The Letter That Saved My Life

About two years after Mom passed away in her sleep, I turned to my Aunt Dolores in my desperation to meet my lingering sorrow and fears head-on. She lived in Florida and I was in Albuquerque. My aunt sent the letter that saved my life. She was my mom’s sister who I wrote about in Blended Abandonment and The Baptists. Of all the aunts, I had the most memories with her and felt she was the one who would give me the answers I was seeking.

In How To Survive After Finding A Loved One’s Body, things did not go as planned after I reached out to a social worker for help. Looking at myself holding onto Hayes for dear life in the photo below, I remember being overwhelmed every day and thinking, I won’t make it. The dark circles around my eyes capture the pain and sorrow I could not manage.

My instinct was right. My aunt replied with a nine-page hand-written letter.

“Dear Marilyn,

It’s really difficult to write about things in our past. They say “truth is stranger than fiction.” Sometimes the truth is very ugly. To date, my age being 66 plus, I’ve written 5 books about my life and only one has survived. April (her youngest daughter) took it without telling me. I spent 5 years writing one for Carol (her oldest daughter) and 1 year writing one for Karen (her middle daughter). Upon completing them, I threw them in the garbage, fearing they would hurt someone I really loved.

You wanted some information about your mom and her childhood. Before I write about your mom, I have to write about our dad. In spite of what I write here, I want to say I dearly loved my dad. I think all of us Marshalls did. In spite of his faults, he had great strength and we admired him for that.

Dad began working in the lead and zinc mines at age 11. There were no child labor laws to protect children in those days. By the time Dad was age 29, all of his buddies that began working in the mines at such an early age were dead. They died from miner’s consumption or lead in their lungs. Dad got out of the mines and started farming. Lawton, Kansas was a “Mining Ghost Town” and when he went to Lawton to visit his parents, everyone always greeted him with this: “Hi, Farmer!” They were poking fun at him. They considered him a miner. Fresh air, sunshine, and farming saved his life.

I’m sure it was tough having 6 children to feed, clothes, etc., and starting a new vocation. Dad always bragged he was the richest man on earth. His wealth was his children and wife. Every time we had a new family addition, Dad had another worker for the fields.

Dad was 5’8″ tall, 155 pounds soaking wet, and was tough as whang (super strong) leather. He was a slave-driving man. We were never allowed to be sick or unable to work. You can believe me. We all worked. Two of us would drag 100 pound bags of corn seed and with hoes we planted corn-two grains in each hill.

We planted tomato plants by the thousands, chopped a hole in the ground, carried wash tubs of water from the creek, and watered with tin cans.

In the summer Dad leased meadows and bailed them with a horse drawn press. They had to change a team of horses every 60 bales in 100 degree plus temperatures. That’s all one team of horses could take. Yet, Dad used us girls to follow the team around and around all day-whipping the horses to keep them moving. We were the only girls in the county who did this kind of work.

Men ran the mowers, sweep rakes, till, and piled bales of hay from sun up until dark. We could never go to the toilet. There was no place to go on an open prairie in front of men and boys. You can imagine our embarrassment.

Mom said both twins (nicknames Tude (my aunt) and Tiny (my mom) weighed less than 8 pounds. From birth, Tude was the stronger of the twins (physically). Tiny was weaker or punier as Dad said. In fact he called your mom “Granny” because she acted like an old grandma.

When work time came, no one was spared or allowed to stay home. I remember Mom crying and begging for any of us that she felt was too ill to work but Dad would not even consider her pleas. One day your mother was too ill to go to the field. Mom always canned all our food from the garden. Tude was to stay home and help Mom and she offered to work in the field taking your mom’s place. Tiny would stay home and work with Mom. I know Mom would have let her rest and stay in bed because she was so sick.

Your mom refused to go to the field, so Dad took her to the horse barn and hanged her by the wrist and said, “by tonight you’ll be ready to go to work tomorrow.” Mom cried, begged Dad to be merciful. He proceeded to get the teams ready to go to the field.

We were all scared to death of Dad. Tude defiled him, took a knife, and cut your mother down from the barn ceiling. Tude went to the field in your mother’s place.

The twins went to high school in Joplin, Missouri. Your mom did housekeeping, etc., for a lawyer and Tude worked taking care of an elderly woman. They received $3.00 a week for their labor. They were on their own, without any help from Dad or Mom until they married. Tude married Merle (my uncle) at age 18. His nephew, Earl Grove, came down for her twin at age 19. They got married and your mom moved to Chicago. (I could not find any wedding pictures of Earl and my mom).

Earl was in construction which was seasonal work-November to April or May. Your mother worked in a laundromat, ironing white shirts. She worked there till 6 weeks before Wayne (my half-brother) was born.

When Wayne was age 3, Earl went into the service during World War II. Tiny and Wayne lived in a little cottage in the back of the landlord’s house. Kay (my aunt) and I went to Chicago in the summer to work in the factory. Merle was in the service too. Tude had a 3-room apartment in Bellwood.

Tiny received $80 allotment from the government to live on for rent, food, fuel oil, utilities, clothing insurance, etc. I stayed with Tiny, and Kay stayed with Tude. I worked days and your mom worked the 4 PM to Midnight shift. She tried to live on her earnings and save the $80 allotment check.

When the war was over, Earl was discharged. He came home and while your mother was working the midnight shift, he left Wayne alone asleep in the bed along with a mysterious note for her. He had to go away.

Earl’s mother hired a detective to trace Earl and they located him when he picked up his discharge papers. He had another woman. She was pregnant and her brother was after Earl to marry his sister. When your mom found this out, she went down. She had neuritis so bad she couldn’t walk. She had to be almost carried to the bathroom and had to be fed in bed. It was two weeks before she was able to be up and regain her strength.

Your mother told me Earl had a girlfriend while she was pregnant with Wayne. I hate to say it but your mother loved him dearly and never got over him.

When Merle Snyder (Tude’s husband) died, we attended the funeral and dinner at the church. After the funeral, Earl (my mother’s first husband) was there too standing in the doorway. I was sitting beside your mother at the table. She turned to me and said, “Do you know that man in the doorway?” I looked at her and said, “Do you feel okay?” She said, “I feel fine. I never felt better in my life.” I said to your mom, “That’s Earl.” She said, “Do I know him?” I said, “That’s Wayne’s dad, remember?” Your mom then replied, “They took all that away from me when I was in Loretta Hospital. I don’t remember any part of that.” I wrote about this in Mental Illness Mom’s Secret.

When the Marshalls started reminiscing about their pasts, your mother sat there and listened to all our sad stories and then said, “None of you have ever gone through the hell I have.” That was all she said.

After Earl left your mom and Wayne, she kept working at the factory. After work one day she met your dad. They shared similar circumstances. Your dad’s wife had written him a Dear John Letter when he was serving in the Philippines and wanted a divorce. Your mom’s husband wanted a divorce for his new love. She divorced Earl within 6 months, and then she and your dad started dating.

Your dad got her a fur coat for Christmas and he bought himself a new Mercury. Then he proposed marriage. She said she didn’t know if she loved him enough to marry him, but he had a good-paying job and he wanted to adopt Wayne and raise him as his own son. I feel she really took all these things into consideration.

There wasn’t much future in a factory job and little hope for the future. I was their bridesmaid and Ray (my uncle, father’s brother) was their best man. The Baptist preacher allowed them to be married in the First Baptist Church in Bellwood. The preacher thought they were both victims beyond their control and made some exceptions. I do believe your mother came to love and respect your dad.

Your mother was so proud of you and Debbie (my sister). She thought you were the smartest kids. When I didn’t attend the PTA meeting at my kid’s school, your mother said she always goes to PTA and visits with your teachers. She told me that you and Debbie always get straight As. (What I found interesting about this is that I have no memory of my mom ever praising my grades or saying to me or my sis how proud she was of us. I was glad to find out that she at least said those things to her sister).

Then my aunt finished her letter to me with, “I hope I haven’t written anything here to hurt anyone. I enjoy hearing from you. Keep in touch and may the Good Lord Bless you. You have a great husband and a lovely little cowboy (Hayes). When in doubt, count your blessings.

Love you, your old ugly Aunt Dolores.”

Dear Aunt Dolores,

I am most fortunate to be a writer like you and Gramma Effie (she wrote for the Smithfield, Missouri local newspaper). Thank you for saving my life and any chance for me to have a mentally and emotionally stable future. I miss you. As you know, if a writer loves you, you are never really gone.

Of all the previous posts, this one was the hardest to write. Like my aunt, I never want my writing to harm or disrespect another, especially a person I love. My website mission is to write every memory and suggestion with the intent to help others.

It had been a long time since I read my aunt’s letter. While writing, the tears were flowing so often that I had to stop and take a break.

I felt the pain of all involved. If only our parents would have shared this information with Wayne, me, and Deb, how different our family life growing up would have been. To the best of my knowledge, my father never adopted Wayne nor do Deb and I have many memories with our older brother growing up.

As my aunt said, the truth can be ugly, but it can also set you free. I wish my parents would have chosen the truthful path instead of keeping their pasts a secret. As hard as it is sometimes, I accept that I cannot change the past.

Her letter unlocked the secrets behind my parent’s unhappiness. I finally understood where the anger and addiction came from. Their sorrow had nothing to do with Wayne, Deb, and me. Once I knew the truth about my parents and their pain and injustices, I no longer blamed myself for my father’s alcoholism, my mom’s mental illness, and their troubled marriage. Knowing this truth was such a gift. Thank God my aunt had the courage and trust to share it so I could heal and move forward.

I cannot imagine the level of the emotional and physical pain of being hung up by your wrists by your father in a barn. I cannot imagine the torture my grandfather endured as a child, carrying on the generational trauma his parents tried to survive. I wrote about generational trauma in Generational Trauma Entrepreneur.

I am eternally thankful for my Aunt Dolores and her letter that saved my life. I learned that to know forgiveness and to be able to forgive is the daily universal challenge needed to preserve ongoing peace, purpose, and happy trails in my life.

Although I felt more of a connection to a spiritual path instead of organized religion in my early adulthood, I never forgot my Baptist upbringing. Through the grace of a Loving Creator and my desire to be the best mom to Hayes that I could, I am grateful to say I stopped the cycle of abuse and so did my sister.

Tough Cookie Tip: The child-parent bond (birth connection) is so powerful, but so is the lasting pain for any child that grows up feeling unloved. If you explain things to children in a loving and honest way about your less-than-perfect choices, chances are high that they will still love you no matter what. Children already know you are sad and unhappy, so why not tell them the truth so they don’t blame themselves. Secrets only guarantee the path of destruction through the generations to follow. I hope you always find answers to secrets that impact your well-being. Remember to look inside yourself for the ones you have not been able to find.

Copyright © 2022-2025 Marilyn K Fuller. All Rights Reserved.

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