Danny died. There’s more to it than a long, heart-wrenching 17-year battle with addiction and CPTSD. But for now, he’s gone in a shitty, fucked up way. I tend to take death easier, and lately, there’s been a lot of it in the recovery community. I was not even sad, and I thought I was okay after getting the news. I called his mom immediately because I know how fast word travels on social media. She answered the phone and said, “You know it makes me nervous when you call me outta the blue like this, Forrest.”

Danny’s death was no surprise, although he was only 33 years old, and we had high hopes for a different outcome. The rotating door of addiction recovery inevitably slams closed for the lost souls that traverse it indefinitely.

I felt nothing when I got the call and nothing as I relayed the news to his mother—nothing as I set up to tattoo that day. Then a friend stopped by, asked how I was doing, and gave me a hug. I cried for about 15 seconds and then felt nothing again. Later that day, I felt pure, white-hot rage because I could not remember where I had set my cup of coffee. Okay, Forrest, sit down, breathe, and acknowledge the absence of grief while the broken parts manifest as anger. Breathe through it and move on.

The week passed, and in my friend group, we passed around the usual condolences, sadness, and irritation at the waste of another life during this fentanyl epidemic. I met with friends, exchanged stories, and heard from old friends, the usual. This morning I awoke tired and groggy. I’m not sure if the extra exhaustion is from Danny’s death, the additional tattooing, or the book stuff. I’ve been sleeping about 12 hours a day for the last three days…

As I stumbled into my morning routine, I noticed a brand-new t-shirt set out on my dresser. I’m particular about black t-shirts with cool art prints. I didn’t even stop to think about where it came from. I just grabbed it along with boxers, socks, and pants on the way to the shower.

I live with two females, and we have one bathroom in our little beach house. I glanced in the mirror and saw that I was looking kind of fuzzy with 4 or 5 days of bristle, so I decided to shave, which I do in the shower. I looked around and couldn’t find my razor refills. The dollhouse insanity of female accessories covers every bathroom surface, but my razor refills were not around. Fuck.

I got in the shower with a rusty razor, looked for my shaving cream, and it was gone too. I shaved with body wash, got out of the shower, and noticed the empty toilet paper roll on the counter. I looked in the cabinet for the bag of tp rolls, and there was none. Fuck.

I dried off and got dressed. I had precisely 26 minutes to get ready for work. I approached the kitchen, and the sink was piled over with dishes, attracting flies. As I poured my coffee, I noticed crumbs all over the counter and table. I went for the paper towels, and guess what? The cardboard tube was still on the dispenser, but no paper towels. I looked above the fridge to refill it, but no dice. As I scooped crumbs off the table with my hand and went to dump them in the trash, I noticed the wastebasket was overflowing. Fuck.

The heat was rising off the back of my neck now.

Don’t get me wrong, we all have our chores. I pay a housekeeper to come once a week, and I pay all the bills. I clean up. I’m not averse to housecleaning duties. Our family meets and discusses what our particular chores are. And I don’t mind picking up the slack wherever I can. But today, I didn’t have the time, and I felt unusually angry and resentful. Usually, it’s not such a big deal, but that anger has been rearing up these last few days. Probably that grief.

I sat down to breathe again. I love my family deeply. It can be challenging to be kind to the ones close to us. I am well aware of the damage caused when we don’t practice kindness with our immediate family. It’s easy to practice compassion and patience with people we see once a week or so. I stated aloud, “I love my family, I love my life, I appreciate the beauty and richness that my partner and daughter bring to my life.” I looked down at my shirt. I laughed at myself. I was wasting my day being angry about the state of the house, not even acknowledging the surprise gift that was waiting for me first thing in the morning. How sweet, kind, and thoughtful was it for her to get me that shirt? I had been so focused on what was wrong that I almost entirely missed what was kind and caring. I almost missed the gift.

I smiled and acknowledged the feeling of gratitude for the love that my partner and daughter bring to my life every day. Then I carried on with my day. Humbled, more present, and able to enjoy the day.

Rejection and abandonment are my Achilles heel. For me, those are even worse than not feeling believed. Feeling irrelevant is the big one. The way I felt all those years ago.

Some parts of the kid in me are still wounded and angry. He cries out, “THEY DID THOSE THINGS TO ME; THEY GOT AWAY WITH IT. THEY STOLE MY INNOCENCE AND CHILDHOOD, RAPED ME, AND ROBBED ME OF YEARS OF MY LIFE. THE FUCKING YEARS, THE SUFFERING, THE DAMAGE.”

As the inner child yells, the inner critic still yaps its ugly words. “It’s not that they don’t believe you, bro. It’s just that they don’t care. You don’t matter. No one gives a shit.” While writing and putting in the hard work and money to publish Angel Blue, this voice has had a big party in my head. The most evil lies typically have a hint of truth.

The big machine of the publishing industry gives zero fucks about my story. They care about projections and dollars, platforms, and notoriety. This rejection was brutal for me to navigate while figuring out the new territory of storytelling through a memoir. I am in a consistent practice of not throwing a tantrum at every corner.

I fear that the people helping me, even those I paid, will abandon the project without finishing it. I suspect that the manifestation of this underlying fear in our interactions makes their work slightly more difficult. Writing about all those bad things inflamed all the insecurity and psychosis I have struggled with for my entire adult life. And that’s ok. I get to have compassion for myself while I do this project.

I recently began reaching out to organizations that support veterans and sexual assault survivors to ask for help spreading the word about my story. The inner critic whispers, “They only want to help other survivors, not you, not someone who worked the last four years and faced all that shit and worked and worked. You don’t count, buddy boy.”

I can analytically dissect those thoughts. Maybe they don’t help authors. Perhaps they’re busy. Possibly it’s against their business model, etc. I have kept so consumed with giving all to this project that I am probably just tired. But it’s not over yet, not time to rest yet.

I don’t have a mentor to look to who did what I did the way I did. I am in personally uncharted territory. I watched a documentary called I’ll Be Gone in the Dark about a woman named Michelle McNamara, whose book about the golden state killer was instrumental in his eventual capture. The story was very personal to her, as she had crossed paths with the killer as a child. She accidentally overdosed and died in the process of writing that book. I do not intend to let this project kill me, but I understand how that happened.

Developing and maintaining momentum has been a constant struggle, and I am not yet completely exhausted, but I am close. Before I edited this document, I took a time out and meditated for 20 minutes. Little reliefs, little steps. Almost there.

I will not quit. I will never surrender, never back down. I am stubborn like that. I love you.

Every year on April 17 at 11:55 PM, I light candles at the corner of Utah and University. (Except 04 when I was in Iraq. Big Forrest, rest in peace lit them for me that year). The first few times were horrific. Just going to that place sparked all the horror. I ran from that place for years. I ran to Los Angeles, and I ran to Iraq, and I ran to Arizona. Still, life kept pulling me back to the neighborhood, that corner. 

I hated myself for the accident. I couldn’t understand how I had done something so stupid. Everyone knows you’re not supposed to play with guns, right? I beat myself up for years. Every day. How can I deserve to live when I had taken a life that was so beautiful? 

And really, not just because he’s gone. Everyone who knew Thomas will tell you that he had an impact. One of my friends called him a spiritual dentist. He was the first man I ever met in recovery that was willing to talk about being molested as a child. Thomas saved my life.

Nothing was the same after the night of April 17, 2001. It’s still not the same. I will never be the same. 

It took me years to figure out what forgiveness is. People told me to forgive, but I didn’t even know what it meant. When I had the realization, man, that was something. 

Forgiveness is clearing resentment and abandoning revenge. 

Nothing.

Fucking.

Else. 

We can equate discontinuing punishment to entering a room. Sometimes we leave that room without knowing it. But as I grow further in recovery, I spend more time in forgiveness. I have forgiven myself: I still forgive myself. And I don’t need anyone else to forgive me anymore for the accident. But I still go every year to light candles on the anniversary. 

It will be 20 candles tonight, one for each year. I will make the short trip to the spot. It is like I am not even moving my body; it is just autopilot when I go. I will sit, either surrounded by friends or not, and light those candles. I will tell Thomas about my year. I will sit as long as I need to and feel whatever I need to feel. And there is no more punishment. I have paid my dues. And grief remains. Only those who have accidentally taken a life know how it feels. 

If I sit and take stock, life is good. I have very much to be grateful for. I appreciate my life. I’m ready to die when it’s time. I will continue to do my work. All of this is possible while in the hallway of grief. I enter it tonight, and I will remember Thomas. I will go to the place where he died and light those candles. As long as there is breath in my lungs, he will not be forgotten. Not because I owe him, but because I want to. Not because I owe anyone else, but because I still feel grief, and I honor that grief

The last time I stepped out of that foster home, I was 16 years old. Two years later, I found a home in the barracks at the Navy’s Recruit Training Command, Great Lakes, Illinois. I put that uniform on, learned the language, and drank to forget.

The human subconscious is mostly formed by the time we are eight years old and makes 85-95 percent of our decisions. After I got sober, I spent my time building a good life, seeking recovery, and failing forward, but I began to suspect that a dark curse was placed over my life because I kept ending up in bad situations.

On April 17, 2014, I began writing what I could remember on the notes in my iPhone during 12-step meetings, putting the pieces together. I felt safe in those meetings, surrounded by people who acted out of love for the most part.

I kept them on my phone for years without showing anyone. In 2017 I participated in Ascension Leadership academy, a variant of the Landmark program. I showed the notes to my buddy. He suggested that if I ever write this book, I start it with Thomas’ death because no one gives a shit that I was born May 24, 1977. His advice made sense to me.

Life was beginning to get good, and I had wanted to wait to write a book until I was fully stable and felt that I had something worthwhile to say. I continued to practice all the tools I learned in PTSD treatment, 12 step and personal growth work. My daughter was in junior high, Kristin was happy, and I had a successful tattooing career. Should I leave my story behind and just enjoy life?

But it nagged at me, all those suicidal men in the PTSD program for combat vets. The stuff they shared. They also had been molested, beaten, neglected, and abused as children. How could I not share with them how I got to the good life?

I had not left the US save a couple of trips to Mexico since Iraq. I was happy to live out the rest of my days at home. The boys in my club from Iceland kept inviting me to come out in the summer. Iceland is one of the most peaceful places in the world. I just want peace. I decided to give it a go and try traveling.

I couldn’t find the original copy of my birth certificate to get a passport. I called New York’s health dept they sent me to a company that took over. The letter I received from Vitalcheck informed me that there was no record of a Forrest Lang. I called and asked for a supervisor. How the fuck do they not have my birth certificate? Two bosses later, the lady asked, “Does the name Pritchard mean anything to you?”

Instantly I remembered all of it. That my brother, who was three years older than me, molested me from as young as I can remember until I was ten years old, that we ate out of dumpsters, the beatings, poverty, religious abuse and cruelty. That my mom abandoned me. My foster mom molested me when I was only 12 years old, and she stole my innocence and my childhood. She adopted so Child and Family Services (CFS) would not check up on me anymore. Then she tried to kill me when I was 16, and I ran away and lived on the streets.

I remembered in such vivid detail that I began screaming, at the lady from VitalCheck, “That’s not my name! That’s not my fucking name!” I pulled over and screamed that my name is Forrest Lang until long after the lady hung up.
The next day I began writing Angel Blue on my Ipad.

I met Gregg Foster, and he looked at the first chapter. I had struggled to make it perfect and he said, “just get it all out, all of it. Don’t worry about spelling or grammar. Just get it out, bro. I will help you.” And then I poured it all out, typing on the screen of my iPad. Gregg strung all the parts together for me, kind through my pain and irritation. Writing Angel Blue was so painful that I emailed every version to a trusted friend. That way, it could not be lost. I also made her promise to publish it if I died in the process of writing.

The voices screamed at me when I was tired, “What the fuck makes you think that anyone cares what you have to say? You ain’t no millionaire, you’re a loser, a fuckup, a pathetic excuse for a man. You fucked up everything in your life, now you have had a couple of good years, and you think anyone gives a shit about what you gotta say? Fucking piece of shit, you are worthless, shut the fuck up, no one gives a shit. No one would believe you anyways. Don’t you remember that counselor in the Navy at the spiritual growth retreat? You opened up then, and she didn’t believe you. What makes you think if anyone even wants to waste their time reading your story, that they would believe you? You gotta lotta nerve, bro.”

By this time, I had a new weapon. Declaration, the spoken word. More powerful than those voices in my head. I used the fuck out of it. Shouting back, out loud, at those voices when necessary. I kept writing.

One night I was tattooing. I kept the door unlocked with the sign flipped to closed. That way, my friends could come in, and strangers would assume the shop was closed. I heard the door open, and after a few seconds, I looked up, expecting a familiar face. This big man was not familiar to me. I was like, oh, shit, one of the crazies off El Cajon Blvd is in my space. I might have to toss this dude out the door. I go, “What the fuck do you want?” He squinted at me, “Hey, sorry to bother you, man, was wondering if you could fix this for me. He pulled up his sleeve, showing me a faded first tanks tattoo, that blue diamond. “Fuck yeah, devil dog, I got you. Have a seat.

I finished my tattoo, and Nick Popaditch aka Gunny Pop sat down in my chair. I feel at home with Marines, so I shared what I was doing, my fears, and my intentions with him.

After his tattoo, he said, “Why don’t you let me take a look and what you wrote?” Out came a magnifying glass. You see, Gunny Pop, Speaker and author of Once a Marine, was hit in the head with a rocket-propelled grenade at Fallujah. Gunny Pop is a silver star recipient, a bulldog of a man, and an outstanding Marine. He has a tough time seeing at night, so he couldn’t tell the shop was closed.

“Doc, this is good. This is really good!” Gunny Pop signed me up for Focus Marines Foundation, a personal development course for Marines and Corpsmen that is goal-based. I attended and got the refresher I needed along with the motivation and encouragement to keep going. To set the bar high and move through the fear of failure. I broke two keyboards pouring out all those words.

A year in, I felt done enough to start querying literary agents. The few that responded did so with words like “not interested.” Rejection after rejection. I realized that I needed a good editor. Thomas Fitzsimmons, a successful author, began mentoring me and sent me to his editor, John Paine, who did wonders for Angel Blue.

One agent was kind enough to explain the rejections to me. I had no social media following other than my tattoo page and Facebook friends. No one really knew me, and my writing style is nothing special.

I mean, damn, I thought Oprah Winfrey was gonna show up in a golden chariot with a team of literary and press agents and thank me for all my hard work. “We’ll take it from here, son.”

I went through the manuscript one more time, taking everything I learned thus far and applying it to my writing. I worked hard on social media. Reluctantly, I started an Instagram page for Angel Blue. Believe you me, I learned more about human nature and how to handle rejection and cruelty from that page. I also found that the majority of human beings are good.

I felt silly because I thought that social media was for kids to post selfies and funny pictures, but I ended up making some beautiful friendships because of it. Like Lil, who was hit by a car when she was five and was supposed to die, but she proved them wrong and is my hero. Lisa, whose brother suffered from the after-effects of childhood sexual assault. He took his own life one April day. Lisa has an organization named for him, Sean’s Dream. And many more people shared with me their heart-wrenching stories of childhood trauma. We are not alone.

One day, rushing out the door, computer, calendar, and iPad under my arm and a bag of laundry over my shoulder, I tripped on the doggy gate and fell forward at a high rate of speed. I crashed through the glass porch window, breaking my arm and tearing my labrum and rotator cuff. Shit, I didn’t have time for a broken arm or opiates. I must stay aware to finish my assignment. I healed with water, Motrin, Tylenol, and plenty of clean socks. Literary agents rejected me one by one. I needed to move forward and begin the long process of doing it myself, but I was mentally, physically, and spiritually exhausted. I decided it was time to go back to the ayahuasca ceremony, ten years after the last time. I needed rest. Ayahuaska is an ancient healing medicine, sometimes called “the vine of souls” that is used to offer a glimpse into the spirit world.

I drove up. The sun was setting as I made my way to the sacred space. The first night the lights and shapes were too bright. I wanted to rest, but the mother ayahuaska had some things to teach me. A man sang over my broken arm the second night, put your shield down, and let them love you. Broken arm broken shield. The whole collective of humanity, all of the souls, rose before me that night, fierce, towering above me. “Who are you to speak to us?” I responded, “I am me. You can squish me if you want. But I am telling my story.” The collective dispersed like falling glowing Legos. And then I rested—deep rest, relaxation, like the sleep after an 18-mile hump with full gear.

An Iranian man who lost his son to suicide gave me a fatherly hug as I sat up. “I am proud of you, my son.”

Covid hit, and I decided that even if there was a nuclear war, if I survived, I would finish this fucking book. My therapist intoned that she did not believe me right in the middle of the pandemic. I had a mild breakdown. I called someone from every period of my life, making sure I was not a crazy person making all of this up. My company first sergeant was pissed at the therapist. Okay, it did happen and it really was that bad.

Thus far, I have been encouraged and lifted up by grassroots support. Because it is not my story. Angel Blue is our story, and I am merely a character in it. The big-time people so far have not given a shit. But most of us are not big-time; most of us are grassroots. And so far, people connect with Angel Blue.

After a year and a half of rejections by literary agents, I decided to self-publish.

I hired a cooboration lawyer for errors and omissions. They help us tell a story responsibly; you know how sue-happy people can be. I thought they would get my records from CFS for me, once again, dream on.

I was working doing tattoos, being a dad and a partner, and meeting all my other obligations, and now this. I contacted CFS, and they told me they had no record of me. I focused and gave it my all. The juvenile division said my records were destroyed. The police department, records destroyed. No one had records…

A supervisor at CFS said there were no records but encouraged me to keep moving up the chain. I called the city council, and they connected me with an angel. She drove to a storage warehouse and found a dusty box of records with my name on it, marked “destroy by 1999.” The policy is to throw the foster children away and then, seven years later, throw away any record of them. She went through the big box of papers, redacted the legally protected information, and organized my history. We shed some tears when she sent them to me. I exist. It really was that bad, and now I have proof. I told her, “Thank you so much. I have been shaken and don’t even have an original birth certificate.” Her voice cracked, “Well, you have it now, son.”

Social media is now blowing up. It is happening. A reporter for the UK paper, Inews, did an article about my TikTok account. I found Jeffery Machado, the perfect voice actor, to read the audiobook. J.Michael has been mentoring me and marketing and doing all that stuff I don’t know how to do. And here we are, less than two months away from publishing. I am tired, ready for this 4-year patrol, the longest patrol, to be over.

I’m ready to come home.

“You need to move on. Man up. Fake. Everyone is a victim of something. What were you wearing?” These are some of the comments on my social media pages dedicated to raising awareness about childhood sexual assault. “Stop crying already.” Sprinkled among the mostly loving support and affirmations from other survivors are ignorance, apathy, hate, and sometimes pure evil.

At first, I was nervous about sharing online. I know how shitty people can be on the internet. My heart raced, and I got angry at the strangers’ ugly words. I breathed through it, and I wondered, who are these people who troll and act like that online? Cyberbullying is nothing new and has been commonplace since Bill Clinton called Monica Lewinski “that woman.” I even have a few friends that are not very nice on the internet. I’ve come across them in forums, perhaps giving them a call to see if they are okay. But I digress.

Most trolls online are private accounts with a few followers and no profile picture. And most are men, easy to tell by the language. “Did it hurt when he went in?” I usually ignore them and block the few dedicated pedo trolls that make new accounts simply to stalk mine(and I imagine a few other creators). “And you waited 50 years to cry about it on social media?” But the ones that are the most interesting to me are not over the edge, and the person is not what I would consider a troll. These have their faces showing, sometimes with good intentions, sometimes not.

People say shitty things on the internet, and I leaned hard into my reactions and responses. Why did they have so much power over me? Could it be that I am reading their words in my inner voice? Does that create a more powerful message? Could I turn that around and use it for good?

Who are these trolls? Kind of like, who keyed my car? I find it infuriating to feel attacked without a way to defend myself. “You don’t win a prize for being molested. It happens to women all the time.” And the well-meaning folks who point out the positive aspects of getting raped, beaten, and tortured as a child. “Well, what doesn’t kill you makes you stronger,” and “God gave you that battle because He knew what a strong warrior you are.”

People say shitty things on the internet, and I was fully aware of this before I began to create an online presence. But after a while, it all starts to sound the same. And affect me less because I am used to it, and it does not reflect what I believe about myself. And it’s not that I don’t care what other people think. There are many people in my life who I care greatly about what they believe. I am beginning to care less and less about what the people who say ugly things on the internet think. Because it is such a small-minded thing to do, and, honestly, I could give a rats ass about what narrow-minded people think.

For real. I reflect positivity more and more; therefore, it is what I absorb more and more. Life is good.

If you like this story please share this with your friends.

In Loving Service,
Forrest Lang