AmethystElizabeth

    So, we all have those days when shit just doesn't go your way, right? Well, that has been my entire life for the last few months.
    First of all, in January 2016, my mother decided that she wanted nothing to do with me, so she put me in state custody(Please note that I was 6 months away from being 18 and I had A 1-1/2-year-old daughter). I was living with my boyfriend at the time and we became self sufficient after my mother walked out, but the state only saw that I was a minor. So they throw me into foster care, which in turn forced me to place my daughter in the foster care system in order for her to stay with me and prevent the person who raped me from getting her.
    So, there I am: alone, confused, severely depressed, and quite frankly, a little bit pissed. The woman whose home I was placed in was abusive, controlling, and racist(my daughter and I are white and she is black). I was stuck there until my 18th birthday in July. During those six months, I was interrogated repetitively on false claims by this woman that I abused my daughter. She thought that since I let my daughter act up after sitting still for two long hours, that I was a bad parent. My daughter and I should not have been forced to attend services against our beliefs(I am Wiccan and my daughter is technically undeclared until she can make that decision for herself). My daughter is very advanced and active; Sitting still is not something she is good at, nor something I force her to do.
    However, that barely tips the iceberg. Each day, this woman would rudely enter my sleeping quarters and yell at me saying that I need to hurry up and get ready. So I get up and get ready, then get LeeLa(my daughter) up and ready, then I go to the living room and sit for anywhere from 45 minutes to and hour-and-a-half waiting on her to get ready. Then it was a whole day of sitting for 6-8 hours in a fumy, closet-sized room while she got her hair done or sitting in an acetone-ridden, oxygen-baren wasteland for another few hours while she got her nails done. then we went to the mall and she bought herself fancy make-up or clothes or shoes. This woman would spend hundreds of dollars in a single trip. On the way home , she would stop by a fast food place and ask what we wanted, making me pay mine and LeeLa's bill of course. That's all I'm going to say about that.
    There was also another girl in the home. She was 13 years old and almost 8 months pregnant by a 27 year old, whom she was convinced was going to marry her and provide for her and they'd live happily ever after. Once her baby was born, she had no idea what she was doing. This woman refused to help her in anyway. She would only watch the baby when it was convenient for her. The baby would often run out of diapers. I never minded giving a few dollars to help with that, but this woman would rarely take us to the store to get things that we needed. I had to go without deodorant for nearly a week because she didn't feel like going to the store.
    After a while, I had noticed that my stash of money was nearly half gone. After reviewing my receipts, I found that $70 was missing. A few weeks later, the other girl in the house comes up with money from her "baby daddy". Then the next week, another $50 was stolen. Then after that, another $20. Ironically enough, those are the exact amounts her "baby daddy" gave her. After talking to state workers, they said there was nothing I could do without proof. So there went my college housing deposit and my court fine payment. After the girl left the home we were in, she lost custody of her baby, tested positive for drugs, and was sent to a residential facility.

**Excerpt:
Okay. It's 1 in the morning and I'm actually tired now, so this will be part 1 and I will finish the rest in the morning when I wake up.

I am here.
I am everywhere.
Every place you've been, I've waited.
Every face you see, I have worn.
I have not one name, but thousands.
I come on the wings of an epidemic, of a massacre, a lone scream in the night,
Enhanced by the distant thunder of a war or the bleet of the slaughtered calf.
I visit the dying in their burning skin, devour the bodies of the sick.
I crush the hearts of the hopefuls.
I dance on the backs of the weak.
Your greatest fears are my delight.
With your cries, you invite me in.
I am the betrayal you could not have seen,
The killer you thought you knew.
One day, I will be your mother or your father or your friend.
Another day, I will be your neighbor or perhaps I'll work through you.
There are monsters hiding in your closet.
There are ghosts beneath your bed.
The dream you feared was real,
Was real.
These are gifts to you from me.
I love you, in my little way.
With your suffering, I am alive.
Can't you hear the music on the wind?
Don't you recognize the tune?
Is it you, my friend?
You're struggling, Your state torn limb from limb.
But I am not Death.
Death is your deliver.
Death looks to me with sorrow in his eyes and asks, "Why must you do this?"
My answer remains unchanged. "I do what you cannot."
No end is swift under my watch.
Mercy is a mistake I correct.
I am peace destroyed and eyes forced open, the ragged ring around you neck.
I am your secrets wish for others.
I am their secret wish for you.
I have not one name, but thousands.
But you, you may call me
Agony
And I am pleased to make your acquaintance.

    I cannot breathe.
They chain me down...

    Lock me away.
Into a pit of nothingness.
    I fall. Further and further.
I hide. They find me.
    They lock me away.

H
E
L
P

M
E
.
.
.

I am falling.
Falling.
Falling.

Into this void.

I cannot escape.
I cannot hide.
I cannot see.
I cannot help myself.
I cannot breathe.