Introduction for my memoir

On telling the truth, living off love, and the meaning of forgiveness

When I sat down to write this book, all I knew was that I had to tell the truth.

That meant mining my memory—and the memories of others—to piece together the full story. I spent the first year “interviewing” my family, cross-referencing events between my grandmother, my father, and my mother. Some things Mom didn’t remember because she was too strung out, but Dad did. Grandma did. My brother, on the other hand, remembered almost nothing—his mind had blocked it all out (don’t worry, he’s in therapy). I did the opposite. I held onto everything, replaying it over and over, like my three-year-old says, “to keep it in my mind.”

But the problem was, as a survival instinct, I had convinced myself it was all okay.

For most of my life, I didn’t let myself see how bad it really was. I grew up in a meth lab in the Mojave Desert, with parents who were either cooking, using, or robbing houses—when they weren’t in prison, where Mom shared a cell with Susan Atkins from the Manson cult. My childhood was a constant state of high alert, watching Dad’s secret security cameras, waiting for the next raid.

By my early twenties, my body started to break down from the stress of it all. I landed in the hospital over and over—shingles, pancreatitis, chilblains. At one point, my blood work was so out of whack they thought I had lupus. The doctors never found a clear diagnosis, but I know now what was happening: I wasn’t facing my past. I was sweeping everything under the rug, running from it, avoiding it. (None of this about me being sick made it into the book, by the way. I had to cut something, and maybe I cut all the wrong things—but that’s the beauty of serializing the memoir here on Substack. I can add notes, and behind-the-scenes insights, share what I was feeling when I wrote certain chapters, and let you in on the in-process details writers don’t usually get to share.)

I didn’t set out to be a writer.

I wasn’t the kid with journals, books, and big dreams—I was just trying to survive. Writing didn’t find me until I was almost thirty. One afternoon, my partner and I were walking beneath the tall pines of Northern California, talking about our childhoods, our parents, our pasts, when he said, “You should write a book.” Others had said it before, but this was the first time I really heard it. And believed it.

For the next three years, I wrote. I took every class I could, devoured craft books, listened to podcasts, and joined writing groups. For the first time in my life, I was forced to confront my past—I had to sit with it. To tell the truth. To make something out of the pain, the love, the longing, and the hope.

Then came the family interviews. Hearing my childhood stories told back to me—stories I had long breezed over—made me see how not okay everything really was.

And yet, at the center of it all, I still found love.

So many people have asked me how I have such a good relationship with my parents. How could I forgive them for everything that happened? The truth? I never had to forgive them—because, at the time, I never believed I had anything to forgive. I saw them as two people fighting the demon of addiction, and my brother and I were simply caught in the crossfire. It wasn’t something they wanted to do, something they chose. They didn’t WANT to neglect us, to abandon us, to leave us without security or safety or dinner—it wasn’t intentional. It was just the byproduct of their addictions.

And now, they carry the weight of it. My parents already live with a boulder of guilt on their backs. What good would it do for me to add blame on top of it? I hear it in Dad’s voice and the way he clears his throat every time I bring up the past. Sometimes, I think I’d rather him be strung out and at least feeling something than be this damn sad all the time.

But really, I think this all goes back to my people-pleasing nature. I never wanted them to feel bad, so I never blamed them. I never confronted them in a way that warranted an apology.

It wasn’t until I had my son—a year after finishing the book—that the resentment started creeping in. I almost didn’t speak to Dad for a year. Mom was living with me at the time, and instead of confronting her, I poured all my anger and sadness into therapy.

Sometimes, I wonder if I’d written the book now, after becoming a mother, after years of therapy, would it be different? Would I have more to say? More rage, more sadness? Probably. But it wouldn’t change the fact that I love them. And that love shines through the pages—even in the moments I’m furious, screaming at Mom, her smoke-blackened meth pipe clutched in my hand. Maybe that’s too Pollyanna. Maybe I should be better at calling people on their shit.

Maybe. Probably.

I guess what I’m trying to say is that you’ll find love here.

It pulses through this story like a steady heartbeat, beneath the rage and the grief, always present. Maybe love is not enough. Maybe that’s why the memoir didn’t sell—maybe there wasn’t enough blame, enough tension, enough fury.

You can be the judge.

When I was interviewing my uncle (Mom’s brother), he told me that when I was one, he tried to adopt me because things were so bad, but Mom wouldn’t agree to it.

“But I love her,” Mom said.

“She can’t live off love,” he told her.

He was probably right.

But still, that’s what you’ll find in pages of The One Who Leaves.

---

Become a paid subscriber

If you haven’t signed up for a paid subscription, the first installment drops on March 6, but you can sign up anytime to read it. The memoir is 99,000 words and 56 chapters, so I’ll be sharing a chapter (sometimes more) every week.

The subscription is $5/month or less if you purchase an annual subscription ($50/year). If finances are tight right now and you can’t afford the annual subscription, let me know—I have a handful of $20/year subscriptions for this very reason, as well as free subscriptions.

I’m excited to share this with you. And as you’re reading, please feel free to leave comments—I’m an open book, and nothing is too deep or too sacred to explore.

The official About for The One Who Leaves

At thirty, I was pulled back to the shit-hole town off Route 66 in the dust of California that I’d spent my life trying to escape because Mom was facing felony charges—again. I get her out of the Mojave for a weekend and away from her drug-fueled lifestyle so that I can explore our shared past in search of truth. On the road, the narrative of Mom's life unfolds throughout the pages like a labyrinth: tales of home invasion well into the hundreds, her imprisonment with cellmate Susan Atkins from the Manson Cult, the meth lab Dad built in the garage of our sun-bleached house, the cast of homeless addicts I was raised around, and her role in the dissolution of our family.

These two narratives braid together, exposing the story of my life, but also my mother’s life. Of her unwavering love for me and her struggle to stay clean long enough to show it. Of my fight to understand her and accept the love she had for me all along, so that I could finally start a life of my own. The One Who Leaves is a raw and unflinching exploration of the ties that bind us to family, the lasting impact of addiction, and the power of redemption—revealing who we become both because of, and despite, a mother’s love.

---

In case you missed it…