17 Dannon Prichard – Life Lessons and Unfinished Pages

Dannon Prichard (She/Her) is a Freshman from Terre Haute majoring in psychology. This work was prepared for Ellen Shelton’s ENG W131, who states, “Her literacy narrative was well written, and she explained her life with no holds barred. It could be made into a movie. I loved it.”

Life Lessons and Unfinished Pages

When I was a little girl, I grew up in the middle of nowhere. No real friends, neighbors, or siblings. Just me and a single addict of a mother. A very lonely life and upbringing filled with a lot of sadness, neglect, and abuse. In these times, my grandparents were like my safe haven. I loved going to their house and getting away from it all. In the time spent with my grandparents, my grandmother taught me how to read and write. I remember going into her room and seeing her sitting there in her rocking chair, book in one hand, cigarette in the other, and a cup of coffee steaming on the side table. She would always see me wander in and invite me on her lap. l lived for these moments; I looked forward to it every night. After I had settled in, she would continue wherever she was in her book, and she would start reading it to me too. I would always frantically search the page trying to find where she was at so I could follow along and learn to read new words I didn’t know. Those moments have stuck with me for a lifetime. Someone cared enough to cuddle me and read to me, even if it was out of her Stephen King book. In these moments in that smoke filled room, my love for reading was born.

Reading opened an entire new world for me. In books I could have a friend, a sibling, a father, an adventure, anything I ever wanted I could have through a book. In the early days of my reading my grandmother had taught me how to read out of this Care Bear Numbers book. I don’t remember the exact book and to be completely honest I’m not sure if I learned how to read it or if she read it to me so many times that I memorized the words. It was worn and tattered by the time I was finished with it. We moved on to the likes of Dr. Seuss and from there the sky was the limit for me.

Reading came very easy and natural to me. I’ve never recalled struggling to read or picking up a book that I couldn’t wrap my head around, unless it was an educational text because I have definitely struggled with that.  As far as just learning how to read and being capable of reading, I never struggled with that. In elementary school I was often top of the class as far as reading and writing go. We had Accelerated Reading (A.R.) tests in elementary and they kept track of the points and at the end of the year we got to make shirts with little stamps on them and however many we had represented the number of books we read and points we earned from them for testing. It was fun and I think it was a great initiative to get students to read. I regularly had a lot of those stamps on my shirt. The only other person that read the way I did was a boy named James, and he was in the same class as me several times throughout elementary school. We ended up becoming good friends over our shared love for reading at the time. So, I had a friend and that was an amazing feeling. The rest of elementary school went on like this for me, very easy, I got good grades and did really well. School was easy for me.

Middle school is when my reading really picked up. In middle school I was introduced to the Harry Potter series, and I had never read anything like that before. It was this whole new world with a kid from neglect, like me, and he went on to this school filled with magic and friendship. Those books fulfilled something in me I had always longed for. I tore through that series in middle school, more than once. I couldn’t get enough of it. I loved the feeling it gave me reading about everything he was doing and going through, I didn’t think any other book would give me that satisfaction. Then I ended up reading the Percy Jackson series, that one filled me with the same joy that Harry Potter did. Twilight, Warrior series, the Series of Unfortunate Events, the good books just kept coming for me in middle school and I couldn’t get enough of it. Although middle school is when I started to struggle a little academically. It didn’t really bother me at the time I was more worried about my next book, my next escape.

Then came high school, which also meant I moved halfway across the country with my mom and my new stepdad since he was in the military. I hated her for that. Dragging me across the country away from my only family and friends, alone with her. I did, however, become close with my stepdad. I always felt like I was safer when he was around. He was in the military though, so he was gone more often than he wasn’t. So, there wasn’t much of a safe haven for me anymore. High school was a big change. I went from the middle of nowhere small town to a huge school, big town, they even wore uniforms there. That was when I realized just how far I was behind academically to my peers. High school marked a moment for me when I no longer enjoyed reading as much. I felt discouraged to read, I could barely handle the coursework let alone enjoy something like reading in my spare time. I became a person to myself that I did not know. I started ditching classes, doing drugs, sneaking out, doing anything to try and fit in with some group since I didn’t fit in academically anymore. High school was a pivotal moment for my literacy journey, although I stopped reading as much, I had grown an attachment to Jim Morrison and had picked up his poetry books, I listened to The Doors all the time, even watched the movie that I had no business watching at that age. This sparked my interest in writing, and I really enjoyed it. I liked being able to freely express myself in a way that I wasn’t harming anyone or myself. I have always liked writing. I just didn’t do it a lot as my mother regularly tore through my things and would destroy them or read them. Writing wasn’t a safe thing for me to do at home, so this was a really defining time for me. Me writing also meant opening myself up to more abuse. I didn’t care at the time; it just fueled my writing. This point in my life was met with a lot of turmoil, teenage angst, and drug fueled rage. These same years, my dad, grandpa, and grandma all died. I lost everything that had meant anything to me at that time in my life. I stopped reading, writing, playing guitar, anything I found any enjoyment in. It came to an abrupt end for me at this time. The reality of the world was a weight I couldn’t shake at sixteen years old. Losing that many people at once in such a short amount of time will do some things to your head and heart.

From sixteen to nineteen my life would be torn upside down over and over again. Sixteen would mark the year both my stepdad and grandfather would take their own lives. I thought that year would never end. I helped write the obituaries and speeches. I even gave speeches through my tears. I found solace behind a bottle of pills and a worn-out notebook that year. Maybe it wasn’t the best way to cope, but it was the only way I knew how to make the pain go away. The next year my grandmother would pass, and that hit me hard. I remember getting the phone call, my knees buckled, and I felt like all the air left my lungs. My heart was pounding, tears stung my cheeks, and my throat was raw from the scream that erupted out of my body. This moment is when I hit rock bottom. When nothing really mattered to me anymore. In the years to come you could find me strung out on the floor at someone’s house with drug paraphernalia and notebooks scattered all around me. These weren’t my best moments, but they belong in my story, nonetheless.

Those three years were my own personal hell, and I had no one else to blame but myself. Day after day doing the same dumb things I knew better than to be doing. Despite the active tension and abuse between my mother and I, she did let me live in the house until I was sixteen. Maybe the couch surfing homeless teenager was a target for the drugs. I just know it made everything numb for a little while. When I was high, I didn’t care that I was homeless and couch surfing. I didn’t care that my mom threw me out on the streets. I couldn’t feel the gaping, agonizing hole in my chest. I wasn’t angry at my grandpa and stepdad for committing suicide. I didn’t care and I certainly didn’t feel. That’s the funny thing about grief, you have to feel it to heal it, and I was running from it like someone had set a blaze of fire at my heels.

By the time I was nineteen, I was three years into a narcotics addiction, a high school dropout, and pregnant.  Luckily, when I found out I was carrying another life inside me, I didn’t hesitate to stop doing drugs and I never turned back. So, in a sense maybe a baby was exactly what I needed at that time. I had actively journaled all through my addiction, so naturally I kept a journal through my pregnancy too. Writing had become a coping mechanism for me. I wasn’t able to write freely without punishment for so long, I enjoyed the freedom to be able to do it outside of my childhood home. I enjoyed journaling. I like being able to look back on the things I wrote and even being able to have a visual of how I’ve grown not only as a person but as a writer too.

Writing would continue to be something I enjoyed doing and it was even implemented in with my therapy. Journaling is very good for therapy, it turns out. Therapy also helped reignite my love for reading and I didn’t realize how much I missed that. I hadn’t really opened a book up for pleasure since high school and now I’ve gone through several series and stand alones.  Reading just as much as I did when I was kid, if not more now. eBooks are a game changer. Reading and writing have played a crucial part in who I am today, and I love it. Writing has always been a kind of a crutch for me, something I could turn to when times were tough. It has helped me grow as a person all through my life and even now with going back to school. I’m glad it’s taken me back to school, it’s comforting finding joy in school again. I hope maybe one day I can help kids like me and raise awareness to addiction among our youth. Maybe even publish my journals or something. For now, I’ll just get my degree in psychology and see where the world takes me from here.