Kelsey Quinn - Leading by Example

Kelsey Quinn

Leading by Example

Dealing with Childhood Trauma as a Type-A Somewhat-Sorta-Kinda-Occasional Adult

First published by Tenacity Together 2021

Copyright 2021 by Kelsey Quinn

All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, scanning, or otherwise without written permission from the publisher. It is illegal to copy this book, post it to a website, or distribute it by any other means without permission.

First edition

ISBN: 978-0-578-94946-8

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For Momma

Thanks for getting me here

I love you

Kelsey Quinn is a proud San Antonio girl. She has a Masters in Vocal Performance from and sings opera. Everyone generally agrees she should have stuck to that! Instead, to everyones deep dismay, she decided to spill the family secrets and talk about her feelings. When not doing all that, she can be found hanging out with her dog and binge watching Netflix, reading fanfiction, and/or spamming the group chat with far too many memes.

I need to thank my family first and foremost! My entire family has been so incredibly supportive. Insanely supportive. Ridiculously supportive. Suspiciously supportive. I mean, really, aint none of yall gonna tell me this might be a bad idea? This is worse than the time I got that bad middle part, and yall let me walk around looking like a knock off Leonardo DiCaprio. I went around looking like an Off-Broadway Backstreet Boy, and yall said nothing! But in all seriousness, Im very grateful for all the love and support Ive been given. I cant imagine who I would be without it.

Id also like to thank my very dear and darling friends who had to listen to me ask questions like, Is anger bad? and, Would you call me an aggressive person? at 3 a.m. and still dove in without any hesitancy. This book would not have been finished without yalls help!

Id also like to thank the my alma maters Counseling clinic who sent me many of their CITs to emotionally scar. Im sorry I took notes in counseling. I know that probably threw yall for a loop. Of course Id like to thank Jae, my favorite counselor who understood me so well it was like we shared a brain. Im so grateful for all the help and validation you gave me while I worked on edits and letting my family read it. I would have had at least 12 more mental breakdowns without you!

Most importantly, Id like to thank my Soul Sister, my Kindred Spirit, my Favorite Editor, Sam. This book literally could not have been finished without you. You had to listen to every insane notion I had, every bit of doubt and anxiety, and then had to fix the entire thing! I am entirely and eternally grateful for everything you have done for me. Love you!

My father didnt love me; he didnt even like me. I suppose thats as good a place to start as any. Thats the beginning of the story, anyway.

You should know what youre getting into! This isnt an easy story to tell, and I think it probably wont be easy to read either. My father wasnt a good man, and that affected my life in more ways than I can count.

I wrote about the worst days I ever lived, the worst things I ever did, and the worst thoughts I ever had.

I wrote it all down exactly like I would tell it to a friend, and I hope thats how you read it.

I hope you imagine us sitting on your couch, drinking a cup of tea with blankets in our laps, so were nice and cozy. Or maybe imagine us in your car having one of those emotional late-night talks.

I hope you imagine my hands waving about in big, exaggerated gestures because I never know what to do with my hands! I hope you see my eyes a little wild and squinting as if Im completely focused on something I dont particularly enjoy. If Im being honest, I probably have the vibes of a spooked animal, tense and ready to run at any given second, so imagine me that way too.

I hope you hear these words with a southern drawl, and I hope it sounds like Im ranting and raving because mostly I am. I talk fast, loud, and pointed. Never did learn how to be gentle with it.

I hope you imagine me struggling to get it all out because thats the truth. The most honest thing I can plainly say.

Its not an easy story, but its mine.

Ill try to lighten the mood with some humor, but Im not very funny, so take that with a grain of salt. Itll mostly be puns and enough Catholic jokes to get me excommunicated.

But please, if you do nothing else, imagine me laughing at my own jokes because I truly, truly do!

I am also keenly aware that if youre anything like me, even with my bad jokes, all of this might be too much at any given point. Some of these stories might be too hard to hear, and at some point, you may have to put it down. You may even need to skip something youre not ready to deal with yet.

Thats okay. Ive set it up, so you can take what you can and leave the rest if need be.

Each chapter can be read on its own and understood in its own context. Youll probably need to read the next chapter to understand the background, but after that, you should be good to go. If you set it down and dont come back for 6 months, it should be fine to pick up where you left off.

I promise I wont take it personally!

And if youre worried about it, spoiler alert, I turn out just fine in the end.

Mostly fine. Fine-ish. Ignore the explosions in the background; I have it under control!

My father was physically, mentally, verbally, and emotionally abusive. Hes an all-around piece of shit!

My first memory is of him choking my mother and saying, You fucking whore! You wanna act like a whore, Ill treat you like a whore.

My next memory is of him picking up my mother and throwing her against the wall like she was a fucking rag doll. I was supposed to be in bed, but I heard them yelling, and I peeked my head from around the door to see what was going on. When she hit that wall, the trailer shook a little with the force of the impact, and I got nervous. I ran back to my bed and hid under the covers with my little brother, Gerald, and tried to fall back asleep.

Those are my first memories, and as you can imagine, it didnt get much better from there.

My father, Jeff, was a good ol boy. He was charming, and everyone always loved him. No one would have ever suspected anything untoward about Jeff. And if they did, well, he came from a big family in a small town in Texas, so nothing would have ever come from it. Momma would have bruises on her neck, and no one wanted to know why.

We all suffered through that for four years. We each responded in our own way. The abuse affected all of us differently.

I had night terrors. Id wake up screaming about snakes biting me, crying to make it stop. To this day I cant see a snake, I cant hear them, I cant even think about them too hard without working myself up into a panic.

Gerald couldnt sleep in his own bed. Hed climb out of his crib and onto a dresser that he would then crawl over to get to my side of the room. Just in case, I guess.

Momma bore the brunt of it. He threw fits and destroyed the house, punched holes in the walls, broke everything in sight, and told her he would kill her from time to time. There were times he got pretty damn close to doing it too.