Sick and tired of a dead end job, and a walking dead affair with a married man, I bought the cheapest ticket to the warmest place I could find. Gave away all my stuff and hopped a plane to Los Angeles. Life was good. I put myself through nursing school. I put myself through acting school. I got married. I got sick.
Life is not fair. The cash I won on a game show paid my tuition through nursing school. As a graduate nurse, I was lucky enough to find a part time job at the ‘Hospital to the Stars’. Now I could afford tuition for acting school. While still in school I booked my first gig. A cameo appearance in a major motion picture, playing opposite the costar. Hallelujah, I'm union. I also did TV sit-coms, standup comedy, musical theater, and music videos. Even prowled the catwalk, me a full figure model.
Along comes Bear Johnson. At 6’6 1/2’’ tall and, 240 lbs., Bear was a perfect match to my Marilyn Monroe on steroids image. Gorgeous does not even begin to describe his looks. When he confessed to being my greatest fan, he also became my favorite point guard, my power forward. We got pregnant. I lost the baby. We got married. Three more miscarriages led to a diagnosis of autoimmune disorder. I would never have children. My husband, who neglected to tell me that he was bisexual before we married, now sought the company of other men. Alone, unable to work, I lost everything. All of it ... gone ... in a heartbeat. I returned to Philadelphia the same way I left, with nothing but the clothes on my back.
Moving into my mother’s house was a mistake. I should have stayed at a homeless shelter. I had been away just long enough to forget my mother was ‘special’. As the high priestess of her own ‘Church of the Poison Mind’, Teresa lies, steals, and cheats, anything to get her way. No one is immune. Before being born again, I thought she had a personality disorder, probably some form of malignant narcissism. Now I believe a demon spirit has taken possession of her mind. After a perceived slight, she poisoned my dog. Family members have died as a side effect of her murderous tongue. To look at her you would never imagine the things she is capable of doing.
Living with Teresa, managing the pain and depression resulting from my illness, was incredibly difficult. The worse I got the worse she got. She cursed at me, she hit me, she stole personal objects. My jewelry, perfume, makeup, even my clothing which didn't even fit her. It didn't matter. She wanted to withhold anything of value to me. She flirted like a young girl with any man that showed the slightest interest in me, going so far as flashing one poor guy when he brought me home from a date. I had to get out. Morbidly close to four hundred pounds; I began using a walker just to get around the house. Where was I going, how was I going to get there?
I chose weight loss surgery as a beginning. The surgery was a success. That patient was a failure. For almost two years, I was in and out of hospitals, and skilled nursing facilities. Comatose or delirious, unable to care for myself, I could not even roll over in bed without help. Teresa absolutely loved the attention showered upon her as the mother of a dying child. Can you say Munchhausen’s Syndrome? Standing at my bedside she complained, I was the thorn in her side, I always had to be the center of attention, I was always stealing her joy. Out of earshot of anyone else, she hissed,’ just get it over with and die’, thank you very much.
I did not die. Well I did, but God snatched me back from the gates of Hell. Two hundred eleven pounds later, I am wobbly but walking. Something the doctors said I would never be able to do again.
Over a period of time, I tell Gabriel my story. He looks at me in awe. He had no idea he says. He asks how I did it. I tell him, “I didn’t do anything. God hit the pause - reset button on my life.”
He claims I am obsessed, but I remember. I remember confiding in my best friend, speaking of things I’d never spoken of out loud.
