Woman recalls witnessing her abusive father brutally beating her mother - and the shock impact the heinous moment had on her life

Felicity Nicole was just 10 years old when she woke up one summer morning and found her mother crying on the living room floor with blood running down her face.

Her father, who had struck his wife with a crystal ashtray, was running through the house grabbing his bag before being escorted outside by her sister's boyfriend. Felicity's sister was on the phone to 911.

'[My dad] wasn't saying much to us kids as we're watching the chaos… and my mom was sitting on the floor and she's crying, "Why me?" and her head is split wide open, and there's just blood going down her face,' the now 46-year-old recalled to DailyMail.com from her Chicago home.

Her parents' marriage was tumultuous and, as a result, so was Felicity's childhood with a sister and two brothers.

'My mom and dad… got married at 16. They had my sister at 16, they moved in with my grandparents, and then they moved out on their own and my grandparents kind of raised my sister a lot, because I think there was a lot of drugs and parties and things,' she explained. 

Felicity Nicole was just 10 years old when she woke up one summer morning and found her mother crying on the living room floor with blood running down her face

'My mom wasn't one to partake in it. She was more or less the babysitter. But, my god, she loved him. But I don't remember my dad around much when I was little, but when I do remember him there, he was high.'

Most 10-year-olds would be screaming or having a meltdown over the harrowing scene that Felicity witnessed that summer's day, but she recalled reacting quite differently.

'[This is] how I knew I was different… I didn't know back then that I was a healer, but… there's so many ways that a 10-year-old would handle this. I mean, you would break down and say like, "Oh, my God, Mom," scream, meltdown, cry," she explained.

'I was like so put together. I went into the bathroom, I just grabbed a ton of toilet paper and I just walked over to her and just started blotting the blood away.

'And I said, "Mom, it's gonna be okay. It's gonna be okay." For me, those were like some of the earlier signs of God putting me on this path of being a healer, being a teacher.'

After this awful event, she grew up without her father around. He 'disappeared' from their lives for 12 years, only popping 'in and out every once in a while to give her [mother] money,' Felicity shared. 

After that day, Felicity didn't see her dad for about 12 years and her mom 'mentally and emotionally shut down.' She's pictured with Felicity's son Evan as a baby

Felicity's parents got married when they were 16 after her mom fell pregnant and they moved in with her grandparents. Pictured is Felicity's dad (back left), her father (back right), her nan (front left) and her mom (front right)

Her parents' marriage was tumultuous and, as a result, so was Felicity's childhood with a sister and two brothers. Pictured is Felicity with brother Tommy, and cats Frieda and Sammy

Meanwhile, Felicity's mom 'mentally and emotionally shut down,' and her daughter didn't blame her.

'Given the circumstances, she was not a drug addict. Her vices were coffee and cigarettes, and she worked,' the 46-year-old told DailyMail.com.

Felicity writes about her powerful story in her memoir, Pieces Of Me

'So we did the best job as kids to learn how to cope with the chaos, the dysfunction.

'It was bread and no butter… food was scarce, we were poor. Sometimes we had a bathroom that worked, sometimes we didn't, sometimes we'd have to take baths in the utility room sink.

'The roof fell through and we had a big hole in our living room ceiling.'

Before Felicity started doing her 'healing work,' she would have described her childhood as 'fun,' but she would later realize how 'toxic' it was.

'We didn't know how to cope, we didn't have food. The house was filthy,' she explained.

'She (my mom) just would sit there on the couch and smoke. It was just sad when I think about it now, because I would have thrown my kids in therapy, I would have done it differently.

'But back then, in the 80s. You didn't really do that. I mean, I was wetting the bed at 10, 11… there was something going on there on a deeper level.'

'We did the best job as kids to learn how to cope with the chaos, the dysfunction,' Felicity told DailyMail.com. Pictured is her childhood home

'[My mom] just would sit there on the couch and smoke. It was just sad when I think about it now, because I would have thrown my kids in therapy,' Felicity shared

Now Felicity helps other women who are struggling to reclaim their lives and find their purpose through mentorship and coaching as part of her own business, She Is You

Felicity recalls in her memoir, Pieces Of Me, that her father, Richard, 'liked women and drugs more than anything on Earth,' and her mother, Erin, suffered 'many bouts' of his rage, infidelity and aggression for more than two decades before he 'finally bashed her head open with the crystal ashtray,' nearly killing her.

His drug-fueled lifestyle would eventually lead to his death.

'I remember him smoking pot cause I remember asking him, what kind of cigarette is that?' Felicity said.

'And my sister learned to roll a joint at the age of four through a Kmart receipt.

'He would do coke, and we know that he was sharing needles because he would be later diagnosed with hepatitis C.'

Now Felicity draws from her experiences in her childhood to help other women. 

Following the deaths of her father and her mother within months of each other in 2013, and the breakdown of her first marriage, Felicity restarted her life aged 36 as a single mother to a young boy.

'I started rebuilding myself in 2013, mentally and emotionally, just by doing affirmations, by googling YouTube videos and listening to meditations and things like that. That was just to give me the courage to rebuild myself, to say, "Hey, I can do this,"' she said.

Felicity (pictured dressed up for a school dance) recalls in her memoir that dad Richard, 'liked women and drugs more than anything on Earth,' and her mother, Erin, suffered 'many bouts' of his rage, infidelity and aggression

In her book, she writes about her parents' relationship and how it impacted on her. She's pictured here aged 21 before her marriage

Felicity and her family and her sister's ex-fiancé, who she still considers family, are pictured here during Christmas when she was in the fifth grade

Through her business, She Is You, Felicity helps other women who are struggling to reclaim their lives, and find their purpose through mentorship and coaching.

When asked what advice she would give to those who find themselves at a crossroads, she offered this: 'I would say you've gotta listen to your heart. Get out of your head and get into your heart. What does your heart tell you? Because this is our kingdom, this is where God lives, this is our intuition. Just what does your heart tell you to do?

'And then from there we would break it down because you have to have logic. Your heart can tell you to move to France, but if you don't have any money, then we need to get there.

'But what I would say is if somebody is just stuck like I [was]. It just comes down to… how hungry are you, just to live? Because I'm gonna tell you, once you get out, you gotta start from ground zero, and it's hard.

'So you have to be hungry because you're gonna have to work really, really hard. And you're gonna have to prepare yourself for emergencies and have emergency money and prepare yourself for setbacks. And there is no, "I can't." It doesn't exist in my vocabulary. It just doesn't, because I wouldn't be where I am today, if there was.'

Felicity's book Pieces Of Me is available now.