Archive for year: 2019

Sister Sista!

“I haven’t time to waste my time with the likes of you!…”

I would think by now you’ve read enough to understand some of the reasons as to why mine and Dales relationship is the way it is. Since my teens there has been a steady flow and varying degrees of shit, so when the events of the past five years first unfolded the majority of it was of no great surprise.

However, what did take me by surprise is how the relationship between myself and my sister fell apart. To be totally honest I’m still flummoxed. It’s actually quite funny as the love and adoration I had for Dale as a child could not be said of my feelings for her.

Our sisterly bond didn’t really kick in until after she left home. Before then it felt like I was more tolerated than loved. She was always so bloody miserable! There were never any girly sessions or guidance from her. I actually struggle to recall any major bonding moments that didn’t involve me trying to garner some form of affection.

There is an eleven year age gap between us, so by the time I was 10 she was 21 and we had little in common. By then I was a typical kid into my pop tunes but had also been introduced to my Black side via my eldest brother. She was different. She had a Black side but it was more diluted.

Considering that she and Dale were born in Antigua they both spoke as if they were born with silver spoons in their mouths. Dale would switch it up every now and then and try and drop a little patois into the mix, but I don’t think I’ve ever heard her speak anything but the queen’s English and banshee.

She liked jazz, funk and soul, and I credit her for introducing me to the likes of Anita Baker, Maze, Roy Ayers and Tania Maria. My main impression of her back then was that she liked make up and shoulder pads, wining, dining, hobnobbing and white men.

I mentioned previously that she and Dale never talked when I was little. I used to think that part of the reason must be because she was so moody and uptight, but then I finally got it. She was bouji!, and I came to understand it was mostly frustration at her environment. For someone of her imagined stature living at home must have been torture for her.

It wasn’t unusual to have the smell of sweat and testosterone wafting upstairs alongside the grunts and groans of Dale and his mates working out. Not the greatest when you want to relax with a glass of wine and chill with Robbie Vincent.

She was smart (or so I thought), had good taste and liked the finer things in life, but we were flexing with Vimto money and she had champagne tastes! She tried though, bless her. I’ll never forget the time she bought carpet for the front room. Lovely, fluffy, deep pile CREAM carpet…👀

Even at my young age I knew it was a disaster waiting to happen!

It was lovely carpet for about a week. Then Dale came home one day and walked clean through the front room with his muddy Doc Martens and left a trail of destruction behind him. Understand the rest of us virtually hovered over this fucking carpet let alone sip beverages darker than water anywhere near it.

You have to go upstairs to enter the front room, so he had plenty of opportunity to take his boots off before walking on it but chose not to. He was basically saying fuck you and your carpet.

I remember the vexation from my sister at the time. I can’t be certain but I believe that was a turning point for her. She realised her efforts were not going to be appreciated within the house. I’m sure it helped to cement her decision to leave home and have all the cream carpet her little heart desired.

Well she did just that. Cream carpet an’ all! She was seeing her now husband at the time and they eventually moved in together. I remember Dave and I praising the Lord that she’d gone. The mood totally lifted and from then on our relationship was great. I’d literally never seen her so happy. Space was definitely what was needed all round. She was free to be as bouji as she pleased and was loving it, and most definitely living her best life.

On paper we were polar opposites. Looks, tastes, lifestyles – everything!, but we had at last bonded. We’d often talk about things going on at home and Dales behaviour. She was glad to be well out of it all and was in no way looking back. In fairness to her, despite not coming back to the house very often, whenever she upgraded anything she would give the old bits to mum to help spruce the place up. I say old bits but they weren’t old or battered. It was all good quality stuff and mum was grateful.

My sister was always adamant that she didn’t want to have children. They’d encroach on her lifestyle too much. Bali’s not quite the same with a bawling brat in tow don’t you know!? She was good with my two girls and her other nephews and nieces, but admittedly far from the motherly type.

Just after having my second daughter I discovered that I had two other sisters on my dads side that lived in London. I knew I had other siblings but didn’t have a clue that any lived in England. One of them happened to go on a trip organised by the Antigua Association and met a woman who told her she knew of siblings she had in Slough.

She took her number and passed it on to my mum who passed it on to me. Now after giving birth to my daughter, a week later I was in hospital with a headache I’d had for the whole week. I’d never felt anything like it. It was the worst and constant. It felt as if my brain was being battered inside my head and any kind of light was like torture.

As it turns out I had a benign pituitary adenoma, and after spending 2 weeks in hospital and having a fit, I came round to discover the headache gone and along with it all recollection of giving birth. I remembered being pregnant but not much after that and totally did not register my baby as being mine…sorry Sadé.

I’d had enough head fucks by then, so receiving a number from a sister on my dads side wasn’t really appealing to me. I had visions of her trying to get me to reconnect with him and I sooo wasn’t interested. I believe it was my husband who encouraged me to make contact…it’s all quite hazy, but I do remember the day we actually met.

I had to laugh. It was a lovely summers day and it was as if the higher power were saying, you know what girlfriend, you’ve done been through enough honey chil’! Have this on me!

They were like the sisters I’d imagined and never got. They were FULLY in touch with their roots and we all looked alike. One of them even had locs and smoked too! We clicked and bonded straight away. Like me they had Black partners and Black kids and all I kept thinking was why couldn’t I have met them sooner?

Don’t get me wrong, I have nothing against mixed relationships and I have no issues with it at all. It was just nice to have females on my level who could relate to being my kind of Black. I never had that with my sister, and my mum and I were generations apart. The fact that they couldn’t stand our father either just added to the love.

My paternal sisters came to Slough and met the rest of my family and we’ve been in regular contact ever since. A couple of years after meeting them my sister unexpectedly found herself pregnant. That wasn’t just a shock to her but to all of us, trust me.

She was in her early forties by then and recognised the miracle that it was so decided to keep it. I was happy for her and especially her husband. As much as he was happy to live life as a twosome you could tell he’d love to have had a child of his own.

And I was pretty sure this child had come to fix my sister!

Whenever and wherever I could I helped out. I loved my niece and at that time my sister couldn’t drive, so if she needed anything or had to go anywhere whilst her husband was at work I would be there. When she went back to work I looked after her. She knew I smoked but it wasn’t an issue. She knew I wasn’t a junkie and wouldn’t do it around her daughter.

We were good. We were tight. I thought I knew her. Sure she was bouji and a little stuck up, but ultimately she was good people. Hear me when I say when the shit hit the fan I was totally blindsided by her and it cut deep. Real deep! Never did I imagine she’d be Pinky to The Brain.

She sent the opening quote to me. This was well after all of Dales escapades I’ve mentioned previously and after the majority of what you’ve yet to discover. For her to look down her nose at ‘the likes of me’ whilst backing the likes of him is to me beyond a joke.

As much as she may think cannabis has fucked me up in the head, it seems it’s not a touch on the gin that’s addled her brain! I promised her that one day I would remind her of everything.

Buckle up bitch!😂

R.I.P Diahann Carroll and all those who have passed away recently

R.I.P Joy Morgan. Now your family can finally put you to rest

Huge congratulations to Dina Asher-Smith, Katarina Johnson-Thompson, Shelly-Ann Fraser-Price, Allyson Felix and Nia Ali for totally smashing it for black women in the World Athletics Championships!

Affairs Of The Heart

“The situation between myself and Dawn Williams has always been an issue, for whatever reason she has chosen to create problems for me…”

And we’re back to that line! We’ll be coming back to it a few more times still, but for now if you’ve read It’s A Family Affair you’ll have some understanding of today’s topic.

Sometimes life has a way of putting things in your path. In Disclaimer (Part 1) I spoke about signs of the star and mystic variety and the fact that I believe some signs we are meant to see. Dale would have you believe that my life is so boring I have nothing better to do than find myself all up in his business. Like most narcissistic sociopaths (he’s been upgraded), he fails to realise that HIS actions have consequences. Shit doesn’t just disappear because you choose to forget about it!

Back in ‘94 Dale started seeing someone. Our relationship at that point was ok. He had become a born again Christian (😐), attended church twice a week and he surprised the fuck out of me by dating a Black woman! Before then I knew he had dalliances with a few but as far as I was aware and seen, his preference was White women.

She was from Leicester and was lovely. I admit to being amazed he’d bagged her, but then again he does have the gift of the gab and was still fit and good looking so I could see her attraction I guess. She had been doing for herself before meeting him and had a young daughter. We got on really well and she was of Antiguan heritage too so that was an added bonus. We’d often travel up from Slough to go to the carnival or to just visit and were in regular contact – she was good people.

Being completely honest I’d hoped that she might have been the one to set him straight, but I can see now that was mission impossible; and at a time where I possibly held out a little hope he wasn’t a total cunt.

We both fell pregnant in ‘99, me having my eldest in October and her giving birth to my niece in January. By 2004 she got blinded by the light and they were over. I commend her for lasting nearly 10 years.

At that time Dale showed his true colours like you wouldn’t believe but that’s another tale for another day!

During the time of their relationship he was still in contact with his 2 sons from his failed marriage and had introduced them to their little sister. To say his eldest saw sunshine when looking at him is an understatement. His dad was his idol and they both adored him. They had been mostly shielded from the truth of what had caused their parents to split, apart from one encounter when the eldest was about 10.

He had been informed he had another brother and was obviously very upset. He asked his dad and he denied it and said it was all lies. His son naturally accepted it and moved on. Personally, I know he was a child at the time, but I believe it would have been better to tell him the truth. It’s not the truth people need protecting from – it’s the lies! Despite my beliefs, he’s not my child so I kept out.

Fast forward a few years and I’m bopping through Queensmere shopping centre, minding my own business, and I’m stopped by a woman who asked if she could speak to me. She wasn’t familiar to me and I thought she was going to try and sell me some kind of shit, so being the polite person that I am I listened first before shutting her down.

Well!! When she asked if I was Dawn my ears pricked up. I scanned for the lucky heather, and then when she asked if I was Dales sister I did a mental eye roll, inhaled and braced myself. She informed me that she had a daughter by him and wanted to let us know as Dale wasn’t acknowledging anything and she has a right to know who her family are.

It’s not every day you get a random come up and tell you these things. She didn’t look cray-cray but you never can tell, and she was mad enough to get pregnant by him so…👀 I asked a few questions, took her number and told her I would have to talk to my brother and would contact her once I’d done so.

By this time the incident in Antigua had already happened. I was fuming that he could carry on and treat mum the way he did and I’d written him a letter as he was still away to let him know how I felt. If you hadn’t noticed I’m a bit passionate like that. Funnily enough he didn’t appreciate it!

I got a phone call when he got back asking what I was doing sending him letters, so I said no worries, I’ll come and see him instead. I came to the house and explained exactly what my beef was and that was when he again reiterated that he did not get to live the life he wanted because he had to take care of us, and that I was disrespectful in sending him letters disregarding all his years of effort.

I totally understand, love and appreciate him for stepping up and would never do it down – but to say his life was ruined because of it is a little fucking rich. We were born in 1974 and he left home less than 10 years later and was not financially responsible for us way before then so, wtf!? It’s not like by then all of the best years of his life had gone. He would have been in his early twenties – hardly past his frigging prime! Were we seriously going to be held responsible for HIS life? It would appear so.

I left him to wallow in his self pity and we hardly spoke again after that. I really didn’t have time. I grew the hell up at 17 when I left. He was in his forties and still pining about missed opportunities. He had it better than I did as he was still living virtually bill free and rent free, working, running “businesses” and not taking care of any dependents. By this time his ass should have been out of the house a long time ago, but yet here he was, bitching. Fuck off! You can miss me with that bullshit.

Now I had to go and speak to him again after having this bombshell dropped at my feet. As you can imagine that went down well.

I came round to the house to talk to him. I explained the situation and he straight up denied it and tried to make out it was nonsense. I told him there had to be some truth in it. Women don’t usually approach others about these types of things without having some kind of certainty. He then admitted that he had slept with her once and that he knew for a fact that she was sleeping around with lots of other Black men so it was probably one of them.

I pointed out the fact that even if that was the case (which I highly doubt!), it still made him a contender in the baby daddy stakes and the only way to be sure was to take a DNA test. That’s when he lost it and shut it down. He didn’t need to do one because he knew, in my best Maury voice – he was not the father.

I called the woman back and told her what he’d said. She was adamant he was the father and I have to say I believe her – especially after seeing a picture of her daughter. But looks alone is not concrete evidence. Her mum spoke to her and at the time she wasn’t ready to deal with it, which I totally understood, but we have since been in contact. I know there is nothing on paper stating who she is but I’m not about to dismiss her because of it.

Even if it turns out she’s not his I wouldn’t view it as wasted time. What’s wrong with showing a little love regardless? I wish more people put as much effort into loving as they did fucking. The world would be a better place.

By this time his sons were adults and their relationship with their dad was ok but the shine had definitely diminished. We all still lived in the same town so I did what any logical thinking person would do and made it known that they possibly had another sister in Slough. I make no apologies for it. By this time she was nearly 16 and they were males. Shit happens, and I’d prefer it if it didn’t happen between siblings thank you. They took it well, I’m guessing they had already started a little chalkboard of their own!

A few years after that I’m sat at home, minding my own business, and the phone rings. It’s my fiancé. He’s in the barber shop and I’m not going to believe who he’s with. He said he walked in and there was a young man sat down and he looked exactly like Dale so he asked him his name.

It turns out that he was the son that was conceived whilst he was still married – and unbeknown to me at the time, the biggest sign the higher power was to send out!

I did not create any of these ‘problems’. HE CREATED PEOPLE! I wasn’t out digging into his business, I stepped in his shit. But unlike him I dealt with it instead of ignoring it and spreading it further. Because I did this I’m being accused of interfering in his affairs, and yet again I say, so be it.

It’s a family affair once kids are involved, and some of us actually recognise what that entails.

R.I.P to the young boy who passed away in Salt Hill Park and to all those who have lost their lives recently. We seriously need to find a way to combat the madness.

Congratulations to Jharrel Jerome on winning an Emmy for your magnificent portrayal of Korey Wise in When They See Us.

Congratulations to Jurgen Klopp on being named the Best FIFA men’s coach of the year! #YNWA

Chalking It Up!

“The problem is and always will be that since David and Dawn have been awarded control of our Mothers money, something that we had not agreed to, that there has been a scam going on with regards to what they are doing with her money…”

It’s said that money is the root of all evil. I don’t believe this to be completely true, but I do believe it can cause people to do evil things. You will notice that it’s mentioned prominently in the first paragraph of my last blog and it was a major factor throughout this whole debacle.

As I’ve mentioned my mum has vascular dementia, and naturally there came a point where she could no longer take care of her finances. Eventually myself and my twin would be awarded deputyship to deal with this, but for years before then I had already been helping my mum out. Dale states that he had not agreed to my twin and I being officially appointed. Well let me set the record straight.

There are several hoops you have to go through and 1001 pages of forms to fill in before you are given control. One particular form had to be sent to all siblings informing them that we were planning on being mums deputies; thus giving them the chance to contest it if they so wished. You had to state how the form was delivered and sign and date it to say that you had done so.

Dales was hand delivered directly to the property. We made sure we took photo evidence to be sure, and at that time we both had access to the property to take care of mum so we saw it every day. The envelope stayed in full view on the countertop unopened for weeks on end. I’m not sure if it was because he saw it had my handwriting on it so he didn’t want to open it, but that’s his business.

Obviously there was a time limit on when he could respond back and he’d missed it and then some. I can well imagine it’s probably still sitting somewhere unopened all these years later. By this point my sister was standing by his side, but she didn’t contest it either. I’m guessing it was before she’d become fully converted.

I know I keep saying this tale is about the past 5 years, but to put things in context I have to go back so you can get a clearer understanding of what’s to come, and so you, like Dale, might understand the reason as to why we are here.

You’d be forgiven for thinking there are only 4 siblings but in fact we have an older brother. He wasn’t mentioned previously as he never actually lived at the house. Myself and my twin are the only ones who were born here, the older 3 were all born in Antigua. He remained there with my grandparents when my mum, Dale and sister came over to England, and when he did finally arrive he lived in London before coming to Slough.

He is 19 years older than me so by the time I was born he would have been old enough to do his own thing once he reached this green and pleasant land. My relationship with all of my siblings are different, but out of the elders he is the one I get on best with…to be fair considering the options it’s no real shocker.

Don’t get me wrong, he’s not perfect by far. Between my father, Dale and himself my impression of men and relationships was a distinctly negative one. I certainly wasn’t going to take any shit from any man and marriage wasn’t worth the paper it was written on.

Don’t worry, someone did eventually break through the barriers! I still take no shit but I am married! But going back to my eldest brother, I have to give respect where it’s due. Without him my early years would have been dry as fuck! I ain’t even lying! Some of my best memories as a youngster were spent in his and his families company.

I don’t want to come straight out and say he was the black sheep of the family but he was the black sheep of the family. Literally. It’s gotta be said, Dale and my sister were decidedly original Oreo with a coconut twist, where he was a bourbon dipped in Bournville. If I’m keeping it 100, I’ve always felt that if we were living back in the times of slavery, should massa’s house and fields suddenly catch afire (👀), three of us would be running for the hills whilst the other two would be throwing buckets of water ‘cause we’s on fire!’ #GuessWho

He was in touch with his Black side and he was like the Pied Piper for me. One blessing my elder 2 siblings gave me was the love of various kinds of music, but he had the ragga and lovers rock tunes. He always had chewing gum or mints and would take us on drives to London. He smoked and drank and had an I-Give-Zero-Fucks kinda attitude and I loved it.

He was where the fun was at, and when we were with him we had the freedom we didn’t have at home. He lived with his partner and kids but they were deemed a little too ‘ghetto’ in certain families eyes, and it would appear in their opinion I was becoming the same way. That being said we were a lil’ ghetto, but all in all we were a little too Black and a little too proud for their liking.

Because he wasn’t around as much he had little to nothing to do or say with how things were run in the house. He’s a character, but ultimately a man of few words. Although he can create it occasionally, he doesn’t do drama and prefers a quiet life and to be left the hell alone, which I can relate to. We’ve definitely got that in common but not quite on the same level! In any case he wasn’t really needed to deal with anything anyway.

Now I’ve semi explained our eldest siblings absence, I’d like to go back to the reason why I was taking care of our mothers finances before being officially appointed to do so. By 2006 my twin had left home. Again this was a decision Dale was the root cause of.

After one particular holiday to Antigua, Dale made his feelings quite clear.

My dad was not the father of my elder siblings, yet for all his faults he still paid to get my mum and 2 children that didn’t belong to him over to England and housed. By all accounts – well from my sister anyway, he was pretty decent up until he left; at least to her, and I’m assuming Dale too. After that his name wasn’t spoken much in the house and if there were any mention, you could see and feel the annoyance of it clearly from my brother.

My dad didn’t just up and leave the home. He was cheating and chipped with another woman to America where he still resides. Dave and I first spoke to our dad via phone when we were six and then again when we were 12. At 16 he paid for my mum, my twin and myself to meet him in the flesh for the first time.

We spent 2 weeks in Philadelphia, and a week with some family in Florida, then returned home with renewed faith in our relationship. We didn’t hear from him again until we were over 30 years old…

By this time Dave and I were well and truly over him, but my mum would still talk to him. She was grown and it was her decision. She was happy enough to take a trip to Philly to go and see him and they were in regular contact. In 2006 my mother and Dale went on holiday to Antigua and were staying with my aunt. It just so happened my dad was over in Antigua too and decided to visit our mother at my aunts house. Big mistake!

Shit blew up, resulting in Dale making his feelings known. Our mother had disrespected him by having anything to do with that lowlife man and bringing him anywhere near him. He had spent the best part of his youth clearing this mans mess and in doing so did not get to live the life or do the things he wanted to do. How could she have the front to rub this man in his face?

He shouted at them all that he was owed for his years of sacrifice and when they got back to England he would be throwing Dave out of the house. Naturally mum was very upset and my aunt called and told us what had gone down. It was at that point Dave decided he wasn’t going to wait around for it to happen and left. #TwoDownOneToGo

When he was living at home, either Dave or I use to get the food shopping for mum as we were both driving and mum couldn’t. She would venture out down to Ali’s and the post office or to the high street, and would pop in to see her friends occasionally, but she would mainly communicate by phone. My sister likes to deny this but she would very rarely come to the house. She’d keep in contact with mum regularly by phone, but you could count the number of times she actually stepped foot in the house on a yearly basis on one hand.

Again, Dale was the main reason for this and before she’d drunk the Kool Aid.

She’d always had a touch of the Hyacinth Bucket about her (loving, long suffering husband to boot!) but she was right on this occasion in thinking our brother should do more around the house. It wasn’t run down but it was definitely shabby. When Dale first moved in he gave mum £20 a week to begin with but that soon fizzled out within a few months. So considering he was working 6 days a week and occupied the majority of the rooms in the house whilst living there rent and bill free, really the least he could do is help fix up the gaff, right?

When Dave left I took over getting mums shopping for her. She’d write a list and leave me the money and I’d go and get her bits, and if she needed anything or taking anywhere I was always the go to person, which I didn’t mind. She is my mum after all. It’s what you do, right?

In 2007 I got another sign of the man I was dealing with. The incident with him in Antigua and other incidents up until this time already had me watching him sideways and accumulated a few more lines on the chalkboard, but he was to open my eyes even further. Early one morning Dave got a call from Dale who informed him our mum wasn’t feeling well. She’d been up all night and he’d sat with her and made her a cup of tea but she wasn’t looking good and he had to go to work so…

I’ll just let that marinade with the fact that by this time our mother is 72 years old…

Naturally Dave told him to call a fucking ambulance and said he was making his way to the house. By the time he got there the ambulance had already arrived and as he walked in, Dale walked out and went to work.

Dave accompanied mum to the hospital where he called me from. By this time I was working at Next and had just got to work. He told me to stay there for now until they’d assessed her and he’d let me know as soon as there was any news. I called my sister and told her what had happened. She too, like the both of us, was disgusted at Dales behaviour. A little while later Dave called back to say it was a suspected heart attack. I left work, collected my sister and we made our way to the hospital.

Mum spent a week in Wexham Park before a further 2 weeks at Royal Brompton Hospital following double bypass surgery. Between the 3 of us we had every day she was in hospital covered. Dale didn’t visit her once, yet he could tell people on road how she was doing. KMT!

From that day forth I took over doing not just the food shopping, but drawing her pension and making sure all of her bills were paid on time. This is how I know for definite that he contributed jack shit towards the household apart from his own phone bill, although he was still running up her bill as her statements would show. Any appointments she had I took her to. Any item she wanted buying I’d get it for her.

She was never in any kind of debt and although she received housing benefit she was always in credit on the amount she was supposed to pay. I always gave her £60 cash each week which she’d tuck away and the rest was left in her account.

I can’t confirm it, but I believe he’d seen the signs of mums mental health decline pretty soon after it arose and knew it was the perfect time to conduct another part of his master plan. My intentions had been clear from the start. After all I was there for her as much as I possibly could be since after her heart surgery and it was NEVER raised as an issue.

There was no hint of me being accused of trying to rob her at that time because then it was just a case of several less jobs they had to do and he had nothing to gain. Now however, there was a window of opportunity.

The problem isn’t Dave and I having control of our mother’s finances. The problem is and always will be that I put a stop to him trying to bleed our mother dry.

R.I.P Ric Ocasek and to all those who have lost their lives this week.

“One touch to your heart without breaking your skin. No one has the power to hurt you like your kin.”

India Arie ~ Get It Together

In my case, never has a truer word been written. I have no doubt that every family has some form of fuckery they have to deal/contend with; in fact I know I’m not alone! But being raised Black there’s an unwritten rule that you don’t talk the business!

That’s how certain members of my family would love it to be. So that they can continue to lie and generally behave in any which way they see fit with no repercussions. In fairness, I told them that their time with me will come, so this should come as no surprise.

The reason I’m writing this is because I’m going to tell you about my life over the past 5 years. It’s been a trip and a half to say the least! A few months after I was diagnosed with Stage 3C bowel cancer my mum was diagnosed with vascular dementia and that’s when the real fun began. I’ve spoken a lot about the cancer side but now it’s time to share the other side.

I’m putting this part of the disclaimer out because, as mentioned in Disclaimer (Part 1), I fully expect people (especially Black people) to voice some kind of opinion. I’d like to clarify a few things, so that I’m not continuously going over my reasons and why I feel the need to do this.

You can think you know a person, but you won’t ever see how they really stay until the shit hits the fan. I’d already seen it with my elder brother. He has a habit of causing shit storms wherever he may roam. I’ve come to the conclusion it’s because he’s a sociopath. I cannot officially confirm it, but he ticks too many of the boxes for it to be completely dismissed. To be honest, the real eye opener was my sister. You’ll find out why in time.

As you may have ascertained by now I’m a big believer in talking. Communication on a whole is important, but the best way for me is to (wherever possible) address issues face to face. I will always try to do so, and give 3 tries before I tap out. After that you can come to me if you so wish and we’ll take it from there!

Because of the nature of the situation and who we were dealing with (our mother), I gave more opportunities than my usual 3 to try to talk. The chance was given, time and again, for us to sit down as a family and work through things. They didn’t want to know, which is fine, but what isn’t is the bullshit that came with it.

Over the years my siblings have been selectively vocal. As in they will tell selective people their version of how our situation came to be. In the few times they’ve had to sit down with me, it was under best interest meeting settings, and the literal finger pointing and accusations against me came thick and fast.

I’ve heard this and that from various people on what they have been told, and would normally laugh it off and let folk think what they want – but this time it’s different. It happened when I was going through my own little whirlwind, and instead of throwing in a rope to help they threw bricks to try and knock me out.

Well the storm is over and I am now clearing the debris and finding peace. But not before I analyse wtf went down. So here we are. Many questions were asked and accusations thrown, in black and white so there’s no debating, and now my head has stopped spinning I’d like to address them.

I could just keep calm and carry on, which I usually have no problem doing, but this is a special case for so many reasons. Love on all levels was tested. Knowingly or unknowingly (though I believe it to be the first), my siblings tried to break me. The saying goes there’s a thin line between love and hate. It’s true. But it’s also true that there can be a thick fucking wedge too!

I shall now reiterate my feelings to be super clear.

You will read things and think, damn; she sounds so bitter/angry/hurt/upset and fucked off to name a few and say the least. You would be right in thinking so. At one time or another over the years I’ve felt all those things and more. I’m not denying it. It happened and I’m 95% over it, but this is a piece of therapy that I need before I can reach the full 100! This is for my mental health as much as anything else. Sitting back and reflecting it’s been a lot!

This is my chance to be vocal. Not just to a selective group but to everyone.

There are at least 2 sides to every story, (more in this case) and this is my chance to put mine across. My siblings didn’t want to hear or see it. In fact they made a point of choosing a ‘dignified silence’ when it came to ‘the likes of me’. I guess it’s easier than having the truth in your face.

Most of the time it’s not a dignified silence people try to maintain. It’s not wanting the reality check! It’s not wanting to have to face the fact you may have been wrong. As my siblings weren’t interested I’ll put it to you all to decide if you believe I had a point.

This isn’t for my benefit but for theirs, as they value the opinion of what the outside world can see. I’m more interested in sharing what you can’t.

I truly don’t care how you feel about what I write. I’m not doing it for sympathy, love or likes. Unlike some I don’t feel the need to put on airs and graces and lie to my peers and myself that I’m a better person than I am. I give the only version of myself 24/7 because I can only be me and I’m happy with that. Might be laughing and smiling, might be a moody bitch – but it’s all me!

To my elder siblings personally, it’s a shame that in the 44 years of my existence it’s coming like you didn’t really know me at all.

You’ gon’ get to know though!

Understand this, I’m very careful with my words – you should have tried to be the same. Everything I write concerning these events will be MY truth and MY opinion – apart from any quotes and anything else I say I have proof of. They will be all you, and should you feel I have lied or caused you any distress at all, I beg you please:

TAKE MY ASS TO COURT!

I will happily stand and supply whatever proof necessary. Emails, text messages, banshee screaming voicemails – the works!

I’VE KEPT ALL OF THE RECEIPTS!!

Think on that before you come with any new lies as I FULLY stand by anything I have written to you over that time.

You should have never come for me and expect me to keep quiet!

That being said, should any ‘accident’ befall me – look to them first!

I ain’t even joking. Shame and embarrassment can cause people to do off key things.

And there’s a thin line between sociopath and psychopath too!

R.I.P to all who have passed away recently.

Ohio and El Paso we feel your pain

Toni Morrison I salute you sista.