BITTER MEMORIES: A Memoir of Heartache & Survival

by Sue Julsen

  I’d overheard Olivia talking on the phone earlier that day, so I already knew no one else in my family wanted me. I saw no other alternative until Auntie Bitch moved and I could return home to Granddad’s house. I’d already decided I didn’t want to live with Olivia full time, but I didn’t know where I’d go if I didn’t agree to what my uncle had asked.

  “I guess so…if you’re sure you want me.”

  “We love you, Sarah, and you’re my sister’s daughter. We want to adopt you.”

  “Adopt me!?” I screeched. “What about Grandmother and Granddad? They love me, too! Who’s gonna live with them? Auntie’s going back to Dallas! They won’t have anyone!”

  “They have each other, Sarah. My parents are getting up in years and they’re too old to raise you. That’s why I brought your clothes last night. You’ll be living here from now on.”

  Just as I thought! They didn’t give a damn what I might’ve wanted!

  Like I’d already assumed, I’d just have to make the best of it, and hoped I could get along with Olivia. Still, I didn’t believe for one second that she really wanted me, and I felt very sure she didn’t want me on a full time, permanent basis anymore that I wanted to be with her.

  “Uncle Henry? Can I ask you a question?”

  “Sure.”

  “At the funeral, I saw this man, and I felt I should know him. His name’s John. Who is he?”

  “I don’t believe this child!” Olivia shouted, then stood up with her hands on her hips, glaring. “We’re giving her a home, food, clothing, an education, your name, and all she wants to know is, ‘who’s John!’”

  “Olivia, that’s enough! She has a right to know.”

  “Fine! I’m going to bed!” She looked at me with her alien mouth and black monster eyes, then stomped out of the room.

  She’s pissed, but I can’t worry about her right now.

  “Who is he, Uncle Henry? Should I know him? Please, tell me.”

  “Sarah, you met John years ago, but only briefly. He married and had already left home before you were born. Your mama talked every night about him, until your daddy, being the bastard he is, said he didn’t want that name mentioned in his house again.”

  “I don’t remember Mama talking about him. Who is he?”

  “John is your big brother, Sarah. Your mother’s son from a previous marriage.”

  My jaw dropped, and I swear, if I hadn’t been sitting on the floor, I would’ve fallen flat on my face!

  We talked a few more minutes, then I went to bed, feeling exhausted but very happy. I finally knew why I’d had that connection to the tall, good-looking stranger, and nothing else mattered, at the moment.

  Lying in bed, I whispered into the darkness, “John is my brother. Uncle Henry wants me, and I have a big brother!”

  I had the biggest grin on my face as I fell asleep thinking about my brother and the new life ahead of me.

  Epilogue

  Tying Up Loose Ends

  After Mama and I returned to Texas, even though I didn’t remember her, my grandparents, the house, or anything else, I felt so lucky, and somewhat happy, to be home with people who seemed to want and love me.

  I looked forward to getting to know my mother again, and maybe, in time, even remembering her. Of course, I didn’t get that chance. I’d only been home six months when she died, and that wasn’t even close to being enough time to get to really know her, or anything else.

  Mama died still being nothing more to me than a nice lady who came and brought me back to a place she called home; a nice lady who had promised never to leave me—never to let me out of her sight again.

  Thankfully, I do still have a few pictures of her, and Mama was a beautiful woman. I look at her pictures today and wish I could remember something about her before the abduction, but all those memories are gone, forever.

  Did I love Mama? Damned right I did! And, I still do.

  I love the memory of the nice lady who rescued me. I love the memory I put into my head of a woman who gave birth to me, looked for me, found me, and brought me home to be with her.

  I love what could’ve been if she’d lived.

  I love the dream that my life would’ve been as close to normal as possible being with a woman who, I believe, would’ve loved me with all her heart. A woman who would’ve been my best friend and helped me to grow into a decent, loving, worthwhile adult.

  That dream will live on forever—in my heart.

  But, in the real world, I don’t know if Mama’s death was an accident, suicide, or murder. I always wanted to believe it was an accident like Henry had said, but deep down I never believed that.

  If only Mama had lived…would I know what a normal life was supposed to be like, or was it already too late for me? Would I be a better person than I am today? I’m sure Mama would’ve been someone I could’ve talked to. She would’ve been my best friend and, I’m positive, same as I loved her, she would’ve loved me just as any normal mother loves her child.

  Yes, that dream will definitely live forever in my heart.

  So, here I was in a new home with strangers, and for once in my life, I had hope for my future. I knew I wouldn’t have to worry about going hungry or being left alone in a car, but Olivia had me scared. I’d already survived life with an evil stepmother, and since Olivia didn’t like me, I didn’t know what to expect from her.

  Soon after I came to live with them, I had my first exposure to bigotry. Henry and Olivia were extremely prejudiced, mainly against anyone African American or Hispanic, but that, I figured, I could deal with. I’d just have to be very careful that Olivia, especially, never found out I made friends with people I knew she wouldn’t approve of. People she believed, because of skin color, were “scum of the earth”.

  I guess she didn’t know there are good and bad in all races.

  When I started to school I found it very difficult to find anyone who lived up to Olivia’s standards. Because of my uncle being a cop, it was difficult to meet anyone who wanted to be friends with me. The majority of kids were afraid I’d run home and tell “the cop” they drank beer or smoked pot, or any other unlawful things they did, and he’d arrest them.

  Of course they were totally wrong, but needless to say, I didn’t have many friends growing up. Actually, I could count on one hand, and still have three or more digits left over, the number of friends I had each school year from grade school through high school.

  It was a rather lonely existence, but I figured, so what? I wasn’t allowed to leave my yard to play with the few kids in my own neighborhood, and I couldn’t invite anyone over to my house, or go to anyone else’s house, so I could live without friends.

  Besides, nothing could ever be worse than what I’d already been through, and definitely, nothing could compare to the torture Janet, the stepmother from hell, had dished out. So, not having friends—that was a piece of cake!

  After Henry and Olivia adopted me, the time I spent alone with Henry was great, but in a short amount of time I found out words could hurt just as much—if not more than—Janet’s torture tactics.

  Over and over again I heard from Olivia that I was a ‘pathetic, good-for-nothing, useless kid’, and that I’d ‘never amount to anything’. After hearing these words enough, I began to believe I really was no-good just like Daddy.

  I grew up believing I was a disgrace; never should’ve been born. I was unlovable, and that was the reason, even if she’d wanted to, Olivia couldn’t love me.

  Whoever said ‘sticks and stones can break your bones, but words can never hurt you’ didn’t live with a person like Olivia. Her words cut deeply. They hurt like hell!

  Still, my life had started out as crap, so the only way I could go was up. Right? But I had no self-confidence whatsoever to make it up. How could I? Most of my life I’d been told how bad I was, and then to hear over and over again the words: ‘pathetic, useless, no-good, stupid, worthless’, to name a few, I didn’t think I had a snowball’s chance in h
ell of growing up to be a decent human being.

  With Daddy, and then again with Janet, I’d learned how to stay alive. With Daddy, I had to steal just to eat, and with Janet every single day was a struggle to survive. Thank God, I had a means of escape! I had the others to protect me.

  But with Olivia, I needed to learn a whole new set of rules. Not to stay alive, but to live day by day without getting a ‘whipping’, as she called it. I was scared to death of her!

  At ten years old, worthless and unlovable, I wanted to die.

  Somehow, I still clung on to a minuscule amount of hope that someday Olivia would like me, and my life would get better. And in some ways it did improve greatly, but I remained insecure, extremely timid, and most of the time somewhat withdrawn.

  A pain—an aching loss—a feeling I couldn’t identify—radiated through me constantly. I’d lost so much in a short amount of time. I didn’t know whether that feeling of loss was from losing my daddy and my mother, or having to leave my grandparents, or what, but I quickly found out I didn’t have anyone I could talk to about what I felt.

  I couldn’t talk to Olivia! Sex was a forbidden subject, and love—well, if I had to ask—then I wasn’t capable of loving, or being loved. She truly believed I was just like my daddy, and to this day, I believe Olivia took her hate for me to her grave.

  And, no, I did not go to her funeral. She hadn’t talked to me in over twenty years and I didn’t want to be a hypocrite.

  I knew she never wanted me, but since Uncle Henry wanted to take me in, Olivia had agreed to do so, only as her duty, to do as her husband wanted because she’d married him for better or for worse. And, since I was just like him, Olivia reminded me often how worse things had been for her since I came to live with them.

  She believed I was sneaky and manipulative, and with every breath I was trying to break up her marriage. However, from what I know today maybe my body language made her believe that about me.

  I didn’t feel wanted in the first place, and being terrified of her, then adding into the equation her accusing tone of voice—none of which helped when asked a question—I stuttered and stammered, my eyes darted back and forth, I blinked a lot, or I’d look at the floor and fidget. All definite signs of trying to hide something.

  I tried to hide my insecurities knowing she hated me, and therefore, she wouldn’t believe me no matter what I said. I tried to hide my fear of what would happen next.

  Like any “normal” kid, I didn’t always tell the truth, but the majority of the time I did. But even telling the truth, if she read my body language, I know it read just the opposite. But, who was the idiot here? Me—by sending false signals out of fear? Or, her—giving signs of pure hate?

  Underneath all that, I think she was jealous from the start of the relationship I had with my uncle. I do know she tried her best to destroy his love for me. With every chance available, she couldn’t wait to tell him if I’d done something she considered wrong or if I got a bad grade on a test or anything else she thought would make him not love me.

  But even that wasn’t enough satisfaction for her! She had to make me a laughing stock by telling her women friends in the entire neighborhood everything I’d done wrong! Of course, these women told their kids who told other kids at school…so, I guess Olivia did accomplish one of her goals—she had all the kids laughing at me.

  However, she didn’t destroy my uncle’s love!

  None of the neighborhood women ever told Olivia about things their kids had done wrong, so Olivia believed them to be little angels who never did anything bad. She constantly threw this in my face saying, that if I wasn’t my father’s daughter I could be decent and good like other kids. She couldn’t be proud like the other mothers. She couldn’t be proud of ‘her daughter’ because she’d been stuck with a hellion—a useless, no-account hellion that she, come hell or high water, would change.

  Olivia, in charge of all the discipline, swore to beat the meanness out of me on a daily basis for as long as it took while still living under her roof, even if I was forty years old.

  Her type of control, these days is known as child abuse.

  She strongly believed in belts and paddles and switches. She believed that old saying, “spare the rod, spoil the child,” and she lived up to that belief to its fullest extent, never sparing the rod!

  I lived in a world of fear. Extreme fear of Olivia’s belts and paddles with holes, and afraid of being bad. She left bruises and/or open cuts on my legs, butt and lower back every time she picked up her weapon of choice.

  On several occasions, after she’d whipped me, she found out it was undeserved. But did she ever say she was sorry for the mistake, or sorry she hadn’t believed in me? Hell no! Olivia said, “This whipping is deserved! It makes up for a time you got away with something I didn’t find out about.”

  I couldn’t win no matter what I did—or didn’t do!

  Uncle Henry wasn’t home much. He always came in very late at night, and left early in the morning. He stayed at his lake cabin most every weekend. I figured he didn’t want to come home, and of course, I didn’t blame him.

  I didn’t want to be there either!

  Did I like Olivia? Not very much. Did I love her? I don’t know. I tried to. I tried my damnedest to please her so she wouldn’t think I was like Daddy. I wanted so much for her to be proud of me and to love me, but nothing I ever did was good enough for her.

  Since Olivia had been best friends with my mother (until Mama started drinking), I wanted to be—I tried to be—like Mama, but still, Olivia could only see my daddy when she looked at me.

  Olivia told me she didn’t blame Mama for the way she’d turned out. Nope! She blamed my daddy for driving Mama to drink. It was Daddy’s fault Mama turned to alcohol as a means of escape. It was Daddy’s fault Mama drank until she ended up dead.

  She blamed me for being his daughter!

  At fourteen, I no longer hoped Olivia would someday love me. I no longer hoped that I could be different from Daddy. I knew no one would ever love me, and I’d never amount to anything. But, finally, although the feeling had gotten stronger, I could identify that gut wrenching, never-ending ‘loss’ I’d felt for so many lonely years: HOPE…

  I’d lost all hope.

  At sixteen, I started hearing stories from neighbors, and from kids at school who heard their folks talking, that Mama’s death wasn’t an accident, but a suicide. I was told she didn’t accidentally fall, but purposely jumped over the banister.

  At first I became angry at them for telling lies, but then I remembered Mama telling me that she’d die before being locked away again, and it made me wonder if the stories could possibly be true.

  One of the worst beatings I ever had was when I asked about what I’d been hearing from the kids at school. Olivia went ballistic! Again, she accused me of trying to break up her marriage by “making up stories” to turn her husband against her!

  Say what? Her logic made no sense whatsoever! How in the world could she think what I’d heard had anything at all to do with her?

  At eighteen, with the help of a boyfriend, I left home to get away from the controlling Olivia. Well, actually, I snuck away while Henry and Olivia were at work. The neighbors saw me throwing clothes into the boyfriend’s car, so of course they called Henry. Luckily, I managed to slip away before he made it home to stop me.

  After a week I still hadn’t contacted them. I thought they didn’t know where I’d moved to, but one quiet night Henry and the alien-mouthed Olivia showed up on my doorstep. Henry informed me that he’d known the “dump” I’d moved into before I could even unpack my toothbrush!

  After he made a rude comment about my bed being unmade at seven o’clock at night, he literally forced me to leave the duplex I’d rented and return home with them that night.

  Now, you’re probably thinking he had no right. After all, I was eighteen and of legal age. He couldn’t force me to do anything…well, that’s what I thought, too, but boy was I wr
ong! I found out real quick since Henry was a cop, he could force me.

  Of course, if I’d had money I could’ve hired an attorney, fought it in court, and I’m sure I would’ve won, but I took an easier, more drastic route—I married the boyfriend! And somehow, our loveless arrangement worked for a year and a half.

  It took two weeks to get the blood tests, the preacher, and the wedding out of the way, but finally, he was free from his parents to drink his beer, and I, free from my adoptive parents, began searching for those answers about Mama’s accident everywhere I could think to look.

  I felt I needed to find out the truth.

  Soon I discovered Henry had all records of Mama’s death sealed (or hidden), and he’d also sealed my birth records after he and Olivia adopted me. Everywhere I searched I hit a brick wall.

  I slammed into that damn wall so many times word filtered back to Henry what I’d been doing. He wasn’t too happy to learn of my search, but Olivia became outraged and ordered me to stop my foolishness.

  I stopped searching, but not because Olivia told me to. I stopped because no one would talk to me about any of it and I had no other avenues left. The only thing that hadn’t been hidden was the obituary in the local paper and that had been written by the family. It didn’t tell me a damn thing in the way of truth.

  While writing this book I heard another side of the truth. Aunt Julie had heard from Grandmother that Olivia pushed my mother over the banister.

  Whoa! I wasn’t ready to hear that one!

  But, after giving it some thought; then considering the original source, my Grandmother who didn’t like Olivia in the first place, I chose not to believe Mama had been pushed—at least, not by Olivia. And, I didn’t remember Olivia being with Henry that tragic night when he came and took Mama away that last time.

  Of course, it is possible she was there and I didn’t see her, or after all this time, I forgot she was there…but either way, suicide or accident, I’ll never know. Everyone who knew the truth is deceased, not that I would’ve heard the actual truth anyway if anyone were still alive to talk about it.