Pancakes Taste Like Poverty: And Other Post-Divorce Revelations (27 page)

But, because of the severity of the situation
and the picture of the bruises
any small, itchy doubts were quickly pushed aside.

One of my friends was hurting. One of my friends
was in danger. One of my friends was in a hospital – alone.

All I could think was “How can I make it
better?”

I urged her to share with the group. She did,
even posting the picture of her bruises with the headline “Trigger
Warning”. And the group, as I expected, showered her with
emotional support immediately.

How could this happen?
Where are
the police?
Why is it taking so long to get a rape kit
done?
Where is your family?

We were all consumed.

Completely
consumed
with this woman, her
rape and her pain.

However, the next day I received a shocking email
from one of the ladies in my group. She was trying to find a way to
send money and this woman was not answering any texts or phone calls.
She decided to look the woman up online to see if she could find any
leads that would help her contact her.

And that’s when all hell broke loose.

This woman, as it turned out, was a
world-renowned
internet hoax artist.

Just typing her name in a search engine led to
about a dozen websites dedicated to warning people and exposing her
lies.

This woman faked a rape, faked HIV, faked cancer.

She went so far as to
shave her head
and
order hospital gowns
to solidify her story.

She accepted
thousands
of dollars from
people concerned with this young woman and her harrowing story of
survival. And she was about to do it again.

It wasn’t just my group, but there was
another group – centered mostly on Attachment Parenting single
moms – that was also in the process of setting up a foundation
or donation site for her.

Confusion. Hurt. Rage.

All of these things invaded the minds and hearts
of the women in my group.

I
was mostly wildly shocked and
entertained.

The whole hullabaloo was like a reality-show
train wreck.

I asked the group how the situation should be
handled and the general consensus was that, whether the current rape
was real or not, the group no longer felt like a safe space and she
should leave.

I eliminated her from the group. When she
confronted me I told her exactly why.

“Someone in the group Googled you so we
could find a way to contact you and we found all your hoax stuff. The
trust is broken. I wish you well but you have to go.”

The source of the drama was gone. I dusted my
virtual hands and believed we were done with it. But we weren’t
even close to done with it.

The
source
of the pain was gone but something insidious took root.

The infiltration and antics of the notorious
lying woman caught everyone off guard.

Once I removed her from the group, I assumed it
was back to business as usual.

I assumed wrong.

That same day I got three messages from women in
the group:

“_______ raises my red flags.”

“How well do you know _______?”

“I think you should get rid of everyone
you don’t know personally.”

“Maybe we should run everyone through
Google, just to be safe.”

And just like that, where one seat sat empty
Suspicion was more than happy to settle in and get comfortable.

Literally
weeks
after we were all high
on camaraderie, sending each other Christmas gifts on what is usually
the most sickeningly lonely time of the year for single moms, we’d
grown cynical and mistrustful.

My sole opportunity for social interaction was
crumbling before my eyes, dying of infection.

But when I stepped outside myself to find out
why
this was happening, the gravity and the
cruelty
of what this woman does became clear.

Again, aside from the occasional unwanted grope
from my nightclubbing days I have never been sexually assaulted. But
many, many women in my group have.

And if you are a single mother, mentally ill or
not, who thrives on stealing money and attention from large groups of
people, what better target than a group of single mothers, a third of
whom have been victims of sexual abuse?

This woman sat among us long enough for us to get
comfortable enough to share our experiences and our truths and she
used them against us. As one of my friends stated, “We had a
safe place, we had trust, and she violated that trust and essentially
built a stage on our
backs
so she could act out her shit.”

A Predator
.

In the days that followed the ousting, while
still fielding emails about who is real and who is fake and who is
suspicious, slowly women began to share their feelings on what had
happened.

This liar made one critical mistake in her almost
flawless performance.

After posting pictures of her “bruises”
from the hospital, she sent a second picture of herself “feeling
better” with this bizarre watered-down smile on her face. I had
no compass as to whether or not this was normal behavior but for all
the women in the group who
had
been raped or sexually
assaulted, this was the blaring alarm.

But we didn’t question her in that moment
because no one wants to be the person to question the validity of the
traumatic event – a traumatic event that was still so real and
so raw for so many.

24 hours worth of this woman’s drama undid
years and years of emotional safety for my
friends
.
This incident opened wounds, reignited nightmares, revived anxiety
and paranoia. It was PTSD for them.
Getting
rid of the problem didn’t end the problem at all. What this
woman did is more vile and more insidious than I could have
imagined.
I believed, like so many people do, that the anonymity
of the internet provided some sort of buffer to real-life emotional
damage and the kids who got caught up in some silly Catfish drama
were exactly that – naive kids. She is in her early 20s so, to
me, she’s a “naive kid.”

But she was a naive kid who had the power to
unsettle the lives and hearts of who knows how many across the
country over her years and years as a con artist. And she impacts not
just the women she touches directly, but victims of sexual abuse –
period.

Women like her only further perpetuate the
slut-shaming and victim blaming that keeps 97% of all rapists OUT of
JAIL.

The seeds of mistrust and doubt have been
planted.

I hurt so deeply for my friends.

I always have words, but for the way I feel about
what this snake has done to my friends’ hearts I have none.

I have none.

On how everyone will cope with the frothing of
painful memories, the digging up of buried hurt, I can only hope for
swift and effective emotional growth and peace. I felt for a while,
since the group was
mine
, that somehow this was
my
fault. Maybe I didn’t vet people well enough. And this is the
second person with a personality disorder that has slithered their
way into my inner circle. What’s wrong with
me
that
this keeps happening?

A friend answered that question well:

“You
don’t attract crazies. You attract
people
.
People
want to be around you and statistically, some of those people are
going to be crazy.”

So here’s my ultimate takeaway from all
this madness:

Firstly, drawing emotionally vampiric personality
disorder people is not an indication that something is
wrong
with me – or you – or any of us who has dealt with one of
a handful of these types.
If anything, it’s an indication
that there are some things about you that are really, really
right
.

It means you are empathetic, helpful, big-hearted
and strong. You fight aggressively, teeth bared, for those who are
hurting and need a champion. That is not something to be ashamed of
and it’s not something to allow a few assholes to take away
from you.

Secondly, there
is
no completely safe
place because
humans
–
no forum, no Facebook group, no self-help club – any and all
bonding and sharing is at the risk of being hurt. All human closeness
involves an element of emotional danger. But that’s the risk we
take
.
I can hear some of my happily-marrieds disagreeing with me
but I also know many, many happily-marrieds who learned the hard and
painful way that sometimes even your “safe place” is
contaminated without your knowing.

I’ve gotten more
good
back from my
investments in humans than bad. I’m not afraid of a little
risk. A couple bad returns aren’t slowing me down.

The best I can do is continue to draw my
boundaries with a permanent marker. I used to be terrible at this. I
had
no
boundaries. I used to pride myself on “having
never thrown anyone away.” Now, honestly, I am most impressed
with my ability to say “no” without feeling the need to
explain myself.

Despite all the hurt everyone is coping with
,
ultimately I am
proud
of us, some of us having
narrowly escaped marriages
to
poisonous, vampire people for trusting our Spidey senses and being
swift and decisive.

Jessica a year ago would have wanted to hear her
side and work it out and try to play devil’s advocate. I still
have no way of knowing if
this
rape was a real or fake one.

Jessica
now
trusts her gut, takes action
and lets it go. It doesn’t matter if it is real or fake. There
are plenty of resources available for her. She has a family.
I
don’t have to be the human band-aid.

The
group is still fractured now. People still feel unsafe and there’s
nothing I can do to change or alleviate that and it’s not my
responsibility to. But like all wounds
,
hopefully, this one will heal and we will all be stronger and smarter
from it.

Brick Wall

This is a the writing of a mad black woman.
So,
let me start with the bad news.

I was rejected today from a college I applied
to.
Now let me explain why this news is pretty close to making me
pull a crazy right now.
This decision not to accept me is based
on my transcripts from the last time I was in college which was over
thirteen years ago. Thirteen years ago, I didn't want to be in
college so I screwed around and flunked a lot. I faked wanting to go
back a couple of times only to withdraw. Then I met my ex and had a
bunch of kids and a crappy marriage.

Now, I'm a grown ass woman. I've got three kids
and no education. Now I know
exactly
what I want to do. I
want to teach abroad. I want to travel and, most of all, I want to
show my kids that I can do this.

Nothing, on Earth, is more important to me than
my kids seeing me, as an individual. achieve at least
one fucking
goal
.

My oldest daughter is almost eleven. I am past
the halfway mark. I
need
to be in and out of school ASAP
because I
NEED
to feel like I contributed to her financial
security at some point before she leaves my house.

The whole time I was married we bounced from home
to home, following the lead of "the man of the house" who
barely managed to keep a roof over us but always managed to have
cigarettes or alcohol at his disposal.

So I left.

And despite being intellectually impressive and
effervescent, I worked mid-range hospitality or office jobs with
hourly pay. I never made enough to cover after school care or a baby
sitter so that I could work full time or get health insurance and
somehow, even with an ex-husband with
no
schedule in the
same
city
, I didn't have his support to watch
his own
children so I could work.

So I ran away home and things have been better.
We have food and shelter. And that's great. But, my mom and sister
are doing the bulk of the financial supporting. My ex does none. My
contribution to our well-being, as agreed upon by my mom and I,
was
going to college and getting my degree so that I can get out of this
tar pit and stay out.

I don't want to be on welfare. I don't want to
rely on family.

I need to move forward.

I just recently identified that my complete
apathy and disconnection from myself was depression.

I'm a little depressed. I've gone numb. This
waiting
period was killing me. But what kept me from letting
it consume me was the
hope
that I was going back to school,
again, in the Spring. I knew that the interim was temporary, so I
could trudge forward.

I had a
plan
.

I just had to wait for my "yes."

And today, completely by surprise, in the mail
with Christmas cards and my water bill was a big, fat No.

No.

It doesn't matter how hungry, how competent, how
focused, how determined you are.

You are just the academic footprint you made when
you were eighteen and stupid and directionless.

Rejection.

And I cried today...

Which would be the first time since May when my
ex-husband failed to call his child on her birthday.
I felt like
I'd been shot. Or hit by a train. The carrot was yanked away. I
sobbed in the bathroom. Then my best friend called and I sobbed
again. Then I read an encouraging text from another friend and sobbed
some more.