What's your greatest accomplishment?

serendipity

Ok, folks, here's an opportunity to pat yourself on the back.

What do you feel is the greatest accomplishment of your life thus far? How did you celebrate it?

Lady Lee

surviving and being nothing like my parents

Then my daughters

then an education

mrsjones5

Our kids, our marriage, my career , our house

serendipity

Hi MrsJones & Lady Lee,

How about elaborating a bit. Why were the things you mentioned such accomplishments? I'm a newbie here and don't know your stories.

mrsjones5

My kids: I had problems conceiving so I didnt ever think I would have one much less four.

My marriage: Married 13 years, in this day and age I think that's pretty good.

Our house: I used to live in California where only 23 percent of the population can afford a home. I never thought I would be able to buy a house until I moved to Indiana.

My career: My parents doubted that I would find a job or make any money after I graduated from design school, I proved them wrong.

serendipity

Hi MrsJones,

Ah, now I understand. You should be very proud !

Lady Lee

You want the long version or the short version? It'll be easier to post the short one - point form

mother got pregnant and as a good Catholic girl decided to marry my father then give the baby (me) up for adoption. Instead she took me home and wound up having 3 more boys.
home was physically and emotionally abusive - lots of screaming, yelling, police coming to the house - general mayhem (saw my mother being strangled in her bedroom - she knocked him out before he killed her)
mother finally left my father and took the 2 youngest but left the oldest boy and me with a friend
father found us and kidnapped us and then the sexual abuse began - got infections - police were called and we went to live with my mother and her boyfriend (who were beginning to study with JWs)
Mother already had custody of her 3 brothers and her younger sister (taken from their father for sexual abuse)
mother and now Common-Law-husband had a baby
so in the apt we had 3 teenaged boys, and 3 boys under the age of 10, my aunt (1 year older than me), me(11 yrs old) my sister (1 yr old) and my grandmother and mother and CL-husband (grandmother and her 3 boys and daughter were all baptized JWs)
1 of the teenaged uncles caught abusing the younger kids - he was the one who got sent away
all teen uncles were abusing my aunt and I
CLhusband was caught sexually abusing my aunt so PO recommended she be sent to another one of her sisters to live (abuse not reported and abuser left in the house)
Then he was caught sexually abusing me - PO recommended I be sent to foster care 0 again keep the abuser and get rid of the victim
abuser kidnapped my sister and sexually abused her then he disappeared and soon after mother got baptized
in foster care (for 3 years) I was emotionally and physically abused.
then went back to live with my mother when I was 16. Forced to quit high school to take care of my sister
mother arranges a marriage to a new person at the hall (he got baptized 1 week before we got married (she proposed and set the date)
2 weeks after I was married I knew it was a terrible mistake but had no where to go
I stayed and was emotionally and sexually abused by husband who also physicaly and emotionally abused our 2 daughters
after 15 years of abuse and becoming dangerously suicidal I committed adultery to get him to leave me alone and get my divorce and was DFed
went back to school (college as a mature student and graduated with honors) then went on to University
stupidly moved across country and married a man - not too bad in the beginning but as I became more disabled he became more emotionally abusive (more than once he would walk in the door at night and ask if this was the day I was going to "off myself"
on my own again and loving it even though dealing with the disability is a hassle but it is nothing compared to all the previous stuff

Well there's the outline for my book

Wow Lady Lee, you are a survivor! You're life started off badly and you tenaciously turned it around. You're a very courageous person to be willing to live alone with a disability. So many would have been afraid to leave. Congrats to you!

Lady Lee

serendipity

It was either survive it or die. My sister committed suicide 1 month ago. She didn't survive the childhood.

The disability can be worked around if I have what I need to manage. It is nothing in comparison to all the rest of the crap. And to be positive about it - the crap was a good training ground for surviving

I'm still here

Now aren'tcha glad ya asked?

What's your greatest accomplishment?

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