Breaking the Cycle...

I felt the need to share this memoir I wrote several years ago. It's appropriate right now, because I have a family situation that made me reflect on it. I have changed the names of my children to grant them privacy.

WHEN I WANT TO HIT THE KIDS:
Breaking the cycle of child abuse

Sitting here at my kitchen table, the odor of bacon, eggs and burnt toast lingering in the air, solidifies the rough night I had. God, I’m tired. Keith, my five-year-old, was sick last night, depriving me of sleep. When I looked in the mirror this morning, horror was the best description available. The bags under my eyes attested to utter fatigue. With hair sticking up like I had electric shock, combined with the jaundiced color of my skin, thoughts of famine relief entered a fuzzy brain.

This total exhaustion continually wears me down and causes reflection on this situation. I just lost my job because of a car accident, the bills are piling up, and I’m alone. The tears have all dried up, there’s just no crying left. Hope, faith and strength have fled through an open window. What now? The children are squabbling.

“You took my marker!”

“Did not!”

“Did too!”

“Don’t hit me!”

Then, the dreaded ear-shattering scream. “Mom! Amy hit me. Mommmmy!”

Keith runs into the kitchen, grabs my leg, clinging like an octopus…and whining. That incessant whining. It drives me crazy. I intervene as always and restore peace and order. Back to the kitchen table, maybe to grab just a few minutes of my own peace. Without even making it to the chair to sit down, the children are at it again.

“Mom, Keith is in my room. He’s bugging me.”

“I am not, Mom, she’s lying.”

When does it ever end? The constant fighting and arguing is stressing me out – thinking straight is not an option. That’s it. I’ve had it. I can’t take it anymore. It will be made clear who’s in charge here.

Thinking back on that minute between the kitchen and the bedrooms will forever be emblazoned in my mind. As I raised a shaking hand to my son, I looked down at his little innocent face and froze. He gazed at me, his beautiful blue eyes tinged with fear. It made my stomach turn. How could the thought of striking him even enter my mind? My frustrations are like demons nipping at my brain. The anger at my situation uncoiled serpents, ready to strike with no regard to who my victim was. At that moment, my mind flashed back to my childhood.

I was about eight years old. My father was on military maneuvers, and I was allowed to have two friends over to play. Mary, the trouble maker, sneaked into my parents’ room. When I found her in there, a bolt of anxiety gripped me. I yelled at her to get out and slammed the door behind us, sure the thing was ripped off the hinges.

A few hours later, my mother, screaming like a mad woman, came raging down the hall. “What were you doing in my room?” she demanded.

How she’d figured out anyone was in her room was beyond me. “Mom, I’m sorry. Mary was in there, but I told her to get out.”

My mother’s reply stung me. “You’re lying. I called your dad and told him I can’t handle you when he’s gone. He’s coming home.”

My heart hammered in a tightening chest. Surely, death was imminent. I tried to convince myself there was no way he could abandon his exercise, leaving me a few days to live. Later that evening, as mom ironed and I lay on the couch coloring, the door burst open. There he stood in all his Army gear, covered in mud and filled with rage. It brought to mind the monsters at the Saturday matinees. He stalked toward me with fists clenched so hard the veins protruded. He reached down, grabbed me by the shirt, hoisting me to dangling feet. He shook me till my teeth chattered, as he screamed in my face, his foamy spit spraying like a rabid animal’s. Trying to wriggle free only managed to anger him more. He reached out and grabbed teh iron, raised it over his head and in what seemed like slow motion I saw the glint of silver descending upon me. My mother grabbed the cord and pulled the iron from his hand, the only time she ever intervened in a beatin. When he realized his hand was empty he balled his fist. Out of the corner of my eye, I saw his fist coming at me; the ceiling light danced on the red stone of his Army ring. His fist and my eye connected. A split second later, a sticky wetness was flowing down an already swelling cheek. In that moment of confusion, my chance for escape came. Lumbering down the hall to the safety of my room, my bed, was the only thing on my mind. Reaching for my face, shaking fingers traced the swelling. Though my vision was blurred, crimson snakes running down my fingers were clearly visible. My terror-filled scream brought mom and dad running. One look sent mom wailing to her room. Dad scooped me up in the blanket and rushed me to the hospital. Another emergency room visit. Another lie to another doctor.

When I snap back to the present, Keith is frozen like a statue in a red-light, green-light game. Lowering my hand, I turn and leave the room. How could the thought of putting my child through that brutality even enter my mind? The anger does not lie with him. It’s just anger. This moment of reflection forces me to step back and think about the situation. I go out on the stoop, count to ten, recite the National Anthem, whatever it takes to get a grip. Once I get myself on an even keel, the situation will be handled calmly, rationally and with love. I have made a conscious decision to stop the cycle of abuse that has existed in my family. I must keep reminding myself that physical and mental abuse is not the answer to any dilemma. Children should never be the victims of everyday stresses and problems that push us to lose control. The trust my children have in me must never be destroyed.

I am a survivor of such destruction. If the pressure becomes unbearable, I’ll find help before there are regrets and actions that cannot be reversed.

You can do the same...

Misjudging the flow of thoughts...

I'd convinced myself that I could write these blogs in chornological order regarding the events as they occurred in real time. I realize now that these blogs will be snipets not in order of age, severity, or impact. These will simply come in the order that my mind allows me to purge them. While waiting for one of these "memories" to come to mind, another question arose in my thought process, so I digress.

Why did I allow myselft to be beaten, degraded, and humiliated with no resistance? I suppose the guilt comes into play often with this question. Who can I blame besides myself for enbling another human being to do those things to me? I'd imagine a shrink would have standard textbook answers; talk of childhood trauma and issues with self-esteem. For me, it still comes down to the basic desire to know why after the first strike; I did not turn and walk out of the door. Was it such a desperate need to be loved, that any punishment fit the reward of those rare moments when it felt like love? How is love defined in these types of scenarios?

Here's what I came up with, and this of course is solely in relationship to my personal universe.

Failure. Now that word evokes a strong response from me. This would, by psychiatric standards, fall into the childhood trauma arena. Looking beyond the physical and emotional abuse, I ponder the pshcological abuse. The molding of a young and impressionable mind is the most powerful tool we have, which can be a blessing and/or a curse. Perfection is my least favorite word in any language. It was the primary expectation imprinted into my brain; there was no room for "failure."

My upbringing was quite sterile. My parents did not show physical affection, or impart it on me. As time passed, I actually acquired an aversion to being touched. There was a certain discomfort with the feelings that coursed through me when there was human contact. This was not a major issue when I was younger, however, it did create a serious problem in adulthood. It was my double-edged sword, the desire to be loved, but an aversion to experiencing it through physical contact.

Don't get me wrong I had the desire to make love to my husband, at first, it was the affection he expected outside of the bedroom that I couldn't give. He would hold my hand when we were walking and I would pull away. I can't say this was the catalyst that made him angry enough to hit me, hurt me, and scare the hell out of me, but as victims do, I internalized. I justified each "incident" by convincing myself it was my fault, and I had to try harder to be "perfect."

Again, over time this became my reality. Every beating, every degrading word, plays through my mind like a flickering, black and white movie. As the reels run their course and the pictures jump by, I grasp a moment, a thought, that if love hadn't been so important to me none of those things would have happened. The logical solution to the problem was to castrate love from every part of me, including myself. It worked quite well for a few years, until recent events. I've learned that love is not always associated with pain. I've also learned that love for myself and those I treasure, creates passion, and this passion translates into every part of me, especially my psyche.

One of the largest transitions I've made, is the realization that I crave the human touch in many ways. Commonplace for most, profound for me...

My thoughts were intense yesterday...

I am remiss in not having posted yesterday; however, much has transpired just in the past 24 hours. In a sense, it's been a personal revelation, a deeper understanding, and a profound sense of fate taking place. I am filled with emotions that have overflowed my capacity to put words to screen right now. The weekend is upon me again, and I plan to formulate those words and put them into a coherent post.

In order to adequately portray my life, there will be moments of insight into what is transpiring in me now. I feel the need to step away from each post that depicts the pain and suffering and balance it with the goodness that flows through every day of my existance at this turning point. There is so much inside of me, so much that I have pushed away and told myself I'm over, but the reality is that I embrace it, all of it, because it is the foundation to my purpose.

The best part is that I've met someone who is willing to take the journey with me, without judgment, without condemnation, and without pity, but with a deep sense of love and understanding. He sees the vision as I do, a means to do something real, positive, and very necessary.

Lives will be changed, survivors will be forged out of the wreckage of devastation, and peace, personal serenity, will come at last. Life doesn't get any better than that.

Seven Days Into Life, Death Tried to Claim Me

My father was obsessed with having a child. He wanted a son more than anything, someone to carry on his name, his legacy. They were told my mother couldn't have any more children because of what had happened to her during the war...the rape. Dad being who he was, felt that he could prove that wrong. For two years, my mother took her temperature and called him when she was fertile. He would jump in his jeep, rush home to "do the deed" and produce this miracle child. Finally, it happened. Mom was pregnant. My half-sister (I'll call her Helen) was about 11. From what I hear she wasn't too happy about this revelation. I laughed years later when my dad told me that he knew exactly when I was conceived. He's quite pompous as you will discover.

Nine months later, on February 14, I came into this world - blue. The city was gripped by one of the worst snow storms in decades. Power outages and blocked roads created chaos, especially on a military base. My mother and I spent a week in the hospital (as was the case back then), and on the day we were released it was snowing like hell. We were all bundeled in the car and on the treacherous journey home. Just as luck would have it, about a mile from our destination, the car died. My father pushed it all the way to our apartment with my mom steering and me bundled up and lying on the passenger seat.

When our little family arrived, the discovery that there was no power, therefore no heat, set my father into a rage, my mother into tears, and me into the first major struggle of my life. It was like an omen of things to come. Mom ran over to the neighbors apartment, an elderly lady, and asked if she could borrow a blanket or two to help keep me warm. The woman was so touched by my mother's panic that she lent her an old, faded fur coat and told her to wrap me up tightly. Her thought was that if it could keep the animal who once wore it warm in freezing weather, it should do the trick for me. Interesting logic to say the least.

We spent that night huddled together, candlelight casting a warm glow about the room, deceptive comfort at best, and relied on body heat, blankets, and that old fur coat to keep us warm through the raging onslaught of nature. The next morning I awoke with a cough, which quickly developed into pneumonia. We couldn't make it to the hospital until the following day and by then things had worsened. I struggled for five days to survive the onslaught of fever, dehydration, and chest rattling coughs.

I came into the world blue and beat the odds. I fought with every ounce of my tiny body to battle pneumonia and I beat the odds. I've been beating the odds ever since.

The Foundation of Me

It's funny when you imagine your parents meeting, courting, getting engaged, married, the whole ritual of a man and woman connecting and making the committment to stay together til death do them part. I actually enjoy hearing stories of how my friends parents met. Then, they ask me. In the beginning I hesitated to tell people; however, as time has passed, I feel it has some relevance to how my life turned out.

My father (then 19 years old) was a GI in the Army and stationed in Germany in 1954. One night he went to a Gasthaus (like a restaurant/bar in America) and saw my mother. It was post WWII and most of the GI's were warned that German girls were trying to get married to Americans so they could get out of the country. There was my dad, an African American male reveling in the beauty of my mother's Aryan features, blonde hair, blue eyes, alabaster skin. He immediately fell in love, and tried to woo her. She would not give in, but he continued to frequent the Gasthaus leaving my mother good tips, hershey bars and Marlboro cigarettes. I forgot to mention, my dad was a miliary policeman. Since it was postwar, he carried his weapon (concealed) at all times. So, one night he went into the Gasthaus and sat down for his nightly meal of schnitzel, sauerkraut, dumplings, and a Lowenbrau beer. He noticed a GI harrassing my mother, when suddenly the man pulled out a gun and put it to my mother's head. Apparently this man wanted my mother to sleep with him. Most of the GI's had perceptions that the German women were easy. My father jumped up from his chair and approached the situation. He pulled his gun out and put it behind his back, and approached the other GI, who wasn't really paying attention. He put the gun in the mans back and asked him if she was really worth dying for. After just a few minutes the man relented and gave himself up.

From that time on, my father endeared himself to my mother, her daughter, and my grandmother. My mother had been raped by GI's at the age of 19 and my half-sister was the product of that. Nonetheless, my father took care of all of them and then my mother finally agreed to marry him. The military did not look kindly on this for three reasons. He was black, she was white, and he was in the military. Believe it or not, that was an issue then. It took quite some time to get permission from his superior officers, but again he was relentless. My parents were married an 1955 and one year later my mother became an American citizen.

Two years later, I was born.

The Transition Begins...

To start at the beginning would not explain the impact of my life adequately enough, so I'll start with a journal entry from a few weeks ago.

I'm sitting in a bath of sea salt with 8 drops of lavendar oil, as per my physical guide''s instructions. Last night was difficult for me. I went through a transition that physically and emotionally rocked me and depleted me. My body and my mind hurt in unison. I am still trying to grasp all of this. For the longest time, I thought it was my imagination, wishful thinking, but I realize now that is not the case. This is all being driven by many forces that have gathered together to take me to a higher level of consciousness. This is the second wave of the overall transition. Each one becomes more intense, more profound. The fear, however, is gone.

I suppose my biggest fear was driven by the idea that something I have searched my entire life for might disappear one day when I awaken. I realize now that is nowhere near the truth. I've been assured of that in more ways than one. I have learned that it is okay to "allow" to "trust." I appealed to the powers that be in answering the question that has driven me to the brink of tears so many times. When I reach the apex, when the crown is completely open and I finally realize my potential, will the one thing that I've searched so long for be taken away from me? I know, it's a selfish want in the bigger picture, but I won't lose sight of the fact that I am human, therefore, I have dreams and desires. I did realize though that it was something I placed in my own mind to prevent me from forging ahead.

I lost sight of the demons I have to realease, solely out of fear of what would happen if I did let them go. They have become such an integral part of who I am. There is a large part of me that is embroiled in my past, so much blame I have shouldered for the chain of events that have caused me pain. The burning question in the forefront of my mind has always been "why me?" I couldn't begin to grasp why these things were happening...relentlessly.

I do understand now, and the release will come in waves. Along with that release will come the ability to affect a change not only in myself, but in others as well. I am beginning to understand my purpose.

Traveling through the past...

Recounting situations of the past is not a healthy way to deal with the present and future; however in this instance it is important that I share the past in order to bring to light the amazing turn of events that have taken place over the past two months.