The Secret Life of Jolly Rancher (D, age 11)

That night Jolly Rancher was scared of the dark. Then he remembered he brought a flashlight to help him see at night and not to be afraid of the dark. He turned on the flashlight and after a couple of minutes the flashlight suddenly turned off.
AAAAHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH!!!!!! SCREAMED Jolly Rancher. D.J. said SSSSHHHHHHHHHH! We are going to get caught by the Pony Police. Jolly Rancher could not go to sleep so he sang a song and by the 100th time of singing the song he was able to fall asleep next to D.J.

T -age unknown (Younger than me; older than her children!)

The back story here is that she and her 3 children were in a horribly abusive relationship with her husband/their father. Just go with "nightmare" and you'll pretty much have the idea.

Don't ask me why I'm thinking about the dog we used to have. I miss him. I've thought of going back to where we used to live, to see if I can find him. But the people who live there now would probably think I was weird.

His name was Dingo, and he was HUGE. People would think that he wss scary, but he was a big old baby. He wasn't allowed on the bed because we had a water bed. But once the comforter was on the bed, and he couldn't hurt the water bed, I would let him get up there and snuggle with me and the kids.

But when my husband started hurting us, Dingo got tough. After it had been going on a while, Dingo would growl whenever my husband would come in the house. He would snarl if my husband walked into the kids' rooms. He would try to get in between him and the kids. He never left the baby's side.

Eventually my husband just started hurting the dog too. Then he bought a chain and chained him outside, with the chain hooked to a big fence. I would let Dingo loose when he was at work, but I knew I had to have the dog chained up again before he got home. But I know that dog wanted to protect us. I don't know if we'll get another dog when we get a house again. Maybe we would jsut compare the new dog to Dingo, and that would be awful.

B -Age 50-ish

Some days here at Hesed House are almost too much. I try to pitch in and make sure everything is done, but then I feel badly when I have to say no to some people. Like today... two people are in the hospital and a third person is probably going. Who's going to do their chores? Who's going to make sure that H can get home from the hospital if I don't do it?

Joe (my therapist) says that I need to set limits -that people push me and pull me in different directions. I have to figure out where I want to go. But I don't know how to do that yet. It's loud here. Baby L is getting teeth and screamed all night. The kids run around and scream. There is no quiet place to think.

I'm thankful to be here. Don't get me wrong. It's just that it takes a lot of work to be here. People on the outside forget that.

I Have a House -k, age 5

I have a house now. It's white. The bathroom is green. My bedroom is blue. Well, my blanket and pillow are blue. The walls are...not blue. I think they're white. It's on a street by that store. You should come visit. My mom says that we can't jump on the beds, but we can jump rope in the yard. Will you come visit me? I'll have to go to a different school next year, that's fine.