Story time. My mom left my dad in 1980 and took me and my older brother, saying we were going on ‘vacation’. Weird, cuz September...? We get to Ft. McMurray of all places and are told we are living there now, school is being set up. No more dad kicking us with his cowboy boots on

So, relief but also UGH. Start school. Mom gets an apartment. Carry on. Ah, but dad isn’t ready to let us all go. He comes to visit, to reconcile, and it’s not pretty at all. Ugly even. My brother and I are already wildlings... Mom sends us back to small town Manitoba with him

The 80’s were f’ing weird. We were one of only two fams in our town who had separated parents. Also, dad had no clue abt raising kids. So we raised ourselves. Awesome in that we were pretty freakin independent, had no curfew, could do as we liked. Was not malice just 0 awareness.

Life goes on. 80’s mentality said ‘don’t contact your kids very often, it’s confusing for them’ ‘don’t call’, ‘visit 1 or 2 times /yr ok’. And so it goes.
Bro was prob more fucked up than me, cuz he got way more beats and physical violence.

But I was the ‘good kid’, overachiever, just trying to control everything in my control. Grades, whatever. Bro is too far gone. All I think abt is being a grown up and being out of this situation. At 11, fam went to Disneyland. HUGE fight happened btwn dad, bro, stepmom, stepsis

I. Ran. Away. In Anaheim, Ca. Went to Disneyland by myself for the day cuz everything was just too much. I rode the monorail and cried. I bought and put on makeup and pretended I was grown up. I am seriously lucky that nothing happened to me, cuz at that point I dgaf

Back home in Canada, stepmom packed a bag and said she was going to the city to see her daughter for the weekend.

She didn’t come back.

Life goes on. I do as I like. I am the 11/12 yr old with red fishnets and a fake leather dress at a cousin’s Catholic wedding.

Drink in one hand. Cigarette in the other.

(I really didn’t intend for this thread to have so much detail, there’s a point! Lol)

So, stepmom comes back, makes biomom sign over custody as condition for marrying dad. Promises me she will protect me, and take me away if that is what is required. OK.

High school in a small town sucks. I’m weird, different. Possibly satanic? Pffftz. Back I go to Alberta and Ft. Mac just to go to a school that has more students than my town has ppl. To escape, recreate, be myself