Adventures in Crazyland

Adventures in Crazyland

(Or Dude, Where’s My Justice?)

By: Cassandra Adams

Cassandratellsthetruth.com

This story is dedicated to helping those who had a painful upbringing and who are still struggling with the losses and anguish of a shattered childhood. The author pulls no punches as she dissects and demonstrates the horrendous toll that child abusers extort from their victims.

CASSANDRA

ADAMS

ADVENTURES IN CRAZYLAND

ADVENTURES IN CRAZYLAND

Cassandra Adams

Copyright 2011 by Cassandra Adams

Smashwords Edition

Table of Contents

Forward

Chapter1

Chapter2

Chapter3

Chapter4

Chapter5

Chapter6

Chapter7

Chapter8

Chapter9

Chapter10

Chapter11

Forward

This is not a story about a man named Jed or a novel about philosophical concepts like I think, therefore I have a German accent. Nope. This is a story about the spiritual journey of someone who has endured poverty, humiliation, raging jealousy and utter lunacy from her family as well as the community in which she was raised. If you are not comfortable with raw language, black humor, violence or the unbridled truth, then this book is not for you. But if you can tolerate and possibly embrace those factors, and you believe you have experienced similar perils and challenges in life, then you may find solace in this story as you identify with certain passages as well as with the main character’s attempt to effectuate justice and find her purpose in life. In short, this book is dedicated to those who had a painful upbringing such that their parents, siblings, relatives, clergy, so-called friends, neighbors, teachers or any combination thereof tried in earnest to harm them and/or succeeded in damaging their physical and spiritual being.

The premise that childhood is a time of exceptional vulnerability to stress is untenable. What is more, stress encountered during this period may have the lasting impact of training a person's brain and body to be on high alert for the rest of that person’s life. Such high anxiety often exacts a terrible cost on the individual in terms of mental disturbances and physical illnesses.

Hence, the experience of being an unwanted child can be horrendously traumatic. Even in cases where the parents are basically negligent, children still are innately programmed to hang on to them. The more neglectful the parents, the more emotionally dependent the kids may become, which results in an enormously painful and endless cycle of parental rejection followed by the dejected child’s futile attempts to gain the acceptance of their sadistic parents. The salient point here is that one should not be surprised if, as an adult, you are still struggling with the losses and anguish of an abusive childhood.

This is a true story, but due to the vicious and malicious nature of the characters involved, the names thereof and the places involved have been changed to protect the author. Therefore, the names of the main players and places in this saga are as follows:

Birth Father: Phil, the old man, birth father

Birth Mother: Theresa, Freakazoid, birth mother

Brother: Robert

Older Sister: Annie

First Younger Sister: Kim

Youngest Sister: Debbie

Maternal Grandmother: Francis

Maternal Grandfather: William

Maternal Uncle: Oliver

Paternal Grandfather: Frank

Paternal Grandmother: Louise

Hometown: Crazyland, USA

So, if you have decided to keep reading, then smoke ‘em if you got ‘em because the story that follows contains more than a few bombshells.

Chapter 1: The Beginning of a Different War on Terror

I was born into a poor, white family in a small town (population est. 5,000). When I say poor, I’m not referring to the so-called lower-middle socio-economic class. I’m talking about dysfunctional, incompetent, white-trash, lazy parents, raising-five-kids-in-a-hell-hole kind of poor. That description should sufficiently set the tone for the rest of this story.

I learned the meaning of the word terrorism at a very early age. In fact, my earliest memories were very bad ones that occurred at the age of two. You might already be saying Bullshit – nobody can remember that far back. But I have two distinct memories of some petrifying experiences that occurred when I was two years old, and my recollection of these events has never faded.

The first incident occurred in the spring shortly after my second birthday. I was standing in the backyard near the swing set along with my older sister (who was five years old at the time). I still can see my sister’s face, which was contorted with a jealous rage as she hurled the glider on the swing set toward my head. I knew something bad was about to happen, but I was not able to move out of the way in time. Upon impact, the glider cut a hole in my chin through to my gums. There was quite a bit of blood on my clothes, and, hence, quite a bit of crying on my part. I recall my birth mother giving me a bottle to stop the crying, but then as milk leaked out of my face more hysteria ensued. The wound required stitches and I still have a slight scar to this day.

The episode was very predictable because I recall my older sister, Debbie, relentlessly abusing and harassing me when I was a toddler, but also recollect that my birth parents did nothing to curb her bullying or jealousy. (The phraseology birth mother, birth father and birth parents is used throughout because no real parenting ever took place during our crazy-ass upbringing.) After the damage was done, my birth mother engaged in her usual histrionics and out-of-control screaming (which was typical on any given day), but my sister couldn’t wipe the smile off of her face.

This event was just the beginning of a long cycle of abuse that was fueled by my birth mother’s rage about her upbringing and the feeling of being trapped in an abusive marriage. On top of our birth mother’s damaged psyche about the state of her life, our birth father was a violent, self-absorbed imbecile who not only totally rejected any responsibility for the well being of his family, but actively harmed his family, both physically and emotionally. In short, our birth parents’ deep-seated mental problems were a recipe for disaster for the family unit. And, thus, it is not surprising that my sister learned at a very early age that her violent and malicious behavior toward me would be rewarded. In fact, she and my other female siblings gave new meaning to the phrase twisted sister.

Predictably karmic backlash occurred several years later when Debbie was in the seventh grade. As she was walking home from school one fall day, some dope decided to throw a rock at her. His reason for throwing the rock was not revealed to me, but the rock he hurled made a direct hit to her face. More explicitly, the rock tore open the skin from the bottom of her nose to the top of her upper lip. Several stitches were required to repair the damage, which caused Debbie to become an emotional wreck. Our birth parents were visibly angry and indignant that some hillbilly kid, as they called him, could cause such an injury to a young girl’s face. I thought our birth mother was going to pulverize the rock-thrower as she screamed at him and glared with evil intentions on her face. In contrast, our birth father was his typical chicken-shit self with respect to the whole deal. In front of the family unit, he said he was going to kill the son-of-a-bitch, but when the rock-thrower and his old man presented themselves and expressed contrition, he cowered, uttered very few words and hid behind a doorway. But our birth parents did act consistently in one respect. They failed to reflect on the fact that the victim in this case had bullied and violently injured someone much smaller and defenseless earlier in her childhood, and also ignored any possibility that the concept of what-goes-around-comes-around had just busted a move.

The rock-thrower’s old man made him apologize in person for his actions, and I am reasonably certain that he got a beating that left him with a pain that is here to stay. But the end result was a very visible and permanent scar in the middle of Debbie’s face. This sequence of events made me realize early on that what you send out to the Universe will come back at you. You may refer to it as the Golden Rule or some other spiritual term, but the lesson to be learned: Don’t treat life like a balance sheet, such that there are debits and credits for good and bad deeds, respectively. Rather, I believe that one must not underestimate the powerful and exponential reaction of the Universe to the good and bad acts you commit each and every day.

I always wondered if Debbie connected the two events. But even if she had made the association, I realized she would never admit it because of the viciousness and vindictiveness that was instilled in her by our birth parents during our formative years. I can honestly say that my birth parents take the prize for the most vicious and malicious people I have encountered in my life thus far. Considering the high number of thoroughly rotten, unethical and degrading people I have dealt with in business and elsewhere, the above proclamation is a strong statement.

To further delve into Debbie’s behavior, it is important to understand that on most days our birth parents would spew violent-themed catch-phrases at each other (and at us), and then would often act on those threats. Therefore, it should not come as a surprise that my siblings were filled with distrust, zero self-worth, uncontrolled rage, jealousy and depression, all of which ultimately destroyed any chance for a functional relationship among the members of our family.

My second memory at the age of two occurred in the middle of summer. I watched as Robert, my brother (age six at the time), defiantly rode off on his bike as my birth mother screeched at him to stay in the yard. My birth mother’s screaming voice, by the way, could have been used to garner written confessions from the hardest of criminals. Anyway, back to the story. In a futile attempt to please my birth mother, I ran after Robert to bring his smug ass back home. I remember him looking back at me and laughing while riding ever faster to leave me in the dust. I recall my birth mother watching me toddle after my brother because she yelled at me to stay in the yard, but never made a move to retrieve me. In my quest to find Robert and make things right, I managed to wander at least three quarters of a mile from the house. Soon, I lost sight of my brother and realized I was absolutely lost. I remember feeling the extreme panic that arises when you have no idea where you are and don’t know which way to turn to get back on track. After a few hours, a neighbor pulled up in their car and found me in a state of hysteria wandering the streets. My birth parents never ventured far from the house to look for me, but instead engaged in vitriolic screaming and arguing with each other. Ironically, my birth parents always had referred to the neighbors who found me that day as white trash, and continued to do so even after they brought me home after a very terrifying afternoon. I surmised that my birth parents were disappointed that I didn’t stay lost as my disappearance would have lightened their financial and parental load. Although my birth parents held a very inaccurate and unfair opinion of the people who rescued me, I was always grateful for their kindness, and marveled at their unselfish and caring behavior in contrast to my birth parents’ lack of concern about my whereabouts and safety.

Because of these events and continual daily strife in our family, I began to realize very early in my life that something