Content note: Domestic Violence, su*cide, homelessness ::: Please share!
Edit 1/22 8:07p: I have raised enough for a security deposit and I'm close to enough for 1st month's rent too! I am still looking for a room to rent!
--------------------------------
Hello my dear friends. I have a special favor to ask for my birthday week! I turn 39 on Monday, January 23.
So does my twin brother, Andy, the cop. I haven't seen him in two months, since he mocked me & taunted me for having PTSD.
It's now been 9 years since I came out of the closet as a trans woman. I changed my legal name and gender, I grew out my hair and nails, I shaved my beard and pierced my ears. I am so close to being able to transition medically. I just need one more heart surgery, and then my cardiologist said it will be safe for me to transition with hormones.
But right now, I have a more urgent problem: I'm unhoused.
*** My birthday request is this: Please, share this post far and wide. I need your help. I'm asking you to spread the word. All you have to do is click share. Post it to your timeline. Share it to your story, too. Link to this post in a tweet. Please, I need your help. Share this post! ***
If you want to help me even more, please react to this post, too, and leave a comment with your words of support below.
If you really want to help me, please read this post. Thank you in advance for your time, and your attention, and your compassion, and your support.
My name is Danielle Muscato, or you can call me Ellie. I'm 39 years old, now. I'm a trans woman. I'm an activist. I'm a writer, and a musician. I'm disabled. I have chronic pain. And now, I'm a domestic violence survivor, too.
I'm currently homeless. I need your help to survive.
I need a roof over my head. I need a room to live in. I don't need anything fancy. Just a place to sleep, and write on my laptop, and practice my guitar (quietly, with headphones).
I don't have much income, just about $300/mo from my Patreon supporters, while I wait for my disability benefits application to be approved. So I can't apply for a standard lease at an apartment complex or whatever.
I do have a bit of money, and I can pay month-to-month for a room. I need your help. I need a place to stay in, or very near, Columbia, Missouri.
I applied for disability benefits 18 months ago. I have a good disability attorney and all the documentation I need from my doctors, but it takes a few years to get approved. I have horrible chronic back pain, and PTSD, and ADHD, and a serious heart condition. I'm trans, and I'm a domestic violence survivor.
I need to stay near my doctors. I still need one more heart surgery before I can take hormones and ADHD meds, and I have mobility disabilities from my chronic back pain.
My brother, Andy, the cop, hates me. He hates me because I'm a trans woman. And because I wear a Black Lives Matter hoodie every day. He's cruel to me.
But my parents are even worse.
I had been living with my parents for about a year, even though they have a long history of abusing me, because I needed a place to recover after having heart surgery and back surgery. My parents are multi-millionaire medical doctors, and they helped pull some strings to get me in with good doctor friends of theirs, since I'm disabled and on Medicaid.
I'm homeless right now, because on November 22 of 2022, my cop brother came over for dinner, two days before Thanksgiving last year, and then mocked me for having PTSD. And when I calmly and quietly left the room without having dinner to get away from him and meditate, I closed the door, and sat in the dark with my PTSD app, just like I'm supposed to do when I'm upset… My brother followed me, and picked a fight with me, and mocked me and taunted me, six more times in a row.
After repeatedly asking him politely and calmly to go back to having dinner with my parents and his 4-year-old in the other room, over & over & over & over & over & over, I finally yelled at him to leave me alone. Six times he taunted me and mocked me for having PTSD. While I was having a panic attack. I said a curse word.
My dad, Dr Joe Muscato, heard me yell at my brother to leave me alone, and heard me say the curse word. He got up from the dinner table two rooms away. He charged into the room and physically attacked me, screamed at me, and injured my right wrist. See comments for pics (warning: Domestic Violence). He screamed and screamed in my face and demanded I apologize for saying a curse word where his 4-year-old grandchild could overhear.
I'm a guitarist. For multiple days afterward, I thought my father, Dr Joe Muscato, had broken my wrist. I was too scared to go to the hospital, because I knew they would just call the cops, and my brother, the police detective, would retaliate against me. Obviously, I was too scared to go to the police myself, either. I've tried that once before, the last time my dad violently battered me, in 2016. My cop brother successfully, illegally and in a corrupt fashion, buried it that time, too.
After my dad attacked me, two days before Thanksgiving 2022, I left my basement apartment that I was renting from him (with a written lease) to go to a hotel for a couple of days. I was clearly not safe at home.
Because I was on heavy prescription opioid pain meds while I was recovering from back surgery, I asked a friend to come over to pack me a bag and drive me to the hotel. I couldn't bend over at the waist, or even lift the weight of my own purse, let alone drive.
Then, during a scheduled follow-up appointment from my back surgery, my surgeon saw my injured wrist, and asked me what happened. I told her the truth, that I'm living in a hotel right now, because my dad battered me. She had me meet with a social worker. And because she is a mandated reporter, she also called the cops.
To keep from getting arrested, my dad, Dr Joe Muscato, consulted with his (multiple) attorneys - he's a multi-millionaire, you see - and decided to play the victim.
He illegally changed the locks to my apartment without giving me 30 days' notice to move out. He lied to a judge in order to get a temporary restraining order against me! He claimed in writing that HE is the victim, even though he's the one who attacked and injured me, and I have the bruises to prove it.
He also paid off my cop brother $100,000 - the one who instigated this whole incident, and who witnessed my dad assault & batter me from 3 feet away - to lie to the domestic violence police investigator, to corroborate my father's false account, that my father was defending my brother from me.
Now I can't go home. My emotional support animal, Hermione, my 19-year-old cat, is there. I miss her so much. I haven't seen her in two months, while I'm dealing with all this trauma. I don't think I'll ever get to see her again. She doesn't have much time left.
I only brought one change of clothes to the hotel, because I only planned to be there a couple of days.
That was two days before Thanksgiving, 2022. I ended up living in that hotel for two whole months.
Did I mention that I had back surgery six days before that, and could barely stand up without a cane at the time?
I also only brought 4 days of meds with me to the hotel. I take 15 prescription medications. Aside from prescription opioids for my back pain, I also take 5 heart meds, including blood-thinners. I take prescribed antidepressants, and 3 meds for my PTSD, and anti-anxiety meds, too.
My PTSD and chronic pain are terribly symptomatic. I'm suffering. I need my emotional support cat. She's 19 years old.
My dad, Dr Joe Muscato, tried to kill me. He refused to return my 15 prescription medications for THREE WEEKS until I took him to court and the judge ordered him to do so.
I almost died.
Without my heart meds, my blood pressure was 168/119. Without my PTSD meds and antidepressants and emotional support animal, I became actively, urgently suicidal.
I even emailed my dad's lawyers, and told them explicitly, that, and how, I was going to kill myself. I also texted my older brother, Jeff, and told him the same thing. Neither one even responded.
My father, Dr Joe Muscato, should be charged with assault & battery, obstruction of justice, bribery, illegal "self-service" eviction (changing the locks without a proper notice or a court order), and last but not least, attempted murder.
He will never face any legal consequences, because he is rich and cis and straight and white and educated, and he has expensive lawyers and police connections. And he has zero ethical problem with lying.
I'm in Columbia, Missouri. I'm no longer suicidal now that I’m back on my meds, since that the judge ordered my father to return them to me. I had to titrate all 15 of my meds from scratch, but I survived. That was 6 weeks ago.
I need a roof over my head. I can't move out of the area yet, because I still need a second heart surgery, and another round of physical therapy. Also, my trauma therapist's license requires that she can only treat me if I'm physically within the state of Missouri, even over video chat. The last thing I need right now is to switch insurance & surgeons & therapists - I have Medicaid, I'm traumatized, and I'm seeing my therapist twice a week because of diagnosed PTSD, due to my family’s domestic abuse.
My dad financially trapped me when I moved in with him to recover after having these first round of surgeries. He needs me around, to be the family punching bag, to blame and project, to absorb his violence and anger.
He took my emotional support animal from me, my housing, and all of my personal property. I was supposed to get 30 days to move out, but because my dad lied to the judge in order to get an order of protection, I'm not even legally permitted to go back to my apartment, at all.
In order to return my personal property without getting sued, my dad offered me, via his multiple attorneys, FOUR HOURS to pack up and move everything I own. Not 30 days as required by Missouri law. Four hours.
Four hours, to pack up and move everything in my apartment. And I wasn't even permitted to be there myself in person! I had to hire a group of friends, on only a couple of days' notice to bring over boxes and bubble wrap and dollies. To pack up as much of my personal property as they could within the time limit. They got a U-Haul, and took what they could of my things to a storage unit that I rented.
They had to leave behind all of my furniture, my most expensive kitchen knife and my immersion blender and a lot of my other cooking gear, my fountain pens, all of my books, and last but not least, my 19 year old cat, who is legally registered as my emotional support animal.
I had to go through lawyers to force my father to return my name-change paperwork, my social security card, my birth certificate, and my passport. He has complete control over me. It's financial abuse.
He STILL won't give me back my car title, or my emotional support animal.
My cell phone is in his name. My car insurance is in his name. We even have a joint checking account - he gets notifications on his phone whenever I use my debit card for everyday spending. He literally screams at me and throws temper tantrums and throws things at me, whenever I spend any money he disapproves of.
He's a multi-millionaire. My spending $30 on food should not matter to him. I'm 39 years old. He just needs me as his personal punching bag, as a valve, to release his violent anger.
He chose me to abuse, because I am weak, because I am disabled, because I have chronic pain and cannot fight back. Because I am trans, because I'm a woman, because I have mental illnesses. Because he knows no one will believe me over him, the rich famous doctor, even though I have audio recordings and bruises to prove it.
I'm trapped.
He has complete control over me, just the way he wants it, so that I can't escape his abuse without his permission.
He intentionally, maliciously deprived me of my 15 prescription medications, including pain meds 6 days after I had back surgery, including PTSD meds and antidepressants and 5 heart medications 4 months after I had heart surgery, cold turkey, for 3 weeks (!) until a judge ordered him to return my prescription meds to me.
Just wow! He's a medical doctor! He teaches at the medical school at the University of Missouri!
I almost died.
He lied to the judge and said he “couldn't find” my meds, even though I emailed his lawyer literally 15 times over 3 weeks, saying I need my meds, or I'm going to die.
The judge ordered him to "look again."
Then, magically, after 3 weeks and a dozen emails to his attorney begging for my meds, they were delivered to my hotel, a whole big blue tote bag filled with my medicine bottles, within 2 hours of the judge's order to "Look again."
My father, Dr Joe Muscato, could have brought me my meds at any time over those 3 weeks. See the screenshot of the tweet below.
He chose to deprive me of my 15 prescription meds, cold turkey, to make me suffer. Heart meds 4 months after heart surgery, pain meds 6 days after back surgery, antidepressants and PTSD meds and my emotional support animal, after attacking me, gaslighting me, and injuring my wrist so badly I couldn't push an elevator button without pain, let alone play my guitar. I was heartbroken and terrified I'd never be able to play properly again.
He also refused to return my clothing. I only brought one change of clothes with me to the hotel, and I emailed his attorneys 3 times in the week leading up to our court date, saying I need court-appropriate clothing out of my closet in the apartment I was renting from him, in his basement. He refused to give them to me.
He WANTED me to show up to court, off my meds, in dirty clothes, in excruciating debilitating physical and emotional pain, to poison my credibility in front of the judge.
He acted all innocent and bumbling in court, as though he is the victim in all of this, as though he doesn't have complete control over everything he's doing.
Two hours after the judge ordered him to look again and return my prescriptions, when he delivered my meds to my hotel, he also brought me…. Two pairs of my underwear from my closet, and two pairs of HIS black socks.
I was very clear, I emailed his attorneys 3 times in the week before our court date, that I need court-appropriate clothing. He brought me two pairs of underwear and two pairs of his socks.
He’s trolling me. He's being passive aggressive on purpose to torture me. It’s sick.
I have an audio recording of the night he attacked me, November 22, 2022.
I told him I was recording him, explicitly because I hoped that by asking him to please stop screaming at me while I'm having a PTSD episode, while he knew he was being recorded, maybe he would stop screaming and throwing things at me.
See the comments for the Google drive link to the audio recording of 25 minutes of Dr Joe Muscato screaming and throwing things at me, while I beg him over and over to stop and just sit down and talk to me instead.
My father knows he is above the law. He knows that because he is a rich cis straight white male doctor with police connections, he can do anything he wants, and face no accountability whatsoever.
He knows he can bribe his way out of getting arrested. He knows that he can play the victim and judges will believe him over me.
And he's right. He never even got arrested, let alone charged or convicted or sentenced. Even though he battered me and injured my wrist, even though he tried to kill me, even though he attacked me in anger for overhearing me say a cuss word from another room.
I have the bruises to prove that he attacked and injured me, and he successfully lawyered and bribed his way out of even getting arrested at all.
Dr Joe Muscato is the most evil man I've ever met.
And everybody loves and respects him, because he's filthy rich, because he's two-faced, because he's a great actor, and a better liar.
He plays the victim. He pretends to be this bumbling elderly innocent generous gregarious weak old man on a "fixed income."
He means a budget. He's retired. He has season tickets to Mizzou. He's loaded.
In reality, he's fit, he's strong, he's pain-free, he's filthy rich - like, for example, he wears a $22,000 wristwatch. He works out every morning at 7:00 AM, before making himself a high-protein breakfast. He's not weak or bumbling at all. He's much stronger and more fit than I am. He's totally able-bodied. He's a professor at the Mizzou medical school. He lied to the cops and described himself as weak and elderly, in order to play the victim. What a monster.
He's violent, he's angry, and he SCREAMS at his family behind closed doors, for everything from my mother buying bagels instead of bread, to me falling asleep on the couch instead of going down the stairs to my basement apartment to sleep in my bed, because I want to be with my emotional support animal who sleeps on the couch, because my chronic back pain and recent back surgery make it painful and difficult for me to use the stairs. SCREAMING at me for sleeping on the couch.
I have over a hundred hours of audio recordings of my father screaming and throwing things at me, and at his wife, Dr Mary Muscato. He even screams at his toddler grandson.
My father, Dr Joe Muscato, throws temper tantrums when he's behind closed doors, when he knows he won't be held accountable. He becomes violent and abusive and angry when his friends and colleagues and neighbors aren't watching. He's two-faced. He hides it from everyone outside the family. He denies it, even though I have audio recordings proving it.
*** Today, with this post: ***
I'm launching a fundraiser for housing for my birthday week.
I need your help.
For my birthday this year, please, I just need a place to lay my head at night. Someplace safe, and climate-controlled where I can bring my guitars.
Someplace ideally without a lot of steps (or with an elevator), because I have mobility disabilities.
Someplace in or near Columbia, Missouri, so that I can stay near my doctors. I have one more heart surgery to go, and then I can fulfill my decade-long dream of not only being out of the closet, but transitioning with hormones, too. (AAAAAND once I have this surgery, I can take ADHD meds again, too!!!).
I have a little bit of money, and I can pay month-to-month for a room. I just need someone with a guest room, or a basement, anywhere that I can stay and store my guitars and be safe. Just me, no children or partners or pets. I have a bed in my storage unit that I can have brought over and set up, if you don't have one already.
If you want to help me, the best thing you can do is SHARE THIS POST.
Tag people you know who you think can help me.
I'm a disabled homeless trans woman activist writer and musician and public speaker. If you know some employed people with decent paying jobs, or people who have some money available, who can afford to pledge to my Patreon each month…. Please share this post with them, and ask them to read it, and decide if they can pledge and help me get away from my abusive family, while I wait to be approved for disability benefits.
If you want to make a monthly pledge to my Patreon, this is my only source of income right now. Thank you. The link is:
http://www.Patreon.com/daniellemuscato
If you want to support me with a one-time donation, you can also send me $100 or $10 or $20 or $500 or whatever works for you, via these apps:
@DanielleMuscato / last four: 0420 on Venmo/Cashapp
danielle@daniellemuscato.com on Paypal or go to
Paypal.me/daniellemuscato
When you donate, or pledge monthly to my Patreon, please LEAVE A COMMENT on this post below, telling everyone how much you pledged or donated. That way, we can all encourage each other to help out, and it will help boost this post on each other’s feeds, too.
If you can't afford to donate or pledge monthly, THAT'S OKAY!
Please just SHARE THIS POST, and comment below, to help with visibility spreading the word. Leave me a few words of support, that helps too, so much more than you know!
Thank you for your time, your money, your friends & followers, your attention, and your compassion.
I need a place to stay. I need some money to get settled, to start over after surviving and escaping my family's domestic violence.
Please help me. Please share this post and react and comment below.
Thank you. I love you all. I'm so grateful for anything and everything you can do to help me.
All my love, appreciation, and solidarity,
Ellie Muscato
Venmo/Cashapp/PayPal @DanielleMuscato
danielle@daniellemuscato.com
Last 4 of my phone: 0420
www.Patreon.com/daniellemuscato
-------
Here is the audio file of my dad screaming at me on November 22:
https://drive.google.com/…/180a_NlfRNxS302iZABEmmi_wy…/view…
Here is a recording of my call to the crisis line that night:
https://drive.google.com/…/1JGAuFb-EyB2Ssi3_52D5n8yRT…/view…
Here is the recording of my dad harassing me on Nov 22 after I ran to the basement without my dinner, or my pain meds (6 days after back surgery), after he attacked me and injured my wrist:
https://drive.google.com/…/18hcaLTzKzP-t4N-n6JEtTrLD2…/view…
