When I was 5 my mom hit me. It wasn’t just a slap on the arm, or a whack on my behind. It was with a wooden stick. Her anger and rage was uncontrollable at times and she went to town on me with that stick. In my attempt to get out of her grasp and to stop being hit, I ended up with a gash on my leg. I went to the hospital that night and received multiple stitches. Today, over 30 years later, I have a 6 inch scar on my leg. It’s a constant reminder of my abusive and horrible childhood. My mother should have gone to jail, but back then that was just my life. Children didn’t run to authorities or post their stories on the internet. We were kids and they were the adults. There was no room for negotiation in that matter.
What I find difficult to reflect on, is the fact that she continued to be abusive even after that incident. Was she really that unaware of her actions? Did she ever feel any remorse? To this day she has never acknowledged the hurt or the abuse. She acts like the victim and tries to guilt me into talking to her.
I haven’t really spoken with her in two years. Most of that was by choice. Once I entered Al-Anon, a lot of deep-seeded emotions came to the surface. I didn’t realize how much anger and resentment I harbored. It’s as if someone opened up the can of emotional worms in my soul, and life as I once knew it would never be the same. For so many years I was just existing and playing a role. Everything about me was about trying to please her and to fit into some unobtainable mold that she had in her mind for how her daughter should be.
One day I woke up and I let myself grieve for that little 5 year old girl whose earliest lessons in life were about pain and anger. There was no love or respect for who I could, and would, become. That little girl was all alone and had to fend for herself during a time when life should have been about discovery and play. She retreated into herself and she stayed that way for a very long time.
Her father was an emotionally distant man. His life was about work and he never had much to say. He was a stranger in his own home. She can recall one time when he hugged her, or rather, when she hugged him. It was awkward at best.
He died when she was sixteen. It was a blur and her memories are fuzzy now. She still grieves, but for what? He was the father figure that was never really a father. He was physically present, but never emotionally present. She grieves for the father who never really was. How is that possible?
Her mother won’t talk about him. The days right after his death, she threw out everything of his, including photos. Everything tangible to verify his existence is gone. Was he ever really there, or was he just merely a stand-in playing the role of father in the story of her childhood?
Her mother grieved in inappropriate ways. She had no awareness for her daughter’s own grief. Again, at sixteen, she was alone. She retreated further into herself and for the next 20 years she would merely exist. Her motivation would be to get away from her mother. Her siblings weren’t much help either. She was the scapegoat, the one who took the brunt of their mother’s anger.
Her relationship with her siblings are complicated, but she often wonders if they had been raised with the same parents. How could their memories be so different? And how is it possible that they have figured how to have a harmonious relationship with her?
She’s angry that at the age of 36 so many of her relationships have failed and her life feels empty and pointless. She realizes now that it’s because she has not resolved her family issues. Two years have passed since the journey into her pain began, and the pain, anger and resentment are still there. She wants to move past it, but how?
One day, she hopes, peace and love will prevail. But until then, the struggle to accept what once was, and to prevent it from influencing the future, continues.
More later!
