Origin Story

A Sister Conversation About Childhood, Coping, and Connection

In this deeply personal second episode of The Shadows We Cast, I sit down with my two sisters, Kate and Teresa, for a raw, revealing conversation about our early years—growing up with a mother whose mental illness shaped every corner of our childhood. We talk about what poverty looked and felt like, how instability became our norm, and the adults who tried—sometimes successfully, sometimes not—to keep us safe.

This isn’t just a story of hardship. It’s a story of sisterhood: how we held each other up, how we made it out, and how we’re still making sense of it all. From small-town Canada to the deserts of Arizona, from hiding emotions at our school desks to navigating unsafe home environments, this episode travels the geography of our early lives with honesty, humour, and a lot of heart.

We speak openly about the things that were hard to name back then—parentification, addiction, emotional neglect—and the fierce love and resilience that got us through. Whether you’ve lived something similar or are just trying to better understand the shadows that follow us from childhood, this conversation invites you in.

Host & Producer: Jenn St John
Editor: Andrew Schiller
Website: www.jennstjohn.ca
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LinkedIn: Jenn St John
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Transcript

THE SHADOWS THAT CAST 

Episode Title: Origin Story:  Growing Up with a Mentally Ill Parent - a Sister Conversation About Childhood, Coping and Connection

Episode Number:  2

Guests:  Kate Baker and Teresa Dunford, sisters of the host, Jenn St John

TRANSCRIPT:

Jennifer: Financially mom was mostly doing everything on her own. she loved to work, but she would work 3 jobs instead of 1, Or it was like either she was working 3 jobs or she was on the couch and couldn't get out of bed, kind of manic levels, but because legally mom couldn't work with Tom in our lives things felt like they went up he was making more money than she did as a single parent, and he owned his own home.

Again, it felt like there was a little bit of a stability thing there. he literally built a room on it so that we could all live there, which the room didn't get 100 percent finished. So there's no heat to the winter and stuff like that. But he was really trying, you could tell he was really trying. And I do think Kate, you were saying earlier, there were always adults in our lives who very much saw what was going on, loved us and wanted us to be safe.  And I do feel like he was one of those adults. 

I can remember, there was just so little money, I was very much teased because I would wear the same pair of pants almost every single day to school. to the point of we were on the bus and there was this one boy who, was going beyond and the bus driver had to get involved and help me to make sure I was okay and I was safe.  I remember that feeling too because that's one of the things that we can't hide, you can't hide not having much, food for lunch and you can't hide wearing the same clothes every day at school or not having, things that you need for school.

I can remember being involved in plays and a teacher would take me out to get an outfit at the used store because somehow they knew we couldn't do it and they just were looking after us. So do you guys remember any kind of external things like that starting to happen at all around those ages as well?  

Teresa:  Definitely the teasing, mine would have been earlier, but around the same time. So for me, starting grade three, grade four is when I probably became aware of the poverty level that we kind of hovered around And I think that, age and stage for kids, you do start to feel less than, and I think that for me only grew because even when we were with Tom, a lot of that money was focused on kind of the party lifestyle, especially out in Arizona.

And that didn't include us. I mean that one pair of pants that you had eventually made its way to me.  So yeah, a just never feeling like you measure up.

Kate:  For me, I think the poverty thing really, became apparent when we lived in Westport because I was at that age. I was very lucky in the fact that, I was very, well embraced by the community. because it was a small amount of people, like there was, eight people in the graduating class of grade eight.  They were all very kind and friendly and they didn't tease and they didn't make fun of, but I was aware that it was there, you'd go to their homes and, see their clothes and their Christmas gifts. so it was an awareness for me for sure. But fortunately, I wasn't faced with the teasing and the bullying around that.  

So I was very lucky that way. But I think that's what drove me to get a job as soon as I could. So I was babysitting at 12, making money and buying my own clothes. I went and stayed with one of our aunts that summer and who had a home daycare and I made a bunch of money she took me shopping before I went home.  So I had some nice clothes for grade seven, I think it was grade eight. And I got a waitressing job and, just worked all the time after that in order to have money so that I didn't have that feeling of being less than.

Jennifer: I think we all did that for sure, as soon as we could.  Teresa is just going back to what we were talking about. the Arizona, Missouri time and the escalation of mom's mental health. Do you have any kind of, memories or a specific incident that highlighted that kind of demise, I guess, of mom's mental health during that time?

Teresa: I saw a lot of the, highs and the lows. It would be a Friday night and she would rent seven movies and just literally stay on the couch all weekend and in the dark and you don't answer the phone and you don't answer the door and it just would be this low and then she'd rally and, then it would be the opposite.

I can't tell you how many times they had a specific couple that they were friends with in Arizona and they would go out on their boat all the time. And how many times they woke up from the hangover the next day that, that mom was covered in like, Probably second, third degree burn blisters over large parts of her body because she would fall and she kept saying to us like, Oh, I fell into the engine.

So it was one of those boats that would have had like an exposed something so many times. I remember that happening. She just wasn't well.

Jennifer: I remember those blisters. Oh, my God. Do I ever remember those blisters?

Teresa: My memories of Missouri are very much of her being very insular, very much staying indoors, not going out, definitely the addictive personality stuff.  I started to see that more than when she would just fixate on things.  I remember we got our first video game system and that was super exciting. But again, she didn't have a job or anything that she was going out to. So, her days and nights weren't exactly days and nights.

And she would wake us up to help her get through these levels on these video games. I mean, it's a school night and we still get up the next day and go to school, I specifically remember those desks that the chairs are connected to. So like the desk actually has a shelf inside it, you know in grade four.

I spent a lot of that year pretending I'm rooting around in my desk looking for something, but I'm just trying to hide the fact that I'm emotional, cause it just doesn't feel right. I don't know what it is, and we don't have any family around or anything. I'm not really making friends with anyone, but it doesn't feel right.

I wouldn't say those were her greatest years. I think that was a real struggle. 

Jennifer: With the escalation of the alcohol abuse, came more accidents.  Even in Westport, I think most of the vehicles we had, obviously because of the level of money that mom was making, they were always what we would call a beater.  They usually ended up totaled because of mom driving under the influence never being charged, but always single vehicle accidents, usually late at night, and kind of, it was always the weather or the sun or something.  

I can remember in,in Missouri and Arizona, driving under the influence with us and the vehicle started, maybe it started before, but I can just really remember it happening and being aware enough that I was like, again, Kate, with the gun situation, we are not safe in this moment right now and just trying desperately to make sure that she stayed on the road and got us home. 

I can remember coaches having to stay for hours, hours.  Because nobody was there to pick me up and it was dark out and I couldn't walk home, which is, how we got back and forth to school usually. And she'd show up and I still don't understand how these coaches let us get into the vehicles with her. she was inebriated and should not have been driving, but at that point they've been waiting probably for three hours for her and, getting into that vehicle and you're just, you're so scared because you're just like, how are we going to get home? But then also what happened in Arizona is that Kate graduated from high school. And so that was another really big transition that we all have to face. Kate, obviously you had choices that you could make as to where you were going to go and what you were going to do? how did you get through making those choices?

Kate: So in the beginning, my first plan was to stay in Arizona and go to, college and be there while you guys were still there. then I had a huge falling out with mom and Tom to the point that there was a physical altercation between Tom and I. And it was, one of those nights they came home, the two of them drunk from being out with those friends with the boat. she's once again burned. And he seems to be the more sensible one in the moment. Still he was drunk as well because his drinking highly increased with mom's drinking. And they had some very volatile interactions throughout that time in Arizona. And at that point, I'm questioning mom saying is he doing this to you? Because this is like the third time she's coming home with, these burns. because I know there had been altercations before. And so I vividly remember the house in Arizona. We were in the corner of the L shaped hallway. And he lunged at me.  And I Punched him in the face and kneed him, and he went down in a lot of pain.  And I, I get it now, but I didn't get it then. She protected him.  It was all about him. And at that point I was like, I can't be here anymore. I have to go. I'm not quite sure how this all transpired, but I ended up out West, with one of our aunts and uncles and a cousin who I had been very close to as a child.

And they had lost a child a couple of years prior we're not sure, but we think drunk driving, leave the scene accident. but I ended up there in Victoria for the summer and worked there just had to leave, had to get as far away as I could. Again, a lot of guilt leaving but, she kicked me out, really, is, is what mom did. I was not allowed to stay and I tried, I didn't have the means to stay. I tried to get an apartment. I remember going and looking at a couple of places. 

They were the neat apartments with the pool in the center and the girls could come stay with me. I thought, oh, I could do this. But I was 18 had just graduated high school, worked at like Kentucky Fried Chicken, I think is where I worked at in Arizona. I just didn't have the means and so I had to leave because I had no way to stay.

Jennifer: Yeah, well, I remember you leaving, but it was never presented to us that that was under those circumstances. I just thought, okay, of course, it's great. 12. You leave the house, your off, you're going to go back to Canada and, go to school or, you know, do whatever. But I do remember we all left LA the same day. I remember seeing your plane in the sky. And this point, It's almost three years we've seen no family, and we've not seen dad.  we had had one family member, our Aunt Erin, had flown down to see us in Lake Havasu City. And I can remember, I'm sure by that point, well, mom was spiraling,  had been spiraling from the moment we got down to the states. But I think even for us it was getting quite palpable at that point that we needed to see family.  And so we were also conveniently shipped off for the summer as well to Canada. And put on a plane and back to Ontario and basically floated around, got to see dad and spend lots of time with dad mostly, I think, stayed with Aunt Terry that's what I remember, Teresa.  And just got to be immersed in that love and obviously they all just opened their arms up and just took us in and, again, they wouldn't know it, but everything we'd just been through for those three years at our home life, it's like the total opposite walking into any home that we walked into, whether it was a friend's home, whether it was dad's home or whether it was an aunt or an uncle. So emotionally, almost getting your bucket refilled, I guess is what it felt like for me. That was a big summer. That was a really big summer. Teresa, for you, did that help with any of the loneliness that you were feeling?

Teresa: I remember it being lots of positive experiences. We didn't have a lot of peers, like we didn't stay anywhere that summer in the sense of I wasn't able start to make friends, that kind of thing. But from a relative perspective, absolutely filled with lots of love and, and that kind of thing for sure.

Jennifer: Well, and I guess because I was older in those other places, but I went back to Peterborough and saw friends I had. And I wrote letters, during those three years here in the States, I like pen paled my life away, trying to hold on to connections, cause that was the only way. 

Teresa: There's a huge part of me that just didn't have that. I was young enough that when we left lots of these places, I didn't have that pen pal connection.  We weren't in the digital world. connections are just so essential, they are such a part of the foundation that, I've raised our kiddos to really, seek out and, sustain connections with people because I really think it is part of that foundation. And it's something that I really lacked in a lot of my life is just having people, I might have had them in the moment.

But then you're on to the next place, and the next thing, and the next house, and the next whatever. So, being present enough to seek out and sustain those connections is huge.

Kate: I was reflecting on this the other day when I knew we were having this podcast, and do you think part of that is why we've ended up where we are in the province? I mean, we've all done some moving around and done some things. But for me, Westport was my biggest connection.  It was the longest place we stayed, it was, grade five to grade nine for you guys.  I think Orillia is where you spent the most of your time, Like, if you look at a chunk of time and so you have both kind of settled close to not within Orillia, but you've, you've settled close to there. Do you think that has something to do with that because that's where we spent the most of our time and made some connections and created some roots?

Jennifer: I totally understand your connection, Kate, I only really came to Orillia in grade 9. I was gone, by 12. 

Kate: Oh, okay. 

Jennifer: so Westport was five years. So that was the longest we lived anywhere for me was was Westport. So I totally understand why when you were able to go back to school and you made the decision to go to school in Kingston, that was a very natural place for you to feel a sense of family and stability and friends even, Because I'm sure you reconnected with people because you were older at that age when you left Westport.

Kate: I still have some of those friendships now.

Jennifer: Yeah, exactly.  I think for me, honestly, it was more so when we were leaving Toronto.  This is fast forwarding many years into my adulthood I wanted to be close to family and it was a lot of work stuff with my husband and we love Westport.  We love where you guys have settled, but for him work wise, it was too far away from Toronto. And so then the next place I had family still was this area. because really my friends that I still maintain relationships with from high school aren’t here.

Kate: True.

Jennifer: It was where could I go to, a, make it work professionally and b, be close to my siblings.  And so because it was just too far to go to where you were Kate, then the next thing was okay, well where’s Teresa.  And we don’t live on each other’s door steps, but we’re at least closer than we would be if I had stayed in Toronto. 

Kate: True.

Jennifer: Teresa, you were out West and came back to this area. Was the driving force was kind of work slash family?

Teresa: I think it was probably based more on familiarity than connection.  Like, yes, I was in Orillia from grade 6 to grade 12, and had some peer groups. But I didn't have the greatest social skills. It wasn't something that was really honed for me as a kiddo.

So, I hadn't kept up with a lot of those relationships and, I wish that I had of but Orillia was still familiar. So there was, you know, more familiarity than connection. That brought me back here. 

Jennifer: I understand that though, because when we go to visit Kate and we go to Westport, I mean, Kate doesn't live in Westport, but it's familiarity, right? It isn't like Oh, I went to school there. I had this, happened at this Spot down at the spring or I hiked Foley Mountain or, I took swimming lessons at the beach.

I guess that's the connection. I guess you're saying is more with people. Whereas familiarity is more with place.  

Teresa: Home for me has never been a place.  home is a feeling in my heart of comfort.  because it was never a dwelling, that for me is not what definition of home is.

Kate: Yeah I agree with you, and I think home for me the definition was always the homestead. We didn't talk about this yet, but the homestead was a big part of our childhood, And that's the property that grandparents bought and built on. And for many, many summers, T, you were really young, you were an infant to a couple of years old, we would go there every summer and camp.

And I remember looking forward to that summer because that's where I felt the safest.  there was 85 acres to go and have fun and explore with our cousins and all of our aunts and uncles were there and mom was on her best behavior.  because she didn't treat us the way that, she did treat us in front of them ever. It was a very hidden secret. And so that's another draw for me to this area is that's where I felt the safest was the homestead. And it was, a big part of why I moved back.

Jennifer: Yeah, and also those family members, Nan and Pa, Pa was no longer with us by that point. But Nan and Pa, and then the, aunts or uncles that we also felt connections with and that we felt safest with, that homestead was the place that everybody would go whether it was, Easter, a holiday or summer or whatever.

So yeah, I totally understand that connection there, Kate. that makes a lot of sense. having those years of your childhood there, it's like a piece of your heart is there, right?

Kate: And I always had the dream to buy that place back, And, and make it what it was before. I still have that dream. Who knows?

Jennifer: Yeah? Oh, that's awesome. That's awesome.   

 So at the end of our Arizona year, we're all put on planes from LA.  Kate’s leaving leaving.  She’s done high school, she’s gone back to stay with family on the west coast. And we’re put on a plane back to Ontario and we spend the next two months with family there.  During that period of time, the decision is made, or the decision was made for them, that we’re now no longer living in Arizona.  We’re moving back to Missouri.  For Teresa and I, that transition is made over the summer, and they pack all of our belongings up, and they move them back to the house that Tom owned in Missouri and I can remember by the end, not even probably by the end of the summer I didn't want to go back. now I had the moment you had, Kate, when you were in Peterborough, moving to Missouri, and I did not want to leave Canada. I was very emotional and very adamant. I talked to aunt Terry about it. I talked to dad about it. they were both of course, very supportive and wanted to help me out with that decision. I didn't want to leave Teresa in the situation, but it's just that whole weight of you're trying to save yourself. You're also trying to save your sisters. And you're just trying to survive. And I felt like this, my best, opportunity to survive was going to be to stay. you were home in Canada too, Kate, that was another reason why I wanted to stay and just try to be close again. And I can remember mom just shut it down and she was just like, Absolutely not. It's not happening. and I was a mess. So she came and picked us up and drove us back to Missouri. And now I was angry. I was not happy with the situation at all. I, I think that's when things started to turn for me as well.   

 so it's now back to Missouri. And I'm in grade nine. Teresa, you must be in grade six.

Teresa: Yeah.

Jennifer: And Kate, at that point, had you gone to Hamilton and you were getting some upgrading done, right? So that you could apply to schools in Canada because you'd been in the States for a few years.

Kate: Yes. I left Victoria and the plan was to go live with dad in Toronto at his apartment at Jane and Finch. And I remember our aunt Tara and her husband at that time picking me up from the airport, and taking me there. I guess the way she's describes it is. And I was, I was like, I can do this. I got it right. I'll figure out and go to school. I've done it. 

Jennifer: We’d been there before. It was the place he lived the whole time we knew him, right? Like we'd been there lots of times.

Kate: but she left there just devastated that I was going to be living in Toronto, you know, on my own pretty much because at that point dad worked and he'd go away for work and do all of that. So then the decision was made that I would go live with her and her husband at that time in Hamilton.

And yeah, I found out that I couldn't go to college right away. Because of being in the States and then being back in Canada, I didn't have enough credits. So I went to what at that point in time was called OAC.  I only needed a couple of credits, but I figured you might as well make a year of it, kind of just settle in for a year and, figure some things out.  

So yes, I moved in with them. And then, two days later, got a job at a curling and country club, golf and curling country club in, in Dundas. And I spent the year there.  

Jennifer:  And then for us obviously the elevation of unhealthy coping mechanisms and the elevation of mental health issues for mom, wasn’t going away. So that was just kinda of peaked for us in Missouri in that first, kind of, six months. And we obviously communication with you Kate mostly through letters. Because I’m sure phone calls were tricky to have and mom would have been very paranoid again about what was being said and what was being done. 

I'm sure at that point, that would have been the first time that one of her children was no longer outside of her house and under her control. I'm sure that the relationship was already very tattered because of how you left, I’m sure that she was very paranoid about what you could say or what you could do. 

Kate: Absolutely Jenn, she actually threatened me. When I first moved in with Tara, I got a phone call from her, and was along the lines of, “oh you’re just making your way through my family’.  Like she always called it ‘her family’. And definitely threatened me that I was not to say anything, that if I was choosing to abandon you guys and her that I’m not allowed to have anything to do with you.  Don’t call.  Don’t communicate, don't anything. So yeah, I remember that phone call vividly.

Jennifer: Yeah.  But I do remember that we still wrote you.  

Kate: Yes, you did.  

Jennifer:  Because Teresa, do you remember, you can tell us about, only a couple of months into that period of time where we were all no longer now under the same roof. We were back in Missouri. You were now in Hamilton. There was a massive incident that started a very big ripple effect of another big change in our life. So Teresa do you want to tell us about that?

Teresa: I remember writing a lot of letters, both in Arizona and Missouri. I mean, again, I was young, but I remember I would like circle the tear marks on the loose leaf and I'd be like, see, this is how much I'm crying. It was hard for me when Kate left.   

 I remember writing a lot of letters and communicating how unhappy it was,  and just talking to Kate about, the fights that were going on and just fear, I think a lot of those letters didn't get sent. I think a lot of them were intercepted by mom.  

Cause again, I'm young, so I need her in order to gain access to the post office and stuff. And I remember being really surprised when one actually got through and it was obviously one that wasn't, she mustn't have read it because the best of my recollection, it communicated some fear of what was going on.  And then it just felt like, efforts for them put in place to have us come back for a visit. And what I recall is kind of a, a bit of an intervention, but Kate can probably better recall.

Jennifer: well, and the letter situation and Kate, I think you and I probably remember it more clearly. I think it was to Aunt Tara that you wrote a letter.  Oh, it was to you Kate? And you showed Aunt Tara. 

Kate: Yeah. Yes. Yeah. So I got the letter. 

Jennifer: You were detailing you were detailing a very unsafe situation. And that’s why Kate and Tara like (gesture of ripping things off) 

Kate: And I think, I think because that letter, you know it spoke about guns again, right. And I had experienced that already. So I knew it to be real. And even at that point, I didn't share with Aunt Tara. I just, like my experience of what happened, but I shared the letter and I said, I'm going to tell you that. This will happen. It's not a matter of if, it's a matter of when. And Teresa, in that letter, you described an argument you overheard between Dennis and mom when you guys were somewhere for Christmas or something staying in a, in a room with a bunch of people, like a bunch of other little kids, and you were awake and threats were made.  

Jennifer: And so I'm sure I don't know financially if. If it was a financial reason why mom wasn't willing to leave, you know, I, I, we don't know, right. Or just mental health wise, she couldn't make that decision.

Like she just wasn't able to make the decision. But yes, so then I remember it was all of the sudden that the family had pulled enough money together and we drove, well, we took a train, yeah, we took a train up, right?

Teresa: Yeah.

Jennifer: Yeah, that’s right. We took a train up and then we rented a vehicle. we came to Westport, we came to the homestead got to see all the family, and then I know for me, so this is when people try to, you know, Separate us from mom in a quiet corner and have very real and pointed conversations about our safety and what was going on down there. I don't know, Teresa.  I'm sure the same thing happened with you.

Teresa: It was, but I feel like I remember a lot of fear during that time because mom had very much cautioned us on the way of like, just really reinforced that we were not to share information at all. And so I felt like I remember being nervous as we left the homestead in that red rental car, and I remember driving away and I still have the visual in my head because I thought, oh, shit's gonna get real now because we had all had some of those quasi conversations  and the adults had conversations with her.  Like I remember there being a time where it was all the kids, and we, I just had that sense, that they were all having a BIG, I say intervention, but like a big conversation.  

And I thought this is not going to go well. And it didn’t.  Oh, It didn't. I think the yelling started as we left the driveway and like hours, hours of screaming and yelling. Like it was bad.  because we had opened up.

Jennifer: Yeah, I had no problems opening up at that point. I had, like, I was at the age and stage where Kate was when she, you know, had to come, like, wanted to leave and had to come back and couldn't leave. And I think I also felt like it was going to be our escape. like I  very much felt like this is the only way for us to get out of this situation that we're in right now. And if we don't do this now, who knows what's going to happen. And so I, I had no problems opening up. I can remember when we were, because I remember we drove back in like a snowstorm and when we got home to Missouri, it was like the whole place shut down because it had snowed, like, I don't know, 6 inches or something and they just didn't have the infrastructure to deal with that. So we were getting back for school to start, but then school didn't start. So I felt like there were 2 or 3 days there where I can distinctively remember being like, in that living room and the sun shining in and it's winter and we've just gotten back from this trip.

And mom is just bawling. She's so emotional. And she's obviously very angry with us. But I can remember her telling me that she felt like I made her feel stupid.  And I felt like, I think it was around that age that I felt like, well, I'm making better decisions than you are. Like, it was almost like, you know, that parentified, right?  Like, we were obviously already parentified, but I feel like as we all got more mature and, and, you know, grew up.  I think that she did feel that with all of us. Because we were all almost surpassing her to some extent on some mature, like, emotionally stable, smart things that she wasn't capable of, even though we were under 18 years old. So I can remember that conversation and that was a pretty tricky one to have with her because like, what do you say? Right? Like, it's like, well, like, based on your behaviors, this is what's happening. So and then I was in high school, so that was, I was coming up to the end of my term, right, in grade nine, because it was like, you know, the end of January would have been the end of the term, and our family got us home in time for me to start high school at another high school in Canada. So, that was the end of our Missouri stage. And Tom was still in our lives, because I guess they didn’t end the relationship, even though we all knew that needed to happen. but he stayed, I remember he stayed down there for a bit,

Teresa: but they were still together, like,

Jennifer: Yes, they were still together and then I can remember being, we took a train this time home.

I remember cause we had kind of minimal stuff and we took the train through Chicago and dad, dad met us. And then we ended up settling with family in Orillia. And that's kind of how we came to then be in Orillia. I can remember on the train trays, remember, cause finally did get legal. We didn't really talk about this, but when we were in Arizona, There was a point where Kate tried to go to school and they were like, where's your paperwork?

And she's like, don’t have it. So Kate and I were sent back to Missouri to finish school for like, I don't know, four months or something, live with family that we didn't even know. and you guys stayed and you like were homeschooled.

Teresa: We'll use that term loosely, but yeah,

Jennifer: But that was, that was that phone call that we were talking about that took place that fall where mom was desperate to officially get divorced from dad because she had to get married to Tom in order for us to stay there and go to school for her to work. And we'd already been in the States for what a year by that point.

Kate: Mm hmm. 

Jennifer:  Um, and so, I can remember us getting those like illegal alien cards, and when we were on the train in Chicago and we were dealing with customs coming back to Canada, and they were like, ‘Oh I guess you’re not going to need these anymore’, and they took them away from us.  So that was like, I can remember it just feeling so final, so it was like okay, that’s over.  

Jennifer: So then we get back So, we're now living in, Teresa and I are living in Orillia, and Kate, you're in Hamilton finishing up your OACs. because we're going to do another interview just based on kind of adulthood, Kate.

So, I'm going to, I'll probably just focus a little bit more on Teresa and I kinda finishing out.  But for Orillia for me, umm, obviously still moving around a lot.  Like every year we were living in a different place.  But we were still at least in the same school this time, which I guess was similar to Westport.  we lived in a bunch of different places, but we were still in the same school. And so for me, I can remember this is obviously teenage years for me, so I was thrilled to be back home.  I don’t think our relationship with you Kate, was great at this point, because Mom was still very much in control of that.  And again, still no digital age here.  This is still just like phone calls and letters.  And yeah, I think that it was very much, just put your head down, do well at school, I was very involved in school had a job, obviously. Had lots of friends, at this age as well, had boyfriends. So I think it was a lot of just um trying to just get through high school.  I think at this point for me too, it was very much I can see the light at the end of the tunnel.  Like that was already like you know, I wanted to do as well as I possibly could at school so I could have the best opportunity to do something afterwards.  Like just launch, right?  Just leave and get out. How are things initially for you, Teresa? Like, what do you remember, kind of, the first couple of years?

Teresa: A lot of different guys. 

Jennifer: After the relationship with Tom ended?

Teresa: No, while the relationship with Tom was still going,

Jennifer: Oh yeah, right.

Teresa: I remember being of the age, just that I, like, I knew that they were still together, even though geographically distanced, because he was still down in the States, but, like, waking up to various, you know, individuals.  Substances involved.  obviously dad came around, was one of those individuals and I didn't love that.  I never had a super close relationship with him because again, he was more not in my life than in my life. And it wasn't awesome. I also, you know, again, dad was very loyal to mom. So you couldn't speak ill of her and you couldn't find fault. And I was of the age now I'm grade six, right?

So grade six, grade seven. And so I'm starting to be like, this is not okay. You know, I had a sense that what she was doing was like adultery, right? Because she was still with Tom. And so that was tricky. And there was a number of individuals and. Some of those individuals were family friends that I knew were married.  So I really struggled. 

Jennifer: Well, and especially that she, like, was bringing it into your world.

Teresa: yeah, I can remember like middle of the night I'd wake up, it'd be loud. They'd be like. At various points in their interactions and their relations and I can remember spending long stretches of time outside in the darkness by myself, because it was better than hearing what was going on, which was either conflict as a result of substances or sexual relations that I felt were problematic for me on a moral level because I knew she was still in a relationship with Tom and yet why are these individuals here? And so even though we had family in town, I felt like it was still this like cloak of secrecy that we were to kind of make it like everything was fine and everything was okay.

Jennifer: It also adds to the instability feeling too, right? Of like, you know, who's going to be here tonight? Who is spending the night? Who, who is going to be in the house when I wake up? Like it's like, that's a big of the part of that instability as well.

Teresa: Yeah, I just I started to make some friends. So I started to come into that mode of you know, just being able to have some outlets where I would be able to get away from that. But I definitely had that shift of thinking, like, these are not okay things.  But, you know, what can you do?

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