Raised by her immigrant Iranian father after abandonment by her stripper mother, "The Snake", Jessica shunned trauma and embraced resilience. An Iranian dad (baba) trying to adjust to life in the United States and make a living at Good Guys strip club in Washington D.C. An American mother called “The Snake” who stripped for a living at the same club and later abandoned her husband and young daughters to follow a famous Christmas crooner. The ingredients of a perfect and predictable storm for their daughters, who were simply trying to understand, survive, and exist in a confusing and chaotic 1970s world. Despite the expected and predictable outcome for many who grow up in chaotic, trauma-filled homes, author Jessica Nicely defi ed the odds by graduating from university, representing Arizona in the Miss USA pageant, and helping hundreds of abused children through important volunteer work and her own nonprofi t organization, Winged Hope, to help abused and neglected kids. One word describes Jessica Nicely—resilience. Jessica doesn’t take the much-repeated stance of blame and victimhood in her childhood story. She instead weaves the complicated existence of love from and for her father, who happens to be the cause of her trauma-filled childhood. Her story takes us through violent shootings, physical abuse, frequent visits from law enforcement, and a killer in the basement to teachers who understood but responded only minimally to her situation. We long to protect her and cheer as her grandmother cares for her and her friends’ families demonstrate what it means to be a “normal” family.
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