danniirene

[danniirene]

Mobile-hat

I’m going to try to describe this as best I can. I’ve tried previously to people, but they get the wrong idea. When I say that I cannot feel happiness, joy, laughter, that I can only feel good feelings like at most 70%, I mean that it is not possible for them to be felt below surface level, for the most part. Recently I came up with a pretty understandable metaphor that would work if I could find the right image, or if I was good at photoshop, which I couldn’t and am not so here goes, using my descriptive words. So, imagine a mobile. You know, one of those toys that go over kid’s cribs that have different little toys on the ends that hang down. Now, imagine each of those toys being a different happy emotion. Happiness, joy, comfort, friendship, laughter, family, etc. Now, imagine the base of that toy being attached to my head, so that all of those emotions are floating around me, never quite touching me, but, if the speed is high, it one or two of them may brush my nose slightly and momentarily. That’s how I feel. None of these emotions are allowed to soak into me. I am never allowed to feel these things wholly and completely. I am allowed to have a moment’s worth of fun when I’m dancing to a favorite song at a concert or a wedding, when I am socializing with some of my favorite people. Otherwise, it’s all anxiety, guilt, depression, and more. I can’t feel happy emotions in my soul, but all of the bad ones just seep into my psyche and just set up shop and live. My brain feels the depression, anxiety, random cognitive impairments, and the expectation of failure, where my heart gets to experience the heartbreak, the longing for acceptance, the debilitating loneliness. 

Debilitating loneliness. One thing that I did not mention on my mobile is love. I do feel love. It’s few and far between but it’s still there. I recently connected with someone that I fell for, in an entirely platonic way. But it was someone that I would hope that I could talk to, someone that seemed to understand that I wasn’t typical. I’ve said this before, I’m not a good friend and I’ve lost quite a few people due to my own doings. I am a pain in the ass to have around, and therefore I try to avoid friendships because the endings are always painful. As this one is. I am at an all-time low. I’m not sure that I will ever have a best friend, a maid-of-honor, someone to trust, someone that believes that they can trust me. I didn’t get to tell this person the details of my brain injury, I tend to keep it close to the belt when it comes to friends as no one really gets the seriousness of it. But, I did warn that I am not OK and that I have serious mental illness. I doubted her ability to handle it. I was right. It’s not her fault. She was great. I am always the problem. So when someone better came along, it’d be stupid for her to not run with it. I’m a loser. 

I honestly don’t think that I’m meant to be a part of this world for a long time. Which is awesome because I can’t imagine feeling this way for another 40, 50, 60 years. Jonathan is the only thing holding me together right now and he is going to leave me one way or another one day. Life is hard. Life just plain sucks sometimes. Doing it alone just makes it so so so much worse. 

Not to be such a downer. I’m trying. I’m not suicidal. I just have a lot of feelings about death, since I did almost die and since now I see it on a day-to-day basis. I’ve got to say, I wonder about the people looking down at me going “there’s such an easy solution RIGHT THERE!” Or knowing my future and seeing that my tears and emptiness aren’t worth it. The bottom line is that I do not know what I am doing. But I know that I am scared of the whole thing. 

I write these that despite anything, I want people to know that I am trying to relate these to other people, and that if another TBI survivor reads them and relates then awesome, I am like you too. 

[danniirene]

It Just Doesn’t Stop

I’ve tried to relate my feelings before, in describing my lack of depth perception by having cardboard cutouts of people around me, not actual people with a mass and shape. I stated that I’d like to try to get people to try to understand my mind a little bit, even though to have someone completely get it is out of the question. I’ve been extremely depressed and anxious lately, and although a certain amount of that daily is normal, it has come in an monumental amount that doesn’t seem to be letting up any time soon. I went on a trip to The Florida Keys in the beginning of May, and just last weekend we went to New York State. The issue that I’m having is that I am having a lack of connection to these things. Although they were “great” trips, really nothing bad happened on either, I still experience a serious lack of connection to these things. For instance, there is a beautiful picture of the mountains in New York, but just like cardboard cutouts, it didn’t seem real to me. It might as well have been an overhead projection of someone’s picture, even though I was there and it was “real.” That’s how everything is. My perception of reality is, obviously, skewed, so memories of those things doesn’t make sense. I can tell you what happened last night at work (I might have to think about it at first), but it all is remembered in a haze and I feel a major disconnection to those memories, therefore everything in those memories. Key West, fishing, dancing on the dance floor, drinking too much Saturday night; All those things really happened. But in my mind’s alternate reality where there is a figurative space between me and those events is how I remember them. 

What’s the most scary, and the most depressing, and the thing that keeps me awake at night is my lack of connection to people. This is probably going to be the hardest thing I’ll write, but it’s the most important. I’ve written previously about how since the accident, people have come in and out of my life, most of the time through my own fault. And since I’ve had quite a few people leave because I am too much to handle, I’ve been pretty good at holding people at arm’s length. I know how much of a burden I am to myself so this is not something I like to put on other’s shoulders. I don’t want to muddy up everyone else’s lives. So, I try to keep people away. My mind is sick and won’t let me enjoy the very things I pray for. I don’t think I will ever be ok. My mind will always be periods of happiness masking the underlying, riddling depression. My brain will never be the same after having it almost literally be scrambled. I’m going on 12 years and I’m still struggling with no relief in sight. I thought sharing this with someone I felt would try to be empathetic would help, but I was told that my “negative thoughts” is what is causing my negative life. What if the thoughts are just there, just as plain as my arm is?

Mental health is the most underappreciated thing in this world, and yet it is the most important. It pisses me off that it is not taken more seriously, that “cries for help” are ignored, that more and more kids’ depression and anxiety (which, no matter what, growing up sucks. Puberty, school, friendships, all of it suck.) gets ignored. The suicide rate for children should be ZERO. Kids’ mental health should be a #1 priority. But, I get it. I was a suicidal teenager, just like I am a suicidal adult. I’ve never attempted, but FUCK I’ve been close.  I want to take all these kids and just hug and cry with them. It’s an absolute sin that this be allowed to happen repeatedly, and that parents and teachers and siblings and others don’t heed the warnings. It makes me so disappointed in this world, that the children that we are bound to protect are not being protected, and this problem is not being taken seriously. I don’t really know what else to say. I just don’t get it.

[danniirene]

10 years ago today

I’ve been struggling to write this for 10 years. I’ve been struggling trying to figure out the words to make another person get what happened to me and what is still happening. A piece of understanding is what I would love for someone to have after reading this. Not just sympathy, but actual empathy. They say that only other TBI patients could understand that experience. I wish there was a way in which I could articulate a TBI experience so someone else gets it. Sure, a lot of people can read what technically happened to my brain. There were lots of people who saw me there at various points in my hospitalization and recovery. But they don’t know...they don’t know the lowest of low points that I experienced and am still experiencing. Some people won’t care...but at least I’ll try. God gave me this obstacle for a reason...so I’ve got to do something with it. 

I don’t remember anything for the next three weeks. The stories I’ve heard are pretty horrible. I started “waking up” about the 28th of the month. I didn’t know who I was or what I was doing except for what people told me. That’s all I had so I believed them. I had memories of my previous life’s childhood. I remembered the people I worked with but not my job. I knew my family. My mind was very spotty. I had a lot of blanks. A lot of those blanks are still there. 

After having a TBI, one of the main things you hear from other TBI victims is about how many people leave the life of that victim. It’s like everyone just vanishes. There are a lot of friends and family that can’t deal with all of the changes that happens to that person and so they are dropped. It is true. I have had many many many friends and family leave me, or the opposite, I have left them. People don’t realize what it takes to restart your brain, to have to relearn every single thing that you at one point knew how to do. This is the definition of a complete mind-fuck. It’s not an excuse. There were plenty of those instances where I can look back and know that I was in the wrong and that if it were the other way around, I’d have left too. It is just a fact of the process. There aren’t too many people out there that are willing to stick through all of that with a person struggling against their own brain. It sucks because a lot of those friends/family members were good to me, I thought we were really close. But, *shrugs my shoulders*, didn’t work out, I guess. 

One of the points that I wish I could get to show people is how I see the world. My memories, meaning what happened yesterday, are completely different to me. They are foggy...I can remember what I did (sometimes with help), who I was with, and the vision in my mind’s eye is fine. I can remember details of certain things if I specifically paid attention to whatever that was. However, the whole vision is remembered through a narrow telescope, with everything around the central character in that vision being blurry. Another facet of my TBI that I recently figured out how to describe to people: my world is 2-dimensional. There are no curves to the person coming towards me. That person may as well be a cardboard cutout like the life sized ones at the movie theater. I know that I can hug a person, touch a person, but my vision doesn’t acknowledge the space that a person or thing is taking up just by looking at it. It’s weird because I can see a shelf and know how much can go on it, it’s just my memory of it isn’t real. 

I don’t get excited over things ahead of time. While things are happening, I may be excited depending on if I have time to be, but that is rare. I graduated nursing school. I wasn’t “excited” about it. It was just the next thing in my life that I had to do. That’s how it goes. What’s the next thing on my list? What do I have to do today? One of those days it was like, “Today, I take a test.” That test let me get pinned which was what was on my list for April 24; “Today, I get pinned from nursing school.” I had “taking the NCLEX” on my list for July 8 and 9, therefore “stress about NCLEX” was on my list for the next 3 days until I learned I passed. I passed, and it was a huge relief, but the feeling was still kinda blunted. It was like, “okay, what’s going on tomorrow?” Next! 

Life with a TBI is exhausting. There are a million and one new emotions that have come about since that accident. No one knows what goes through my mind or how my mind works.(Hell, I have a hard time with it.) If I can somehow make others try to make sense of it, maybe I won’t feel so lonely. Maybe somehow I can break down a wall so that in general, TBI victims don’t feel so isolated. Maybe I can figure out how to make people understand, so maybe we won’t lose so many people from our lives. 

I know that my struggle isn’t over yet. 10 years down the drain...lots of lessons; lots of people leave, me leaving lots of people, getting fired, debilitating loneliness, getting through school, and then nursing school, meeting the love of my life and dealing with the craziness of his family, complete emotional instability, dealing with a constant low-to-non-existent self esteem, multiple antidepressant prescriptions, suicidal thoughts, getting back into the church, moving out, my animals dying, people dying, meeting tons of new people (most of which are gone), living into my 30s, among many many many more things. I still to this day wake up every day wondering what the point is, what is my point. It’s a constant battle which I plan to win because I have God on my side. But, hopefully in the meantime I can make it a little easier for someone else by spreading some awareness. *shrugs my shoulders* I’ll give it a try. 

[danniirene]

Leslie, Again

How do you sleep at night? How do you wake up every single day thinking that everything is okay? Your son DID NOTHING TO YOU! Why do you treat him the way you do?

I firmly believe that you had him, and luckily he came out disabled, because then you would get to keep him. You truly believe that that human being BELONGED to you. 

God doesn’t give you other people. God lends you other people. God gave you your child to nurture and raise into the best human being that he could be for God. Jonathan was not yours to keep! Jonathan is on this earth to live under God’s Will, not Leslie’s will. Why were you okay with letting your girls spread their wings and do what they were meant to do but not Jonathan? Was he just meant to be your constant helper, your little do-bitch, and work down the street from you forever? And now, 6 years after he moved out from under your wrath, he is doing great. He’s got goals for himself, he works hard, and he laughs so much. It sucks that you miss out on the greatness that is Jonathan. Your son. He’s kind, helpful, thoughtful, and I thank God every day that He let Jonathan be my boyfriend. Do you thank God for letting him be your son? 

Let me ask you: if he hadn’t moved out, if he hadn’t have met me, what did you plan on Jonathan doing now? Would he still be at Publix down the street from your house making minimum wage? Would you still be making money off of your son, taking $300/month directly out of his account to spend on yourself? (Would that price have gone up?) Would he still be the one you would call if you were at work and remembered your curling iron was plugged in? Would he still, at 32 years old, need to put his cell phone on the counter because you didn’t want him using it at night? Would he still need to write down addresses of friend’s houses where he would be spending the night?

How much control did you plan on taking on over his life?! 

And do you still to this day believe you were right?

I see that the rest of the family is on your side as you wanted. You poisoned your daughters against him. The rest of the family is against him, too. Is that what you really wanted? You wanted everyone else against him like you said, even though you know that it is all your fault.

YOU KNOW YOU WERE AND ARE IN THE WRONG. 

You know in your heart of hearts, if you search within your soul, that YOU fucked up. And not just a little, big time. 

Why would he want anything to do with you? A mother who controls him. A mother who discriminates against him. A mother who abuses him. 

I thought that once the family knew what happened that they would give a little bit more credence to Jonathan's side. I mean he was the VICTIM in this entire thing. But, I guess not. I guess, Leslie, you’re golden as far as they are concerned. I guess that abuse and discrimination against your one and only son, who has overcome so much (probably because of you), is an OK sin for everyone to look away from. They blame him for being defensive. They blame him for leaving. What would you have done? Put yourself in his shoes. Put Camden in his shoes. Put precious Taylor in his shoes. It’s SICK no matter who this is happening to. 

It sucks. You took away his family, which is what you said would happen. Congratulations! 

Keep in mind. The real you is the one that Jonathan was afraid of coming home to. The real you is the one that told him he couldn’t drive, The real one is the one who grabbed him by the throat. The real Leslie is the one that took his door off of its hinges. None of your “fans” have even seen an inkling of the real you. Which is, hopefully, why you still have fans. (Although Rich knows all about, and is a witness to, all of this stuff which makes me wonder why he is still your fan, protector (where was he when his son needed protection?), your secret-keeper? That’s another letter for another day.) I like to think that everyone is just saving face with you...that deep down they think that you are the trash that you are but don’t want to make waves. I guess we will never know. As long as you believe that you are popular, right? And as long as your son isn’t, right? You won. Congrats, again. 

But, you, me, Rich, and Jonathan know the real you. You are evil, conniving, deceitful. Fake. Jonathan said this morning, that like a light switch, once you get off the plane your fake, nice side will all of a sudden be who you are. 

I’ve said this before, if you’re evil in private then you’re evil period. You don’t deserve Jonathan. He is the best one of your kids. Hands down. And he is the one you tried to hold back. He is the one that God put me specifically in his life to free. You called me a “bad influence” because I live on my own, pay my own bills, drive my own car and he saw that and he wanted that. He deserves that. I want him to be the best version of himself that he can be. I want him to fulfill his every desire, and every desire that God wants for him. I don’t control him. I don’t tell him what to do, where to go, who to hang out with. After he was kicked out that night he was SOBBING saying things like,”I don’t think I could ever forgive them!” And I was the one saying,”Yes, you can, and you will eventually.” I was the one stating how important forgiveness was. I have never told him not to see his family. 

Then this last incident happened. 

After this last time, I’ve decided that I’ve had it with you. I do not want anything to do with you again ever. But, as pissed as I was at you, I was 10 times more pissed with Jonathan. He let you undress him, dress him again, tell him what shoes he was to wear. He told you what colors he wanted to wear ahead of time, so you told him that you didn’t like the colors and picked other out colors for him to model for you. You didn’t ask him ONE TIME what he thought, to look in the mirror, nothing. You dressed him up like a doll. He said nothing during this whole entire spectacle. And that is where I had my problem. I told him that if he was okay with being treated like that, then he could get the fuck out, that I was not going to marry a boy who was clearly uncomfortable when you were doing that to him and yet didn’t speak and stand up for himself. I picked him up 6.5 years ago after you kicked him out to stop bullshit scenes like this...and he let it happen. That was my breaking point. I told him to choose between you or me. 

YOU treat him like crap. YOU treat him like a child. But it is his responsibility to grow up. And if he chose you, fine. He’d be treated like that until the end of time, because you would’ve stunted him, but it was his choice. I allow him the freedom to be who he wants every single day of his life. You are a terrible, terrible, piece-of-shit mother. Maybe you were great in the beginning, but you’ve certainly turned that around tenfold. 

So soak up all the attention you’re getting. Your greatest asset, the best thing you’ve ever done, is turning his back on you AT YOUR OWN FAULT. It breaks my heart how many times you’ve called him threatening to call the police on him, how many times you’ve made him cry, how many stories I’ve heard of all the sick, twisted things you do and say to him. 

He is going to be great. Not because I want him to be, but because God designed him to be. And you know that I’m right, and you know that even with all your fans, that if your son isn’t one of them, then you fucked up. 

I will defend him as long as he wants/allows me to. You don’t scare me. 

*****Side note:I don’t know what your family knows. Jonathan told me about a big pow-wow that happened at the time of your mother’s funeral. Now, maybe this happened, maybe it didn’t. Maybe your family doesn’t know everything. I mean, they only get your side, and I’m sure that you are 100% honest with every point that you’ve made against Jonathan when complaining about him to them.  But, if it did happen, I would think that that would’ve opened their eyes. I know that if I loved my cousin and I heard about all the abuse that his mother (and father) put him under, that I would definitely think of them as a different types of souls altogether. If this didn’t happen, and they don’t know about things like what is in this letter, don’t you think they should just to give Jonathan a fair shot? 

It’s funny to think of you living in a gated community, thinking you’re all hot shit, meanwhile behind closed doors you’re torturing your son, kicking him out, then blaming him for everything. Guess the gates are all smoke and mirrors, behind them is an absolute nightmare for the unlucky one who was born disabled. 

[danniirene]

I’m the friend who is asked to babysit

I am eternally lonely. I am not sure I will ever have friends, real friends. I’ve lost so many since my accident, a lot of whom had seen me go through what I went through. Every time I think that I have found someone to talk to, to share with, just to be my friend, it turns out not to be. I just don’t even want to try anymore. I’ve asked people on multiple occasions to hang out, to try to get myself out there, but it never works out. No one wants to hang out with me. 

Last year I thought I found someone. Kalli was in my nursing cohort at the time. We had gotten along great all semester but what made me really excited was when we went to a TBI seminar and the presenter was talking about how depression and anxiety are a part of having a TBI...she turned and looked at me and said,” that is you!” I thought that I finally had someone to talk to about this; about all the evils that went around my head. She had told me via text that she wasn’t going to give up on me. I thought that maybe I had someone. 

About 2 weeks later she told me that I “bring her down” and basically that she didn’t want to hang out with me anymore. I get it. I’m not fun. I’m never going to have anyone to talk to about things. I am not worthy, as I had told her. So, I started my separation with her. (This also caused separations with a couple other people in my cohort; that was a lonely time and makes me sad and basically sick to my stomach to think about.)

Tonight, I was asked to babysit Stephanie’s kids. I like Stephanie, and get along with her well. She will talk to me and tell me everything that is going on in her life. But, she really doesn’t care much about mine. I guess I get that too, she is friends with some of the people from the above situation at nursing school. So, in that regard, I guess she gives me more attention than I deserve. 

Tonight she went out with 2 other people from nursing school, and then via Facebook told another girl that she should come out to hang out with them next time. 

Maybe it’s jealousy, kinda. I just feel like no one wants to hang out with me. I’ll watch the kids while everyone else goes and plays. 

I’ve invited Molly to hockey games in the past. I’ve invited Alexis to get Mexican with me multiple times. I’ve invited countless people to have lunch. Never happens. Everyone says “yes” when I say something, but nothing ever goes beyond that. 

And no one ever invites me out.

What’s the point? I know who I am. I know that I am no good. I know that my social anxiety gets in the way of a lot of things. I know that I am a downer sometimes. Why would someone want to hang out with that?

If I didn’t have Jonathan, I would kill myself. I’d be done. I don’t want this anymore. This pain is too much. It eats away at my insides. 

He’s my best friend. And I feel like my problems are seeping into him. I feel like he has a certain amount of social anxiety probably because of me. I wish I could make him better. I wish I was better for him. I feel like if I could break up with him, he’d see that he could do better. The problem is that I have put him into too much debt, and that I do not want him going back to the hellhole that was his mother’s house (no doubt, the second she could, she would swoop in and claim him back as her servant as he was before.) I have to pay off the debt and leave him with money so he can live comfortably after I leave. That is gonna be my good deed for life. 

I feel like such a waste of space. I just don’t belong. I feel like I live in an alternate reality than everyone else. My thoughts, my feelings, my memories just don’t make sense. I don’t know how to describe them. Except that they hurt. I just hurt. And when I’m walking around as if I am okay, I am actually not. I am actually hiding everything, including the tears. 

I just want the pain to stop. I just want my mind to stop. I don’t know how to describe the eternal fire that is going on in my gut...loneliness, sadness, depression, confusion...it’s everything and more. 

Where do I go? What do I do? Keep trucking along, until some time when something happens. Pray that God is with me. I need Him. I need some guidance. I am so alone. 

[danniirene]

Leslie

I have a million things to say to you; a million questions. I will never understand you and how you can sleep at night, look at yourself in the mirror daily knowing that you attempted at ruining a person’s life completely. It’s not going to be, but that’s what you wanted. 

I thought after this last Christmas season things could change a little between you and I. I mean, I will never like you. You are inherently evil and therefore I will always have that in my head when dealing with you. You ABUSED your son. And although I pray that I can, I don’t know how or if I can ever forgive you for that. However, I figured that maybe I could move passed certain things just for Jonathan’s sake. He still, for whatever reason, wants a relationship with you. I could keep my mouth shut a little, laugh and smile when around you even though I just want to scream at you. 

But that changed. I heard that when it was brought up to you that we might need to stay with you for a minute if I get a job in Land O’ Lakes that you “weren’t fond of that idea.” I don’t know the exact words of the rest of the conversation however word on the street is that your husband said that you’re gonna have to get used to the idea because if we need to, we will be staying there whether you like it or not (props to Rich.) The gist is that you do not want us being in your space, being around you, sharing your air. 

Can I take you back to April 20, 2013? You forcibly kicked your son out of your house. You slammed the door in his face. 

You have since, allegedly (I have no proof of this happening), apologized to him for this and have also stated that you were wrong for the abuse that had happened leading up to and following 4/20/13. Again, I have doubts that this occurred. But, my thoughts are...if you were really sorry and you really miss your son, and your son needed your help, why would you not jump to help him? Why wouldn’t you open your doors for him? Probably for the same reason that you took away his house key 6 years ago and still haven’t given it back. He is not welcome. If he comes over, he is a guest for that particular event, and that is it. He is not welcome over to your house, because it is yours. (You’re a terrible mother.)

I no longer want any type of relationship with you. If I never see you again, I would be totally okay with it. You probably noticed that I absolutely had nothing to say to you Friday night. I am now at the point where I cannot even fake it with you. I am sick of keeping my mouth shut. I am sick of faking it with you when you are unfair, abusive, downright psychotic, egotistical, and selfish. 

I remember a conversation that you had had on the phone with Jonathan when you found out he was going to go up to Syracuse 12/2013 (which was total bullshit on EVERYONE’S part.) You remember this one. You were on speakerphone YELLING at Jonathan for daring to want to go to Syracuse. You had made the statement,” if you cut me out of your life, you cut the family out too. They are on my side.” ......Well, it turns out that you’re right. They are all on your side. You still, for every single family function, fake laugh with all of them. All of them still have zero qualms about what kind of horrible person you have been to Jonathan (no big deal, right, as long as you’re not abusing them?) You still got to hang out with Mark and his girlfriend and you were smiling and laughing and being all loud....fake fake fake fake. (If you are an evil person behind closed doors, you’re an evil person, period.) You have your daughters, sister, nieces and nephew, cousins...no big deal. They are all yours. 

You know what sucks though? You know what should break your heart? You do not have the respect of your son. HE is the greatest thing that you’ve ever done. But then you turned around and committed the worst sins that you’ve ever done against him. When you’re on your deathbed, I have no doubt that you are going to look back at all the things you’ve done and are doing to him and all the time you are wasting not even trying to have a relationship with him and THAT is going to be your biggest regret. You aren’t going to be thinking about the popularity contest you think you’re winning. You are going to be thinking of Jonathan, how you gave birth to him, how you protected him for years, how he struggled and how you helped him...just to let it all go. Just to hit him, yell at him, strangle him (both literally and figuratively), to NOT let him achieve his highest potential, to kick him out of your house and to not let him back in when he needed help. I am telling you, Leslie, if when you die you have hundreds of people at your funeral telling all these great (fake) stories about you, but your son isn’t one of those people, then you have failed. 

Jonathan deserves better. And I have no doubt that I was put in his life to make sure he realizes that. I will defend him until the end...against you and every single other person that has a problem with him. Have a million-man army, if you want, Leslie...I’d rather be on his side every-fucking-time even if it’s just the 2 of us. At least I’d now it’s genuine.

PS-I was never going to move into your house. It was never going to happen. Just so you know. 

[danniirene]

To the Dean

02/01/2019

I started Keiser 08/2017. From the moment I’d started talking to Keiser, I let them know of my disability accommodations which are necessary for my success. I need extended (double) time for testing, isolation when testing to avoid distractions, I need access to a calculator, and tutoring. Being at the Clearwater campus, they NOT ONCE made me feel badly about this, they all worked together to make sure that my situation was properly handled. 

I had to come to the NPR campus in 05/2018. On my very first conversation with Director K, I let her know that I had these accommodations that need to be met. As soon as I was on campus, I had a conversation with the president regarding this, I also told my teacher about these. I have been very open and honest about these accommodations. They are very important, they are not for nothing, they are what will make or break me as a student. 

In general, the support for these has been severely lacking at NPR. Sometimes I get extended testing, sometimes I don’t. I, more often than not, have it set to arrive on campus at whatever time, and end up waiting a long time before I can start my exam. 

Last semester was the worst. Ms. Hall was the absolute worst and made me feel as if I was a thorn in her side because of these accommodations. (I did write about this in detail and submitted it as a part of the end-of-course survey that I did on Hall. These surveys obviously do no good.)

Yesterday, I was scheduled to be on campus at 9am for my dose calculation test, PRACTICE. I was ready to take this test. Then Director K tells me that she has some announcements, that I should meet with the class to hear those announcements prior to testing. The announcements weren’t anything urgent, so I’m upset because this could’ve waited until after my important test I was supposed to be taking. She then sends me to the isolation room and tells me that she will meet me there in a few minutes.

I am not kidding when I tell you over 30 minutes goes by, and I am still sitting there staring at my computer waiting to take this thing. I am MAD! Not only because I had to listen to these “announcements” that really weren’t urgent, not only because I was ready to take this test when I walked in the school, but now my mind is reeling over the fact that this lady who apparently is our “director” is our boss and isn’t taking care of her students and left me there to just sit there. 

I am by myself, I have no one to help me figure out what is going on, how much time should I wait? I leave the room, I walk down the hallway, I see Marianne in her room ( her door is almost always open) and she sees that I’m upset. She walks down the hallway with me and asks me whats wrong, I tell her that I have been waiting for over half an hour to take my test. We make the right hand turn there’s Director K outside the computer lab (was she supposed to be in the classroom proctoring the other students?). She heard what I said was wrong to Marianne. She says,”I sent you an email telling you that you can go ahead and test.” I tell her that I am not allowed to have access to my email while I am testing, so how would I get that email? She looks at me and says,”Okay, well you can go ahead and start testing.” Seriously. Like that was what I was waiting for. Like this was my first ATI test and I just needed the teacher to just verbally ok me to take this test. I say,”I need you to give me a code to take this test.” Unreal. This is our DIRECTOR? I need to tell her how it is that I have access to my ATI tests?! So I spend the whole test thinking about how pissed off I am and how this campus is just a mess. It took me forever to take this test, barely paid attention to it because I was immensely distracted, and got an 85% and I needed a 90% on this to pass. I have to go find the class who happens to be in a random room with Ms. Stinson (after I go get my stuff out of my car because I am not allowed to have anything with me while I’m testing), I take no break for food or water, Stinson says “well the next one is for you, Danielle.”...”Thank you for joining us.” Now, I don’t know if this was sarcasm, but I’ve had a very stressful morning and just failed a test that I shouldn’t have failed (I always do very well on dose calc), walk into a random classroom joining them doing whatever it is that they were doing, and get picked on as soon as I walked in. I feel like I am about to break.

Soon afterwards, I get an email with remediation instructions for the dose calc I just failed from Director K. Remediation is 10 hours of studying that I am responsible for since I “failed” the dose calc test. So I am being punished for the fact that I was mistreated and mishandled and couldn’t concentrate on this test. (Also, I don’t remember ever having to do mandatory remediation for a PRACTICE ati. I will be studying on my own to make sure I have it for the next time, but the mandatory remediation is for the failure of the actual Dose Calc ati.)

Dean Brvenik, 

I know this is a long read, but it is very very important. I am just astounded at the lack of leadership that there is at this campus from our actual director, but instead had Hall and Stinson acting as if they are our bosses, that they we are underneath them. I saw an interaction between Stinson and Wheeler where Stinson just absolutely treated Ms. Wheeler like crap on her shoe. It was disgusting. 

Professor Hall was horrible to us last semester. She definitely had her favorites and wasn’t fair to the class. (I can forward you that “essay” as well-the one I wrote for the end-of-course survey.) I’m telling you, having her teach us this semester will be one of the worst things that can happen. 

Professor Wheeler cared about us. I would love to have her be our teacher this semester. For people to blame her for what we don’t know isn’t fair. We had a bad teacher for basics the semester before which also contributed to that. 

I will write more as I remember it. 

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WHAT I ACTUALLY EMAILED THE DEAN:

Dear Dean Brvenik,

I am one of the Leadership students who you came to speak with on Tuesday. Sorry it has take me so long to write this. I wanted to talk to you about everything that has been going on, give you my take on things, but I think, for the most part, everyone else has said what I've had to say. I will just fill in the blanks on my particular issues.

I have disability accommodations since I've started here. I have been open and honest with Director K from our first conversation ever, I have spoken with the president about this, and also to each individual teacher about this. In general, I feel like the NPR campus (as opposed to the Clearwater campus, where I came from) has not taken these as seriously as they should have been. There have been multiple examples of this (Ms. Hall has been the worst-I wrote an essay about this and submitted this to the end-of-course survey.) On Wednesday I came in at 9am ready to take my PRACTICE dose calc test. The director made me sit with the class to listen to some "announcements" then sent me to the isolation room where she would meet me "in a few minutes." Over half an hour goes by, I am getting madder and madder, and it turns out she sent me an email telling me to start the test. I don't have access to my email when taking a "proctored" test. She then tells me that I can go ahead and start my test...I tell her I need a test code to access this test (as if I was just waiting for her verbal OK to take this thing. I've taken a lot of these tests, I know how they work, does she?) So, I start the test over an hour later, I am PISSED, I took a lot of time on this test because I was extremely distracted, I get an 85%; I need a 90% to pass. Director K sends me an email that says that I have to do a mandatory 10 hours of remediation due next Wednesday. I feel like this is a punishment for HER mistakes. (That and for practice exams we don't usually have to do remediation for practice ATIs.) I will study for my dose calc for my own benefit, but I do not think it is fair that I have to do an assignment that I should've passed and didn't because of poor management. I've gotten penalties a few times because of improper accommodations at this campus.

After the test, I did not know where the class was. I had to go out to my car to get my backpack, use the restroom, and found the random classroom that they were in due to texting a classmate.  (So I have not taken a break all morning). I walk into the classroom where Ms. Stinson is reading NCLEX questions with the class. She says,"Danielle, the next one is yours"..."thank you for joining us." I don't know if this was sarcasm or not. All I know is that at that point I did not care what was being "taught" and I certainly did not appreciate being singled out after the morning I'd had.  (Professor Stinson has an air about her that she thinks that we are "lowly" or better than us-I've seen her treat others this way, including Professor Wheeler.)

The last point is that part of the announcements that was made that morning, Director K stated that we only have to have 2 contact hours per week. They had made our schedule for Tuesdays and Wednesdays from 9-1 ish to catch up with "the stuff we didn't know." (She also told us to keep it quiet because if people knew that then no one would show up.) I don't have a problem coming to class Tuesdays and Wednesdays for a few hours (more than 2 hours) HOWEVER I am driving a long ways away to be coming to class, so it needs to be not for nothing. And, so far, 4 weeks in and I have not learned a thing. It is wasting time and money and I'm worried about my car. So, please, when you discuss these things with whomever, please make our time and money worth it.  

I can, and would love to, expound on these things. These things that are going on here are disgusting. These disability accommodations should've been taken seriously. Everyone here deserves to be taken seriously. We, as students, I don't believe have been.

Danielle Russo

7673168

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02/04/2019 

Communication received today:

1) Email from the dean:

Danielle

Thank you for your email.  I would like to follow up with you on this email.  I do appreciate the information you are passing on to me and I will look into each issue you mentioned.  Let me know if you prefer to meet with me in person.

I will meet with the instructor and Director K to make sure we are following all compliance for accommodation.

I can assure you that all issues are being addressed.  Please always feel free to come speak with me.

Thank you

Dr. Andrea Brvenik

Dean of Academic Affairs

Keiser University, New Port Richey, Florida

2) Phone call/voicemail from Director K

3) Text message from Director K

4) Email from Director K:

Hi Danielle, I'm trying to reach you so I can address your concerns. Please give me a call. I really want to hear from you. Thanks, Director K Kind Regards, Sandra Kumapayi, MSN-Ed, PhD(c), RN Nursing Program Director

*None of the above have been responded to today. I will be on campus tomorrow and will probably speak to one or both of these people

[danniirene]

James William Freitag

Out of all of my uncles Jimmy has always treated me like an adult. I can’t say he’s never been mad at me but I honestly cannot remember him disciplining me once. And every single time I saw him he would treat me like a human...”how’s it going, Danielle?” He would have conversations with me about hockey, food, life. He was good to me. I will never ever forget him. 

My earliest memory of him is when I was, I dunno, 5 or 6. He went swimming with me in my grandparent’s pool. Just him and I. I would stand on his hands in the pool and I would do back flips into the water. I knew even then that that was a once-in-a-lifetime experience-that this was something that not everyone would experience.

My accident was on a Monday night; he was here on Wednesday. He took off of work and jumped in the car. He was the first person from New Jersey to be here to see me. He took video and a couple pictures of me in the hospital (I don’t know where they are now) and he always told me stories of the nurse Ken who he did not like, and how I tried to flash him a few times, my left hip wound and how gross it was, among other stories. He knows how messed up I was. 

My brother and I wanted to see Alice in Chains when they started touring again after Layne Staley died. I don’t remember the exact circumstances, but we couldn’t or didn’t get tickets for a show in Tampa and were upset about it. Tristan (apparently) gets the 2 of us tickets for Alice in Chains at a little bar in New Jersey. We go up there and stay with Jimmy and Donna in their house the entire visit. Jimmy and Donna take us to the show (they didn’t go to the concert) and pick us up from it.

One of my favorite nights of that trip. Jimmy, Donna, and I went to a restaurant and I (I can be a competitive drinker, usually without the other person knowing) drank one Miller Lite for every Heineken he drank. (I did feel sick later that night however did not throw up :) ) We later went to Michael’s to continue drinking (Donna stayed in the truck I think). My Uncle Jimmy and I smoked pot together that night before going to bed. It’s a stupid thing, something he’s done a million times I’m sure, but it was special for me. I felt like my Uncle really loved me and saw me as an adult. 

Other memories:

-He used to take me to the apartment he shared with Donna on Joralemon street when I was little. I used to play Nintendo there. I remember one time playing Mario Bros with him when Donna came over and turned off the video game to make me watch Pete’s Dragon. I got mad and turned the Nintendo back on. Donna yelled at me and made me watch the movie (which, in all honesty, is an awesome movie.)

-I remember being there in New Jersey for the 4th of July one year and the next day walking around the neighborhood with Jimmy to see what kind of fireworks (gun powder, I guess?) they had used the night before.

-We went to Wild West City and he bought each of us cousins in attendance a Wanted poster.

-Him making fun of my mom for bitching at my father for putting ham on pizza. “Nobody puts HAM on PIZZA!”

-The video of him and Raf with the Parmesan cheese. 

-That AIC visit, he took us to OCC the original shop before they moved. I bought myself a sweatshirt there that I wear every single year when Florida weather permits it. 

-He took me to the Shannon Rose a couple times; a beautiful Irish bar up there somewhere.  

Jimmy could definitely be an asshole. He could definitely be a tough guy. He never was with me. Even once. I will miss him. Forever and a day. His cute chubby cheeks. “Irish Jim.”  It’s amazing what age did to his body. It’s amazing what became of him-how messed up he became. He was so strong. And now he’s gone. But he’s with God now. I can’t wait to see him again. 

[danniirene]

Jimmy

I’m not sure how to do this. I’m not sure if this is the right time or place or if I’m in the right mindset to start this. I know that I need to do this blog post, but honestly I have been procrastinating on it because this one hurts so badly. I want to make this one as complete as possible in as little tries as possible. I want to capture my feelings on this now, but I’m afraid that all of the feelings I have on this subject will take multiple sessions. 

(Most of the time when I start these blog posts I can just type, and usually it is awesome and purposeful and needs very little editing. I don’t want this to take forever but I also know that I have a lot to say and, for once, just don’t know how to say it. So, with that being said, it will probably be a project that I will have to keep coming back to until I feel as if I’ve said it all.)

I will start with this. About 3 weeks ago Tristan, Amber, and Rafael went up north to New Jersey. They stayed with my Uncle Jimmy, Donna, and their rottie Diesel. Apparently, one night Rafael was video-messaging my mother and the video was put on Jimmy. Jimmy and my mother had a conversation. Within that conversation, Jimmy and Donna both said that Jimmy would be retiring in May, and that their plan is to sell the cabin they have in Delaware County, NY and get their house in Belleville ready to sell. They were then going to move to Florida. They have said this many many times. I’ve heard this over and over in my life. But, this time, I believed them. I don’t know why. And I got excited. I knew that Jimmy had multiple health problems and I was hoping that by the time he got down here I would be a nurse with some experience that could help him. I would have loved to make it my mission to help him get “better”-as better as he could get. Less than a week after that conversation between my mother and my uncle, on December 20, 2018 he suffered cardiac arrest at least 2 times, suffered brain damage because of the prolonged CPR, which led to grand mal seizures among many other things which led to his eventual death December 24, 2018 approximately 10:00 pm. My Uncle Jimmy would not be moving down to Florida with me. He had left, he had given up. My heart has never been so broken. 

[danniirene]

Kate’s/Andrea’s Wedding

In August/September 2015 Jonathan’s mom’s cousin’s daughter Kate got married in upstate NY. Jonathan nor I had much money to spend (as is the case for everything). We wanted to up on Thursday (Allegiant was cheap airfare), go to The City on Friday (I would’ve gone on my own if Jonathan had obligations), and the wedding was on Saturday, leave on Sunday. Guess who had the great idea to go to the city on Friday? The whole Skrodzki clan. So, guess who paid for our flight, hotel, trip to NYC, meals (which included a twenty-something-dollar-Cuban Sandwich at Tavern on the Green), etc? Rich. As much as I appreciate this, I absolutely will never ever do that again with HER (never mind THEM). It is not worth it. She was constantly telling Jonathan what to do, where to sit, what to say, everything. I kept my mouth shut the entire trip but it pissed me off to have to be a first-hand witness to her treating him like that. Jonathan does not fight back. I’ve heard rumors that he’s had his moments where he has said things back, but I’ve never seen it myself. 

Jonathan’s cousin is getting married according to a text from Mommy (just letting us know that she’s knows-it-all) letting us know that the wedding is September 7, 2019 in Utica, NY. She told Jonathan (Jonathan told me, he never shows me texts from them because they almost always piss me off) that there are reserved hotels there and that we are responsible for our own stay. No shit. But, keep in mind, I haven’t gotten a save-the-date or a wedding invite, so where would we be if Leslie hadn’t have told us? The date was JUST set. The wedding is 10 months away. I will NOT be in that situation again. I will rent a car from up there and leave on my own. I won’t fucking do it. I will not be under their thumb. I am tired of being a child in everyone’s eyes. My boyfriend is not to be treated like a child. I will not let her do that this time. I told Jonathan that he’d better put a stop to this now or I will not keep my mouth shut this time. WE will get our wedding invites, WE will book our hotel, WE will book our flights, WE will not be doing anything jointly with those people. 

Last time his cousin Adam (Rich’s nephew) texted Jonathan while we were in the city to tell him that he just happened to be in the exact city that the wedding was in. He, stupidly, told his mother. She got all involved because she didn’t want Adam to, I dunno, ruin Kate’s wedding (?) by meeting up with us at the hotel to drink the night before the wedding. I really don’t understand, but she has the need to control everything, so we didn’t see Adam, because he wasn’t approved by Leslie. I have a need to not be controlled. And seeing Jonathan being controlled, it makes my blood boil. 

It won’t happen this time. It won’t. I don’t mind being part of his family, but I do mind when they (she) tries to control people. She doesn’t try to control Laura, Brad, or Taylor...but, again due to discrimination, she tries to control Jonathan. I won’t go at all if that’s the case. Nope. No way. 

PS-that will be the 10th anniversary to my accident. It makes me sad to the point of tears thinking about it anyway, but thinking about how she will be there on that anniversary makes me want to die. Not to mention the fact that it should be a big deal, I should be getting my own party for surviving that thing (I waited year after year for it), but the amount of people I have lost since that day just is a reminder of how I should never have a party. It would be slim pickins. So there’s no point. 

Bah, humbug.

[danniirene]

Hall

At the end of last semester, I had to choose whether I was going to stay at NPR campus or go back to Clearwater campus. The only reason that I was leaning away from NPR was Hall. I didn’t have a class with her at that time, but I met her. And for me that’s all you need to do. 

Hall LOVES, LOVES, LOVES to discipline us. She loves it when we do something wrong. Now this class is a bunch of adults in for their third semester. We aren’t children, although she treats us like kids. And she loves it. 

She would start out every class with a lecture about whatever it is that 1 person did wrong. Even if that one person was dealt with, because it was an opportunity to, she would lecture all of us on whatever said problem was. One person accidentally brought their cell phone into Tender Care. That person realized it, and as soon as she did she brought the phone to the front for the receptionist to watch over. The next Tuesday, we all got the lecture about how cell phones are not allowed in clinical. OK. So Thursday rolls around for class with Ms. Wheeler, I walk in 5 minutes prior to class to Hall and Morgan IN THE MIDDLE of a grand ol’ lecture about how cell phones are not allowed in clinical. Why? I didn’t do that. 99.9% of the class didn’t do that. So why do we have ANOTHER lecture on the same thing. And it was like because Morgan was there, Hall was fluffing out her feathers and making the lecture all about how she got a call about her mother dying and she couldn’t take a phone call because she was in clinical and “those are the type of sacrifices it takes for you to become like me.” I had tears in my eyes because I did not deserve to be lectured...I do not deserve to be treated like a child. I am a paying adult who is trying to get an education. You are not above me. We had to write in a journal every week during the first “15 minutes” of class. I know that I’ve written at least 1 whilst being lectured and I expressed how much I disliked being it in said journal entry. 

Things that she has said to us in the past:

“It should not take you over 30 seconds to put on gloves.”-to a student that she did not like in clinicals that was nervous about giving her first IM injection.

“Please please complete survey so I don’t hear about it again”-the email that was sent to us yesterday 12/12/18 regarding this survey (copied and pasted.)

“Nursing is a self-taught field”-while we understand that a lot of this is stuff that we are responsible for studying to learn the material, but if this is a self-taught class, why am I paying you to “teach” me? I believe that this was said due to the lack of teaching we were getting from her.

People wonder why we didn’t learn anything in Advanced? Because peds and the peds clinical schedule is what took over last semester. Hall made it that way. 

She took over doing the clinical schedule for peds, to be split between Tender Care and hearing tests around the county. She did the schedule wrong because we would add up our individual schedules and we were all off on hours-either too many or too few. She came in and stated,”Guys, I have worked too hard on this for too many hours.” She basically stated we were on our own because of the amount of time she took on it. Is that fair? Was it not HER job? People were afraid to go talk to her because she was “stressed” from spending “hours” on the clinical schedule. Are you kidding me? I am to be AFRAID of going to my teacher (who I am paying) because she signed up to do the clinical schedule, and she has done it wrong? Also, am I allowed to just say,”I’m done. I’ve spent too much time on my care plan”?

(She came to class all of the time unprepared and then tell us about all of the clinical groups she’s teaching, and all of the other things she’s got going on in her life. Again, am I allowed to do that? Can I just say,” My Advanced stuff is too much, I am not prepared for this peds quiz”? No. When it comes to her, there are no excuses good enough for her but they are fine coming from her. )

She yelled at us for being “late” to a hearing-test screening-thing. Before that, no one had told us to be there early. The time we had was the time we had received from the paper that came from her hands into our hands. I had gotten there about 20 minutes early, however, there was no parking available due to the fact that that school had a locked fence where the field was where we would eventually park (apparently having all of us students was another problem, so half of us were sent home. Communication between hearing and Keiser was apparently a problem as well.) We park as soon as the field was open, get our name badges from the registration office, go to the portable where the hearing lady was, and I guess we were late (even though we were on time.) I tell Hall about this, after she had yelled at us, and stated that there was nothing we could do if you sent 14 kids there and there weren’t 14 spots for us to park; she seemed to understand. The next time we see Hall, she reiterates the same lecture to us about it’s “unprofessional” for us to be late to a clinical site and that we need to be on time. After our conversation. Why were we still in trouble for something that we had no control over?! And, why are you telling us AGAIN? I truly believe that she got-off on yelling at us and telling us what to do and lecturing us. 

Towards the end of the semester she gave us take-home quizzes that we were not to discuss with one-another, however she did not tell us when she handed out the first one. We did talk to one-another for that one, turned them in with the same answers on them, got different grades. Then we got a lecture about how we shouldn’t be sharing answers on a quiz. Even though we weren’t told otherwise, and the previous 2 we had done in class were with other people. She sent the last take-home quiz via an email that said,”you all should get a 100% on this.” We turn it in, then get an email about how “since you all are still sharing answers...there will be a test next week...” How do we all get a 100% with different answers? (PS-I don’t know how many 100%s she gave, but it wasn’t many.)

And, finally, my disability accommodations. I have certain accommodations regarding schooling that are pertinent to my learning.  In general, I feel like the Clearwater campus has taken this way more seriously than NPR has. At Clearwater, the whole nursing staff knew about them and worked together to make sure that I am comfortable with everything and to make sure my needs are being met. Since I’ve been at NPR, I’ve expressed my needs to the director the first time I spoke with her, the dean or president (I don’t know/care which is which), and every teacher that I have had. I think I have only gotten double-time for my testing for the last 2 months when I have been at this campus for 7 months. The whole nursing staff has ignored my accommodations as if they are not important, however the worst one has been Hall. The first test that I had she forgot completely about my accommodations and I had to test in her office which has paper-thin walls and I heard everything that was going on in the next office over. The next test I had to test in the library where other students were in there being very noisy, people going in and out; not-at-all distraction-free. We had 2 in-class quizzes that were open-book which we could work with others on. The second of these quizzes she did not give us a time limit when she handed these out. After 40 minutes she stated,”it should not take you 40 minutes to take a 20 question quiz” to the entire class. I should get double-time to take my quizzes, and irregardless, WE should not be looked down on for taking that time needed for this quiz. She asked me before one of my tests whether I would be okay testing with the other students because, it turns out, she didn’t have a proctor for me. No. That’s not my problem. These accommodations are not for nothing. I should not be at risk of failing a class because you think it’s not important for me to have the proper accommodations to take tests. During one of the lectures about depression she stated that she tends to have the attitude towards these people,”suck it up, buttercup.” I feel like that’s how she has been handling my disabilities. It sucks because I am constantly apologizing for my shortcomings. I shouldn’t have to apologize for this. At Clearwater, they never made me feel badly because of the fact that I needed help with certain things-they understood it and did it. 

I don’t know what all will be done with all of this. I just believe that Keiser University should be a professional learning environment. I believe that the ones of us that truly want to be in the professions that we have chosen to spend the money to go to school for should be treated with respect and not talked down to. One of my journal entries explains how I have never been made to feel like a child before more than since I stepped foot onto the grounds of Keiser University. I feel small, like I’m not the adult that I am. But I am an adult...that chose to give Keiser University THOUSANDS of dollars. I should be treated, at the very least, like an 35-year-old adult that is looking for a career and trying to figure out how to straighten her life out. At most, treated with a little respect. Respect is earned, though, and Hall has not earned an ounce.

[danniirene]

Dear Mother

Dear Mom, 

I fell in love with a guy who will be my husband one day soon. And you know what sucks? The fact that I cannot in the least bit feel excited about it. Instead I am sure that when it comes to my wedding, it’s going to be me feeling tremendously anxious about the whole thing. I am excited about the fact that I am going to marry my best friend, for sure. I just know that you don’t like him, and I avoid bringing him up in conversation right now, as it stands, because I don’t want to know what your true feelings are on the subject. 

It’s not petty or childish of me to be mad at people for not giving a shit about you not acknowledging his birthday yesterday. You compared the fact that you would’ve missed AMBER’s birthday too if not for the fact that Tristan reminded you. You compared him to Amber. It would’ve meant the world to me that some part of my family cared about Jonathan, or at least acted like it. I don’t understand why you don’t like him, and I don’t think I care to, considering you tend to “hate” things for no reason at all, but he is, and I said this to you before, the most important thing in my life. He is my everything. He is the reason I have not killed myself. He’s the one that has seen my breakdowns and he has held me while I cried. Have you ever? Would you ever? Because I cried a lot of times living with you (and a lot of it stems or is because of you) and yet you never cared when I cried ONE TIME.  Not once. 

When I said these words,”I know you don’t like Jonathan...” you told me I pissed you off and you hung up on me. Why would you hang up? Why wouldn’t you defend yourself? Because you know you’re in the wrong, not for not liking him, but for not trying. 

I’m sorry to say this, but he and I have been through a lot together. If you don’t like him, too bad. If it’s you or him, I choose him 1000 times over. He has never betrayed me, never hurt me, treats me like a princess which I don’t believe I am because you never told me I was. You were horrible to me as a child/adolescent and and treated me as if all of my “growing pains” were a thorn in your side. I grew up being very uncomfortable with myself because you treated me garbage like, which to this day is what I think of myself.

But Jonathan doesn’t believe that I am garbage. He has never once treated me like I am garbage. He calls me beautiful on a daily basis. He does everything he can to make me happy. I would be stupid to let the first thing in my life go that has come in and at least tried to help me out instead of acting like I am a giant problem. 

So, I want to elope. I want to get married with no one there, except MAYBE a best man and maid of honor, far away from St. Petersburg, Florida, or Syracuse, New York, or Anywhere, New Jersey. I want a small Catholic ceremony, then I want to visit the local bars around the area where we are at. I don’t want ANYONE there who has ever had anything bad to say about him, me, or us as a couple, and there is a huge list of people on that one (I’m looking at you, Leslie and Rich.) And that, unfortunately, includes you. 

I’m tired of he and I having separate holidays because we don’t like each others family. I’m tired of him coming over your house and him sitting alone in a corner until it’s time to go. I’m tired of everything he says, you having a smart comeback or contradiction to him.  I’m tired of you ignoring him like he doesn’t matter. We are not Pam and Bob. I will not tolerate this. I won’t let this go on, I won’t let people treat him badly. It doesn’t take anything to one day a year wish someone a happy birthday. 

So, call it petty and childish. I don’t care. Since YOU robbed me of any kind of sense of self worth, I have denied myself a lot of things that are supposed to be milestones in a girl’s life (ie sixteenth birthday, any kind of good boyfriend) and now you’ve taken away my wedding. 

You always said that at a certain point in a person’s life they can no longer blame their parents for things that happened to them in their childhood. I’d like to think that’s true, but it’s not. Your father was hard on you, so you became hard in return. You were a bad mom. You hated being a mother to me, a female, because I needed things like “I love yous” and being a mother to my brothers was a lot easier because they didn’t. So, at what point did you decide to not let your father’s parenting affect your parenting? Pretty sure you were horrible to me (and a lot of the time, us) because of him. 

And that is another thing. The reason I do not want any children is simply because I cannot live with myself if I took out my relationship with you out on my child. I’m so deeply afraid of that that I have never even teased the thought of a child because I never want another person alive, never mind my own child, to feel the things that you have made me feel in my lifetime. I hate myself to the core. I want to die on a daily basis. I cannot look myself in the mirror. I would kill myself FOR SURE if I ever made my child feel these feelings. These are feelings that no one on earth should ever feel.  

But that’s not your fault, that’s mine now, right? 

Whatever the case may be, Jonathan is my reason. Jonathan is my light. You saw how I rescued him, but you have no idea how he’s rescued me. And you should love that about him, if you care at all for your daughter. You should want that for me. I don’t care about his disabilities, his family, his job, him not driving. You should want me to, for once in my life, be happy. 

Danielle 

PS-I did not sign up to watch those dogs. 

[danniirene]

Finals

I have approximately a 78% in peds.  I need a 76% to pass the class.  I have a final on Tuesday (which is the last day in that class...FINALLY!) which is 35% of my grade.  I am freaking out because I haven’t studied much this weekend. Pray for me...I am not taking peds again.  

Tim Tebow is here today!  Will I have time to see him? I will let you know.  

I usually have a lot to say, I just can’t get my mind around this class.  If I never see this “professor” hall again...she is the worst.  

I have disability accommodations which she just conveniently wanted to “forget” when I took my first test.  So I had to take, along with a couple others, that test without proper accommodations.  Before I took the last test she asked me if I wouldn’t mind taking the test with others. The answer to that is always NO! (Side note:she mentioned in class while discussing mental health in peds that she is, and I quote, more of a “suck it up, buttercup” kind of person. Some things cannot be sucked up.  My brain injury certainly can’t just be swept under the rug.)

I have been taking my lexapro which has helped a lot, although I am still depressed, just not as bad as before.  I took a klonopin due to my nerves this morning.  

Pray for me.  

[danniirene]

It’s a Struggle to go to Bed

Jonathan and I went to Target, Kohls, Home Goods, and Barnes and Noble.  Every single one of these were tough treks. It can be so overwhelming to pull into a full and busy parking lot, struggle to find a spot, walk into the store, then navigate the store for whatever it is you are looking for.  It sounds like such a trite thing.  People may read this and think I’m exaggerating. But I’m not. It’s a lot of energy to do all of this. To go to the supermarket in the soup aisle and just see the amount of soups that they have lined up...believe it or not it hurts my eyes.  It is a chore for me to look through those soups to find whatever it is I am looking for.  So for me to do this today, in 4 different stores, the day after Thanksgiving (”black Friday”), was pretty killer.  My poor eyes and my even poorer brain gets extremely overwhelmed.  Luckily, we were in each store for about 20-30 minutes today, which is usually the maximum amount of time I can handle it.  I’ve had very close to breakdowns in Wal Mart if I’ve been there for too long. 

I felt my depression creeping back around the time it started getting dark, probably in the 6 o’clock hour.  I feel like I just don’t get the point.  As I’ve mentioned earlier, the holidays don’t feel like the holidays to me and I don’t feel like I can ever achieve happiness. So tell me why I am even bothering. 

Today I was with my family, Amber asked me if I was going to watch her dogs when her and my brother leave for vacation in a couple weeks. It ended up coming out that Tristan had already had this conversation with me (and my mother) and I honestly don’t remember a thing about this.  I was actually thinking to myself last week “I’m surprised that they haven’t asked me to go to their house yet.” This happens quite often.  People tell me about conversations they have with me that I can’t recall at all.  I will swear on everything I have that I didn’t say those things or that person didn’t tell me what they said they did.  

What kind of nurse am I going to be? How am I going to be able to navigate all of my patients if I can’t remember them, or keep them straight? What if I can’t remember whether or not I gave a patient a medication? Now, I don’t think that that is going to be such a problem, because that is not something that is done in passing; there is a huge long checklist that needs to be done before meds are given. But, if my memory is going to be a problem, what am I supposed to do about it? Why does God have me in nursing school?

I didn’t want to become a nurse. I spent my entire life saying “no” to nursing.  And here I am.  I love the idea of helping people when they’re at their worst, trying to be a small light of positivity in their negative world at that moment. If there is one thing that I know I can and will try to be is supportive in people’s worst moments. I didn’t have much of that. I don’t think I cried in one person’s arms the whole time I was in the hospital or out in recovery (which is my term for the 3 months from the time I got out of the hospital until I started working again.) I don’t wish that kind of sadness on people, but if people are going to be sad, if cancer is going to be around, if people do have mental illness, if children are going to be sick, I hope that I can help people cope.  So, I guess that’s what I’m going to be becoming a nurse for. The rest is just logistics. 

I don’t want to deal with tomorrow. So closing my eyes tonight is going to be tough. This is my nightly fight. I stay up all night doing stupid shit, delaying the inevitable. I feel as if my impending end is just the right thing for everyone, but it can’t happen because of Jonathan. He is my everything, and he is the one that holds me when I cry now.  I have to stay alive for him. 

[danniirene]

It’s a Struggle to Get Out of Bed

The day after Thanksgiving.  Thanksgiving isn’t a holiday anymore.  The holidays aren’t special anymore.  Maybe it’s a part of growing up.  But it was just a day where my parents made a bigger dinner.  I do love being around my family (Josh and Heather weren’t there...maybe that would’ve made a difference?) but life is just blah nowadays.  Since I’ve started my second life (September 8, 2009) I just don’t find joy in things.  I feel like there is all of this hype around things, but I don’t feel it. I feel like I should.  But I don’t.

The truth is, after my accident, I don’t know what I am supposed to feel.  I know who I love, and I know who I want in my life, but in general, am I happy? I don’t believe that I will ever actually get to know and experience true, deep-in-the-gut happiness.  I’ve never felt it before the accident, but at least then I knew that it was attainable.  Now, I just don’t feel like it is there.  My gut now tells me that it is wasted on me.  This isn’t depression talking, this is me saying that my mind cannot mechanically convert to happiness the way others can.  

What do I do?  Do the best that I can, I guess.  Which I don’t feel is that great.  I feel like at my best I will only be able to reach, at most, 80%.  80% is my 100%.  Right now, I’m at 30%.  And Jonathan is what makes up at least 20%.  He makes me “happy.”  The other point is that I’ve got to start doing for others.  I really do believe that that is something God has ingrained in me-that me helping others will help myself.  I truly believe that God made me better to help others, to share my story, to bring others up.  

Jonathan, right now, is trying to help me by putting on a rad Frank Turner song.  I’m gonna try to buck up for a bit and go enjoy our day.  

[danniirene]

My In-Laws: First of Many

This is a very complicated subject.  I don’t really know how to tell this story because there are many many layers, many many years of shit, and very very fake people; people that have made my and my beautiful boyfriend’s lives just plain-old suck.  I want to make sure I get it all, but it’s a lot.  So, I will start with the latest and just fill in the details as life gets to it.  I’m sure it won’t take long to get caught up,

Long-story-short (for now), Jonathan does not drive because his mother (and I suppose his father, since he didn’t interject) decided that people born with cerebral palsy cannot drive.  She also decided (with Father just lazily letting Mom call all of the shots) that he should not go to college, that he was subject to work for Publix for the rest of his life, and that he would live at home with them to be her constant companion and do-bitch forever. He was never supposed to meet a girl, fall in love, get married, have kids, move away, make his own decisions, have a career, etc.  OH! and she was taking $200-$300/month directly from his checking account to “prepare him for paying bills in the future.” (It didn’t.)  (His sisters lived there for as long as they wanted for free, 1 went to UF and another went to FSU with help from Daddy (I honestly don’t know if it’s 100%, I do know that they did not have to do it alone), and each got at least 1 car from their parents.  They also got gas money, and Taylor (and maybe Laura too) to this day, gets certain bills paid for by their parents.  Taylor is a 30 year old who is a full time Occupational Therapist at 2 hospitals in the Bay Area who lives in Hyde Park, Tampa-very very expensive place to live.  Laura, 33, is a Peds Nurse Practitioner who lives in a newly built home in a new development in Wesley Chapel with her husband Brad (who has made me hate all Brads) who does something, I dunno, but makes, I guess, pretty good money, and they have 2 little kids, who really are cute.  Anyway, Rich sends Jonathan sends money now about $200-$300/month which is nice for Jonathan except that unfortunately when Laura and Taylor got money from Daddy, they spent it on themselves whereas Jonathan gets to spend it on bills.  I hope they don’t think that this is even TOUCHING the amount of money that Leslie stole from him, NEVER MIND all the extras that the other 2 favorites got.  Jonathan is a saint.  I’d be done with them just over all of this that I’ve typed, and this is the tip of the iceberg!

Anyway, Jonathan doesn’t drive.  So, when Leslie, with no argument from Rich, kicked Jonathan out at 26 years-old for seeing me (a “slut” and “bad influence” among other things) I went with my father hysterically crying to go get him to move him in with me. Just like that. One day, all of a sudden, Jonathan wouldn’t let Leslie forget about me, that I was a part of his life, and she drew the line: “break up with her or move out.”  So he called me, I called my dad, we drove an hour away to go get him.  We get there and Jonathan is putting his stuff at the edge of his garage to make is easy to bring it to my car.  (There are other details I’m missing here, like the fact that I did not want him to move in with me, I told him to talk to his dad and that he needed to fix this.  He hangs up, calls me back about 1.5 hours later telling me that they forced him to give back the house key, and that he is definitely moving in with me that very night.) (I’ll fill in more details of this horrific day (April 20, 2013) as this blog unfolds.)

Jonathan had worked at the Publix down the street from his house when he lived with his parents.  Now, all of a sudden, he lived with me in Seminole, Florida, and yet still worked at that Publix 1 hour away (without traffic) full time.  How did he get to work everyday? Jonathan doesn’t drive...so, Danielle drove him.  Or he, occasionally, got rides from friends who Jonathan would pay.  

So, what’s the point? I don’t like his parents.  I don’t like his sisters. I don’t like much of his family.  I blame them for everything that happened, as they are the ones to blame.  However, I am having a hard time with forgiving them due to the fact that I saw the torment that Jonathan went through.  I heard the phone calls, and read the text messages from everyone in his family.  They blamed him!  No one blamed his abusive (that’s another story for another day) and discriminatory and downright psychotic mother.  So, why would I want to make things okay? Why would I EVER want to see them again?  Jonathan is a good guy with a good heart.  Jonathan still wants to spend the holidays with them.  I don’t understand why.  I don’t get it.  Yes, conversations of all kinds have happened at various times over the last 5 years between all of them and him (none with me).  Have the problems been fixed? I don’t believe they have. It’s all just covered up. I believe that they all see themselves as above Jonathan, when in actuality, Jonathan is THE BEST ONE! He’s got a heart of gold, and the others (the other 4 of them; they are a perfect little family...) believe that they are better than him.  Maybe because of me, at this point? But before he moved in with me, I saw things, I heard things...I know they always saw themselves as superior to Jonathan.  And I have a hard time getting over that.  I have a hard time looking the other way. Jonathan was torn up when he was kicked out as aggressively as he was (she slammed the door in his face...told him that he can come back for the rest of his stuff.).

Thanksgiving is day after tomorrow.  Jonathan is going to spend the night at his friend Matt’s apartment and Jonathan’s dad is going to bring him over to the family house in Land O’ Lakes where everyone will be celebrating family and they will be faking it up a storm.  Jonathan is choosing to be there with them...and choosing to not be with me. That hurts.  I know that I cannot be mad about this, as he is being the bigger man.  He does have the bigger heart.  But I am upset.  I believe that people like Jonathan should be with people who are worth his time, who cares about him when times are tough, and certainly doesn’t make times tough for him.  I’m not even necessarily talking about me.  I am just saying...they do not, if they ever did, deserve him.  And I will forever be praying for a way to make those people fit in a place in my head with out thinking of all of the bad, bad memories of what Jonathan went through BECAUSE OF THEM.

How is he getting home? His father is holding him hostage (in my eyes) and not bringing him home until Friday. That’s a lot of driving in one day, his dad says.  Meanwhile, I did that while working about 45 minutes from my house in another direction, making $11/hour at a crappy podiatrist office.  I’ve put a lot of miles on my car, not to mention the expense of the gas (at that time gas prices were astronomical), tires due to overuse, and then regular bills.  NOT TO MENTION the exhaustion that was put on both of us due to our new living arrangements, the stress of a new relationship (we were 3 months in).  (I certainly didn’t want to move to the next step in our relationship like that.  It should’ve been way more exciting, and way less stressful.) But Daddy doesn’t want to bring Jonathan home.  Does Jonathan want to stay the night? Well, according to Dad, that doesn’t matter.  It is their fault that Jonathan doesn’t drive.  It is their fault that he lives over here.  It is their fault that my relationship with them is so strained (and I have yet to hear 1 apology from 1 of those assholes) and yet I have to have the love of my life away from me for the holidays due to him feeling guilty (what does he have to feel guilty about, again?) and if he wants to come home Thanksgiving night I will have to pick him up or he will have to take $100 Uber.  Or, he will come home the next day, whenever they get around to it. I’m sure they would love that.  They already love that I am not going to be there just due to the fact that Leslie knows that I am not afraid to be a cunt right back, so if I hear things I don’t like, I say things (it’s happened before); so she knows that she can tell Jonathan what to do more, as opposed to whisper it when I walk away.  (Jonathan doesn’t stick up for himself, which is good in a Christian-kind-of-way, but I hate it that his family (all of them) take advantage of that and tell him what to do and treat him like shit.) 

So, again, they made me cry.  Jonathan feels torn, because he wants to be with me.  But he also wants to be with his family (for whatever reason).  I will always welcome him back.  Maybe he’s afraid that if he disappoints them, that they won’t? 

There is a lot more, believe it or not.  I told you, this is a “shortened” story. Eventually, I will fill in blanks and tell you more about specific instances, such as “moving day.”  I will definitely let you in on the totality of my beef with Leslie, to start.  

I just needed to complain about MY (supposed to be OUR) holidays.  And the ignorance of those people.  Even though they don’t care about what they did to me (if they don’t care about Jonathan, why would they care about me?) it’s still something that I deal with on a daily basis, and it pisses me off that we are gonna be 6 years as of January 2, 2019, and yet I still lose to them.  Those horrible people, who live in a gated community and according to appearances (they are all about appearances) are all fine.  They are not fine, I am not fine, and, most importantly, Jonathan is not fine.    

[danniirene]

Blog #3-Nursing School

I am stressed about a test that I have to take tomorrow.  It is open book/open note, but I still get tripped up when I have to take these.  Plus, nowadays I get super anxious when it comes to Peds.  Ms. Hall was hired by Keiser last semester and I didn’t like her from the moment I met her.  I noticed from the get-go that she has an air of superiority to her, and that she looks down on basically everyone.  And I was proven right.  She loves, loves, LOVES to lecture people when they have done things wrong.  I believe she gets off on it.  I can’t take being lectured (that’s another topic from childhood) and being treated like a lowly kid,when here I am a paying ADULT trying to get an education and move on with my life.  I have never felt like more of a child than since I have started nursing school.  And it has worsened since Hall has been in my life.  (Just a side-note:she has only been a nurse for 6 years.  She acts as if she’s been nursing for decades.  She takes over other instructors class time to lecture us on stuff that the other instructors know better than her (they also let her, which is another issue.))  The point is that she makes me extremely anxious and right now I have a 76.68 in the class.  This is week 13, out of 16 weeks so I’ve got to start stepping my game up.  I plan on being anxious for the next 3 weeks.  

-This is only the beginning.  I can’t wait to tell you all of the specific problems with Keiser University and its staff.  (I have quite a few great people to talk about too.)

TTYL