The Life and Times of a Rose

The Tragedy: 2009-2012

Lenetta's mom and stepdad moved in with us, because they didn't have anywhere else to stay. Karen was half blind and Wesley was just plain weird. Wesley was a middle aged man of forty-two at the time, and loved dragons and eagles. He also was a pervert. Wesley was blond and had wired glasses. He also had a beer gut that someone could sit on.

One day, Dad and Lenetta had a get together. Wesley was on the couch and my sisters and I used to sit on his lap. I guess he decided to try something new when he did it. 

"Angela, can you take off your underwear for me? Are you itchy?"

"Yeah," I said, confused.

 At that time, I would get itchy down there from bubble bath and body wash. So I did it. But what I didn't know was why he was licking me down there. It felt good, I guess, but I knew something was wrong because he would do that to my sister, Cassie.

When we were sent to bed and Wesley would tuck us in, beforehand he would stick his hand in my shirt and pinch what should not be pinched. My sister and I didn't tell for about a month because we thought we would get in trouble.

That's when the counseling started. It was scary at first and now... not so much. I've gotten used to it. 

Afterwords, Wesley was sentenced to ten years in jail for molestation and Lenetta changed. Drastically. She would whip us with a belt, make us clean everything,  and steal from us.

There was this one incident where I left my hair ties on the bathroom counter and they got cut up. All of them.  I had at least 100 of them and all of them got cut up. We were whipped with a belt at least five times because of it.

Lenetta was a baker. She entered a cake decorating contest and placed second. She also made cookies for the local Farmer's Market. We spent all day making royal icing and cookie dough. 

We would sweep, vacuum, mop, dust, and clean up after our brother. She would play our DSs while we cleaned and she would sit in the living room and watch movies all day. 

All of this has affected my eating habits. Lenetta used to set a timer and I would have to eat a certain amount of food in that time frame before I would get whipped, go to bed hungry, or have it shoved down my throat. Now in the present, I weigh only 82 pounds and I have a mysterious eating disorder that resembles binge eating and purging. 

Mother's Day was supposed to be a good day, and it was, until time for showers. My sister needed help washing her hair, when my mom found the bruises on my sister's backside. They were yellowish-brown, all on her butt and lower back. I had the same.

Ella, my baby sister who wasn't a baby at the time, started to cry, but luckily was saved from the brutal lashings. 

So, we got extensive counseling and it really didn't help. The reason was because we were going to the same  counselor for years. She always treated us like the little kids we were before, so we dropped her. The end of that series of events was 2012.