I had a first row seat of watching my mother give herself to men and invite men over to the house. She also gave in to her need for alchohol to probably tolerate life. There was never a coffee without Kahlua in it or a soda without rum or vodka. I could smell it on her and I could taste it in the soda I was trying to sip a taste of. She dealt with life how she chose how. I escaped bruised and almost broken from it all.
When I was about 13 years old, my mom was mad about something and took it out on me. She cornered me on my bed in my room and would just start hitting me. I protected my face but was able to see the angry woman doing this to me. She hit my legs as I tended to curl up in a fetal position as best I could to take the blows. I can not say this just happened once and she came to her senses. It did not. Child Protective services was involved and it did stop for awhile. But the verbal abuse never stopped. The neglect never stopped. I felt unloved, unwanted, and unseen in life. One person’s choice can do that to a child. I was still a child. Her child. Lying and hiding. Keeping quiet as to not disturb her with my existance.
Getting up in the morning and getting myself to school as I knew I needed my education to get me out of the situation I was in. I saw my mother fold under the need for a man in her life. To meet her needs, to pay her bills. She would refer to my dad with a glimpse of money and hatred in her eyes. She wanted to live her life and not work. I saw a woman that was dependant on a man. It kept me going to school. I would not become her.
In my 9th grade year, I transferred to yet another school, a Catholic school. We weren’t Catholic. It was at this school that many things would change. Child protective services was called in and took a report. A counselor at the school belelived me and the abuse I was enduring at home. I ran away. My mother put me in a runaway home.
These transitions led me to talk about my first sexual experience at 14 years old. I spoke about what happened to my room mate at the runaway home. She told my counselor. I found myself being told that I needed to tell my mom about it and my counselor would be there to help me. I needed to tell my mom as the man who I had slept with was 21 years old and took advantage of me. He forced me to have sex with him. I sat in this small room at the top of a home that had been an attic at one time. It is was in the runaway home called the Bridge. I sat across from my counselor and my mother sat in the dark couch to my side. As I explained to her what had happened, her face was cold. No emotion. When I was done explaining I looked over at my mother. Her words to me, her 15 year old daughter were, “Well, you deserved it.” I looked at my counselor and got up and left the room.
What happened after that was a blur. I was taken in a police car downtown soon after that to make a statement and file a report about the rape. I remember talking to an older man with white hair about what had happened. He was with the District Attorney’s office. He just listened and wrote down notes. I sat on an awfully big couch in a room with lots of books in shelves on the walls. The police station was busy and there was a lot of movement and sounds outside of his office. A few days after the initial report I was brought back into the police station. I was told by the same officer that the man that did this to me said he had sex with me but that I told him I was 16 years old. Suddenly the walls became smaller in the room as I sat there alone. I heard the words, “you do not have any family support on this, you need to drop it as the people that will be on the jury will be a bunch of old white men and they will side with him.” I left with my head hung low, he was right, I had no family. To sit in a room explaining to someone how something was wrongfully taken from you. To hear the voice of your mother saying you deserved it. Time stopped. I felt so alone. I felt like a small insignificant human being that nobody wanted and my voice did not matter.
We all make choices in life. We never really know how our choices could affect others. I was grateful to have a room mate that knew I needed to be heard. I am grateful I had a counselor who believed in me. I am grateful that I was brave enough to tell my story of what happened to me. I can not control others responses of what I say. I can not control what others think about me as I tell what I have been through. And I can certainly not predict or hope for a best response or support from anyone. We all make choices. We all are given choices. I can not make you read my blog. I share them willingly. I do not share for anything other than in attempt to do the work to heal. So I pick myself up and dust myself off and know that I do have the strength and courage to fight for myself. Even if I stand and fight alone. And you know that, that is okay. People come and go, they weave in and out of your life. People are entitled to their opinions about my life, but they have not lived it, so how would they really know what it is like?
Have some grace for those who struggle, you never know where they are at in their healing. As I write this, I find myself thinking that i would rather barf this out and heal then hold onto it and choke on it. My mother did the best she could with what she had in her tool belt.
Quiet Intensity 