In today's episode of Unfiltered Stories, we have the privilege of hearing from Mari Neli as she generously shares her journey with us. Mari's story begins with being adopted into a family that placed overwhelming responsibilities on her young shoulders. Growing up on her adoptive family's farm, Mari faced the challenging expectations of laboring like an adult while still a child herself.
Join us as Mari openly shares the difficulties she endured, including neglect and a lack of proper nourishment, which profoundly impacted her formative years and wellbeing. At the tender age of 12, these hardships resulted in Mari being placed in a mental health facility. Mari's story sheds light on the vital importance of ensuring adopted children receive the love, care, support and protection they need to thrive. Her experiences serve as a powerful reminder of the lasting impact of childhood adversity and the need for greater awareness and resources to support adoptees and their families. Mari's resilience and courage in sharing her story offer a beacon of hope to others who have faced similar challenges.
#trauma #survivorstories #truecrime #survival #childhoodtrauma
Follow Mari on IG @marinelistory
Thank you for watching Unfiltered Stories! We offer a platform for our guests to speak openly about their life stories and journeys, shedding light on the challenges they faced and the resilience they've shown.
Our mission is to raise awareness about survivors by delving into their stories, exploring the impact of their experiences, and how they've managed to heal and rebuild their lives.
By sharing these stories, we aim to break the silence surrounding those challenging memories and create a compassionate environment.
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Join us as Mari openly shares the difficulties she endured, including neglect and a lack of proper nourishment, which profoundly impacted her formative years and wellbeing. At the tender age of 12, these hardships resulted in Mari being placed in a mental health facility. Mari's story sheds light on the vital importance of ensuring adopted children receive the love, care, support and protection they need to thrive. Her experiences serve as a powerful reminder of the lasting impact of childhood adversity and the need for greater awareness and resources to support adoptees and their families. Mari's resilience and courage in sharing her story offer a beacon of hope to others who have faced similar challenges.
#trauma #survivorstories #truecrime #survival #childhoodtrauma
Follow Mari on IG @marinelistory
Thank you for watching Unfiltered Stories! We offer a platform for our guests to speak openly about their life stories and journeys, shedding light on the challenges they faced and the resilience they've shown.
Our mission is to raise awareness about survivors by delving into their stories, exploring the impact of their experiences, and how they've managed to heal and rebuild their lives.
By sharing these stories, we aim to break the silence surrounding those challenging memories and create a compassionate environment.
🌅 FOLLOW US 🌅
Facebook âž® https://tinyurl.com/UnfilteredFB
Tiktok âž® https://tinyurl.com/UnfilteredTT
Snapchat âž® https://tinyurl.com/UnfilteredSN
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NewsTranscript
00:00My name is Marinelli. My story is about how I was adopted from Colombia.
00:05My father had a dream for me to have a better life in the United States.
00:10And the family that adopted us, that dream for him turned into a nightmare.
00:15My dad, from what I understand, that he was sick a lot.
00:18My mom, she had a last set of twins.
00:22And on the last set of twins, I don't know if it was right away or like a few months
00:25after, but she passed on.
00:27After she had passed, my biological father could not take us on anymore.
00:32It was due to his health that he could not take care of us.
00:35And so he had decided that the best thing that he could do for us was put us up for
00:40adoption.
00:41So I was two years old when I was put in the orphanage.
00:44No, I don't remember anything about it.
00:46I had two older sisters that were put in the orphanage with me.
00:50So from what I understand, as far as my adoption, I understood that we were put out on a radio
00:56station.
00:57And that's how this adopted family had heard about us.
01:00So they came from the United States.
01:02They went to Colombia to adopt us.
01:05And as far as I know, during that time, we got to remember this was back in the 70s.
01:12So a lot of the laws, as strict as they are now, I don't believe a lot of the laws
01:16back then.
01:17As a matter of fact, I know a lot of the laws back then were not as strict as they
01:20are now.
01:21So I'm not sure if it's because my adopted dad actually was able to pay his way into certain things
01:29not being done right for us to be adopted.
01:33Um, I'm not sure exactly what strings he pulled, but my adoption was not done correctly.
01:41The paperwork that we had come in on, it was done under one number, which is really unusual.
01:49There is no way that you can bring three children to the United States under one number.
01:53So from the time that I was two years old until about, I was, I believe I was about 11
01:59and a half years old.
02:00I went through hell with this family.
02:04Me and my sisters were used as child slavery.
02:08It was a huge farm.
02:10It wasn't your regular background, backyard type work.
02:16This was grown men's work.
02:19We would, um, chop wood.
02:22We would bale hay.
02:24We would dig trenches for pipes.
02:29We would carry buckets of gravel and sand.
02:33And we're talking the buckets and gravel sand from the river.
02:35So of course that was, it was wet and heavy.
02:38They did not feed us very well.
02:42It's just amazing that we even had the strength to be able to do this type of work.
02:47Some of the worst times that I remember working on the farm, I, for me personally, I believe I can
02:55remember back to about three years old.
02:57And from that time, I remember working like a grown man.
03:03And I remember like a lot of our clothes were bought from Goodwill.
03:08They were either too small or overly sized.
03:11We didn't have the proper gear really to be outside because where we were raised, we had all four seasons.
03:18So we were out, rain, sunshine, it didn't matter, snow.
03:22We were out there working.
03:24We had chickens.
03:25And so my sister, she would go and she would steal the eggs from the chickens.
03:31And she would go down to the pit, the fire pit that we had.
03:34And she would scramble us eggs really quick so that we could eat.
03:38But the fear was that they would smell the food being cooked.
03:41So she would do it so quickly and then we'd throw other stuff onto the fire just to make it
03:45smell different.
03:46They didn't like to see us having any type of fun or laughing or singing or, you know, anything like
03:54that.
03:55So for them, it was, they always had to have us in this bubble, like in this, it was just
04:03a constant turmoil, just constant, constant turmoil that we were living in.
04:09And I was about six years old when my adopted dad beat the dog.
04:13But now that's not the first time.
04:15He was a very angry, my adopted dad was very angry.
04:19So he would beat the animals.
04:21He beat a horse.
04:22He beat the dogs.
04:24There was a little poodle that we had and he would kick the poodle and he would throw it into
04:28the, literally throw it from the living room into the family room.
04:32And the dog would hit the ground.
04:34So much so that that dog could not hold its own feces.
04:38And that was my dog.
04:40Actually, I, that I, I took on that dog.
04:43Like I love that dog.
04:45And the one that he beat so badly, it was all because he was barking a lot.
04:51My adopted dad was so full of himself.
04:54He was such an evil, so arrogant.
04:57He was just, he was on top of the world and everybody was beneath him.
05:01So we went from the time that they would tell us to go out in the mornings, they would, they
05:06would get up, us up early in the mornings.
05:08And sometimes we would go without meals and they would tell us, go out and go work.
05:13They didn't care how long it was.
05:15They would leave us out there all day, whether it'd be rain, shine, sun, it didn't matter.
05:20We were to be out there until that task was completed.
05:24Every now and then, this adopted family that adopted us, they did have five children of their own.
05:30The rest of us though, the us adopted children were treated so different from their biological children.
05:40So every now and then, maybe I was rare.
05:44It's so rare that you would see them come out and do any type of work.
05:48Maybe every now and then they would dig a ditch or they would help feed cows or they would, but
05:55it was never consistent.
05:58Like we were, we were put into the, into a family room.
06:02There was a board that was put across from the family room into the living room.
06:07And we dare not to have crossed that.
06:11Basically that was our border.
06:13And if anytime we were hungry, if anytime we needed anything, if anytime we just wanted to speak to our
06:20adopted mom,
06:20we had to stand at that board and we had to yell until somebody responded.
06:25There was sometimes they would just blatantly ignore us and we would just be standing there yelling and yelling,
06:30or they would just laugh at us.
06:32If we were hungry, my adopted family, what they would do, they, they would think it was so funny.
06:37They would throw the food that they had from their meals.
06:41They would throw it into the family room.
06:43Um, and of course mine, that little dog that I told you that my adopted dad would throw into the
06:50family room.
06:50Um, she would run really quick to go get the food, but there are some times I would go and
06:56run down and just literally leap on the floor.
06:59And I would try to grab the scraps or if we didn't get any food, then she had dog food
07:05that they would put in a bowl.
07:06If we got hungry enough, we would pretend like the dog food tasted like peanut butter.
07:11Or we would say, Oh, this one tastes like cake or this one tastes like a cookie.
07:15So we never were, we never were told as to why we never were allowed in the other side of
07:22the house.
07:23Later, we were always told that we were just not part of the family.
07:27I was actually, I know I was probably around eight years old when I found out that we were adopted.
07:34And they, my adopted mom had said, I love you, but I love my natural kids better.
07:39I will never forget that.
07:41That hit in such a manner that when I say that, I still remember the way I looked at her
07:51and the way my adopted mom looked at me with the coldest, meanest, just cruelest eyes.
07:59And like, there was no, there was no feeling there.
08:02There was no feeling.
08:03So any of the stuff that they did to us, never was there an explanation.
08:09Never was there at the reasoning why they might've told us, Oh, today you did something like you didn't clean
08:18up the floor the right way.
08:19So we would get beatings while you didn't, uh, clean a sink or you didn't, uh, stack a pile of
08:27wood right outside.
08:28So we would get beatings.
08:30So that plywood was used as a border.
08:33We would go up to it and call for my adopted mom.
08:37And so they would just sit in the living room and just stare at us as we were calling, or
08:42they would just act like that we didn't even exist.
08:45It really scared us.
08:46We would literally pee our pants.
08:47So of course, when she would come out, she would see that we did that and that would be, we
08:54would get into a lot of trouble.
08:55We would get, she would beat us for doing that.
08:58Then that's where she would start calling us names and telling us that we were just messy.
09:02We were worthless.
09:03We were, why do, why, uh, why were we ever born?
09:08Why did we ever come?
09:09If they did allow us across that border, they would, it was for housework.
09:14So we would go in there, we would do dishes, um, after they ate.
09:20Okay.
09:21We didn't eat.
09:21They ate.
09:22After the mess that they made in the kitchen, we would have to go and we would have to clean
09:26it.
09:26And so we would be in there doing the dishes and we would find scraps in the garbage.
09:35And so sometimes whoever it was that was in there doing the dishes, they would stuff down their pants, the
09:41scraps, or one of the other things that, that they would do is they would put the food into the
09:46garbage and then the garbage would be thrown out into a bigger bin that was out by the shed.
09:51And then later we would go out there and go eat the food and we would eat it.
09:57There was times that my adopted family, they would leave for a little while.
10:02So what they did is they locked us into the family room.
10:05Well, again, we learned how to survive.
10:08And there was times that we were very hungry and we learned how to unlock the door.
10:14Now, my adopted mom, they had put this vase and the vase had a certain color ink in it.
10:22And so they would fill it up and they would put it on the other side of the door.
10:26So if you were to open up the door, the vase would fall and the liquid would come out.
10:32We, the first few times, we didn't catch the vase fast enough that the liquid would fall out.
10:40But we were, again, we were survivors.
10:43We knew that my adopted mom kept food coloring in a cupboard up in the kitchen.
10:50And so what we did is we learned how to make the color of the, the color of the, whatever
10:58she had put inside this vase.
11:00We learned how to make that color and we would fill it right back up.
11:03Because knowing that when they would come home, they would check that vase.
11:09Unfortunately, we were off sometimes by inches or sometimes by an inch.
11:14And they knew, they knew.
11:16So there was repercussion for that.
11:18And we would get beat.
11:19The type of beatings that we got, these were beatings that should have killed us.
11:23There was, um, I can tell you a few examples.
11:27My, I had gotten beat so bad one time that my leg, my right leg, literally I couldn't walk on
11:33it.
11:33And what, what, what, what my adopted dad did, I don't know.
11:38But he beat me bad enough to where I couldn't walk on it.
11:42And it was like that for the longest time.
11:44And even still today, now I have problems with my leg, but I have this limp.
11:48My sister, another, one of my older sisters, they would, one, one of the things that they liked to do
11:55was hit us underneath the chin until we turned black and blue underneath the chin.
11:59But that was my adopted mom who did that a lot.
12:01And I don't know why she would do that, but she would do it in our chins, like underneath here
12:05would swell.
12:07So when we go to bed at night, we would have a hard time swallowing.
12:11They beat one of my sisters so bad that she, she fainted.
12:15When she fainted, there was a chainsaw and it cut her right here on her chin.
12:21And still to this day, she has that scar.
12:25Another time, you know, they, they would have us bend up.
12:28My adopted dad, again, he was a, he was perverted.
12:31He was a very sick man.
12:33And they would have us pull down our pants and they would have us bend over and they would beat
12:37us with croquet sticks, with shovel handles, with whatever they could get their hands on.
12:43That's what we got beat with.
12:44And we are talking beatings to where you went to bed at night and you couldn't lay on your back.
12:50You couldn't sit on your rear end.
12:52We were bleeding, but yet we never, never did we seek any, they never seeked any medical care for us.
13:01They, we never went and saw a doctor.
13:03We healed, we healed on our own.
13:05We all have our own scars, but we did heal.
13:08So over time, as we got older, one of the things is that my adopted father, he did rape his
13:16own daughter.
13:18And so, but again, that was really never talked about with us until years later that they felt that somehow
13:26they needed to sit us down and tell us that he did something to his, to his older daughter.
13:32And that he would never do anything like that to us, um, what that point was, I'm not sure.
13:38But either way, we saw her, she started running away.
13:43And so, of course, little by little, my other sister started following what she was doing because then they started
13:50realizing that the things that happened to us was not, was not right.
13:56Things that were happening were not right.
13:57And so when my sister started running away, police did start getting involved.
14:03They did come to our house.
14:04There was a few times when if my, if the police came to the house, my adopted mom would tell
14:10us, go downstairs or go, go, go get in a room or, you know, she wouldn't ever really allow them
14:16to speak with us.
14:18So, when my two older sisters finally ran away and they both succeeded, when I believe both of them went
14:27into foster care, but it was a very short amount of time, I started following the same thing.
14:33One of the public schools that we went to, I had a really hard time in school and, um, I
14:39would cheat.
14:39And so my adopted mom found out about that.
14:42And so I knew that if I went home that I was going to get into a lot of trouble.
14:47So I didn't go home.
14:48What I did is I snuck onto a bus that wasn't working in the school and I snuck on that
14:54bus and I laid low in the bus and I hid there for a day and a half.
15:01I hid in that bus.
15:03And then what I did is I snuck out of the bus.
15:06I went around to the school and I started looking for open windows where I found this screen.
15:11And so I popped off the screen and I crawled through the window and I found a phone.
15:16Well, there was one girl that would always befriend me and she, for some reason, she had given me her
15:23phone number like a couple of weeks before she'd given me her phone number.
15:26And she had told me, if you ever need anything, give me a call.
15:29I held onto that number.
15:31I was able to call her, her and her dad came out and they met me at the school and
15:36they took me to their house.
15:40And I stayed with them for a few days.
15:42But again, my, her dad didn't want to get into trouble with the law and he knew the right thing
15:47he had to do.
15:48He had to call the cops.
15:50And so he did.
15:51He told me, he said, we're having to call the cops.
15:54You know, your parents will be here to get you.
15:56And I told him, I said, I do not want to go back.
15:59And that's when I started telling him everything that was going on.
16:02The cops showed up.
16:04They separated me from my adopted parents.
16:07And when they looked at my body, they saw bruises, old bruises, new bruises.
16:12They saw scars.
16:14They went back and forth.
16:16I don't remember exactly how long I was sitting.
16:19I was sitting in the bathroom.
16:21They were in the kitchen and they had come earlier.
16:23So it was already in the middle of the night.
16:25So it took them a while to kind of go back and forth and talk about what they were going
16:28to do.
16:29And finally, they took me to foster care.
16:32So I was 11 and a half when I went into foster care.
16:35The first night that I went there, I just remember laying in bed and it was dark.
16:41I was in a room with other girls.
16:43And the next day when I got up, I didn't know what to do.
16:47Mind you, I had never been shown.
16:50I never even took a shower when I was in the adopted home.
16:54They didn't show us how to take showers.
16:56So when I got into foster care, that was something that the foster children had to show me.
17:03They had to show me how to use soap for a proper way, shampoo, how to turn on the shower.
17:12But you know what?
17:14I thought I was a cool kid.
17:16Like I felt really cool doing this stuff because I could do stuff that other people were doing.
17:22So I felt cool.
17:23So this is kind of where the abuse ends.
17:25But then that's where my life started going a different direction.
17:29And certain things happened that I started going into.
17:33I got what I did is I thought it was funny that I would threaten to kill myself.
17:38At that time, I didn't realize what I was doing.
17:40I thought it was just funny.
17:42I would scare people.
17:43That's what I thought was, you know, I would be like, you know, and I think it was a coping
17:47mechanism.
17:49Later, I learned it was a coping mechanism.
17:51But at that time, I didn't realize why I like to try to scare people.
17:55And so I had a knife in my hand.
17:57And one of the foster kids were sitting there eating her cereal.
18:01And I told her, I said, and but I said it in a way that was really demonic.
18:06I mean, I told her, I said, yeah, you want to see what I can do?
18:10I'm going to cut myself.
18:11And I thought it was funny.
18:12And so what I did is I cut my finger.
18:14And you know what?
18:15When I did that, this is going to sound awful, but it felt relieving.
18:22That pain felt relieving.
18:23And I think that's what led me into cutting myself.
18:26And I would take erasers later.
18:29And I would like scratch on my arms.
18:32And I would do all this stuff that it was a way of me bringing out everything that I had
18:41been through.
18:41But I didn't know that at the time.
18:43I didn't know.
18:43I thought I was just crazy.
18:45So at first, it's self-harming.
18:47It started off as a joke.
18:49And then eventually, though, that did turn into some serious, I started making some deep cuts on myself to the
18:55point.
18:56And then later, I got into where I really did want to kill myself.
19:00And that's when, but that part came when I was put into the mental institution.
19:05So when I was 12 years old, I went into the mental institution.
19:08And I was in there until I was 14 years old.
19:12And during that time in that mental institution, that was crazy.
19:16I literally did go crazy.
19:19It's something that they use to calm down a person that's having mental breakdowns and all that.
19:25And I actually, I would attack grown men.
19:29I would go after anybody that tried.
19:32They would tell me, Madi, you know, we're just trying to help you.
19:37We're just trying, we want to talk to you.
19:39And I was so, oh, I was so defiant.
19:43I hated people.
19:44I hated adults.
19:46I had no respect.
19:47It was nothing for me to live for anymore.
19:50And I felt like I was crazy.
19:54So after I got out of the mental institution, I got in, I joined the wrong crowd.
20:00I got into, I became a teen mom at the age of 15.
20:04So when I had my son, I was very messed up.
20:10I mean, I was basically in and out.
20:12I was, um, I was, my lifestyle was not, it was wild.
20:17It was very wild.
20:19But the one thing I did know is that I couldn't handle him and I had no idea what to
20:24do.
20:25And so my aunt and my uncle, and so then they came down, they got me and they helped me
20:31with,
20:32to get him into the right adoption agency.
20:34And so he was adopted when he was two months old.
20:37After that, then, uh, by the time I turned almost 18, 18 years old, I had another kid
20:46and my daughter, I told myself I would not give up my, my daughter.
20:52And I told myself I would raise her.
20:54And I did.
20:55I raised her with plenty of mistakes.
20:57I've made plenty of mistakes, but I would say probably about when I was finally 19 years
21:03old is when I met this person and my husband now.
21:06And, um, I met him, uh, he was in the military at the time, but then again, all those years
21:14of everything that I had gone through that was carried into our marriage.
21:17So after I met my husband, um, I need personally, I became very abusive.
21:23I, but I didn't realize every, all the baggage that I carried into my marriage.
21:28And a lot of it did show up until probably about a year after me and my husband now that,
21:33um, that we, that I even realized all this stuff was coming into our marriage and he put
21:38it up with it for about five years.
21:40I became physically, verbally abusive.
21:43Uh, I cut him one time on his arm.
21:46He was so mad.
21:48He didn't go to the hospital.
21:49Now he was a military man and he, he sold himself.
21:53I had a choice.
21:54Either I was going to go and continue being the same person that I got away from, or I
22:01was going to turn myself around and I was going to be a better person.
22:04And that's exactly what I did.
22:06The only thing I can sit here and tell you is please take it one day at a time.
22:10Take it one moment at a time.
22:12Don't be so hard on yourself.
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