Instead of a doxxing over my life story, I'll be succint in what i have learned in my life lessons:

Mental health needs to be a priority. Just as food and water are essentials. As a child who was "raised" by two untreated but traumatized parents, it negatively affected my childhood and adolescence.

Becoming a parent taught me to put my child's welfare over anything else. It also exposed my mental health needs. Unfortunately being a single parent in my mid-20s meant that i self medicated when my child was with his other parent or grandparents.

The stigma of admitting something is "wrong" with you was alive and well. So i allowed a co-dependent relationship to take over as a means to "help". My partner had a host of issues.

He left me after i became pregnant again. My mother died. I had to finally talk to someone because i was alone and had my small child who needed his mom to be a functional parent.

I stupidly let my newborn's father back after i gave birth. He took my child and claimed i was breastfeeding and using more pain meds than prescribed. This allegation also had my older son given to his father.

Life as i knew it was now something foreign. I developed ptsd. I found sympathy in the bottle and at the bar with friends who didn't truly understand but helped me stay in a denial feedback loop that i was going to be ok.

I failed drug tests. I lost custody. Finally at the end of my twenties I snapped out of it. It was Christmas. I was alone in my apartment. I couldn't stop crying, i allowed myself to feel the pain that i had been so afraid of feeling.

The next day i went to an AA meeting. The next month i was in a psychiatrist's office. I'm not going to list the diagnoses but I am being treated for my mental health.

I see my kids. I speak to their dads. I am clean. I am practicing self care. The illnesses i have qualify me as disabled. If i had been diagnosed earlier in life things may have been a lot different.

My focus right now is healing. I have to prove to court and just about anyone and everyone that I am healthy to care for my kids. I have to let go of anger. I have to forgive.

And when my kids ask me about this time in thier lives when they are older, i can tell them that i had to take care of myself so i could be the best mom i can be.