is his loud voice yelling and cursing. I can't take it anymore, Jessica, I just can't do it." Jessica loses her breath. She was so shocked about what I just told her. " I wish there was something I can do to help, Emily." replies Jess.
" I'm going to ask my mom if you can stay with me for awhile. Everything will be ok babe. Don't worry about it, I promise." Says Jessica.
As she left I was getting ready to go to bed. I tucked my sheets and blankets around me and moved around until I found this cozy warm spot on my bed. I start to fall into this deep sleep. Thousands of things are rushing through my head at once: Chris, Rick, mom, my past, Jessica, all my friends, and a better life. I try to fall asleep listening to Rick's drunken ass yell for no reason. As he yells I start to have flash back him...
I remember his loud voice, him always telling me I'm worthless and nothing, I remember him beating me and smiling. With all the bad memories that I have of him, such as how he made me half-deaf from him yelling so much around me while I was a baby, I realize he's part of the reason I have such low self -esteem. He's the reason I never got close to a father like figure. I awoke screaming and crying. I was happy that my mother got rid of my Him. It was hard for me to call anyone "dad" for that exact reason. We needed to escape and have a better life than this. My mom walks into my room and the crackling of the door opening slowly startles me. She asks me if I'm ok and I tell her that I'm just concerned about her right now. She tells me her plan for moving. She wants to get away, make our life better. She doesn't like how are life is now. We are suppose to able to live happily and we aren't happy here.
"Where will we go mom?"
"Em, I don't believe I can answer that right now, not even I know."
"Mom, I know as well as you do that we can't make it on our own. How are we going to do it?"
"We will figure out a way, we always seem to manage and you know that."
"I love you, Mom..."
"I love you, Emmy. I'm trying to make this better for us. You shouldn't have to live like this, I'm sorry for putting you through all of this."
"It's ok... I know you only wanted the best for us."
"I tried to make our life the best. I didn't mean my life to turn out like this."
"I'm going to try to sell everything while he's gone and that way we have money to move. I want to move as far away from him as possible. We need to start our lives over. This will be better for us honey, you and I both know that. This is what we have been waiting for."
"I hope you are right mom... I don't know how much more of this I can take."
"Plan for us to be gone by Tuesday, which leaves you with three days to get everything packed and have your good-byes said to everyone."
"Are we really doing this?"
"Yes... finally... we're breaking free."
All I can do is break down and cry at this point. I don't know what to say to what my mom just told me. She wraps her arms around me to comfort me. I am crying for everything I'm leaving. "How am I suppose to leave to a whole new state in the middle of my sophomore year? How am I suppose to leave Jessica?" I whisper to myself. It kills me inside at the fact that I have to leave my best friend, the one person that has been there for me ALWAYS and FOREVER. I had to tell her since I would be leaving in less then three days... I just didn't know how I was going to tell her. How was I going to do this without breaking down? I don't think I can leave her not even if my life is this bad. I would go through anything to be with her. I couldn't imagine my life without her.
The next morning I go to school, it was the normal routine, wake up, shower, eat, do my
hair, do my make up and walk to school. The only thing different today was I was extremely sad and everyone could tell. All I heard all day was " What's wrong, Emily?" I didn't want to talk to anyone; I couldn't find the courage to tell people about what's happening. Jessica had to be the first person I told... and I'm going to make sure of that. Jess comes up to me while I'm at my locker first thing in the morning and she gives me her normal hug but she can tell something was bugging me so I had to tell her what was wrong.
"Jessica, my mom just told me we are moving Tuesday..." I reply. Tears start to ball up in my eyes and I can't keep them in.
"Are you serious?" " You must be joking " Jess replied.
"My mom wants to start over, have a better life, she wants to move to a different state, we don't really know where we are moving to yet but it's a for sure thing this time."
"I don't know what to say..." tears start to build up in Jessica's eyes and it brings me so much pain.
My last days here are spent with my friends. I had the most memorable and amazing times of my life, probably the only times that I was actually happy living in California.
Tuesday morning comes and everything is packed and we shove the boxes into our van and leave on our way with our "new life" as my mom calls it. She decided to move to Renton in Washington. It's been a long journey for my mom and me. This trip has made us grow closer to each other then ever before. When we finally got settled in, I meet this girl and her name was Ashley. Little did I know, this girl would change my life drastically. As I slowly get to know her we become better friends. She introduces me to people that will soon become my close friends and most importantly she becomes my best friend and we become inseparable. I start to love my life and even though it was a hard adjustment, it was probably the best decision my mom and I made. Someone once told me " If you have hit rock bottom, things can't get any worse, they can only get better." I will come to realize that this is the quote of my life and actually what has happened to me. My life did get better and now I never have to worry about being hit again and I don't have to live in fear anymore. Sometimes making a change is the best thing to do even though it seems like it would be hard. Now all I can do is think of my future and never have to turn back and hide. No longer will I hide from my fears, I will face them and nothing will put me down anymore.