A Biography and Testimony of My Life (So Far)

I have never shared my entire life's story over the internet. In fact, very few people know what my sister and I actually went through as kids. I figured once and for all that I would put it here. It has a happy beginning, a sad middle, but a happy ending; at least I think so :)

In short, my sister and I had wonderful childhoods up until my parents divorced. Our parents were dedicated Christians and dragged us to church every Sunday morning service as well as evening services and even Wednesday services. My mother was the worship leader and daughter of our pastor (my grandpa Phil May), so I was the closest thing to a "popular kid" at least in our church. Haha I am not trying to say I was anyone special but as a member of the pastor's family, you tend to get a little bit more attention for better or for worse.

Childhood was wonderful and my parents soon discovered I had a knack for musical ability. I loved to sing from the day I could speak and I always found my way into every musical our church put on. In those days, our church was booming and had a regular attendance of over 300-400 members. Not long after I started singing, it was also discovered that I had quite a talent for acting as well. I was the happiest kid in the world. I was acting, singing, and I always had plenty of friends.

Things weren't this way forever sadly. Have you ever heard that statement, "when it rains it pours"? Well it's true. Around the age of 10 (1995), my parents started fighting. They were very careful to do this behind closed doors so us children would not hear them but kids are very curious and very persistent. My sister and I could hear our parents yelling and screaming all the same. My Sister was only 7 so this affected her much deeper than it affected me; or at least it did so in a different way. At the same time, our church had a major split. I am not sure on the details because I was too young to know the politics taking place inside our church but from what I have been told, someone had been spreading some very hurtful false reports about our pastor who happened to be my grandfather and whom I loved (and still love) very much. Soon, our numbers had been cut in half. On top of that, a few more minor splits took place in the few years after that. Again, I can't say I know much about them.

Around the age of 11-12, my parents called it quits and separated. These Godly people who I had come to model myself after suddenly changed very much. My father became a depressed wreck and was a fraction of the confident man I had come to know. My mother began to go out and party on the weekends and completely abandoned church all together.

After my parents separated, I moved in with my mother and sister. My father had told her that he could not handle the stress of having my sister or myself. This broke my heart as a young boy. I had always looked up to my father and now as far as I saw it, he had abandoned me. My mother took us to live in a condo in Orcutt CA (basically the south end of Santa Maria). When we moved in, so did her new boyfriend. This was a major departure from the Christian traditions I knew.

This "boyfriend" was certainly nowhere near as mature and stable as my father. In fact, he was more of a kid than a man. For a little while, my life seemed to settle down. Although I had lost a father, I had gained a friend. I attached to him as a drowning child attaches to a life preserver. My view of God had always mirrored that of my father and since I saw my father as having had abandoned me, I figured God had done the same. This boyfriend of my mom's became the closest thing I had to a father. I became enthralled with everything he liked; his music, hobbies, and habits. In fact, he was the one who introduced me to heavy metal, painting and constructing model airplanes, and stealing.

Yes, that's right. Stealing. Allow me to explain. The "boyfriend" was quite fond of biking and so soon after, so was I. We used to bike everywhere. Sometimes I would ride 20 miles in a day (at age 12-13 that's not bad). Back in the mid 90's, unmanned recycling machines were very popular. You walked up to these things, pressed a button, and dropped your recyclables on a conveyer belt. A sensor in the machine would detect what kind of recyclables were going into the machine and dish out your payment in the form of change. One day, while riding past these machines, "boyfriend" and I schemed up a plan. "I wonder if it is possible to trick that machine into thinking you are putting in bottles when you really aren't? Then we could make loads of cash for nothing!" I knew better but my conscience had long since taken a hike.

We cleverly devised a plan to trick the machine by tying a long piece of floss to a beer bottle (worth quite a bit compared to other recyclables) and sending the beer bottle down the belt of one of these machines. As soon as the sensor detected the bottle, we would pull it back and allow it to go through again. We did this every night for months and made quite a killing. In 1 hour, we would bring in 50-75 dollars in quarters. Then we would transport the quarters in large "fanny packs" attached to our handlebars back home (about 5 miles away). With our money, we would buy all sorts of neat things; model rockets, model airplanes, materials to build a treehouse, bike parts, you name it.

This theft went on for months. One day, in a rare moment of conscience, I came to my mom and told her what we had been doing and how guilty I felt. She was...angry to say the least. I assume "boyfriend" received a good verbal dressing down from her because, when I came home the next day from school, all my model airplanes, rockets, and other purchased items were sitting in a pile on my floor, completely smashed. "Boyfriend" had destroyed them all in an act of vengeance.  My new father figure had betrayed me as far as my young mind saw it (although in hindsight, it was a good thing those were destroyed as they were not bought with honest money). I retreated into myself even more. I no longer saw my house as a desirable place to be and instead, I would hang out at my neighbor's house and play Super Nintendo all day long on weekends and after school on weekdays.

During all of this, my mother would be out at the bar most evenings singing karaoke and hanging out with undesirables. I was stuck taking care of my sister. I was the closest thing she had to a father and I hated it. I was being robbed of my youth and forced to take care of a kid. One I didn't get along with in the first place. One of our screaming matches even resulted in my throwing a cordless phone through the upstairs window (I was aiming for her). In another instance, she came at me with a knife and I had to literally knock her unconscious. I am not glorifying these events of course, but I want to put in to perspective how much my sister and I hated each other at that time and how much I hated caring for her. Don't worry, we get along great now that we are adults.

On top of trouble at home, my grades were hitting rock bottom. It wasn't that I was stupid or slow by any means. In fact, on most of my tests, I scored in the top 5% of my class, but I NEVER did homework. I hate home and hated being there. I had literally 1 friend throughout 7th and 8th grade and I was at his house nearly all the time. Thanks to our poor education system and a personal appeal from my grandpa, I made it out of the 8th grade by doing summer school. Again, I finished all my classwork super early. Proof that I wasn't dumb. I just wasn't applying myself.

9th grade is where things got real bad. This is a part of my life I only remember bits and pieces from because it was the lowest part of my life.

As I entered the 9th grade, I moved in with my grandpa, I think. I only vaguely recall going to school. I do remember choir. Music was my escape and it was the only class during the day I looked forward to. I was only at that school for a short time though. Out of the blue, my mom returned to take my sister and I from my grandparents (who had taken us in without pause and were getting our lives straightened out) with a new husband in tow. This new husband of hers was nothing like "boyfriend". He was cruel, big, and scary. She had moved on from the "guy who never grew up" to the "ex con". I was whisked away to San Luis Obispo to live in a mobile home. I found out later that my grandparents graciously payed to get them into this mobile home and put their good name on the line for it.

After moving, I began attending my second highschool. Not only was I completely unprepared for the transition, but I also was so far behind my classmates, I had no idea what I was doing. Again, choir was my only escape. The choir at SLO High School was huge compared to Righetti. Not only that but they had amazing facilities such as speakers all around the room, tone machines, and other neat computer programs to help you work on your pitch. I was immediately put into the advanced choir (which I found out later is quite a feat for a freshman).

The situation at home deteriorated, as it always seemed to do. Soon I began noticing that my things were going missing. My toys first, then my computer games, then some of my clothes. All of the sudden, we were kicked from our home and forced to live in a campground. (I found out later that "husband number 2" was selling drugs to the inhabitants of our mobile home complex). I also learned later in life that my things went missing because my mother and stepfather were selling them for drug money. When my games were sold, I think that is when I really started down my path of game addiction. I would later become what I can only describe as a "game hoarder". More on that later.

Living in the campground was awful. Every morning, we would wake up at 5AM and drive to my mother's work in SLO. Her job was based in an old house so the original household features such as the kitchen sink, dishwasher, and shower were still there. The owners of the business had turned the shower into a file storage room. Every morning, my sister, mother, and myself would file into the bathroom (no pun intended) and remove all of the boxes and boxes of paper. We would then take showers 1 at a time and once finished, we would wipe the entire shower down until it was totally dry, put all the boxes back in it, and sneak out. This went on every day for a few months. I do remember one thing distinctly from that time. I owned only a few pairs of clothes and 1 sweater. My classmates would joke to me that I "smell like a bonfire" every day at school. I would lie and tell them that my dad loved to bbq and that is why I smelled like I did.

The truth was much less rosy though. We had no money to clean our clothes and I only had one sweater. At night, the campground would get very cold, so I had to wear the sweater. Our only source of heat was the campfire we would set up every night using wood we found on the ground. Most nights, all we had to eat was a can of beans or corn beef hash. I remember those night very well however. My mother, sister, and myself would sit around the fire and sing church songs like "Come Just as You Are" and "Jesus all for Jesus". "Husband 2" hated it and would hide out in his tent every night while we sang, that is, if he wasn't out dealing drugs that evening.

I reached rock bottom halfway through my 9th grade year. When I got home (if you would call it that), "Husband 2" told my sister and I that we were going dumpster diving for recyclables and food. I drew the line. I said, "I am just a kid and I deserve better than this. I have a father and grandfather that love me and can take care of my sister and I. I'll never do that." I absolutely hated that man. I hated him with everything I was. I wanted to kill him and for the first time in my life, I was prepared to do it. I began having dreams about killing him. Sometimes I would walk around the campsite with the hatchet in my hand that we used to chop wood. I would tell myself, "It would be quick. I can break into the tent and chop his head off and nobody would know I did it."

When I confronted my mother about this and told her I was very near to killing her husband, she panicked. The next day, she drove me to my dad's in Santa Maria and dropped me off. My sister decided to stay with my mom. I'm not sure if it was out of a sense of loyalty or because she felt obligated to take care of her. I found out that soon after, my mother moved with my sister and "Husband 2" to Lancaster, the capital of Methamphetamine Distribution.

Although my mom thought she was doing good by leaving me with my father, as a young teen, I didn't see it that way. I felt that she had chosen this terrible person over me. I was again hurt and retreated deeper within myself.

By some miracle, I finished the 9th grade and things were going smoothly with my dad. We didn't have much but we were doing a lot of catching up time on father and son activities. Every weekend we would rent 5 movies and watch them together. We would work on puzzles as well and became quite the puzzle building team. Some time in the early summer of 1999, my sister moved back in with us. She was fairly thin from lack of food (things got much worse for my mom and my sister was dragged along) and had a difficult time living away from my mother.

Somewhere around mid summer of 1999, my dad began dating his childhood sweetheart, Candy. Within literally 2 weeks, him and Candy were engaged to be married. Suddenly, we were uprooted again and moved to Arroyo Grande to live with Candy and her 3 kids (she has 4 but one had moved out by that point). Again, I retreated further into myself.

However, here I had an outlet for my introverted behavior. Candy owned a top of the line computer and it was almost never used by anyone in the house. The rest of my summer was a blur of gaming 18 hours, sleeping, and waking up to game 18 more hours. I completely shut off the outside world and became involved in the fantasy world of games.

I'll sum up my Sophomore and Junior years of high school and say it was a combination of barely passing, gaming a TON, finding time for friends somewhere amidst all that, and half halfheartedly attending church by way of rides from my grandpa every Sunday morning. By Junior year, I had a job at Circuit City making minimum wage and within a few months, I had bought my first computer. I was gaming fulltime on it and would often stay up until 6 or 7 in the morning playing. All the while, my game collection was slowly increasing. At the peak of my collection, I owned over 500 games worth about 40 bucks each new.

In senior year, I finally began to come out of my shell. I was a first choice in most of the school musicals and involved in an all male singing group as well as both of the school's choirs. I even began to spend more time with my friends and less time on the computer. My circle of friends over senior year grew from 2 to 20. We would go out every weekend and have a bonfire at the beach. I would bring my guitar (which I started playing in Sophomore year of HS) and we would sing around the campfire. My Senior year holds my fondest memories of friends and family as a teen.

When I turned 18, my father approached me one night as I was gaming (and keeping him up with my loud talking over my headset) and in not so few words gave me a 2 week ultimatum. "Join the Marines, or get a job and get out of this house." I elected for the latter. The next day, I moved in with my grandparents and got a job landscaping. The landscaping was great as it shed some of the pounds I had been adding up through high school as well as gave me some awesome muscles. I only lasted a month or 2 at my grandparents though. My grandma is a financial planner and insisted I save a portion of my money from each check to buy myself a new car (a significant portion of my checks). 18 year old Brandon didn't like that idea so, he moved out and back in with his father.

Through encouragement from my grandfather and father, I decided to attend college and become a computer game designer. The college was Devry University and the city was West Hills (near LA). At this point in her life, my mother had dropped "husband 2" and moved on through a slew of boyfriends. She was living in Simi Valley which was a 25 minute drive from my school. I assumed that she had her life together and asked her if I could sleep on her couch and pay her 400 dollars a month to live there. She agreed and I moved in prep for my new college.

THIS is where my life completely changed. THIS is where I met the most amazing person on the face of this Earth.The person who I love more than I can put into words. The woman who has stuck by me in my gaming addiction, weight gain, and crazy family problems.

A few weeks before I moved to Simi, I went to visit my mother to get a lay of the land. That is when I saw her. Her eyes were blue, her face fair, and her strawberry blonde hair so beautiful. I met the woman who would one day be my wife. I didn't realize it then of course but God had placed the most perfect person in front of my path through life. Until this point, I had felt unloved, unwanted, and unimportant. That all changed when I met Christy. Christy treated me as her knight in shining armor. She soaked up everything I said and did as if each was some kind of revelation. I felt important again. I felt like I could be something to someone other than a disappointment. She made me feel smart, attractive, MANLY. She loved me and she didn't even make it look like it was hard. Christy never uttered a word of criticism about the way I acted, even when I was a jerk. She just loved me.

I will sum up 2005-2011 and say, we got married, I dropped out of college, and we suffered MANY financial difficulties. Through it all, though, we held on to each other. We never turned on each other when things got tough. Instead, we took on life as a team, as a partnership of unwavering love and support for each other. When other young couples were failing, we were growing. When our families were falling apart, we were growing closer together.

In late 2011, I finally re affirmed Jesus into my life. Until then, I kept him at an arm's length as I did everyone else. Within 4 months he has broken me of my addiction to games, helped me get on track to being healthy (I have lost 10 pounds so far) and brought my wife and I closer together than I ever thought possible. On top of that, my mother has been clean for over a year, she is now sleeping on MY couch (irony), and is back on the praise team as well as directing the church choir.

My life has been completely transformed and I tribute God and my wife's eternal patience for it. Looking back, I see both good and bad but I know that God has brought me through it all. It took years of self loathing and hatred to get here but what matters is that I am here now. Even when I was living in sin, God saw fit to give me the gift of an incredible woman in my life. I will be forever grateful and I can't wait to see what the rest of my life holds in store.

My post on Tithing and Getting out of Debt
Quitting my Gaming Addiction