If you are new to this blog, you may want to read the posts “In a Nutshell” or go to July 2012 and read “Sending out a Letter.” My daughter Emma Katherine Roey lied about a friend being raped and attempting suicide, claimed to have been molested by a priest, and then accused her mother of physically abusing her and poisoning her with DDT. Emma claims to still have health problems because of this “poisoning.” As long as Emma continues with the lies, I will tell her story. Love and thanks to all of you who read and have written to me, Emma’s mom.

Emma got the lead in her school’s production of Metamorphoses when she attended Jackson County Comprehensive High School. When they performed the play in a competition and lost, Emma lied about why they lost, and this was confirmed to my by her Drama Teacher, Bonnie Roberts. (I will later share more about Emma’s experience with the Drama Department at both JCCHS and Jefferson High School, but it’s too long to go into tonight. I just wanted to share this picture because of Emma’s gift for acting. She had the lead in the play, and then went on to play the roll of a victim of sexual abuse and then of child abuse, followed by the roll of girlfriend and the roll of bride-to-be! Quite a lot of drama for one young life!
I really wanted to add this post to the previous post about Emma and her boyfriend, Bud, and I will, but I first wanted to post my thoughts before I do go back and add it, so that my loyal readers don’t have to go back and wade through a post they’ve already read, just to get to one little section that I’ve added.
For some reason, when I got the e-mail from Emma, this line really stuck in my head:
“Oh, and stalking my boyfriend and his family until THEY dumped me?”
I find that this line in Emma’s letter to me, after Bud broke up with her, speaks volumes. VOLUMES. If you think back to being 19 or 20 and having a boyfriend, most of us would agree that we were into the relationship with the boyfriend/girlfriend, and while most of us might have met our boyfriend’s parents, depending on if they lived nearby, we were not at all into making them our family. Most 19 year olds are more into the moment. Why was Emma trying to create an instant family? She was telling people she was engaged when she was not. She was telling people she and Bud were going to go ahead and get married, and she even asked one of her dad’s friends to give her away.
Phill won’t discuss Emma with me, won’t discuss the lies she’s told, and can’t even explain to me why she accused me of poisoning her with DDT, so I have to come to my own conclusions based on what other people have told me about Emma. Emma got rid of her mom and replaced her with Sandra Brooks McCravy. She had her dad wrapped around her little finger and he would do pretty much whatever she wanted, letting her get her driver’s license when he originally said she could not get it until she was 18. (With mom out of the house, and Dad on the road much of the week, Phill couldn’t keep asking the neighbors to drive Emma to school, and God forbid she be put in Jackson County Comprehensive High School and ride the bus.) He got her a car and replaced it twice after she wrecked and totaled two cars. He let her take off and move to Ohio, without every meeting the family Emma was moving in with. I am assuming Emma was asking someone else to give her away because they were not close enough to the situation to know that Emma was lying about getting married to Bud. She couldn’t ask her dad to give her away because he (hopefully) would have asked some questions like maybe, “When is the wedding?” There was no wedding. Emma was just creating more drama for herself. Now she could star as the bride in her imaginary new life, a new role, and a change for her after playing a victim for so long. Once again, though, she had the lead.
Why was Emma so eager to create a new family? Phill and I always joked about what a boring life we had. Emma’s dad went to work and took care of his family. Emma’s mom stayed home and took care of things at home until later taking a very part time little job with a school program. We didn’t do a lot of exciting things. We didn’t take a lot of trips. We were careful with money and trying to save for Emma’s college and for retirement. We did all the responsible things. We bought our house knowing I would probably stay home with Emma, so we didn’t buy a house that would require two incomes to pay for. We were involved in our church and especially involved in Emma’s youth group. We weren’t youth leaders or anything like that, but we were always available to help with activities or to drive the kids on youth group outings. Since the youth group was Emma’s main social activity and was very important to her; it was important to us.
Phill and I weren’t bad parents, just boring. We were both introverted and were always happy to have quiet evenings at home rather than nights out. When we went out, it was usually for Emma. Emma got to go to plenty of movies, plays, the Fox Theater in Atlanta, trips to the beach, etc. She was not neglected, but overall, Phill and I were homebodies.
A couple of things we did have was a lot of love and laughter. Phill couldn’t tell a joke to save his life. He would mess up every punchline, but he was just funny. He could make the simplest things funny, and we both liked puns. It seems like we rarely had a day without a lot of laughter in it. Emma, with her high IQ, seemed to have a pretty good sense of humor too, although, being a teen, she could be oversensitive to some of our silly jokes, sometimes taking things too personally. I remember seeing an IKEA (Phill loved IKEA.) commercial where a teenager was screaming at his parents, “You ruined my life!” and thought it was hilarious. Any parent with a sometimes sulky teen would understand that commercial. Emma often hovered around me at church when I was talking to other adults. I was never quite sure if it was more to know what her mother talking about, making sure I wasn’t talking about her, or if it was just because she liked to think of herself as fitting in more with the adults. She went to her youth group meetings, and was very involved in that, but the rest of the time, she was frequently at my side, especially during coffee hour in the parish hall when I’d have a chance to visit and catch up with folks. One day, I was talking to a friend, and I don’t know how we got to talking about kids or commercials or whatever, but I asked her if she’d seen the IKEA commercial, and she hadn’t so I told her about it. She thought it sounded funny and we laughed about it, and she said she wanted to see it. When we got in the car to leave church, Emma was furious at me for talking about that commercial. I guess Emma thought I was comparing it to her, but I wasn’t even talking about Emma. I tried to explain to her that it had nothing to do with Emma, and that this woman and I were just talking, but Emma decided I was making fun of her by mentioning this commercial to someone else. I thought she was being silly, but I am just the mom, so what do I know?
Ok, I’ve gotten a little off topic, and I will be writing a lot more about Emma’s background, but for now…..¬¬back to Emma and her NEW family. Why did Emma need to create a new family? She had parents, just not the parents she wanted. We were not cool or wealthy. There was some jealousy because I was more popular at Emma’s arts program than Emma was. Her friends enjoyed my classes, but to Emma I was an embarrassment. I was (horrors) her mom!
I find it interesting that Emma said that Bud’s family broke up with her. She didn’t say that Bud broke up with her. She accused me of stalking Bud’s family and said “THEY” broke up with her. I wonder if our esteemed therapists and psychologists, Dr. Genie Burnett (Manna Treatment, Duluth, Ga.), Suzie McGarvey (formerly with Lanier Counseling, Buford, Ga. and now with North Gwinnett Counseling Associates, Dr. Richard Born (Applied Psychological Health) and the many therapists at the Social Empowerment Center, Lawrenceville, Ga. who all saw and treated Emma could shed some light on Emma’s thought process here. Was Emma’s family not good enough for her. I know we live in a throw-away society, and I’ve met many parents who’ve been through similar situations. Is it just part of the gimme generation? I don’t know that I will ever know the answers.
Tired tonight after a long day, so forgive me if this isn’t my best writing. I will work on it and edit it later. I just needed to get it written down.
Coming up next, I want to introduce you to “Lacey,” Emma’s pen-pal who was the catalyst to Emma’s abuse claim.
















