Behind The Scenes

Author's note:

Behind The Scenes

August 31, 2002 at 8:35 A.M a beautiful little girl with bright blue eyes, blonde hair, and fair skin was born. The parents of the child loved the little girl and decided to name her “ Malia Emma-Rose Schubert.” She had an older brother, Isaiah, who quickly became her best friend. They did everything together. They watched cartoons together, ate together, went to sleep together, and played together. Isaiah was a great brother who took care of her when she was sick, made sure she was always changed, and made sure she always had the toys she wanted to play with. Both of their parents worked so they always had a family member at the small double wide to babysit them when they were working. Mandy, is her mothers name and she was a full time nurse at the local hospital in Harriman. Their fathers name is Eldon and he worked full time at a stem plant in Oak Ridge.

My name is Malia Emma-Rose Schubert and this is my story. I never talk to people about anything from my past but it's time to let people know that I have reasons for why Im like I am today. I'm writing this story hoping for people to understand me. Ever since these things have happened to me, I've been so shut down. I don't know how to be myself. I just want to feel normal again.

As a child, I use to lie in the soft green grass while looking up at the big, bright, and shiny ball of fire in the big blue sky, as I thought to myself why every human being goes through horrific things in life but I haven’t yet. I was only a small child with bleach blonde hair, dark freckles, and fair skin but I had a mind that scared me more than reality itself. I was smart as a child and was very talkative too. I loved being with my family and making new friends but then I became nervous about growing up even though I was only a child but I knew I needed to go through something horrific if I wanted to succeed in life. In life people have to go through something to teach them right from wrong. Everyone can't be perfect and everyone goes through things in life to understand the life's true meaning.

As I grew older, I finally experienced something horrific. Eldon started drinking and it became a problem for my mother. She never wanted us to see my father that way but he never knew when enough was enough. He never understood what the word “stop” meant.  I really didn’t know how to handle myself through this painful and mind blowing situation but it is a situation that most children go through. I was scared. All of the screaming, the sound of things breaking, and yelling when they thought we were sound asleep and couldn't hear a thing. The reminder from the man I thought would help me through life and teach me new things as I grew older, still calls me a mistake to this day. But as a child, the little things in life hurts but getting called a mistake from the man you are suppose to love the most in life makes the pain so much worse. It  feels like knives going into your skin over and over again until one day, that kind of pain is normal to you. I grew up thinking I wasn’t good enough for anyone and thinking no one would ever love me the way I was suppose to be loved. My father has always tried to come back to my mother. He wanted to be a father to me and Isaiah but he never could put the beer down and call it quits. It was an everyday thing for him. Always getting so drunk he couldn't even tell his kids that he loved us, tuck us in a night, or tell us that we were safe because he will be the one there to protect us.

As I grew a little older my mom brought someone new into my life. I was only six years old at the time and the man’s name was, John. I thought he would be the man who would love and care for us all. He was really sweet to my mom and helped us through a lot but he was just a little too friendly to me.  I started to become scared of him. I always wanted to go home but my mom really loved him. They were together for about two years. The first six months of their relationship was perfect, he was sweet to my mother, made dinner every night, took her on dates, pick us up from school, and started to try and replace my dad. Everything was going great but then came the other year and a half. I can still picture when it all began. It was in a small building. I got locked in the room that had four locks on the door. It was also sound proof. I was tied down on a small gray plastic table. Some days they were ropes and other days they were chains. It all depended on the mood he was in that day. I never really understood what he was doing but now that I’m older, I finally understand. He always forced me to drink kool-aid before I went into the room. It always made me really sleepy. The only time I would go into the room was when my mother was out for work. He would always undress me and touch me in places that no older man should touch a six year old little girl. I tried to explain it to my mother but she never understood me because little kids always make things up to get attention but she knew I was scared of him. It lasted for a year and a half. The way my mother found out was not from me but it was from my best friend, Isaiah. He started asking her where I went to every day. She finally got an understanding that I wasn't lying  and put cameras up in the building. She watched the cameras until she saw something happened. She saw him take me in the room and tie me up. As soon as she saw it, she came home in a heartbeat and got me out and started punching him. Soon after she picked up the phone and called the cops before he did anything else to me or even hurt my mother. The last time my mom talked to me about him, he got out of jail and moved far far away. He use to send me a bunch of money and bought me a new trampoline. He of course mailed me everything because he isn't allowed to be around me. It was a scary place to be as a six year old but I somewhat have managed to get through it.

People always ask me why I'm so shy. It's not that I am, it’s just that I don't know how to talk to people like I did when I was younger. In elementary school, everyone thought I was really weird because I never talked and I would cry a lot in the corners where nobody goes. I felt like if I spoke, no one would ever understand the pain and suffering in my voice. They wouldn't be able to look into my eyes and see that I was hurting. I soon started getting friends but I never talked. I would just sit and listen.  Even as a child, I laid in my dark room with no voices to be heard and no light to be seen. I was so upset, all the time. I was alone in my mind.

A few years went by as I still laid in the soft green grass while looking up at the big, bright, and shiny ball of fire in the big blue sky but now not thinking about when I was going to go through something horrific but now worrying about when everything would shut down and end. As things started getting better for me, my great grandfather passed away. I wasn't allowed to go to his funeral because my parents are both scared that I was going to get him out and stand him up and tell everyone he wasn't dead. He died from lung cancer. He was in World War II and always told me great stories. March 12, 2015 was the first time I tried to commit suicide. I was heartbroken. I didn't go to school for two weeks. I stayed home getting watched by my mother who was heartbroken that I was going to take my own life. I never had someone so close to me pass away in such a shock. I was scared. I was even more alone than I was before.

As I lied in my dark room, wait to go to my dad's for Christmas, I thought everything was going to be great. It turned out to be another tragic moment in my life. The man I thought would love me the most,Eldon, his wife's son who I haven't seen in over seven years at that time, left a mark in my soul that will be there for the rest of my life. I thought everything would be okay. I stayed up all night that night with him, my brother, and my cousin but I soon started feeling sleepy and uncomfortable. Throughout the night, he grabbed my butt and hit it with pool sticks but I never really thought nothing of it. As I walked into the living room to go watch TV, he of course followed. I slowly started to feel my eyes shut slowly. As I was asleep, his hands gently touched my soft, pale skin. I could feel myself awake but it felt like my eyes were glued shut. I opened my mouth to yell but no noise came out. I was in shock. My father and his mother were in the next room sound asleep but I was laying in fear waiting for someone to put a stop to it. I tried to fight and make sounds for people to hear but I couldn't move and I wasn't able to make any sounds. I soon forced myself to make a small sound for him to hear and he slowly pulled his hand out of the blue basketball shorts I was wearing that night. I sat up in a hurry and said, “I… I have to use the bathroom.” When I walked into the bathroom, I could feel tears filling my eyes. They started dripping down my pale cheeks and I wiped them off with my soft black shirt. All of a sudden the tears starting falling faster and faster as I tried to stop. When I left the bathroom I didn’t go back into the living room but I walked out the back door and went onto the field were my horse was. I didnt have on any shoes or a jacket. It was really cold outside. Of course a thin layer of snow when on the soft green grass. I ran over to my horse not caring what I was stepping in. I jumped onto my horse and rode down a long trail hoping for someone to wake up soon.

I sat in silence for days upon days pondering on the thought of it all being my fault. I didn't eat or even drink until I finally went home. Nobody knew what had happened until three years later. My family found everything out. The scars on my arms and stomach are not there for people to weep over and feel sorry for me but it is a roadmap that someday, someone with follow all the way to the end and holds me while I weep over the nightmares of my past. The day I told my mother about my stepbrother someone from my school did the same thing my stepbrother did to me. December 25, 2015 is when it all happened.

Two years went by and I was finally happy again. I was still shut down but I was finally opening up again. I met a senior whenever I was freshman. His name was JD Livingston. I thought I found my happiness in him but after a year and a half of us dating, I quickly realized that I was lying to myself. I thought I loved him, I thought he made me happy, but he didn't. He was strict, mean, he used me, hit me a few time, and was disrespectful to me and my family. I soon became unhappy.

October 24, 2017. It was in a church elevator. The feeling of a grown boy jerk me into and elevator and try to make to door hurry up and close was nerve racking. I tried to fight but nothing happened. The feeling of someone sexually touching you while having big strong hands around your small neck forcing pressure against you so you can't move. Listening to him tell you that if I told anyone what he was doing to me that he would kill me. It was mind blowing but all I could do was stand there with no motion. My body felt frozen. All of my blood rushed down my body all the way to my feet and didn't come back up until everything was over. My biggest fear at the time was telling someone but I knew I had too. The first person I told was my best friend, Tiffani. She soon told our youth leader who then told his wife. The youth leader and his wife brought me into a room and sat there and talked to me about what happened. I was too nervous to talk to them about it because he was still at the church at the time. When i was in the room with them, I was so nervous, I scratched a huge hole in my hand. Close to my thumb. It bled all over my clothes and rushed quickly down my hand, dripping onto my light colored jeans. The tears that were dripping down my face would not stop or even slow down. I tried and tried to make it stop but it felt impossible.

That same night the boy from my school did those nasty things to me was my second attempt of commiting suicide. My old best friend, Tiffani, was there for me but my boyfriend wasn’t. I was on the couch in a small ball. Tiffani on one side rubbing my back and my mother on the other shedding tears while playing with my hair and saying, “Everything is going to okay, I’m never going to leave your side again. I’m going to protect you now,” I knew she was heartbroken. She felt like she didn’t protect me and couldn’t protect me anymore. She felt like everything was her fault. But that night, I tried so hard to commit suicide but everything I did and everywhere I went someone came with me. I still attempted it. It was sneaky and hard to do, but I tried. I took some pain killer but soon after my mother made me gag everything up after she noticed the empty bottle in the bathroom floor. I still went to school the next day but as soon as school began, I called my mom. I told her that I felt nasty, unwanted, useless, and that I wanted to go home. I didn’t want to be around people or even speak to anyone. My mother later came to my school and talking to the principal. Everyone soon knew who the person was and how unsafe I felt even on school property. I had the cop follow me around school and walk me to every class for about two weeks. Than, the name calling began after the cop stopped following me around. All of the football players teamed up on me and called me the nastiest names a girl could be called. I felt nasty. I began leaving more and more scars on my stomach, arms, and legs. The pain from the razor blade and my fingernail soon became a pleasant feeling to me.  

December 29, 2017 the biggest blessings of my life were born. Phoenix Alexander, Maddox Anderson, and Paxton Andrew. The boys who could make everything disappear. My biggest responsibility. My best friends. My children. I soon started to realize that I wasn't their sister. I wasn't pretty much their mom.  First came home Phoenix, second came Maddox, and then Paxton. That's when I realized, my life has changed. I took care of them from day one. I slept in the couch. Woke up three times a night to feed them. Some nights I didn't even sleep even in school nights. They are my heart and will forever have my heart.

When I broke up with JD, I could feel myself getting happier and happier as the minutes slowly past. The clock ticking in the back of my head, slowly start to spread a wide smile across my face. My smile was spread from cheek to cheek. I finally felt happy again. I felt like I could accomplish anything in life. I could wear anything I wanted and be myself for a while. Of course, JD called me everyday telling me how he want to kill himself and how I broke his heart. I didn’t care. I was finally feeling normal again.

July 4, 2018. It was on one of my favorite holidays. I got invited to a little party that night with one of my friend. She didn't tell me who was going to be there or what we were going to do. I got to the house the party was at  and I saw someone I didn't want to see again. Someone who's heart I shattered into a million pieces. I was having fun just sitting on the couch watching TV. Then I became tired. I told my friend goodnight and I walked into her room slowly and I gently started falling asleep. I fell onto the bed and dozed off. I woke up to a slight breeze of cold air but also a hot breath of air pouring into my neck. The sound of a vibrating phone started to fill my ear. I slowly started to open my eyes. First the left and than the right. I got up as fast as I could. The sight of another person's naked body on your nude body was a scary awakening. I didn't even fall asleep without clothes on. I didnt even fill them being pulled off slowly. I ran to my friend and told her to take me home. She was upset with me and asked why I wanted to leave. I got in her car and she wasn't far behind me. She tried to talk to me the whole way to my house but there were no words to be heard coming from my mouth. I got back to my house around 2:38A.M. My mother asked me the next day why I came home in the middle of the night and I just told her I wanted to come home. She still doesn't know what happened to this day. I just so scared to tell her. I can't open up to her about it again because I don't want her to be heartbroken again.

December 25, 2018 my mother, my best friend, my role model, my sunshine, my protector, and my superhero got diagnosed with disease that will be with her forever. This disease has no cure and could kill you. She a beautiful human with a beautiful mind and soul. She has MS which makes her feel ugly and not capable of doing anything. Most days she can't do anything. I raise four kids, clean my whole house, make sure my mother is okay, make dinner, and finally focus on school and myself. I make sure there is a home cooked meal every night, clean clothes for everyone, make sure my mother took all of her medicine, and everyone is showered every night. I'm the mom in my house because my mother can't do it anything. She is getting worse and worse everyday. She has gotten five stronger pain medications and only have two more levels until she can't walk anymore. If I could take it away from her, I would 100 percent put it all on myself. My kids are 18 and three two year olds and of course me who is 16. I'm trying so hard to be the best sister, mom, and daughter I can be but I need to be a teenager but I don't have that choice anymore.

As I lay in the soft green grass looking up at the big, bright, and shiny ball of fire in the big blue sky, this time not feeling alone but having someone special lay by my side holding my hand while talking about spending the rest of our lives together. He follows the roadmap without even realizing, he understands the pain I feel from the past, he knows what I’m about to say before I speak it out, and most importantly he holds me when I feel the need to cry or when I’m scared and don't want to live anymore. He protects me from my monstrous past and he loves me for the real me.  He is my peace in this horrific world. He is my life and hopefully my future.

Today, I still don't feel normal. The people I see and the things I hear, I know is all in my head. The loud screams that keep me awake at night and the man in the green sweater. The man in the green sweater who is one my of mother old boyfriends. But it's all in my head, right? It makes me selfish for wishing I were dead. I have people who love me but I just don't love myself. The disturbing thoughts that run around my mind day in and day out. People won't understand. I keep the things that scare me inside of my mind and they eat me alive inside my useless mind. I can't say or maybe things will get worse for me. Sometimes things get too bad. I just want to lay in the dark all day with no light to be seen or no voices to be heard. I look in the mirror and I see myself as a disappointment. The sound of people laughing everytime I look at myself. Sometimes it just gets to me and I break. The salty tears will rush down my cheeks onto my shirt. I just can't handle this much longer. Things are actually starting to get worse.

Everyday there is something new. Something new to be heard or seen. The scream have gotten where they could bust someone eardrum and the man gets closer and closer to me every night. People will not understand. That's why I don't speak of things that race around my mind like a 5k. I can't ever sleep. I haven't had a full night of rest in weeks. I run on three to four hours a night. The ear bleeding screams and the man in the green sweater never lets me sleep. I cant even go out with my friends anymore. I always just want to be alone. I'm not okay. I don't know if I ever will be okay. Like, do I have some sort of problem?  I can't tell. People will just tell me that it's all in the past and that I can just get over it. It's not that easy for me to forget all of the horrific things that has happened to me but I promise I’m not crazy. But I do have demons living inside of me that never leave me alone. I just want to be seen as normal. I promise I'm not crazy. I just have the horrific flashbacks of my past. I just want to be listened to without people thinking I'm going crazy. I know what I am and crazy isn't of one the things I am. People will nail the thoughts that I'm going crazy in my brain but then I will actually become insane. But for now I promise crazy. I just have issues. Personal issues that in my eyes aren't crazy.