Surviving Abuse, Addiction, And Starting Over nickies story part 2

The story opens with gratitude and purpose, then drops you into the messy middle of a life lived at full volume. We talk candidly about toxic love, gaslighting, and the kind of chaos that can feel like romance when you’re starved for safety. From early internet personals and awkward food-court meetups to partners who limit clothes and rewrite history, this is a field guide to red flags we wish we had named sooner.

As school and work collide with anxiety and ADHD, weed feels like relief and becomes a trap that steals focus and momentum. The timeline pivots through a tender but unstable relationship with Dave and a leap into Moncton, where another whirlwind arrives: love bombing, PCP, and a Montreal run that ends with arrests, a hospital bed, a blizzard, and a car flipped in the woods. The notebook left behind—and later exposed—turns into a symbol of truth we try to tell ourselves when denial gets loud.

Pregnancy shatters illusions and forces hard choices. There’s job loss, a long dark season of sleep and counting days, and family stepping in with rides, meals, and childcare when the world feels too heavy to lift. We don’t sanitize the impact on our kids, either: the distance from Devin, the weight Ben carried, and how overlooking ADHD needs can happen when addiction narrows your view. What emerges is not a tidy redemption arc but a real one—moving back to Dartmouth, finding work, dropping the performance of “I’m fine,” and learning the difference between intensity and care.

If you’ve ever confused drama for love, numbed pain to keep moving, or rebuilt after a collapse, you’ll hear your own heartbeat in these moments. We focus on practical insight: how to spot gaslighting early, why love bombing feels so convincing, how ADHD and anxiety shape coping, and which supports actually help you climb out—therapy, structure, honest friends, and family who hold the line when you can’t. Subscribe, share with someone who needs a mirror more than a lecture, and leave a review with the one red flag you’ll never ignore again.

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Transcript

Welcome And Land Acknowledgement

Keith "Polar Bear" Gelhorn 0:01

Welcome to the Big Bears Podcast, co-hosted by Chad Grizzly Bear Bunker, and Chief Polar Bear Galhorn. We would like to acknowledge that we are in Mi'kmaq, the ancestral and unceded territory of the Mi'kmaq people. The people of the Mi'kmaq Nation have lived on this territory for millennia, and we acknowledge them as past, present, and future caretakers of this land.

Mission And Call To Engage

Keith "Polar Bear" Gelhorn 0:30

Our mission is to explore the intersection of neurodiversity through a two-wide sea lens, where we share stories of struggle, resilience, grit, and growth. We would appreciate it if you could listen, subscribe, engage, and share this podcast.

Early Relationships And Regret

Keith "Polar Bear" Gelhorn 0:50

Now on to today's episode. Now back to the story.

SPEAKER_01 0:57

Okay, so moving on. So in the meantime, after that, uh there was drugs. Well now. There are no more drugs for me. My graduated from high school. I still wasn't a good person. I I honestly was not good to your dad at all. Like I was I was a dishonest. I I I used him as you know for babysitting so I could go out. You know, I I wasn't a good person.

SPEAKER_03 1:27

Seems my dad had a hard time during that time. Not just with you, but with my own mother too.

SPEAKER_01 1:31

Yeah, and other and his future wife, wife.

SPEAKER_03 1:35

Oh yeah. Yeah, forgot about that part.

SPEAKER_01 1:37

Yeah. Yeah. But but he still loved me. Uh he did love me. And to all the future wives, he loved me.

SPEAKER_03 1:50

Oh yeah, he definitely, definitely, definitely loved you the most.

SPEAKER_01 1:53

Yeah. Anyway, where am I going? Oh, so I graduated from high school and I applied to universities, so me which meant that I would have to move to the city. And your dad at that time had done his adult education upgrading thing.

SPEAKER_03 2:10

Okay, yep.

SPEAKER_01 2:10

And he was he was going to the truck driving school in Truro. Well he went to school. Oh, in Tru. Well, he went to school first, right?

SPEAKER_03 2:18

Oh, okay.

SPEAKER_01 2:18

Right? He had to go to school

Breakup And Emotional Spiral

SPEAKER_01 2:20

for that. So it was in Truro. And that was when he finally got the guts to say, I'm done with you, I'm leaving you.

SPEAKER_03 2:30

And my dad has a hard time with emotions telling people things.

SPEAKER_01 2:33

And I I was devastated. I mean, I deserved it. And now looking back on it, I totally understand why. But I was, I went and I went insane. I went insane. So he was when he when we first broke up, he was staying with Pam.

SPEAKER_03 2:51

Yeah, oh yeah, on Pam.

SPEAKER_01 2:52

Yeah, and I would call her phone number 50,000 times a day and nobody would answer. And then he finished school. And anyway, I don't want to get on his story, but I went insane. So I, of course, couldn't be alone for more than five minutes.

SPEAKER_03 3:11

Jeez.

SPEAKER_01 3:12

And at the time, because this, you know, this so this is the nine, this was 94.

Early Internet Dating And Red Flags

SPEAKER_01 3:21

So the internet, so I was I started university. I'm in university taking information technology, which was very new at that time. Like the internet was brand new.

SPEAKER_03 3:32

Brand new.

SPEAKER_01 3:33

Brand new. So it's wasn't anything like it is now. So there was this paper that came out every week called The Bargain Hunter.

SPEAKER_03 3:43

Okay.

SPEAKER_01 3:44

And it was like people selling stuff. Well, in the back of the bargain hunter, there were personal ads. And so I got on the bargain hunter because I needed to find somebody. So I went out with a few guys, and and basically how it worked is you would call this number and you could record like a like description about yourself, and people would listen to them. And then you could leave people messages if you wanted to connect. So it was all done through the phone. So you didn't get to see their face or long before Tinder. Yeah, yeah. You didn't and you basically didn't know anything about them until you other than what this little short blip, right?

SPEAKER_04 4:29

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 4:31

And I met some weirdos. I met some guys. I met this one guy. We met at Scotia Square at the food court. And he I sat down and he immediately pulls out like a not a Polaroid, but like a picture picture, like an actual physical picture of his penis.

SPEAKER_02 4:51

Long before we could do it with a cell phone. People were taking pictures and printing them.

SPEAKER_01 4:57

I was mortified. I was desperate. I won't lie, I was desperate, but that really freaked me out. And yeah. And I and I did meet, I did meet some really fun people. Like I met this one guy at the Commons, and we ended up in the water sprinklers with like our clothes on. I'll never forget. He was a really nice guy, but I didn't like nice guys. Yeah, right.

SPEAKER_03 5:16

No one likes nice. Right.

SPEAKER_01 5:18

And that's probably why I probably

Russell’s Control And Abuse

SPEAKER_01 5:20

why I took like I took advantage of your dad, right? Because he was nice, right? So um anyway, I finally meet this guy, Russell. Russell.

SPEAKER_03 5:32

Russell.

SPEAKER_01 5:34

And Russell, I spent the next three years being crazy while going to university, being crazy, living like the dramatic story of Russell. So not to get too much into it, but and he's dead now, which you know, I'll do a little dance for that. But he at I I didn't know, but at the time he molested, was molesting my son.

SPEAKER_03 6:06

Oh, geez.

SPEAKER_01 6:07

Ben. And I don't know if he, I don't know. Devin says he doesn't remember him, which I kind of find suspicious because Devin's older than Ben, which I find weird. But but anyway, he he says that he didn't, so I'll take his word for it. But um he was so abusive. Like he was so controlling. I wasn't allowed to dress a certain way. I wasn't allowed to wear makeup. I wasn't allowed and gaslight me. Like he would, he would, he would like say the most horrible, awful things and then convince me that it never happened.

SPEAKER_03 6:40

Right? Narcissists.

SPEAKER_01 6:42

Oh, gas, like the gaslight me so bad, and I fell for it so bad. And I I tried to break up with him. Eventually we like we did move in together, and I broke up and got back together with him so many times. And he broke out my windows and you know, busted up my eye, and like the stuff he did, and he was a porn addict. Oh

Gaslighting And Violence Escalate

SPEAKER_01 7:05

yeah, like I was nearly went crazy. Like I was nearly went insane. And he just wasn't a good person. And anyway, so he was a dope smoker. So this is when I how when the the the dope come along. And he was a dope smoker, and he was at work, and I I know I mean I had tried it before, but like I never got into it, right? I went right for the hard stuff, right?

SPEAKER_02 7:38

Like, I had never really give me the good stuff right away.

SPEAKER_01 7:41

Yeah, and and and I was so anxious and so ADHD and so crazy and so codependent.

SPEAKER_03 7:50

Hyperactive.

SPEAKER_01 7:50

And so hyperactive and so codependent.

SPEAKER_03 7:55

Anything you'd say at me or you you'd just blow your mind up. It like it's so literal.

SPEAKER_01 8:00

Oh yeah, and I lit I literally thought that if if I didn't have him, I would die. I would never get another guy. And I he was like the bottom of the barrel. And but I I thought that's I thought that's real, what love was. I thought that's how it was supposed to be. And I just catered to his every whim. And and sexually, if I didn't want it, he would just take it. Like yeah, it was awful. So and then there's the whole Ben thing, but that I didn't find out about that until later, well, like much later when Ben was 17. So much, much later. But but like I I always like I didn't know, no, no, but like later on in life after we broke up, I kind of wondered because he was so weird, like, and sat like sex-wise, like the stuff that he watched, and like I, you know, I don't want to talk too much about him, but um he was, you

Turning To Weed And Academic Slide

SPEAKER_01 9:05

know, it wasn't your average, you know, it wasn't your average porn. Let's put it out. It was, you know, a lot of it was illegal, right? Anyway. So oh yeah, I got off track. So I was I got into a stash and I thought I'm gonna try some. I went to heaven. Like, this is the answer to all of my problems.

SPEAKER_03 9:42

Just mellow out.

SPEAKER_01 9:43

My life will never be the same again. So I I was in university getting working my butt off, getting excellent marks. My marks immediately went down. Studying became impossible because I was stoned all you can't study when you're stoned.

SPEAKER_03 10:05

Not I can't.

SPEAKER_01 10:06

I guess some people might be able to, but I couldn't.

SPEAKER_03 10:07

You can't do interviews when you're stoned.

SPEAKER_01 10:09

Yeah, no. No, no, and no, or carry on a complete complete sentence. And you think people don't know that you're stoned, but they do. Um and I I I was got a good friend at university, his name was Danny, Danny Baldwin, and he was also adopted, and he was also biracial, so we had a lot in common, and we were both stoners, yeah. So we hung out a lot, and that caused a lot of riff with Russell because he was, you know, thought stuff was going on, which it was not. We were just friends.

SPEAKER_03 10:46

He was probably doing stuff, that's probably why.

SPEAKER_01 10:48

Well, of course he was. He was messing with my son.

SPEAKER_03 10:53

Yeah, that's not a good thing. Considering Ben's outcome of life, I can't I

Friendship, Suspicion, And Stigma

SPEAKER_03 11:00

was hoping maybe he'd come on and share his story sometime.

SPEAKER_01 11:03

Yeah, maybe. Ben has um Ben's very quiet, so I don't know how openly he'd be, but who knows? So the so life was gone. I was getting through school and I was smoking a lot of dope, and I was crying over Russell all the time. So we broke up. And I oh, I've been on medication, like, but I wouldn't take it. Like I would start to feel better, and I would stop taking it. Yeah, I don't do this anymore. Misery, like discomfort. Yeah, so that that kind of went on and off like a lot in my 20s. So I went, me and Russell got in a fight. This I think was the third year in university. Me and Russell got in a fight, and I, my friend Nadina, who I met through Russell's friend, we instantly became best friends. And their boyfriend, like Russell and and her boyfriend, hated it. They hated it because they because we they knew that we talked about them, right? And

Partying, Coping, And New Friends

SPEAKER_01 12:20

every day it would be like we talk on the phone because nobody had like there was no cell phones then, right? It was stand mods. So we would talk on the phone every single day, and it would be all about who what they did, what they did shitty today. Like what did what shitty thing did Russell and Philip do today, right? And then it would be like, oh, they're coming home, gotta go, because we didn't want them to know we were talking. And me and her are still friends. Like, we don't, I'm actually trying to, I haven't seen her in a long time. I'm trying to have a little reunion, I'm hoping. But anyway, so I went to a party with her in Sambro. Is that what it's called? Sambro.

SPEAKER_03 13:04

Sambro?

SPEAKER_01 13:05

Is that a place? Yeah, Sambro. Yeah. And it was at like a cabin in the woods. And me and her, we we used to, I didn't drink a lot then because I didn't go out to bars and stuff, because it was all about Russell, right? So I didn't I didn't drink too much then. But um, me and her, every once in a while, would get a bottle of dark rum, dark and dirty. And I and I actually have pictures of, and I should do a collage because it's funny, is because it's a lot of good memories. We would take a picture of me and her with the bottle before we drank it, and then we would take a picture of the bottle after we drank it. So yeah, so we got the we got a bottle of dark and dirty and went to this party, and they were these people at this party. So the her dad's company was called OSP Consultants. It it's gone now, but they were infrastructure company, like they drew maps for like like power lines and yeah, I guess you call it a telecommunications

Meeting Dave And A Different Path

SPEAKER_01 14:10

company. I don't know, but then they use like AutoCAD, if you know what that is. No, it's like maps for power, like power lines and phone lines and infrastructure, okay, basically. So she worked there as a receptionist, and all these guys were were guys that that worked there. And so that night I met Dave.

SPEAKER_03 14:35

Dave Kingston. Dave Kingston.

SPEAKER_01 14:38

And he followed me around like a puppy dog. Like I know like like I was the best, most beautiful, magnificent thing that he had ever laid eyes on. So yeah, so that was the night I met Dave, and then he he he worked at OSP, but he also so pod on the side. So me, so like all my supply was coming from Russell. So if me and Russell weren't together, I really had no contact. And if I were to call the guy that he got it from, then well, you're trying to get with him or whatever. There would have, it would have been a, you know, I probably would have got my face smashed. So I we were broke up. What time we were broke up, and I was talking to Nadina, and I'm like, where can I get weed? I need weed. And she's like, Well, you should call Dave. So I called Dave, and he was at my house so fast. And the rest was history. So we were together. Me and him were together for a good three years. There was a lot of, he was an alcoholic. He passed away a few years ago.

SPEAKER_03 16:02

Oh, that's fact.

SPEAKER_01 16:03

He was an alcoholic, and he was into drugs, into you know, smoking crack and stuff. And the first night we were together, he had some crack, and I said, either it's me or the crack. And he flushed the crack. And to

Work At OSP And Moncton Move

SPEAKER_01 16:20

my knowledge, although he did confess later that he is snuck it from time to time, but like he didn't, he stopped doing it in that time period. Yeah, yeah. He did confess later on that he because we stayed friends after we split up, but yeah, he confessed. And they we had a good, we had a good time. I mean, he was he had a real problem with substance abuse, and I didn't like it and wanted to change him, and he proposed and got me a ring, and and he loved me. He was he loved me, he really truly did. And I loved him. But I so I so I ended up working at OSP Consultants too.

SPEAKER_04 16:59

Okay. Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 17:00

So I ended up, I graduated from high from not high school, from university in IT, and I went to OSP Consultants to be a programmer, to work as a programmer.

SPEAKER_03 17:10

Nice.

SPEAKER_01 17:11

And so yeah, so me and Dave worked at the same place, and he was he was pretty good with Ben and Devin. Um and so then I was applying for jobs because I wasn't making a whole lot of money, and I was applying for jobs, and I randomly applied for a job in Moncton at Co-op Atlantic, and that would have been 99. Okay. And I had interviewed, I went to Moncton and interviewed, so like I interviewed on the phone, and then I went to Moncton and I interviewed, and I got the job.

SPEAKER_03 17:49

Nice.

SPEAKER_01 17:50

And Dave was still working at OSP, and so then so we did the long distance thing for a little while, and

New Neighbours And Danny Appears

SPEAKER_01 18:00

I mean, there's not like a big need for AutoCAD workers in Moncton, apparently, at the time. So, you know, and it we ended up breaking up, and yeah, we ended up breaking up, and we didn't talk for a long time, but we did we did become friends later on. But I'll get to more of that later. So this is like okay, so when working at Club Atlantic, me and Dave broke up.

SPEAKER_03 18:27

Okay.

SPEAKER_01 18:28

Really good friends with my neighbor. So this was 99. That and I also, so that's so the this is the summer. So I moved to Moncton in the spring. My I met my neighbors who were also potheads and became very good friends with them, Wayne and Diane. God loved them. And uh so this guy comes to uh Wayne, Wayne calls this guy to come sell some weed. And uh so this is when my life got really chaotic again. And this guy comes in, his name is Danny, and he looks like a surfer, and he's on a skateboard, and he's got tattoos, and I'm like, who is that?

PCP, Love Bombing, And Concert Highs

SPEAKER_01 19:31

So coincidentally, yeah, he asked Wayne for my number.

SPEAKER_03 19:36

Oh, geez.

SPEAKER_01 19:38

So I went on a party. It was a party. I mean, he was a drug addict, he was into PCP. Oh, jeez, and I went on a party, something I never get into. I'm telling you, and I won't lie, it's the best thing ever.

SPEAKER_03 19:54

Jeez.

SPEAKER_01 19:55

You nothing could bother you because you are so literally numb.

SPEAKER_03 19:59

Oh, okay.

SPEAKER_01 20:00

Mentally and physically.

SPEAKER_04 20:02

Jeez.

SPEAKER_01 20:03

And you think you are the greatest thing that ever like I mean, I did have some bad experiences, but well, I'll talk about it, but so we started dating. When I met the guy, his his jaw was wired shut because his ex's boyfriend had punched him in the face for trying. So that should have been a sign.

SPEAKER_03 20:31

Should have been a sign.

SPEAKER_01 20:32

Should have been a sign, and he was he was so pot, and he sold PCP, and he was addicted to PCP. Like he he snorted that scrap like it was candy. And so I was going to, we would go to like bars, and I was basically his drug meal. Basically, I would carry it and he would sell it. But uh he loved bomb me so bad. Like the those months, like like bought me jewelry and paid for everything, took me to us to slayer concerts in Montreal and like twice, right? Like, and and oh, and we saw Ozzy and Quebec City, like sugar daddy. Well, it wasn't a sugar daddy because he was actually younger than me. I was I was I was like 30 and he was 28 or something like that. Oh, okay. Yeah, and uh he told me that he was gonna marry me and blah blah blah. So here's a story, and I God, I would never want my father to hear this, but if he's gonna listen to this, he might. So he went on a drug run to Montreal to get a big shit ton of PCP. And I didn't normally go with him, but I went with him that time. And I he proceeded.

The Montreal Drug Run Arrest

SPEAKER_01 22:00

To get so out of it. Like, so out of it. Like, beyond out of it. So we and and insisted that he drive.

SPEAKER_03 22:12

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 22:14

And so we stopped at, I don't know what it was, Pizza Delight or something, I don't know, somewhere in Quebec. And he appeared to be drunk, right? Because he was so out of it, right?

SPEAKER_03 22:27

Oh, geez.

SPEAKER_01 22:28

And we're leaving, and he gets in the driver's seat, and people in the working in the restaurant called the cops. And we got this car load full of drugs.

SPEAKER_03 22:39

Oh man.

SPEAKER_01 22:43

So he is totally inebriated, has no idea what's even going on. And uh so we got arrested. And fortunately, I didn't have any criminal charges as a result of that, which is good because I wouldn't have my job now, and my life would have really not gone the way it has. So they kept us, they kept us in jail, and they took him to the hospital because he was so near and he was so out of it, and let me go. So I had to hang around and wait for him. So I go to this hospital in Boucherville, Quebec. Everybody spoke French, trying to find him, right? I should have just gone home. But anyway, um so finally I find him, he's still out of it, handcuffed to a hospital bed. Uh, you know, take him to the car and put him in and start driving home. And so then we stop. Oh, the story's not over. You would think the story was over, but no. We get to a McDonald's and we go in the McDonald's and eat whatever, and then he insists on driving again. And he immediately, there's a ton of snow. It's in the winter, a ton of snow. Instead of going out to the highway, he drives behind the McDonald's into like a great big, huge ton of snow,

Hospital, Second Police Stop, And Chaos

SPEAKER_01 24:10

and we get stuck. So we call a tow truck. The tow driver called the cops.

SPEAKER_03 24:21

Jeez. Again. Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 24:25

So fortunately, I was straight as a nail, and you know, the the our drugs have been confiscated. He's still in la la land. So the cops take him away and leave me on my own. You think the story would be over, right? Yeah. It's not. Oh, geez. So I'm now this is this will be one to tell my grandchildren if I'm ever allowed to talk to them again. So we're we're I'm driving, and it's a long drive, right? It's winter time. So I stop in Edmont Edm Edmondston and get a room for the night.

SPEAKER_04 25:05

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 25:06

And I'm a mess, right? Like I am a wreck. And so I I because this was kind of the demise of our relationship. I I I had he had like a notebook, like a I don't know, like an agenda thing in the car, and I took it in the room and I start writing like everything that happened. Because I was afraid I was gonna go to jail, right? I was afraid I was gonna, right? I was mortified. So I'm writing down everything that happened just so that I have a clear right like of what happened, and you know, throwing him under the bus, basically. And you know, when you're a criminal, you don't rat. I mean, and he was he had been in prison before and stuff, right? Like he was a criminal. He was a criminal. I I moved once

Crash In A Blizzard And Aftermath

SPEAKER_01 26:00

when I was with him, and this is a weird story. I moved once and I had a U-Haul, and I parked the U-Haul in his yard and went to bed. And then I got up and took the U-Haul back the next day, and the U-Haul charged me because the dolly was taken out of the U-Haul and found at a store that had been robbed.

SPEAKER_03 26:26

Jesus Christ.

SPEAKER_01 26:29

Now, now he said, I don't know, I didn't have anything to do with it, but he must have. He must have. He must have.

SPEAKER_02 26:35

Oh, he didn't want to say.

SPEAKER_01 26:36

Right? And I believed him.

SPEAKER_02 26:39

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 26:41

But he must have got up in the night when I was a bit and took the U-Haul and went and did whatever they did.

SPEAKER_03 26:47

Probably took an ATM.

SPEAKER_01 26:50

And left the freaking dolly at the anyway. I got it.

SPEAKER_02 26:54

You can't be any more stupid.

SPEAKER_01 26:58

And I got the police questioned me, and I, of course, I didn't have a clue. I really didn't know. But logically now, when I think about it, like he obviously did something. Or or made it accessible, like gave the keys to somebody else, and and they, you know what I mean, and they did it. So, anyways, I'm writing down what and and I get up. So I and I I morning comes, the sun is out, it's cold as hell, and I start driving. And I'm like, I got like three layers on and hat and mittens because it's cold. I don't know why. I just wanted comfort, right? Like I wanted comfort because I was very distraught. And I'm driving along, and this big snowstorm starts, like just boom. And I literally could not see in front of me. Like I could not see in front of me. And I'm driving really, really slow. So I decided I'm gonna pull over. I shouldn't have pulled over.

Paranoia, Cleanup, And Denial

SPEAKER_01 28:00

So I was it was a stick shift. Uh-huh. And rather than gearing down to slow down, I put the brake on. And I hit black legs. And the car flipped.

SPEAKER_03 28:12

Jeez.

SPEAKER_01 28:12

Yeah. I'm upside down in the woods.

SPEAKER_03 28:16

Oh man.

SPEAKER_01 28:17

The back at the back it was an a Ford escort, was the con of the car was. The back window broke and the car immediately filled with snow. Now I have my seatbelt on. I'm hanging upside down. I don't have a scratch on me, but I'm hysterical. Hysterical. And this woman was behind me. So she called an ambulance. And anyway, they saved me, and I ended up having to take the bus home. And I'm like up to my neck in mud. And so in the meantime, he he so I'm paranoid as hell, too. So I have to call, I call this friend of his and tell him to get my landlord to let him in my house and get all the drugs out of my house because it was like a lot of drugs in my house, and I was afraid they were gonna come raid me. I was so scared. And so in the meantime, he gets out of jail and comes back home and totally oblivious to what happened.

SPEAKER_04 29:23

Has no idea, of course, like no recollection.

SPEAKER_01 29:29

And I'm not happy, I'm upset. So anyway, of course, I forgave him and blah blah da. And in the meantime, I find out I'm pregnant with Isaac.

SPEAKER_03 29:39

Oh, jeez.

Pregnancy, Rejection, And Exposure

SPEAKER_03 29:42

So he's the father of Isaac.

SPEAKER_01 29:44

Oh yeah.

SPEAKER_03 29:45

Wow.

SPEAKER_01 29:46

Yeah, he's Isaac's father. And they're they look exactly the same.

SPEAKER_03 29:48

Really?

SPEAKER_01 29:49

Yeah.

unknown 29:50

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 29:50

The only thing Isaac had of me is his hair. That's it.

SPEAKER_04 29:53

Yeah. Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 29:54

And Isaac is blonde because Danny is blonde. Oh, okay. And those big, huge, massive blue eyes, all Danny. That his nose has the same bump. He looks just like like him. Like sometimes when I look into Isaac's eyes, I see him. Like it's bizarro. So at first he kind of pretended like he was happy about it, but he never really was. And that's when he started turning on me and didn't want to be a father. Yeah. And he got really mean and the love bombing stopped. And he started accusing me of cheating on him and stuff, which never happened. And so in the meantime, the car that I smashed to smithereens has stuff in it that we want back. So we drive to Woodstock, which was near where I smashed the car, to where the car is at this, you know, like dump. And it's gone on forever. I get tired of hearing myself. Oh, and the notebook was in the car. And I didn't think any that I'd written in, and I didn't think anything. Like it, I didn't, I just never, yeah, I forgot, right? Well like a day later, he calls me, and his si sister, who I can cannot stand,

Fired, Despair, And Moving Home

SPEAKER_01 31:22

is reading what I written.

SPEAKER_03 31:25

Jeez.

SPEAKER_01 31:27

So it was history. That was it was this that was the end. And I went crazy. And I lost. So and I and I my I was having issues with my boss at work because I wouldn't conform to a lot of things. And I was I I was I was yeah, and I had was doing a lot of PCP. So I really wasn't I I I got fired. So I'm monked and pregnant and fired and crying my eyes out. I was so depressed. That that was like a low the lowest point of my life, I think, I would have to say. So mom and dad, or dad, um I call dad and I'm crying going on. He says, Why don't you come here? So they lived in Yarmouth at the time in South Ohio. He said, Why don't you come here? Just pack your shit and come here. So that's what I did. I got movers, and that night I was gone.

SPEAKER_04 32:30

Good.

SPEAKER_01 32:31

Yeah, and I went to mom and dad's. Now, those months I just slept. And that like that period of time, my parents really had my back, like they really stepped up. Like mom took care of Ben and made sure he got to school because I was useless. I was literally in in darkness. I thought about killing myself

Darkness, Survival, And Counting Days

SPEAKER_01 33:00

all the time. How was I gonna go to work? How was I gonna get another job and do the daycare thing? And how was I gonna like I just couldn't? It just seemed so bleak, right? But um, you know, dad suggested that I give my baby up, and I was like, it really made me angry.

SPEAKER_03 33:23

Yeah. What was he talking about?

SPEAKER_01 33:28

It really made me angry. But yeah, it was a long month. So I would have gone there in August, and he was born in January. So from August to January, it was like the longest. I would like there was a calendar in the bathroom, and I would count the days on the calendar every single day, sometimes four or five times a day. And I would just sleep, just sleep, sleep, sleep, sleep, sleep, sleep, sleep, sleep, just to make the time go. And I it's surprising. Um and I think probably it's because it was long distance and it would have been on mom and dad's phone, because again, this was before cell phones, and Danny didn't have a computer, so like there was no like an email or any electronic way to communicate with him. I called him a few times, but not anything ridiculous. He never called me, never, not once. Oh, that's not true. He did call me once, and I was in bed sleeping, and mom refused, which just said I was in bed sleeping, and and I don't even know why he called me. I'm sure it wasn't anything to do with me or anything, but yeah, it was it was and I I I it was bleak. So the minute Isaac was born, I a month later I packed my stuff and moved out, moved to Dartmouth.

SPEAKER_03 34:44

Oh, okay.

SPEAKER_01 34:45

Uh and I was on unemployment, so I was broke as hell, and so something I kind of skipped over is my relationship with my son Devin. So after I moved to Moncton, my

Birth, Return To Dartmouth, And Work

SPEAKER_01 35:01

the consistency of seeing him got less and less and less entirely my fault. And I could have called, I could have so there was like a two to three year period where there really wasn't any contact at all, which totally had it broke him, right? Broke him. I I didn't see that then, but I see it now. Uh so anyway, that was because I was selfish and doing drugs and chasing boys, and just you know, it was all about me, me, me, me, me, me, me, me, me, me, me, me, me. Ben was, you know, basically fending for himself a lot of the time. You know, he had to grow up pretty young, right? Um I mean he uh he had everything he needed and he was going to school and all that stuff, but like, you know, I wasn't uh I I wasn't as good of a mom as I should have been, you know, like yeah. So and he had troubles in school and he was very, very HD. And I and I knew it. But in order to do something about it, I would have had to, you know, focus on something other than myself, right? So yeah. So in the meantime, so then okay, so fast forward, I've had Isaac, he's a bit an infant. Me and Ben packed all my stuff that was in mom and dad's basement and moved to we lived on Churchill in Dartmouth in that big tall apartment building.

SPEAKER_04 36:31

Yep.

SPEAKER_01 36:33

But I got a job right away, so like looking for a job was like number one, number one, number one, number one priority. And

Parenting Guilt And ADHD Overlooked

SPEAKER_01 36:40

I was still smoking dope like crazy. Like I was a you know, an avid dope smoker. And I and I did get a job right away, and yeah, so uh like there was like uh a 10-year period where well not 10, probably eight, where I had no boyfriends, then then that would have been like prior to getting with your dad. And but then there was Isaac. Yeah, and that's a whole podcast in itself.

SPEAKER_03 37:09

Oh yeah, it is, it is. That's that's the that's the really good, interesting story.

SPEAKER_01 37:15

Yeah, so yeah, so let's take a break before I get into that.

SPEAKER_03 37:21

Okay, we'll take a break. Guaranteed there's two episodes right there.

SPEAKER_01 37:29

Do I sound all right or do I sound like I'm just sound like I'm going on and on and on?

SPEAKER_03 37:35

We got 80 minutes in.

Closing And Release Schedule

Keith "Polar Bear" Gelhorn 37:38

Holy thank you for listening to the Big Bears Podcast, a two I see approach to neurodiversity. We would appreciate it if you could listen, subscribe, engage, and share this podcast. Tune in every second Tuesday at 7 a.m. Atlantic time for a new episode.