Fear and Loathing

(In regards to the title-why not? I did name my firstborn after Hunter S. Thompson, after all.)

I allowed myself a night off last night to give my mind a brief reprieve.  I spent a couple of hours sewing a dress, then vegged out in the bathtub soaking and watching "The Girl Who Played With Fire," complete with a crappy Mike's Hard Margarita.  Although it was a very enjoyable evening, I felt a little guilty that I didn't write.  This is incredibly important to me and is on my mind pretty much all of the time.  I've had this pent up for years; it feels very good to be getting it all out.

A comment on a previous post raised a very good point-I don't write about how it all feels.  It's like I'm putting this tale out there in the most matter-of-fact way, telling only the details and not including the emotions.  I guess that's because I always avoided processing those emotions back then.  Maybe that's why I don't know how to handle all of my emotions as an adult.  I also dealt with what I witnessed others feel, but not myself.  I'm gonna take a moment to be selfish, to go over my prior blogs and address how I felt at that time in my life.

The first emotion that springs to mind from my youth is sheer terror.  I was a very frightened child.  The primary reason for this fear was Daddy.  He was so volatile, so unpredictable.  There were a few times that he was tolerable, maybe even fun-he had a love of music and used to have me sing while he played piano, we would play video games together sometimes, and occasionally we'd watch movies...but he was just plain scary.  I was afraid to speak, because he often ridiculed and belittled me.  I wanted him to like me, to think I was "cool," because then the hair-trigger temper wasn't a concern.  I never did win Daddy's approval.  I'm not sure how I feel about that even now.  Hurt, certainly.  Angry?  I sure as hell am.  I was just a kid-HIS kid.  He was supposed to love and appreciate me, but instead he abused me.  Everyone had to walk on eggshells around him; nothing was ever right, nothing good enough.  I felt inadequate.  That atmosphere helped cause my mass of insecurities to develop, then flourish.  I was scared of the beatings.  I was afraid that one day he'd go too far and kill one of us.  For some reason I was most afraid of him killing Mom-what would happen to us then?  I was scared to speak out or report what was going on-and when I finally did break down and come forward it was a terrible nightmare.  But still I was most afraid of being left alone.

If terror was prominent, hurt wasn't far behind it, coupled with a lack of comprehension.  I didn't get it.  Why did my parents give me up so easily? Even before it was legal, I was more Minnie's daughter than theirs.  Why were they so quick to pawn me off when I was a baby? Did they not love me? Was I an awful child?  As I grew, I wondered why Mom sided with Dad.  Now, as a mother, it's hard for me to understand why a woman would choose an abusive asshole over her children.  Why didn't she save us?  Did she love him more than she loved us?

Why all the broken promises?  Dad knew we had no money, so why promise us things we could never have? He even took me to a Honda motorcycle shop and let me pick out a bike and a helmet.  It was purple and white, and he promised I would get it for my next birthday.  I never saw it again.  That's only one of the many times he did that (much like the dance classes I was supposed to get).  As a result, I DO NOT make a promise to my children if I can't keep it.  Dad always let me down; I hope my children never think that about me, it would break my heart.

It was never-ending disappointment from both parents.  Mom was just as bad as Dad, except her promises weren't for tangible objects like bikes or keyboards.  The false hopes I got from her always went straight to my heart.  Most often it was her refusal to come see me.  "We'll come down and go swimming tomorrow."  "I'll come get you so you can spend the night."  It always played out the same way.  I paced the floor between the front door and Minnie's bedroom window that faced the street, watching and waiting for Mom's arrival.  I'd call her every hour or two.  "We're getting ready."  "We're leaving in a minute."  Eventually Mom would confess that she wasn't coming-but she'd be there next weekend, she promised.

She still does that today.

That was difficult enough, but harder for me were the pictures of a dream life Mom would paint.  She'd assure me that if I came to live with her it would be different this time, things were tame, everybody was happy.  She'd persuade me, telling me everything I wanted to hear, then I'd be crushed when I got there and everything was exactly the same as it always was.  Then when she got mad at Daddy she'd talk about how good life could be when she left him.  (I don't think adults realize how much their rants can affect small children).  She would tell us about how good life would be once he was gone.  Of course that didn't happen.  Mom and Dad did divorce and remarry, but the separation was extremely brief.  They were together until I was 17, when Dad finally left Mom-not the other way around.

Having my hopes dashed repeatedly like that caused me to be very distrustful.  It's a trait that I abhor in myself.  I'm skeptical of anything anyone tells me that's out of the ordinary-which might be why I'm so afraid that nobody ever believes anything I say.  I'm learning to get past that, but it's a slow process.  It's true that trust must be earned, but then a person must also be willing to give trust.  I'm working on that.

Another issue I had to deal with was the constant sense of abandonment.  My guardians were forever passing me back and forth, leaving me feeling like I didn't belong anywhere, like nobody wanted me.  I tried to play both fields, trying to keep all three adults happy with me.  When at Mom's, I took her side against Minnie.  The opposite applied when I was at Minnie's.  I felt that I had to please them to earn their affection.  If I agreed with them the results were disastrous.  They become combative and condescending, then I would be grounded for talking back.  There was no open conversation.  Children were not entitled to opinions.  As I got older I tried to forcibly inject my point of view and take a more assertive stance with the family.  Unfortunately I'm not very good at being assertive, so imagine how well that went.

There were times I felt I didn't even fit in with my siblings.  They have been known to say that I didn't know what they went through because I wasn't there all the time.  That is very true.  However, they also had no idea   what I was dealing with either.  It caused an odd distance between me and my brothers.  We get along, but we're not really close.  My sister, on the other hand, holds no grudges.  She and I are immensely close.  I actually feel kinda guilty that I haven't told her about this blog because I tell her everything.  I don't want her to see it.  I don't want to hurt her.

I don't want to hurt any of my family.  To quote Bobby Boucher, "I don't like confrontation, I'm a virgo."  But it's time for me to start healing and finally put all of this behind me.  I don't know if I'll ever reveal this blog to my family-I sincerely doubt it.  The fallout isn't worth it.  What's important is for me to finally have my say and be done with it, knowing my voice was heard at last.