Ep. 9 Breaking Through Trauma with Faith and Resilience: My Testimony Part 1

Strap in for a soul-stirring journey as we navigate my life which has been marred by childhood trauma, drugs, and homelessness but I triumphantly emerged on the other side. This episode is an intimate look into my life as I became a father figure to my family at a young age while grappling with the harsh realities of inner-city life, including police brutality and relentless violence. Hear about the unforgettable moment I was handed my first gun at the tender age of nine and the struggle of caring for my mother who was plagued by blackout seizures.

This story of resilience doesn't stop at the harrowing experiences of a challenging childhood, it's also a tale of transformation. Probing the depths of these experiences, I'll shed light on the long-lasting effects of childhood trauma and the journey toward healing. It's about a young boy who had to grow up too soon, carrying the weight of adult responsibilities and the baggage it brought into his relationships. However, amidst the chaos, this tale is one of hope, resilience, and an awe-inspiring transformation.

Finally, I will explore the redemptive power of faith and the role it played in the restoration of my life. Despite the trials and tribulations, a source of strength emerged from an unlikely place- a belief in Jesus that became a beacon of hope. My discussions will extend into the importance of mental health and how it can be harnessed to transform lives. This episode promises to leave you inspired, humbled, and more appreciative of the journey called life. So tune in to this candid conversation and let's walk this journey together.

Transcript

Speaker 1: 0:47

What's good, what's good. Family, welcome back to Do the Work podcast. I love you guys, I love you guys. I love you guys. It's been a minute. It's been a minute, so let me give you a little bit of update what's been going on with me, and I just want to show some appreciation for the fam man. Y'all been holding the brother down, but you also been keeping me busy. I'm not going to lie, you guys. You guys been keeping me busy and so these next couple episodes that I'm going to be doing.

Speaker 1: 1:19

As you can see, I finally got the new video you did set up, so I'm using the, the OBS Bot Tail two. I think it's called crap. I forgot what it's called, but it's the. It's not the, it's the tiny two. That's what it is. So it's the OBS Bot tiny two is actually a PTZ tracking camera that serves as a webcam in an actual camera, but it's 4k and yeah, I look I'm a nerd and I was trying to find the best mobile, durable option to set myself up with that would allow me to take the podcast on the road but also have a nice at home setup as well, and so I found this joint is way cheaper than a DSLR camera is way cheaper than a 4k mirrorless camera. This joint is nice, as you can see. The picture is really crisp, is smooth. There's a couple of things that could be done better for the little sharpness and I can still tweak it a little bit, but for the most part, your boy is looking legit dope on this joint. I'm not going to hold you. I'm not going to hold you. So we're going to be using this for both the do the work podcast and we're going to be using it for life, unscripted, with my wife, cassandra, and so we are excited. But look, thank you first and foremost for all the love that you guys showed me.

Speaker 1: 3:01

I preached on, I think, two Wednesdays ago, first Wednesday of October. I had the honor and privilege of preaching at our church on the Wednesday night and God gave me a great message in the lane of mental health. And now the title of the message was do the work. No pun on do the work podcast. I literally got a scripture where the Lord spoke to me through the scripture. The scripture was in first Chronicles 28, when David was talking to his son Solomon and he says take this series. He's talking about building the temple. And he said take this seriously and do the work, do the work. And so it was a message on mental health and getting counsel and the spirit of counsel and what that looks like and how that affects us.

Speaker 1: 3:57

And so I've been posting clips of that message on my social media and people have been responding tremendously well. You got a couple of people who was just kind of like eh, but for the most part the joint was nice and the feedback was great, and so I appreciate that and I'm telling you like the reason it's taking me so long to record some more episodes is because after that message, man, like, my DMs were blowing up, not from like negative stuff, but like people that's like wanting help, wanting counsel, wanting to meet with me, wanting to really share how that message really gave them the strength and the confidence to dive into some of those areas that they have been holding off in. And if that was you and I appreciate it, man. And so I've been busy doing some soul care with some people and some counseling and just hearing different stories, hearing different experiences and how God's been really unpackaging some stuff and people's lives, and especially men. I love it when men get vulnerable and get honest and start speaking their truth in a way that allows healing and transformation, like that's the stuff that I live for.

Speaker 1: 5:17

And so, without further ado, so these next few episodes, man, what I want to do is I have some guests lined up that's going to be coming on and sharing some great stuff with us and in a lane of mental health and just how we can give us better tools and testimonies and circumstances and experiences that the Lord has really helped them through. And some of them, some of the people that I have lined up, are not Christian, but they understand the importance of mental health, especially for men. So you're going to see some people that's not Christian that once they start paying attention to their mental health, they start seeing their life transform for the better. And so this is. I am not watering down the gospel, I'm not putting my faith on the back burner, but I want to make this podcast a safe space for people to share, be vulnerable, be healing, and you never know the conversations that I'm having offline because of that. So let's show grace, let's show grace, but without that.

Speaker 1: 6:32

With that being said, these next few episodes, however many episodes that take me, I'm going to unpack it of that message, because I was jamming like four months of preparation and research and experience and firsthand encounters into that message. It still went longer than what I expected it to go, and so I'm going to bring some clarity. I'm going to get into the details of some things and I'm just going to help us understand how to do the work. This is going to be like my podcast mandate manual for doing the work and what that looks like, because ultimately, I am a certified mental health coach and working towards my certification in youth mental health as well, with specializations in marriage and family and addiction recovery, and so eventually it's already started to happen Fellows reaching out families reaching out couples reaching out for that counsel, for that coaching, for that assistance to get to that next level, whether that be intimacy, whether that be communication, whether that be overcoming addictions, whether that be just being better people and getting the things in life that belong to you and that has been destined and planned for you and your family. So, whatever that is, ultimately this podcast is going to be a platform to invite those type of people because look, let's be honest, get closer, get closer, get closer. Your boy gotta make a living. I still work, man, but the podcast is an income generator as well, not just a hobby. So let's go All right.

Speaker 1: 8:24

So the first thing I want to talk about is, in this episode, it's my testimony. Now I shared a short synopsis of my testimony in the very beginning of my message and then I built upon that throughout my message. And the testimony was not to highlight me or was not to highlight the things that I've been through, but it was to show you the different levels of depravity and setbacks and things that happened to me that I necessarily didn't cause or wasn't my fault. It's just things that happened to me and how I was able, by the grace of God, to give through that and still become the man that you see here today talking on this very great, awesome podcast here. And so I'm going to read the narrative that I read in my sermon, and then I'm going to stop and fill in the details and the blanks and the healing process along the way, because this podcast is called or named Do the Work, and I'm going to explain to you what doing the work looked like in these different areas of my life. All right, and it may take a couple of episodes to get there, but it's going to be okay, we in here. We in here, all right.

Speaker 1: 9:51

So, without further ado, let's get started. So there's this kid, and I'm reading from the narrative that I felt the Lord wanted me to share as the opening of my sermon. And so here it is. There's this kid, and of course this kid is me, who he grew up like a lot of kids around him. He grew up without a father present. He saw the effects of drugs and alcohol on his mother. He saw domestic abuse between his parents, to the point of he saw his mom get slammed through a kitchen table, breaking the table in half. At the age of eight, he starts dumpster diving to collect cans to sell for cash, and so, look, let me just stop there. So I just jumped through a whole bunch of stuff right there.

Speaker 1: 10:39

At the very beginning, people was looking at me like yo, what is going on right now? Let me give you a little context to what was going on in my life. And so I was born, my mother, linda, my dad, harold, harold McGee, senior. But at the time that I was born, he was not a senior, he was just Harold McGee. And my dad had another family, a whole bunch of other kids, and was married to another woman and so when my brother and I were born, we were born out of wedlock. We were born as my mom was his side chick and, like I say that, being from a place of healing like that, was difficult for me to get my head around at a young age. And so my dad, I will see him come around and I remembered the night that he slammed my mom through a kitchen table so vividly.

Speaker 1: 11:39

Kb has a song shout out to. Kb has a song on his album, glory to Glory, which is the Glory album too, and the song is called Daddy. And then the song either him or the one who's singing with him says that that day is forever ingrained into my memory and the way that my mom cried is forever grained into it. And I felt that, because I have that same thing, like my dad. There was a birthday party I believe it was my father's birthday party and he came to our apartment in the Harrison Homes these are projects and he had a suit on and the dude had $50 and $100 bills pinned from neck all the way down to his shoes, pinned all over his suit $100 bills, $50 bills, and him and my mom get into everybody. You know, oh my God, look at McGee, look at Big McGee. Ah, you know, and I don't know what transpired.

Speaker 1: 12:44

Me and my brother was upstairs, but towards the end of the party people were leaving and it's just my mom and dad and they got into an argument and we heard yelling. So me and my brother come down the stairs and we kind of peep in around the corner, the stairs leading to the living room, and they're in the kitchen argument. So we kind of looking around the corner while they're arguing and they my dad gets upset with my mom, she's yelling, he's yelling, and then all of a sudden I see him lift her up and boom, like right on the kitchen table, the table breaks in half, she falls through, she's not moving, but I know she's alive because she's crying, but she's not moving. And he kind of just keeps talking, says what he has to say and walks out the back door. And I'm like yo, because his truck was parked on a curb in the back. Everybody kind of came through our apartment through the back door because it had that was the access to the road. The front door was just like a sidewalk in between buildings and stuff. And so he just leaves and my mom is laying there In my mind.

Speaker 1: 13:59

I'm like seven, eight years old y'all In my mind I can't comprehend what just happened, like I can't put into words or I can't process that's a better word I can't process what just happened. So in my mind, in a very herald way, I'm thinking yo, my dad, just WWF body slam a human being through a table. Yo, like a real wooden table. This wasn't like one of them cheap joints that's on a W, it wasn't WWE yet, it was still WWF for my true fans, if you know. You know. But I was just like yo.

Speaker 1: 14:53

So the next day when I went to school, not thinking I'm like, dude, my dad can slam people through wooden tables. God, keep messing with me and find out like for real, for real, like this was like I was using that experience of seeing my mom slam through the table. I was using that as like props or bragging rights for my dad, not knowing that that's domestic violence, that's abuse, that's crazy, right and so. But I couldn't process it at the time and my mom made my brother help her move the broken table out to the backyard and yeah, it was a while before we got a new table, but every day, coming in we'll see that broken table sitting out there and I will tell people yeah, my dad did that. My dad slam cast through tables because I couldn't put my mom in the place of the person, so I just said a person or people or whatever I could to make it make sense in my seven, eight year old head. You know what I'm saying. And so that that event was forever ingrained into me and it messed me up on so many levels that I didn't even I wasn't even aware of at the time, you feel me.

Speaker 1: 16:16

And then I talked about dumpster diving. There was a neighbor who lived across the street and he rode his bike and he collected cans and he turned the cans in for money and he made a pretty decent money off of that. And so I was, I started collecting cans too, and so I start getting up three, four in the morning jumping in dumpsters, you know, with the rats and the coons and the raccoons and stuff, and just you know, jumping in dumpsters, finding cans, collecting cans. I will go to my mom's friends, house or family members who I knew had got really wasted that night and got all their cans out of their trash if they didn't save them for me. And I just start collecting cans. It was so and you know, when you live in poverty and when you live in a place that's poverty-stricken, there's a lot of alcoholics, there's a lot of people who drink away the pain to numb themselves. And I collected all those cans, all those Budweiser's, miller, lights, coke, 45's, all of that. I was collecting them joints and turning them in for cash because I knew my mom couldn't afford certain things that I wanted for school, even certain things that I needed. So I was like you know, I'm gonna do it for myself. You know what I mean. I'm still get this, I'm gonna go out and get this back, you know.

Speaker 1: 17:39

And so at an early age, around eight years old, I started dumpster diving, to the point that my man's across the street got mad and was like yo, you need to find a different area to dumpster dive in. And I'm looking at him. I'm like bro, I'm like eight years old dawg, you a grown man, why don't you go further into another neighborhood or projects or somewhere else to dumpster dive? Let me be local and you go further out because you, the grown man, you feel me. But that's my dumpster diving days. Then I went on to say at nine, his sibling is my younger brother and mom are homeless and gets kicked out of all the local homeless shelters because of their mom's drinking problem. This was a big deal. I didn't actually know I was homeless until like six months into being homeless. That's how much my mom tried to make it seem normal, you know. And when I realized that, look, I'm carrying everything that I own in a backpack and I'm carrying it to school with me, I'm carrying it everywhere we go.

Speaker 1: 18:53

So in the Empioria, the first place we went to was, I believe, the Southside Mission. And no, no, no, I think it was the YWCA. The YWCA, the, instead of YMCA, is the YWCA for women. I don't even know what YWCA stands for, but I know the W is for women's. But we were living there for a bit and my mom was going through a lot of stuff just losing her apartment. So the reason we became homeless will blow your mind right.

Speaker 1: 19:32

So the reason we became homeless we got kicked out of our apartment because at the time that I grew up in, in the 90s, if you committed adultery with someone's spouse you got evicted. Like you got to kick out of your apartment and like that was like if that was the case this day, so everyone will be homeless in the projects, right? But my mom, my mom was in a relationship with a guy who was married, similar to my father, but she was with a different guy and his wife had found out and told the housing authority that my mom was messing around with her husband and she wanted her to stop or evicted or whatever. And so my mom got a court date. The court date came. My mom's friend was supposed to take her because my mom didn't have a car. My mom's friend forgot. Therefore, my mom missed her court date and immediately got evicted. And so we found out later that if my mother would have just showed up, it probably would have worked out for us and we could have stayed. But I thank God for the hard things that we had to endure, and so we got kicked out.

Speaker 1: 21:01

My brother and I became home from school and we see in all of our stuff out in the lawn. If you've ever been evicted before, if you haven't, praise God. If you have, you know that in the projects they throw all your stuff out in the yard. And so my mom is sitting on the bench crying and just kind of distraught. And my brother and I come home from school and we see neighborhood people, homeless people, going through our stuff like it's a garage sale, and my brother, he goes in and just start going off on people, telling them leave this stuff alone and don't touch my stuff. And I'm looking at my mom and I'm like, oh man, like this is for real, like we out, out. And so my mom, I said, mom, what is going on? Like, what is this? And she says she says grab the things that are most important to you, because that's and make sure you can carry it. And so we grabbed a couple of toys, we grabbed a couple of clothes and she said make sure you got some clothes and we put it in the bag and we bounced. And yeah, and my mom, she looked at us and she was like I love you and God loves you. And she was like we're going to be all right.

Speaker 1: 22:19

And in my mind I'm like nine years old and I'm like yo, how can you say God loves us? Like we legit don't have a place to stay and people are going through our stuff. Like how can you say God loves us? Like what do you mean Cause? And so I'm confused at a mug, like I'm like God don't love us, like you tripping woman, like if that's what you need to tell yourself to make this seem okay, like whatever. And so at this point I'm heated at my mom because I realized that she missed her court date. I'm heated at her friend because I realized it's her fault that my mom missed her court date because she didn't pick her up like she said she was. And I'm just a kid and I'm just going through the motion.

Speaker 1: 23:04

So we move into the YWCA. My mom's drinking more because she feels like a failure, she feels like she let her family down, she feel like she can't get herself together, and so she just drinks more and we get kicked out of there because she's coming back intoxicated. She's leaving us there by herself, by ourself, on Supervised, and so they're like, okay, if you're just not walking in, where are your children? And we're in the room just watching TV, whatever. And so we get evicted or kicked out of that place. And then we go to the South Side Mission and we live in the South Side Mission and we connect with some people and we doing that and we get kicked out of the South Side Mission after a bit and that's a whole ordeal.

Speaker 1: 23:50

And the same woman who forgot to take my mom, the same woman who forgot to take her to the court date it's the same one that's taking her out, getting her drunk and buying all the beers and stuff and like my mom ain't got no money. And so you're doing all this stuff and you're like you are enabling my mom, and now she's like not even going to get her Not able to function right. And so I'm at it, my mom, I'm at it, my mom's friends, I'm at it everybody. You know what I'm saying. So we get kicked out of there and we are like sleeping on people's porches. We're asking family members and friends if we can stay one night, two nights, with them, and this whole time my brother and I were going to school and we're not knowing where we're going to be sleeping at that night. You know what I'm saying.

Speaker 1: 24:36

And so it was like this went on for literally a year and a half. And then finally we move in with my aunt and her kids and my mom has a bedroom and all three of us are standing in that bedroom, and then her kids got the other bedrooms and then she has a bedroom and we're very grateful you know what I'm saying Kicking it with the cousins, you know, living a life, playing the game, watching movies, whatever it is, you know. And so we're not homeless per se, but we live with a family member. So that's why I said, after that a year and a half mark, we were no longer homeless because we were living with family. But it was rough and right when we moved in with our family.

Speaker 1: 25:18

And so I said in my narrative that I was I'm trying to find my spot my bad. And then, also in the narrative, I said I was molested at the age of 11 by two older girls that lived in the apartment building and babysit at some time. And so the thing with that was like like this is not a lie. I didn't know that I had been molested until, like in college, when I start learning that, okay, what happened to me was not okay, because they were way older than me and I was like a kid, kid, and they were like 19, 20 ish, you know, maybe an 18, you know, and I'm just, you know, because of the environment that I was in, I grew up around some cousins that you know. Hey, they had ladies. You know what I'm saying. And so when they found out that I had messed around with so-and-so, they was like yo, little cubs bagging them. And I was like, yeah, you know what I'm saying, I'm bagging them, you know.

Speaker 1: 26:52

And so for years I was bragging to friends and bragging to people about this life that I was living, thinking that I'm like, I'm this dude, when actually I'm a kid being used and taken advantage of by these older women and I'm bragging about this stuff. And this is like statutory rape, because, like, what are you doing? Like how are you bragging about that? But what you have to understand is that I was in an environment where that was common. You know what I'm saying. It was common, and so I'm not saying it was right, I'm just saying my mind didn't know that a little boy shouldn't be sleeping with these much, much, much, much, much older women.

Speaker 1: 27:44

But because I did, I kind of felt like I was grown and the dudes around me that should have been protecting me and that should have been telling me like yo, this is messed up. They was like yo, my man's, my man's is getting it, my cousin's getting it, and so it was like a rite of passage instead of like hey, you should probably report them. You know what I'm saying. And so instead, and so I didn't even realize what that awakened in me. I didn't even realize the mental damage that did to me. I didn't even realize how, how screwed my, my image and and appreciation for women was warped because of that experience. Like there were so many things that happened because of that that I didn't even understand, you know, and it was just, you know.

Speaker 1: 28:42

It started off as something that was just innocent and escalated to something that was very awkward really fast and I just kind of adapted and went with it and I was just like yo, I guess this is what it is, you know. And one end I kind of accepted it because I wanted to be accepted by the older guys that I was, you know, hanging around, and on the other end, I wanted the girls to know that I had experience. You know what I'm saying. Let's just be honest. But it was man, it was. It was years before I realized like what had happened to me was messed up.

Speaker 1: 29:23

And so when I got married, my wife Cassandra, she wanted all the details. She was like I bet not find out nothing later on down the road. I want to know everything now and I was just like, look, I'm going to tell you as much as I can remember, because some stuff that you really don't remember until, like, something happens and you're like, oh yeah, that did happen. I'm sorry, I really didn't remember, but that was something that I talked about. I talked about the experiencing the police kicking in their door in search of drugs and weapons, because these relatives I've been known to keep the drugs and guns there Like uh, like I grew up around some some real fucks, some real gangsters, some real like drug dealers, like people I like I'm just I'm not bragging because it was so dangerous, but I knew what that life was like and I wasn't attracted to it because I knew how dangerous it was.

Speaker 1: 30:33

But to say the same thing, I've seen guns, I've seen a lot of drugs sitting on a table and I've seen a lot of stuff. And so it wasn't abnormal for me to see the police chasing cats down through the apartments. It wasn't abnormal for me to see cops chasing on cars and on foot in between. I saw that on a regular basis. And so when our door got kicked in and we had a family member stand with us and he was moving some pretty serious weight and he was strapped and the police kicked our door in looking for his supply and drugs and stuff and thankfully they didn't find anything. Either he hit it really well or he had just moved it all out of there, but either way they didn't find anything. But they destroyed our apartment and it was bananas. And so I experienced stuff like that and I didn't realize all the damage mentally that those experiences were doing to me and it was contributing to something that I'm going to touch on later on.

Speaker 1: 31:47

And then I said he was given his first gun at age nine and told if his dad ever touches his mom again to shoot him. Yeah, so that was interesting. That was interesting. And so my cousin who's probably going to watch or listen to this podcast or episode so I'm not going to say his name, but my cousin, my brother, knows the story because he was there he gave me a little 22. It was wrapped up in I remember this, like yesterday. It was wrapped up in a white towel. It was wrapped up in a white towel and he gave me some bullets and he gave me the 22. I'm like nine years old and he says if your dad except he didn't call him my daddy to call him by his name. He said if he ever lays hands on your mom, his auntie, again, I want you to shoot him. I'm nine, I'm nine and I'm like, okay, bet, and I take the gun, I put it in the house, hide it in my room and me and my brother gets chased home by some bullies. Right, and my brother man, we strategic. There's no coincidence that I ended up in the military as an officer, strategic officer.

Speaker 1: 33:29

We used to have buckets of rocks waiting at our like in specific places that if we ever get chased by somebody, we go and we run in, directed to our stash of rocks, and we lighten them up with rocks, like we not finna fight you, we about to bust you up. And that was like our strategy to like not get jumped and not get beat up. We just throw rocks at people. They get mad and then we run off again until they see us at school the next day and they want to fight us again. But or they just don't want to fight us no more, because they like they crazy. But so my brother and I, we run home and I come outside with the gun. I'm like, what, what do something, do something. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Now I'm talking mad talk too. And my brother he talking mad talk too. And the kids was like yo, is that real? I'm like yeah, it is real. And I cock it. And they like yo, that joint real. And so it went from them trying to beat us up to like yo, let us see it. Like, show us something like what up. So here I am, a kid in elementary school with a loaded gun showing friends willing having agreed to shoot my father, like that's insanity.

Speaker 1: 34:50

And so I didn't even know how much of my mind was disturbed by that incident. And I was in therapy and I told the therapist that story and she was like no, no, no. I told my first therapist, who was a guy. I told him that story and he was like yo, are you serious at nine? I was like yeah. He was like do you understand the state of mind that you were in? You were ready to commit murder against someone who you looked up to and admired to some degree, and you didn't think twice about it. I was like, yeah, man, yeah, like I understand, like I was. I was probably crazy, but I couldn't comprehend it. I just it was just survival mode nonstop. And so I had to go through a process of healing of knowing like dude, like like that costs a response in your body. That is not normal, it's not normal. And so after a while my mom, I believe, found the gun in my room and she called my cousin to come get it and she had some very colorful words to say to him, but nonetheless, yo, it was it was. It was crazy Like she whooped my tail some serious when she found out I had that joint and so so I went on to say that I had to grow up quick to both protect and take care of myself, my younger brother and my mom.

Speaker 1: 36:45

And so that was my life, like at a very early age I had to get used to taking care of my mom and my younger brother because my mom, from a young age she would start having these blackout seizures where she would be seizing and stuff and she wouldn't remember things. And earlier on, when it first started happening, my brother and I would take advantage of it and she would have a seizure. So we would take some oatmeal pies, some zebra cakes, some nutty bars and we would take snacks and stuff and then she'd be like what happened to all these snacks. I'm like I don't know, mom, you had one of them episodes and you might have gave it to us and forgot, I don't know. And so as I got older I realized this is a serious health condition and we probably should try to do something about it. But she went to the doctors and the doctor said she was fine and they tried to induce the seizure and they couldn't induce any seizures, so it was whatever. And then they took some CAT scans and later on and said that something was on her brain and they started giving them some medication and it didn't really work and they didn't have really good health insurance, so it was just a whole mess. And so I grew up.

Speaker 1: 37:55

When I say taking care of my family, there was moments where my mom could not do certain things and so I had to do them. There was moments where I had to be the parent in the house. Not that my mom was in cable, it was just like my mom was dealing with a lot, man, and looking back I can see it, but in the moment I really couldn't. I couldn't see it, man. I was a kid, I couldn't see it, and so you know what I'm saying. I was just surviving. And then I went on to say, in the fifth grade my brother and I were taken from my mom to live with our aunt on our dad's side, and so we wasn't really taken as much as told. I don't know, it was weird. So my dad gets out of prison and he's in the halfway house, and so while he's in the halfway house he talks to my mom. My mom agrees okay, they can stay with your sister, because it's really not good for them here.

Speaker 1: 39:03

At the time I was in fourth. I had just graduated fourth grade and I was supposed to be in fifth grade but I hadn't been in school because I didn't have my shots for middle school. So I didn't have my shot records and so middle school wouldn't let me go, and so I was just hanging out all day while my friends were at school and I'm just kicking it and going to the library. I didn't have a library card. So I was like legit, stealing books from the library and turning them back in, like oh, I found these at the park, and so that was weird.

Speaker 1: 39:41

But in that season, something I didn't share, it's like well, I'll get to it. I think I did share it in my story. Yeah, yeah, yeah, I shared it so I'll get to that part. But we were moved because one of the things that was a deciding factor in us being moving from our mom was that I wasn't in school and she wasn't really doing anything to like change that. And so my auntie, she took me to the head department, gave my shots, got me in school and everything, and so I'm going to school up in a better school district they lived in the Heights, so it was a nice suburb area and we see our mom on the weekend.

Speaker 1: 40:23

We live with her. We call it a school during the week and then on the weekend we see our mom and our dad picks us up from the halfway house. He gets to leave the halfway house on the weekend so he come visit with him. We stay with our mom. He takes us to church, so we stay with our mom on Saturday and then my dad takes us to church on Sunday and then he takes us to the laundromat. He takes us to the laundromat and then wash our clothes and stuff and then wash my mom and stuff, and so we hang out as a family somewhat on Sunday and he jumps my mom back off Sunday evening and drops us back off at his sister's house, and that was the whole fifth grade and summer sixth grade. No, no, I think it's just fifth grade, because in the sixth grade my mom and my dad gets out the halfway house and he gets a house for me, for us and our mom, and then we're living there and it's cool. You know, it's cool and it's the first house I've ever lived in. We've never lived in a house, we've only lived in projects apartments, and so this was the first house we ever had.

Speaker 1: 41:38

It was a pretty decent house when we moved there, but it turned out to be pretty crappy really quick, and my dad ended up moving back into his house, which was even worse, and so my younger brother moved with my dad. I stayed with my mom and the house that we stayed in was cool, but it was like so un-maintained, the landlord was crap, like really crap, and so we had rat infestations and we had roaches. Man, we had all type of stuff going on in that house. Man, I say rats because these joints was not my, so these was legit rats, to the point where my mom she would hear them in the wall and she would like no, I'm sleeping in the living room on the couch and then I would be in my room and they wouldn't be in my area. They'd be put back towards the back of the house, which is why my mom wouldn't go to her room because her room was adjacent to the back of the house and so she shared a wall with the back of the house so she could hear all the activity and stuff and it was bad. So we moved through that and eventually my mom, my dad, house gets condemned and he tears it down Like legit, a raccoon falls through the roof or something crazy like that. Because it was like tarp on the roof, like a raccoon or something falls through the roof and it's like running through the kitchen. And my brother was telling me the story and I was just like yo for real, like y'all, look at shit had like a raccoon running around the kitchen. He was like yeah, it was crazy and it was just wild and they had roaches and rats and stuff. It was just really really bad childhood, but we enjoyed the parts that we could.

Speaker 1: 43:27

Then I went on in my story man, and I shared that by the time I was in high school I was working three jobs, I was partying every weekend and spending as much as little time as home as possible to escape my home life. My home life was wack, so I, just I escaped through working. I had a paper route in the morning and then, after my paper route I would go to school. And then I was, um, had a work program from school where I could leave school early and go work downtown at this law firm as like a messenger boy, uh, carrying um parcels in between law offices in different places. And so, um, I did that. And then, by my junior year, I started working at a warehouse. No, I think it was my senior year. My senior year I was working at a warehouse as well, from 6pm to 6am, and so that joint was crazy.

Speaker 1: 44:22

Yo and um, it got to the point and I shared this in another story. It got to the point in another podcast, um, but it got to the point where I was exhausted and my body collapsed and, yeah, it was bad. It was bad. But, um, I was in three shootouts and suffered from my PTSD before the age of 18. And people was like man, you in shootouts. So the first shootout, none of them were my fault, I was just in the wrong place at the wrong time, like legit I'm not, like I'm not really hard, like that I'm not. I'm not about that life like for real, for real.

Speaker 1: 45:00

But the very first shootout that I experienced, I was playing on the playground. Actually I was supposed to be in school, but I couldn't go to school because then they had my shots. And I was playing on the playground and there was this crackhead who was trying to steal drugs from this drug dealer and he was trying to. The drug dealer was serving them and the crackhead didn't have no money and so he tried to rip them off and so he took the stuff and he ran and my man's put out the gun and I'm not thinking, I'm like 19 years old and so I run into the tunnel and my man starts shooting at the dude who cuts through the playground.

Speaker 1: 45:42

He and one of the bullets fly through the tunnel. I'm like it hits one, bust the plastic off one side and exit the plastic off the other side, creating bullet holes in the tunnel. And I'm there shaking and I peeked my head out and I like for a while I couldn't move. It felt like forever, but it was like five, 10 minutes, like I was hyperventilating, I couldn't move. I was probably having a panic attack or anxiety attack or something, because I it felt like my heart was going to bust out of my chest when that bullet just says shoo. And I peeked my head out and the dude was chased, had chased him, had shot him and left him there and police was coming and people was. It was crazy. Somebody took his shoes. It was crazy.

Speaker 1: 46:40

So I'm looking at this dude's dead body and I'm thinking to myself it's like a 10 year old and I'm like yo, I could be just as dead as that guy, that guy right there, and in my mind I'm thinking this would never had happened if I was in school. And so I instantly got upset with my mom, like she needs to get me in school, like if I could do it myself I would, but I can't, I'm 10. And so I was heated, bro. But hey, you know, that was the first shoot out. The second one was at my high school. And so my high school, there was a guy who brought a gun to school, start shooting and we were running and bullets was literally flying over my head as I was going down the steps. They were flying over me, hitting a wall in front of me and I'm freaking out. The dude was the most horrible shot I've ever seen in my life and I praise God for it. The dude cannot shoot to save his life and I think God, all the rounds he shot didn't hit anyone and it was pandemonium up in that joint and I was freaking out and he didn't hit nothing and I was like thank God, this guy couldn't shoot. So that was one of the shootouts that I was in.

Speaker 1: 48:05

And then the third shootout that I was in, it was a mistaken identity. Somebody thought that me and my cousins were someone else. We were at a gas station. They pulled up on us. They thought we were someone else. They started letting da, da, da, da, da da da and we freaking out. So we running, hiding, trying not to get shot, and come to find out they were beefing with some people that we were cool with. We didn't necessarily run with them, but they were beefing with some people that we were cool with and so they thought we were like a part of their crew or whatever. And it was just. It was a mistake and identity stuff. We threw parties. They was at our parties, we was cool with them. It was crazy.

Speaker 1: 48:53

So after that shootout I was like yo, I'm going to college, no lie, I am getting out of this joint for real. And so, after being so close to death so many times, I began to be very jumpy, very paranoid, and it was. I didn't learn till later, when I was in the military and someone was diagnosed with mild PTSD and the provider or the psychologist or whoever was sharing with us the signs and the symptoms of someone who has mild PTSD, and I'm like yo, I had that just growing up. And that's when I realized, yo, I grew up because of my environment, because of what I was exposed to, with mild PTSD it was bad. It wasn't until I got to college, till I got some real security and safety in my life, that that kind of went away and I was able to regulate my body response and my emotions, and so that was a real deal for me for real, for real.

Speaker 1: 50:10

And so, yeah, so, yeah, so this is getting pretty long, but I hope you enjoy this. This is going to be a really long episode, but I really wanted to walk through this so that people understand, and so by the so. So actually, let me just wrap up this episode here. I will wrap this up. Part two. This is I've been going on for a while. Part two about so I've talked to you from my childhood all the way up to high school, and so part two, I'm going to talk about college until now.

Speaker 1: 50:53

And so, yeah, so that's, that's my childhood, and I had to do the work to in that air in those areas, because what you have to understand is all of that that I had endured, went through and experienced, most of it no fault of my own. I brought those experiences, I brought that baggage and I brought that damage into my relationship with my wife you know what I'm saying and with any in all girls, honestly and actually. But but God is a God of restoration and transformation, and so next time I'm going to share with you what happened in my college years and how now I'm better than I've ever been before. Thank you for for tuning in. Until next time we're going to do part two. All right, peace.