COMING 2025

SYNOPSIS

BROKEN FAMILY - Finding Our Way Home

My book begins with my mother sitting on the edge of the bed, the one with the purple bedspread, reading our favorite story, Are You My Mother? She finished the book, set it down, walked out of the house, and disappeared for nine years. We were one, two and three years old. She surfaced nine years later and we learned that she had birthed more children, including a daughter who she also named Tamara, my name.

Shortly after her disappearance I was separated from my siblings and left in the terrifying care of a sexually abusive uncle. This nightmare was punctuated by the erratic appearances of my father as he continually reinvented himself, taking my siblings and me on a chaotic ride through a series of emotionally-unavailable "mothers", illegal careers, and naked-hippie gatherings, only to return me to my uncle. Wanting to raise our consciousness, our father was smoking pot with us by the time we were 6, 7 and 8 years old.

When we were with Dad it also presented other obstacles, from unsafe environments, to being kept out of public schools that he believed were "shame institutes". By 9, 10 and 11 we were supporting his cottage industry by tying macrame hangers and helping make sand candles. He was always trying new food fads so we were put on mugwort tea and brown rice diets to rid our body of worms. Luckily, there was a Winchell's donut house right up the alley, where we befriended the workers and got to eat as many donuts as we wanted. I robbed that donut house before I left home that spring.

Navigating a maze of confusion, distrust and fear, I felt the weight of my secret plans to escape my fathers house, knowing I would be leaving my siblings, my only anchors, behind. But, I felt like I had no choice and at 13 I left home to spend the next several years on the violent streets of Denver, where survival often meant making harrowing choices. I found myself ensnared in survival-based sexual relationships with men more than twice my age, desperate to find security in a world that felt relentlessly hostile. With only five years of education between elementary and middle school, I faced extraordinary odds.

Characters like Uncle Ernie, Little Earl, Cedric, Scat, Misty, Stomper and Leroy Jones, emerged as both mentors and predators, exploiting my vulnerability. They pulled me into a web of dangerous con games, escort services, robberies and violence, each encounter leaving scars that would shape my identity and ultimately power up my resilience.

Yet, since childhood, even in the darkest moments, I felt a spiritual presence watching over me. This presence revealed itself during pivotal times, offering strength that transformed my despair into hope.

It was through this lens and after the birth of my first child at eighteen, that I made my way through the treacherous landscape of my life. I ultimately discovered the strength within me to rise above my circumstances, and I vowed to be the mother I never had.

Broken Family stands as a celebration of survival. It casts a light on intergenerational trauma and the hidden struggles of young people from fractured families. It brings into focus the transformative power of compassion, forgiveness and unseen forces that can propel us toward a positive future.

This memoir chronicles my journey from the tender age of two to the pivotal age of nineteen when a spiritual experience within a Native American sweat lodge ceremony forever altered the course of my life.

The sequel to Broken Family is well underway.