The Bathroom That Saved Me part 1

This is my story about *my* bathroom at my sister’s house

that became a huge component in my journey of homelessness to not-homelessness, embracing my darkness, and a hell of a lot more.

I’m going to type out the pertinent history on this post… it might seem irrelevant but it will all make sense in the following posts

The bathroom that saved me. I don't claim this lightly. I truly have cried over how thankful I am for this bathroom and what it means to me. I realize I sound a little crazy, …. Duh. I accept that now a days. Kinda. But, I’ll take crazy for this one. I don’t care because I think if someone were to look a little deeper, they would understand.

To give the back story for clarity… I became homeless after moving out of my apartment in September 2021. I lived in my car for 3 months (for the most part) while all my stuff was haphazardly scattered between 4 storage units (sidenote: this was a damn nightmare but I digress) 😐

During that time I had become close with my sister for the first time in our whole lives. She is 43 (I am 29). We were going 20+ years on very minimal communication due to distance and age and circumstances and traumas. We are night and day different in many ways except the severity of the traumas we have both endured. I consider her very easy going and likeable to most everyone, no matter who they are. She is more timid and passive while I am more dominant and aggressive. I rock the boat. I am opinionated. and I put up a fight. My sister sees the benefit to “let it be” most of the time. I have envied those traits much of my life except the overly passiveness trait. I cherish the fight I have within because it can be honed in on something important and I will succeed, every time. And I KNOW it now that I’m older.

Anyways,

Because of that passive aspect of my sister’s personality, I always felt she just didn’t care much about me. She was quite a bit older and already living on her own since I can remember. She had my oldest niece and got married to the father at 15/16 years old. She decided that she would also attempt to raise me (I am only a couple years older than my niece) because our grandparents were then in their 70s and not physically able to do a lot of what a typical parent does with a young child and my father was in prison by this time and my mother was MIA and/or in and out of jail and dealing with active addiction.

My sister’s husband was my favorite person back then. I remember being excited every time he got home from work because he would always play with my niece and I. My sister was dealing with her then undiagnosed bipolar disorder which left her in bed for days at a time during depressive episodes and then very eratic spending/behavior during manic episodes.

We will call her first husband “ S “ for anonymity purposes.

S was the only parent around sometimes due to my sister being unable to get out of bed. My niece and I were pretty young… I was around 7 years old and my niece about 4 or 5 years old.

S drank beer every day after work… I now know he was an alcoholic but wasn’t aware of what that meant back then. Because of his own childhood traumas and his addiction to alcohol and who knows what else was going on with him at the time… he was probably pretty mentally unstable if I had to guess. He needed help, therapy, and a lot of attention on dealing with his own traumas in life. Instead he was trying to raise me and my niece while my sister was laying in bed angry and miserable and he worked every single day at a factory job trying to make enough money to take care of all of us. He drank to deal. I get it, I have a couple substance addictions myself. I can’t really blame nor judge him.

And neither should you.

To spare you the details, I’ll quickly explain that he began molesting me and continued to do so for months (6 or so? Unsure really.) If you aren’t educated in such or experienced it yourself then you might be confused at my beliefs and the way I feel about it all but just know that it’s all pretty typical. I was even more attached to him because of being molested.

I felt I was “special” for having a secret with him that no one else could know about. It was our time to “play” where no one else bothered us and I got special attention.

Idk, it’s weird mentally on a kid being molested. I didn’t know what was actually happening all that much I just knew that it was a secret and must be a big deal. Eventually I told my sister after she found an inappropriate drawing I made at school. She questioned me about it and I finally told her.

She lost her mind, literally. She had a true mental break and she lost her shit for an unknown amount of time trying to figure out what to do and how to fix it all. She made him leave while she decided so I didn’t ever really see him again… I was devastated. I lost the one “parent” I enjoyed spending time with while she had no help and wasn’t coping at all while simultaneously making crazy decisions due to her undiagnosed bipolar and current ongoing psychotic episode she was in (I only realize this now that I’m much older).

Eventually she was forced to call the police by her own shame/guilt and by some people she confided in. Ultimately S plead guilty and went to prison for many years. He admitted he was guilty to avoid a trial for me and for him and to just begin his punishment.

Believe how you will but I feel badly for him and the harshness of his punishment. I have many reasons for believing this way and part of them are most certainly due to the dynamics of how children cope with being molested. I’m aware. But, the belief still remains that I don’t have any hate for him and I wish he didn’t do all the time he did… I have paid dearly for his fuck up but such is life. I have also been able to explore my sexuality as an adult to the extent I have because I place so much importance on my sexuality ultimately because of that trauma I believe. So everything happens for a reason. I wouldn’t change it. I like who I am now and that one plays a big role in me becoming this person.

Meanwhile, my sister quickly found herself being consoled by a new guy who appeared would be good to have around because he was protective and wanted to keep her “safe” from the world and he had a home for her and her kids.

He wasn’t safe. He is extremely emotionally and physically abusive and I got the fuck outta there as soon as I saw that side of him. I went back to live with my grandparents and I felt at home finally and had a bit of “normalcy” (kinda) for years after that. My sister stayed with him 15+ years and kept the kids safe at her own expense of taking the brunt of the abuse and being his punching bag mentally and physically. She was isolated from us and remained that way for years. She wouldn’t accept help nor ask for it concerning leaving him (I also understand this very much, I don’t judge my sister for any of her decisions)

I tell all this because my sister is a huge part of this bathroom being so crucial to my healing. It is in her[my grandmother’s] house. The same house that she had convinced our grandmother to buy her when my grandma was at her most gullible. My sister was never around (for good reason I know now). She had plenty to deal with in her own life at the time…

In the last years of my grandma’s life, my sister and her abusive 2nd husband split for good. She was able to get an apartment for her and the kids back in our hometown. She was around again for the first time in a long long time right after my grandfather died in 2013.

At that same time, my long-term partner and I were preparing to sell my grandparent’s house so that we could get a condo together (with my grandmother) in the city where I got accepted to nursing school. I felt strongly I wanted to live in the same city to avoid so much time commuting back and forth. The decision to sell and get something else was obvious for us. My grandpa had already passed away and it was much too big and lonely without him there at the house.

My Dad didn’t see it all in the same way, unfortunately.

My father at that time in his life was a deeply hurt man… he felt depressed and angry and misunderstood. Anger and domination and scare tactics was his way of getting what he wanted. He wanted to take care of grandma (his mother). Grandma’s plan was to give him a lump sum of money from selling the house so he could easily get started in a new place on his own, finally, and have time to become accustomed without her supporting him.

My father was hurt by this whole “pushing him away” thing that he felt was happening by me taking grandma with me and him moving out on his own for the first time in years. He didn’t take it so kindly as the days started passing and time was coming closer to moving out.

One night, I overheard him screaming at my grandmother. He said I was trying to control her and use her. He also told her that he would kill me first before letting that happen. I instantly felt very unsafe. The main reason being that my dad was known for a fight he had gotten into before I was ever born in which the other person died (it was an accident). My dad did quite a bit of prison time for that after being found guilty for 2nd degree murder. Although it was an accident, the prison time quickly turned him into even more of an aggressive person. To survive in prison he had to use that part of himself and put it on the forefront so that people didn’t mess with him and he could just do his time.

In his defense, I feel strongly I would have done the exact same thing he did if I were in his shoes. He remained that aggressive man long after prison. Ironically, last night (10/22/22) was the first time… ever in a substantial way… I saw him able to leave his rigid guard down, remain calm, and actually show me love and understanding.

So, I had good reason to believe he might make good on that threat told to my grandmother when he wanted to regain control over her and not allow her to live with me. I moved out that night and never went back.

The house was sold and my grandma moved in with my sister who is much closer to my dad than I ever was. This was ideal for my dad because my sister wouldn’t stand up to him and tell him no like I would. I never was able to live with my grandmother again before she passed away a few years later. She had died pretty suddenly of a damn UTI-turned-septic of all things so I never felt I got much closure or time with her like I would have loved to get. I was so busy in nursing school and also had washed my hands of the responsibility of caring for her and her finances since I was forced to leave the night my dad made that threat.

It was a big change in plans for my sister to care for my grandmother full time for the last years of her life. That was always going to be my role. I was becoming a nurse and also knew my grandparents the best of anyone. I was also the youngest, not married, and eager to help them. I was living with them while in college to help save money so it just made sense for it to be me to care for both of them. I was also diligent in how to handle their finances and they began teaching me fairly young because I was going to be the executor of their will and they wanted to make sure I could handle that responsibility.

My grandmother preferred to sleep all day and eat the bare minimum at the end of her life. Part of taking care of her was convincing her the importance of actually living and eating and being in the world and not sleep it all away. I was good at this because I have no problem speaking up for someone’s greater good if I know that is what they truly want. My sister is, like I said, much more easy going and passive. She allowed my grandmother to lay around as much as she wanted. She didn’t force her to do the “not fun” things of life. It went unnoticed when my grandmother had been suffering a UTI which caused her confusion (a common symptom of a UTI in the elderly) and ultimately lead to her death due to sepsis. I was devastated. But, I know my grandmother was over living at that point. Everything happens for a reason.

I just wish I would have been able to care for her like what was supposed to happen and what my grandfather wanted before he died.

My grandmother, ironically, lived in the room/bathroom that I am talking about in this post. That’s her gift to me, I believe.

So thank you Grandma. I love you and I miss you!

to be continued

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