I remember growing up in a majority white neighborhood feeling extremely excluded and outcasted. I didn’t feel any different from the others that I grew up with, but I knew that I was. In 2nd grade, I went to a friend’s birthday party. All the girls that were there did makeup, painted nails, played with […]
Link to PHAB Deaths since COVID Shelter in place https://cbsloc.al/2J612Yp In my 20+ years with the Texas Department of Family and Protective Services in Dallas, 3 years in domestic violence and the local school district, I have watched the dreadful, ebb and flow of child abuse and other domestic violence cases. I have watched them […]
Imagine being trapped inside a dark and quiet cage. No one can hear you no matter how much you bang on the walls and scream for help, and soon, you aren’t able to hear yourself as well. You sink to the ground and can only tune into the thoughts that your mind has been programmed […]
I have been divorced for a bit over five years, during which I have been co-parenting three children, two boys currently aged 8 and 9, and my teenage daughter, 14. Since I got divorced, both my ex-wife and I have started new relationships, and moved jobs and homes, all while co-parenting our children. The experience […]
Growing up every child has this unbreakable and indescribable trust with everyone they meet. It’s really due to lack of experience, which is a shame because trust is very hard to come by now. A child will put their belief in their parents like no one else and continue believing in them until they know […]
Yesterday, I walked into a local grocery store to buy some corn chips. This store has homemade chips and I AM ADDICTED! After picking my bag (which are usually right inside the door) I walked to the deli. The woman behind the deli counter asked how she could help me. I told her she already […]
Inevitably, the day came when my daughter, now 14, asked if she could have a WhatsApp account. Then an Instagram account, then others. It was about three years ago. I felt kind of overwhelmed with the requests and how to answer, but, like in so many other areas, I knew saying a simple “no” or […]
October is also Domestic/Intimate Partner Violence Awareness month. According to the CDC, from 2010 to 2012, “nationally, 7.1% of women (an estimated 8,627,000) were victims of rape, physical violence and/or stalking by an intimate partner in their lifetime and first experienced these or other forms of violence by that partner before the age of 18. […]
In the 2019/2020 school year I was horrified to walk into a local office supply store for a binder for my new job at a local school district. What horrified me? “Bullet Resistant Backpacks! I asked myself, are we sending our students to WAR or to SCHOOL??? I was INFURIATED! Never mind the capitalization and/or […]