The Hard Path, pt. 1 *TRIGGER WARNING-ABUSE*

Since I’m enjoying feeling less encumbered from having done a lot of work on dealing with my rape, I figured maybe I should tackle the bigger and scarier monster in my closet. This is one that I wish that I didn’t have, let alone have the need to kill it with fire. And, since I actually dealt with the rape fairly quickly… thanks to writing and having visited the place where I was raped. Now it’s time to do the other.

I’m not sure I need to visit the places I was abused. I have been back to them since the abuse happened. Every time I go there, there’s’ a certain amount of anger that accompanies me. I think that’s largely due to the fact that I don’t understand what I could have possibly done to deserve any of it. Like, what could have been so bad that I deserved the beatings and the words that I received?

So, I guess the best place to start this is at the beginning…

My childhood was… not optimal. I think that’s the best way I can put this. After all, there’s a lot that happened. I was given a set of circumstances that most don’t deal with. To this day, I have no idea how I managed to fight through it all. I had to be strong all of my life. I never had a childhood.

OK, I need to stop dawdling. I’m stretching this out because if I put it in words on a page, then I can no longer sweep it under a carpet. I have to face that this is what happened. This was my childhood. The enormity of that almost gives me pause. Then I remember how hard things that discuss abuse hit me… like an emotional Mack truck. I have to get through this, despite the pain.

The first instance that I remember of physical abuse was at the hands of my father. Granted, there was an instance that I was too young for it to pop into my memory where my mom beat me for saying no… and not just a slap or a spank. I was repeatedly hit… according to my mother. I’m going to take her word on that because I can’t think of a parent who would openly admit to repeatedly hitting their child. Which is good that she admitted that she not only did it, but she did realize what she was doing and stopped. This seems about right because the psychological slide downhill happened after my memories start.

My dad was in a motorcycle accident before I was born. He was in a semi-coma for several months (I’m not entirely sure about the length of time… it might have been just a couple of months. He has brain damage from the incident. It’s not bad enough to have incapacitated him or leave him in a vegetative state. It was bad enough that he doesn’t seem to have matured past being a teenager. To this day, he still acts a lot like a teenager. This is something I have accepted as the way he is. I don’t remember him ever being any different. This is also not an excuse for what happened. More, it sets the stage for what happened.

My sister and I would often stay up late. I have always been a night owl. I still am. This wake up early rubbish is for the birds. It’s at this time, my mom was already starting to experience issues with her bi-polar. So, we’d still be up pretty late… like to the time when my dad was coming home from his swing shift (I think it was swing shift, I’m not entirely sure what time it was because we didn’t have a clock in our room).

Now, I have no idea how or why my name was written on the table in our room. But it was. I don’t remember doing it. I’m not sure that I did… actually, I’m pretty sure I didn’t. My dad was very mad when he saw it and asked who did it. I said I didn’t and my sister said it was me. He grabbed a metal hanger and proceeded to spank me with it. I still remember what it felt like to this day. Metal hangers sting more, even if there isn’t a lot of surface area to the hanger. I kept crying that I didn’t do it, but I was still hit. I’m lucky that the hanger didn’t do any permanent damage or drew blood… I just remember how I felt. I felt scared. I felt that I wasn’t being listened too. I also felt betrayed. This wasn’t a one-time instance. Any time something happened, I’d get hit. It got to a point where I’d be afraid where I’d get hit for nothing again, because my dad was mad. I remember just feeling so helpless. I would lie there and get hit.

Now, my dad has apologized for doing this. I’m not sure whether or not I can get past this. I did nothing and got hit. Of course, this isn’t the only instance where I would be blamed for writing my name on something. I’ve written about that instance before, so I won’t go into detail because I covered it all before and I’ve processed that instance.

But this… This is…

It’s hard I try to view things realistically. I try to have faith that nothing malicious was meant. But… it’s hard to do that when I remember how I felt every time the hanger hit me. I remember feeling incredibly small. I felt like the scapegoat. That maybe the start of why I feel like I deserve all bad things that happen to me, despite whether or not I did it. This might be the start of so many negative thoughts about myself. It’s not the only cause, but it’s a major source.