¶ Unhealthy Love, Family Dynamics, and Healing
Yeah , no , our dad loved our mom but and our mom loved our dad but our it was just a very unhealthy kind of love and and even when we moved from West Texas to East Texas it got better , but it was still unhealthy it wasn't .
I mean , my mom finally told my dad look , you know , you're good , you're all , you're all that you drink , but only on the weekends .
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Hey , my tough sisters . Yeah , you should have got mom hands . I mean , I do have . Oh , I've always wanted to be the petite . Yeah , she's not , but it's like yeah , you got mom's legs , they're just a little quarter . Yeah , that's three teens . I don't think I'm as mean as mom was . No , no , you , I think you are . Yeah , you're the meaner side of .
Well , yeah , I got longer time . Whether I'm the , you're sorry , I'm the sweeter side of mom . Yeah , was , was it sweet fun ? I don't know .
Anyway , well , she did take his phrase all down so now , being from the the crazy kind of Joe Burd house family , was your family always there ? Like your parents , stay together .
Oh , yes , yes , yes , yes , yeah absolutely . Usually that's kind of the yeah , no , our dad loved our mom but and our mom loved our dad , but our it was just a very unhealthy kind of love and and even when we moved from West Texas to East Texas it got better , but it was still unhealthy it wasn't .
I mean , my mom finally told my dad look , you know , you're good , you all , you're all that you drink , but only on the weekends . You know , we're not gonna keep doing this , I'm not gonna keep chasing you . Well , I think mom , I think she kind of settled in , I think she tried to Ground heal .
Yeah , you know , I think she tried to settle in , helping , not wait , really signed that out until later .
About we didn't understand , well , about two or three years ago , when my mother , when our mother died 30 years ago , 36 years ago for the device or something like that , there was a family Bible that belonged to my mother that was given to my uncle , and so about three years ago I had traveled to Arkansas and he had given me that Bible back , which was very
hard for him , you know , because he felt like this is the last thing that I have of my sister and so , but he gave it back to me with tears and as I looked through that Bible .
We knew that in the Bible's our mother kept like important things to her and in that Bible there was a like an AA certificate , you know , with my dad's name on it and so I know we knew then that she tried to help me , that she was trying to cut to bad . You know , yeah , yeah , it is yeah .
And then when we we moved from there , from West Texas to East Texas and we kind of got settled and our life was a little bit more Stable , yeah , and maybe normal , whatever normal . Is it changed about the dynamics ? Yeah , well , our mother got cancer for one thing , but but she's she's kind of stayed sick and they didn't really know what was wrong with her .
So she was going to the doctor all the time and I think to Moving from West Texas , from all of the family , that that all the family out there , it was always bars and poker and Bingo and fighting and that's just the way the family was and it is like , and probably is still to this day , but maybe not as bad
¶ Moving, Family Dynamics, and Faith
. But once we moved from there , we moved here where there were , there were no family , so my dad didn't have , you know , friends and family that he could go out and drink with and and and my mom wasn't having a chase after her siblings and help them and build them out and I guess maybe they could focus on each other .
Baby , the dynamics was still there , it just wasn't to the same degree . Yeah , it wasn't to the same level . It was to a lower level . Yeah , because our dad still is . He still did drink , but it was just limited and he smoked weed , which we were not supposed to know .
But I mean you , you , you can say all day long your kids don't know what you're doing , but they know . Yeah it's you , just you know you live in the house , you know so when you got , when you , lower house .
We're y'all at the international standard of 18 . You were about your order to jelly early to rebel against the life you got brought up all like . How did y'all get out of the house and start on your ?
own . Okay , yeah , I'm thinking about Jersey strong . Yours is why I when . When our mom died , I was 12 and she was not a teen and she was already married and had a baby , so she so you are yeah , yes , okay . Yes , she was already out . I was not . Now I my dad , because of the love that my dad had for our mom he couldn't hit .
His way of dealing with things was to get rid of everything . He didn't want to see anything . He let our house go back . He gave all her clothes away , all her jewelry , all her I mean everything , her furniture , everything .
And previous to that , hulme and my mom and my dad , and then my sister and her husband , had bought some land together and it was through the VA , because my dad was a vetter and once my mom died , it paid the land off and so my dad moved me and Hulme out to that land into a lean tube . Now we were already on that property .
Yeah , they were at a trailer house .
Now are you in this whole time when this is happening and you're moved out , you're married , having kids and stuff are you saved or are you just doing your own thing ? Am I ? What ? Are you saved ?
She knows Jesus . Oh , she was when she was like nine . I was seven when I was when I received Jesus Christ . But now I have a story about when I was four and it wasn't going to rub the bank , she was going to the bank . She was going to the bank . I was going to get the Bible Tree tree , tree , tree tree .
Yeah , so you've been with Jesus for a while .
Yeah , and she never . She never strayed , really yes , she never strayed . She never done drugs , she never drank and like I think maybe , well , there is a story where she , she did . Did she drink when he was in that guy's underwear ? Oh , my goodness gracious , yes , don't even tell that story .
In that guy's underwear ? Yes , of course you just said . Well , I did that story .
Ha ha ha ha ha , because , let's see , I was probably what this was before . I was down 15 maybe , and we used to always go to Brother Dames , which was a restaurant in White House . And I didn't understand .
Like you know , my dad was always drinking , our family , our brothers were always drinking , our brothers I mean just everybody that we were surrounded with and so I just thought what is the big deal ? You know , I just I don't understand .
And so we were all at Brother Dames one night and they were , everybody was drinking , all these kids were drinking , and which is probably not a good story to be telling . It's closed down , it's fine , but anyway .
So then I started drinking and next thing I know , we were at this person's house and of course , my brothers were there , so my brothers would not have allowed anything . I don't think to happen to me , but all I can remember is I was in there . By the time I was in the house , she probably had one great soda .
Oh gosh , I was so sick , I was so sick , I was so sick while I was over the toilet . I don't know how we got from Brother Dames to this house . I mean , I don't know , from one drink , from probably one drink , I was here in the gym it probably was one of what did dad always get for Christmas , for the Christmas gift from his workplace ?
Oh , jim Vane , or whatever . It may have been that with Coke , I guess . Yeah , one of those . Yeah , one of those , they all were . They did wait . I was sleeping in the suds at four of my dad's can . I took her to the suds . She wanted that stuff . I missed a lot of stuff , but anyway , I don't know how we got there , but I was really poor .
All I can remember is being over the toilet throwing up , but I was so sick and it was like I wound up peeing my pants While over the toilet , sick , while I was over the toilet , sick , I don't know how that you were closed , I was . You got horse macketed . I've been tossed on a lot of things . I don't ever make it somehow , but anyway .
So my brothers are like okay , get her some of your sweatpants . And so they gave me these sweatpants I don't even know how , and there's men's underwear , so she put them on .
There was men's underwear there and you had to pin them .
Yeah , so well , they gave it . It lived in this house . He gave us some of his clothes , so there was no women out there that lived there . I don't think . Anyway , there's a party out . I said I just need to go home . And so this guy says , here , I can take you home . And I can remember one of our brothers saying she can ride her motorcycle home .
It's strange the things you remember .
But I remember even the next day being so sick at my stomach and being over the toilet the next day and I thought to myself . I can remember thinking , Lord , I don't get it , this is just blowing me . She never touched it again , no .
After that it was like okay , you gotta gauge you that experience , so you wouldn't .
No , and that's the thing about my life is , I have always had like a hedge of protection . I mean , we're , we'll tell stories , and she's like what ? And we're like dude , how are you so sheltered ? Okay , no , I didn't know .
Then the story that's coming to mind right now is when we were at a cousin's house and all of y'all were talking , and y'all were talking about the brothel , and she's like what's a brothel ? I'm like what's a brothel . And my cousin , I'm like I'm a fat , I'm a stew with brothel . Yeah , yeah , and my cousins , were you raised with us ?
I mean cause , like all of them are talking about it and they're laughing and I'm just like what's a ?
brothel , and so you're not even the oldest . So you were in the middle of everything and still don't have a clue . I don't , I don't . It was like you were older and he moved out and you got out of it quick and it was . You were there somewhere the whole time .
You were so early the whole time .
¶ Escaping Addiction and Finding Faith
It just got worse . It got worse after my mom died , cause my dad and they went from weed and alcohol to heavier drugs . They went to cocaine Cocaine , then our one brother done heroin for a while .
So when my dad , when my dad got rid of all my mom's stuff and he moved us out there into a lean two which we lived in , that lean two for a year and a half , maybe two years , with no water , no electric , you know , in the winter , in the summer , this is where we lived , and it was .
The lean two was made out of a A frame If you know what an A frame is , and a tar that they put on the back , and somehow I don't remember how , but somehow they came into some which usually they stowed stuff .
So they may have stowed stuff , but they found a bunch of bricks and so that we had a brick floor and then we had a metal drum that we built fires in . And so that's how I was 12 and 13 and I would get on the bus and go to school with , and I went weeks without showers .
I say what did y'all do for showers and drinking ?
We didn't there was a lake down the road , you know , and I'd go down there and play around in the lake for a little while , you know , and sometimes I may have went to your house , I don't know . I avoided her house because of the man that she married , john . He was an alcoholic , but he was a very abusive alcoholic and so I hated him .
So you married . You knew he was an alcoholic and you married him . But you stay with you . I didn't .
Oh my goodness , yes , yes , yes , absolutely I didn't . I don't think , you , you know , I didn't think that he's an alcoholic . You just , I didn't recognize that he was , you know . And then , at first , 11 years of our marriage , but the way that I battled that alcoholism , well , first off , there was a story about my mom when I was little , you know .
And now I understand that my mother had been battling it , that , you know , it's a spiritual warfare , is what it is . I mean , I understand it now more than I did then . But my mother was battling that alcoholism , you know , and I remember one day where she said you know what , if you can't beat them , join them .
And she did , and so that I know that fell apart , that stuck in my mind . And so when I was battling and that was a gift from God , because when I was battling that spirit , that spirit of alcoholism , I can remember giving it to the Lord , you know .
And there was a couple of times where , you know , we were in a it was my husband's , it was more verbal and emotional than it was physical and I can remember two different occasions where I thought you know what , if I can't beat them , I can't do that Because I knew that .
That's when it spiraled out of control for the kids that were involved , and I loved the kids and so I was just like I can't and I would go to the closet .
I mean , I just knew within myself , the Holy spirit led me to the closet , I guess , to the wilderness , I mean , you could say and I just laid prostrate in the floor and I just said , lord , I don't know what to do . You know , and she was like the prayer warrior of the family . It was a .
She prayed us all out of our darkness , I do believe it , without a shadow . That's still . That is still occurring today For the family that we're talking about . This is still occurring today .
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