A Survivor’s Journey

I cannot even remember a time in my life when I received attention from an adult that was not abusive in nature.  I grew up with both physical and sexual abuse from the age of five when I was first molested.  It never felt right, but it felt normal to me.

At a high school wrestling match when I was 13, a 35 year old man struck up a conversation with me.  He would come often to these events and seek me out; he said nice things to me and made me feel good about myself.  Eventually he invited me to his house parties and I was happy to get out of the house because things were really rough; also, my parents were going through a divorce, and it wasn’t a big deal for me to be gone.  I craved the attention I got from him, but then he brought other men there to have sex with me too.   It didn’t really feel right, but it felt normal.

I had a baby when I was 16 and I got involved with a gang after my mother took my child from me.   As part of the deal I was used by all the gang leaders and then passed down to the younger members.   I was confused and unclear about what was going on.  I knew there were drugs involved and money changed hands for sex with me and other girls, but I never saw any of it.

I had numerous experiences with the child welfare system.  They kept picking me up and returning me home and I kept running away again.  In my mind, I didn’t feel safe anywhere; I felt safer anyplace but home.  They put me in foster homes and I ran away from those too, and then once I became a juvenile offender, I ended up in secure facilities…but I even found my way out of those.

I decided to run from the gang that owned me, and moved back in with my mom.  During that time I had several abusive relationships, and at 21, started working as an escort and in strip clubs.  I fled in the middle of one night and hopped on a bus to Kansas City, because I was in fear of my life.  Almost immediately I was approached by an older man who befriended me and then sold me to a pimp in exchange for some drugs.  This pimp had 8 women in a house and that very first night they told me what to wear, they set me out on the track, they showed me how to get in and out of the cars with the guys, what to say when I got into the car, what not to say, how to recognize if it’s a police officer.  It was just like boot camp!

Often there were underage girls in the house and there was always a fight for affection. He liked to keep us in limbo and to keep us competing with each other for his attention.  I wanted all of it and I would do anything to get it, whether it be telling on the other girls or turning more tricks so I could give him the most money.  I was determined to win him for myself, and I thought I had when he got me pregnant and moved me out of the house and in with him.  I understand now that it was a branding technique, a way to ensure I’d stay under his control.  That, and the drugs that were waiting for me on my bed stand every morning, did exactly that.

I was prostituted until I was at least 6 months pregnant, motivated by the idea that I was his number one in spite of the fact that I had seen him in bed with at least 3 other women at one time.  I was never locked up but I was in a prison of the mind.  He was in complete control, and he maintained it by alternating affection and brutality.  If rules were broken, like being dropped off in front of the house by one of your tricks, someone got beat up, to make an example to everyone. Most often it was me because I was the most “loyal” (needy) and he knew there was no family I could run to.

He broke my nose when I was pregnant with absolutely no remorse, and made rule breakers stand outside nearly naked for hours.  He is in federal prison now on drug charges, not for pimping! Despite his brutality, many of his girls are waiting, will run right back to him when he gets out because his control over their minds is so complete.  He is God to them.  It doesn’t feel right, but it feels normal, and that’s all they know.

Fortunately for me, I met a God who thinks of me as His Favorite!  I also met Kristy Childs of Veronica’s Voice who has shared the experiences I’ve had and overcome the same mental and physical addictions and humiliations. I have a great job that I am perfectly suited for, helping other girls escape their bondage.  I am now part of Veronica’s Voice as their Outreach Coordinator, funded by Shared Hope International under the WIN program.  I hand out outreach bags to the girls who are still being used in prostitution, and go visit the jails and meet with girls who have sexual exploitation issues. I also go to youth programs—I started a youth group recently for people ages 13-21 where I educate them about pimp control and risk reduction. But most important, I am building a life where my baby girl and I can live in dignity.

When I go out to the streets now, it is to share with them how different life can be.  Usually when I pull up on them they’re just so excited to see me and see that I made it out and they say things like, “If you can do it, I can do it.”  It gives them a lot of inspiration especially if I haven’t seen someone in a long time and I go out to the jail and I run into them and they’re like, “Gosh, you know, you look so good.”  “How did you do it?” Then I offer them different options and even if they’re not ready to get out, I still come back around.  I may give them my card fifty times and it might take a month, or two months. Eventually, they end up showing up even if it’s just to take a shower or for something to eat.  That’s a first step, but an important one, to believe in themselves and find a new “normal”, one that also feels right.

The Courage to Speak Out

My life turned upside down when my stepfather came into it, bringing abuse with him.  Neither my mother nor my real father protected me or intervened on my behalf, and I tried repeatedly to run away.  The juvenile system just labeled me as incorrigible after I was returned home so many times, so I got the message constantly from both home and the juvenile justice system that I was bad, I was bad, I was bad–so I believed that I was bad. I knew that to really escape the abuse I would have to get out of Joplin.

I left Joplin, hitchhiking, and I ended up in Denver. It was through the hitchhiking experience that I started prostituting. I was 12 years old and the only currency I had was my body, so I traded sexual favors for things I needed like a ride, a bed to sleep in, and food. A couple of times they said  I was too young and they wanted to help me, but it was always a lie. They would just use me. After arriving in Denver, someone told me I could get money for sex and buy my own food and necessities instead of having to trade it for my survival.  That sounded good to me!  I was immediately approached by a pimp. The other women told me to “go home” and “it can’t be as bad as what you’re going to find here”, but I didn’t want to go home. I’d rather take my chances being abused by strangers than by those I felt should protect me– and I really wanted to feel protected. I desired the protection of a pimp because once while sleeping on a park bench I was dragged into a car and taken to a house where nine different men raped me. I escaped and found a payphone; I suddenly realized I had no one to call. That was a really overwhelming feeling, to stand there knowing I had no one in the world to call.

I think I knew the guy was a pimp, but I needed protection, someone to care for me, someone that cared if I got hurt or if anything happened to me.  Of course it was all lies. At 14 I was arrested and sent to jail because a guy who tried to rape me claimed I robbed him.  I did pull a knife, but it was to protect myself from rape.  My mom and stepfather came to get me and took me back to Joplin.  I bounced between them and relatives in California. Feeling lost and confused, I got involved with a pimp from Kansas City who drugged me and flew me to Alaska before I woke up. He had me prostituting out of a massage parlor and on the street.  One day he picked me up from the massage parlor from a 12 hour shift.  I hadn’t made enough money so he took me straight to the track and put me to work in my open toed heels in the snow. I was controlled by fear.  Once I was hung in a closet for a couple of days by my thumbs and I didn’t know how long I would be in there.  He taunted me from outside the door; he was very emotionally abusive, as well as physical and sexual.  I was so terrified of him that even when he was in Alaska and I was in Denver, he had control of me and I was afraid to make the break. I was with him the longest.

I was jumping in and out of strangers cars all hours of the day and night.  I was brain washed and under the control of violent pimps.  My life was in the balance ALL the time.  For years I talked with God, asking for help until I began to pray for death.  I prayed for several years for God to let me die.  If all I was made for was to be a whore I wanted to be dead.  Just let a trick or the drugs kill me.  Though I contemplated suicide, I saw no way out.  Just when I had gotten to the edge of the end GOD delivered me and showed me my way out.  It was a miracle!  It was like I was in complete darkness and could not see the way, the moment I heard my unborn son’s heart beat God spoke into my spirit and immediately I could see!  I was in the light!  He delivered me from severe depression and drug addiction.  He guided me through my process of healing and recovery.

After I was completely out, I still lived with the fear of being found out.  I still lived with the pain of seeing the women on the streets and knowing how it felt out there.  I prayed for God to use me, to use my experiences to help others, to make what I had gone through have meaning.

My goal is just to make a difference in this world for the women and girls that are trapped in prostitution. I had a friend who was murdered when she was twenty-one years old. I was older than she was by ten years. We met when she was only 14,  this little girl in the hallway, always approaching me, telling me about her life. We had such similar experiences that we became very close.  Her name was Veronica and her story made me wonder how many paths I had crossed with girls and women that had been through the same thing I had, but we had never talked about it. I didn’t get involved in other women’s lives.  Veronica was the first. I started Veronica’s Voice, a street outreach and drop-in center for victims of sexual exploitation, and now I know a lot of women and girls who have parallel life experiences that led them into survival sex.

I have overcome. I have become a leader that believes in the potential of other survivors to lead.  I have experienced a great redemption that has changed my life and now I have the courage to speak out. The women we serve at Veronica’s Voice have learned to let go of the shame and understand that something happened TO them—they were the victim, not the criminal—but now they are survivors. Watching them grow and become empowered is what inspires me to continue to fight for America’s forgotten citizens.

A lot of people look upon these women and girls simply as objects to be utilized in whatever way they want to use them.  The user is just the average man—it can be anyone—from janitor to CEO, and he is usually a married man with a family.  He’s not looking to leave his family, so he justifies what he does by looking at her as an object to be used instead of a human being.  I wish people would just see the little girl. These girls come from lives of unimaginable violence.  At Veronica’s Voice, we’ve had a young girl who was sliced up with swords and almost lost her arm and nearly bled to death. We’ve had a gal that was shot twice in a motel, and even though the room was in the john’s name, nobody would prosecute the case because it was her word against his.  We’ve seen a lot of trauma against these women; one girl was sodomized with a baseball bat. None of these women or girls want to be in this situation of being prostituted or being drug addicted. They are just struggling to survive.

We must remember that the women that are on the streets across America, drug addicted, in and out of the system – they were yesterday’s children. Let’s not forsake them.

Violence and cruelty were part of my daily life

I was only 2 weeks old when my mother abandoned me. I was raised by a family who treated me more like a slave than a child.  I kind of compared myself to Cinderella, but the charming prince was not part of my story…

I couldn’t wait to strike out on my own as soon as I turned 18, and I started hanging out with friends who were strippers from Toledo.  I started having financial problems to the point of being evicted from my apartment. I knew I couldn’t go home and I was feeling desperate, struggling to survive each day.  So my new friends persuaded me to try stripping too.  I was very shy, but I needed the money, so I did it.

It was then that I was first approached by a guy named Robert. I actually knew he was a pimp; I just didn’t recognize how dangerous it was to accept his help, and he came to me at a time of real crisis in my life.  Not only did he help me with rent and furniture, he even got me gifts and made me feel loved, wanted, comforted and special.  I told myself that I was different, that he really loved me, and I came to trust him unconditionally.  Then one day he said we were going for a ride to Indianapolis for a day trip, and that is when my life changed forever.

He told me that now I worked for him and I had to do everything he said, which meant selling myself.  He watched me every moment during work hours and when I was not working I was not allowed to go outside unless I was with him. I was not to even look around but had to keep my head down, looking at my feet or the floor at all times. If I looked up, I would later be beaten when I got back to the house.  These beatings were done with anything he could get his hands on, including broomsticks and metal hangers, and he often burned me with candles or cigarettes. Violence and cruelty were part of my daily life.  Once, I ended up in intensive care and I knew then that he could and would kill me for breaking any of his rules.

I was terrified of the consequences of trying to run or of telling someone what was happening to me.  I would do anything he said rather than get beaten again. (I actually did try to leave Robert one time to go with some other pimps that worked together, thinking they were less violent.  They both raped me repeatedly and I was worse off than with Robert.  I got pregnant as a result of those rapes.)

In Indianapolis we worked at the Dollar Inn lot where the truck drivers parked; they referred to us as “lot lizards”. How many guys I saw a night just depended on the numbers– how many buyers versus how many of us were working. Some nights I might have 10.  Some nights I lost track, like the time I had to work for 36 hours straight as a punishment, making almost $3000. But no matter how much money I made, or how much I earned in tips, I was never allowed to keep any of the money. If he found any money on me, I would be accused of stashing it for a get-away, and punished severely.

Not only did I work in Indiana, but anywhere my pimp traveled. Since we girls had to be supervised at all times we would have to travel where he did and work in that city. One time, traveling to Oklahoma City, we went to a truck stop where we were stopped by a cop.  Nobody was arrested though; $85 made him forget what he saw.

Violence and cruelty came from the customers also.  I always had a quota to work off each night, and one time towards the end of my shift, a trucker and his accomplice robbed me at gunpoint and then took me away from the lot to rape me.  Then they dumped me in a field with nothing but underwear and a shirt on. I ended up having a baby as a consequence of this rape also.

In spite of the consequences, I periodically tried to run away.  Fortunately, I finally succeeded.  Two years later Robert was up for trial and I found the courage to be a witness against him. I moved to a new state and a new city where nobody knew me and nobody would judge me.  I want to be an example to other trafficking victims and tell them that there are ways to get out, and good people who can support them and help them in their journey to a new life.

Nobody was there for me

I grew up without being accountable to anyone.  I never knew my father, and my mom was an alcoholic; she was around, but not there…all I know, I have learned from my own experiences.  I wish there had been an adult in my life to teach me what is right and tell me what to watch out for, or what could happen to me.  I just didn’t know.

When I was 12 years old, a guy I thought was just a “dope boy” kept following me in his car when I walked to school.  He was older and real cool, and he said I was really cute.  He paid a lot of attention to me and eventually I got in the car with him.  For a while we were girlfriend and boyfriend; we would go everywhere together.  It didn’t take long before I experienced the real treatment—being beaten, stomped on, manipulated and sold all day every day.

When I think about how it must have looked to people, a baby-looking girl like me with an older “boyfriend,” it makes me wonder why nobody was ever there to stop it, or even ask any questions at all.  I think in our society there is nobody that even wants to stop it.  It’s just normal.  Everything is about sex everywhere you look in our culture, and sex with little girls is just another part of the picture.  That’s the way it seemed to me when I was 12. When I realized my boyfriend was a pimp, I thought, well, I guess that’s just the way it is and I did what he told me.  I thought I was making the choice, and that was pretty much what I would have to do to get along in life.  Nobody ever told me–I didn’t understand what a choice really was.

People have asked me how I could have done what I did—sell my body on the street, in cars, in trucks, anywhere and everywhere and then deliver every last dollar to my pimp.  Looking back on it from my vantage point today, I can’t answer that question…I’m amazed myself, that I was so under the control of that man.  He was the only person in my life that I felt connected to and I even felt like he was my only protection; therefore, I would have done anything to stay with him. The price was for me to sell the only thing I had, my body.  He gave me a different name, a street name…it was Cookie.  That was fine with me because Tonya would never do the things Cookie did; I was a different person when I was tricking.

Sometimes the john would tell me they knew I was young and they wanted to help me get out; I always took it as a joke because they would go ahead and use me anyway. They acted like their pity or their money helped me.  They never did anything to help me and I stopped hoping that anyone ever would.

It’s a very strange world when you are in it.  In a really screwed up way, I had a family.  It was a family of “wives in law” that fought each other out of jealousy and competition for our pimp’s attention. We were only allowed to talk to each other, never anyone outside the family.  I was arrested 17 different times in all kinds of cities and every time I went to detention, they thought all they had to do is change where I was.  So I ended up in group homes where people had serious drug and mental problems, but not my kind of problem…there was nothing to help me deal with the trauma of what happened to me. I wanted nothing to do with those places.

Being with the “family” was at least something I was used to, so I ran away and back to my pimp every time.  Each time I was transferred from out of state back to Ohio, it was in handcuffs and leg shackles and I was surrounded by policemen that I felt were my enemies.  Despite my age, I spent 8 months in prison when my pimp caught a federal case.  Yes, I’m the one that went to prison.  I could never trust anyone.  Sitting in a facility with criminals didn’t help, it only made me more bitter.

What did help was to finally meet someone who had walked in my shoes and survived.  This lady was real, not just in what she said, but because she had been where I was; I had a torn-soul to torn-soul relationship with her.  So many others are out for the publicity, but girls like me can tell when someone is sincere, understands what it is like to be a slave, and really wants to help.  I have a new life now, and I am going to study to become a doctor.  The day that changed my life, I was walking to school.  I was going to a special program because I was smart.  A lot has happened to me and I’m wiser now, but I’m going to go back and pick up with that smart girl and move ahead.