The comfort Of little A

I did not get to ask Little A what exactly went through her mind yesterday evening when she painted this picture.  I just fell in love with it and wanted to share it with you all.

    So then, today comes along.  Just another unassuming day.  I went to work.  We had Potluck thanksgiving dinner at work. 

 It was a really great day, because of the comraderie of the “family” type workplace we have, the dinner was completely enjoyable. 

 

 

  This morning we had awards ceremony too.  a long one.  I had to take a lot of pictures.  Even the weather was great.  I think it got into the 60’s maybe with sunny skies.  It would have been the perfect workout weather but I was so tired for some reason, maybe the huge lunch, IDK.  

 

 

 So I slept and pretty soon, “HE” came home with little A. 

 and then Big A came home.  

Then,

  Big A,

 came….home. 

 

 

 She was in a bad mood, where hanging with her friends brings the bravery out in her. 

 So she was amazingly snotty to me. 

First off, she wants on the computer, but I am not happy with her room, so I sent her up to clean it, and she comes down in 2.5 seconds.  *ahem*  not really clean.

  she brings the laptop over to me and wants me to type in the pass word. 

 When I refuse, she calls me “lazy” and proceeds to screech at me.

  Now,  she has decided that her own evening will be…in….alone without friends and folding clothes. 

 With this, she said “you suck” and “I hate you”.  

  One more thing came out of her mouth and I got up and steered her to the kitchen, asking “him” to come downstairs.

 

 

 

I should have known better to involve doug in any damn thing where conflict is involved.  shame on me.

  At this point, I have already given her a consequence for her actions: 

 which was to fold clothes, clean the kitchen, and go straight to bed. 

This time,  I give her a stern warning. 

 

 

 ME:  you don’t want to ruin your evening tommorrow do you?  (she shakes her head no because she wants very badly to attend the school dance with her friends)

 

 ME: then I suggest you never talk back to me again.  I am not screaming at you, you will not disrespect me by screaming at me and calling me names.” 

 

   Well…. Big A nods.  Yes, she understands, she was about to proceed to finish the chores, when “he”  got 2 inches from her face and screams at her:

 

 ”Yeah, that’s right!  You’re fucking gonna learn the rules of this house

I’m sick and tired of you disobeying..” 

 

OMG OMG I knew what was coming next. 

  Big A’s eyes welled up with tears, she screams back at him.  “I hate you! Go to hell!” 

  ME: Big A!  No! 

 

 

At this point, the “man” has stepped away but he turns back around and I am in the middle of them.

  Once again, I feel him absolutely “vibrating” with energy.  I don’t know how else to describe it.  It wasn’t him “shaking” so much as his actual self was vibrating like an electric wire.  

 He was full throttle and stuck in high gear. 

 

 

 Again, as in so many other times,  he is close to her and screams into her face:  FUCK YOU!!!!  his own flesh and blood daughter. 

 

 

i want to die.   

i am tired.

it is over between us.

it may not be today.

it may not be tommorrow. 

but it IS most assuredly over between us.

 

 

Big A’s best friend’s dad is a cop here on post.   I called him to have him come over and speak with my ‘husband’ rather than have me call some police on duty and have his name on the blotter tonight. 

 

his response after the talk was to go park himself upstairs and watch wrestling.  I didn’t try to follow him. 

   It quieted him but now, 3 hours later, as I write this, i realize.  I am just biding my time before he and I separate for good.   He just won’t ever get the damage that he has done and Is still doing with these daughters of his.

 

 Because my life has been so negatively touched by abuse almost from my 2nd year of life onward,  I now lack the capacity to do anything but love those who give love back, and no one else. 

I have chosen to sleep on the sofa, with no blanket tonight, wearing “his” army socks  and my dog by my side. 

 I won’t be able to really talk to him anymore after this. 

   

 The picture Little A painted?  was it prophetic?  A comfort to me? 

 or just a picture…. I’ll never know.

 but strangely tonight I am deriving much comfort from it. 

Disgustingly Happy starting….NOW!

 Through the tears of anxiety I see something emerge.  My strength.  I thought it was gone, when I lived in a crack ridden, gang neighborhood without a car for 2 years, but it’s still there.  I didn’t know it before but I already took that strength and now I’m standing on a high precipice of change where I belonged to begin with, and the road forks.  Oh it forks!  There’s no going around it either. 

Like a darkened room of pitch black nightmares, and suddenly a small pinpoint of light emerges and the cretinous human that’s been holding my heart hostage steps aside, to let me out into my own life.    Happy.  Happy is what I feel.  Like a hundred pounds off my shoulders.

 

Then a thousand fears and thoughts come into my brain at once, and they look something like one of those ticker tapes at the bottom of the stock market screen except instead of numbers, it’s words like these:

 

alone kids work life men money hurt bills job rent transportation abuse love asshole him lawyer hit school credit report insurance car forever breakup fourteen marriage hate sin help feelings sleeping creditors retainer court agreement stable medical women vent call friends excercise tired lack appetite shove it jerk fault no fault failure.

 

All because something, a colossal twig I think, snapped this morning, and it was something that not only broke deep inside of me but freed me as well.  Well what did he do NOW you might ask? 

 Well, nothing he hasn’t been doing for 14 years.  

 After we *ahem* “talked” he took it out on Sugar later on this evening.  Who the fuck hits a puppy in the face with a comb over and over, to get it to stop whining? I think my therapist called it displaced anger. 

The kids tattled on him.  I calmly told him please~~do me a favor and don’t ever hit the dogs again. 

 

 

I called a divorce lawyer today. 

Catalyst~Part 11 in series on childhood abuse

 

I have to stop myself sometimes and remind my brain why I began writing this series of posts about my own abuse. 

 

 If I didn’t remind myself of exactly what finally started the series, all of the posts might come off just a tad jaded, bitter, and unforgiving.  

 Sweetiegirlz is not unforgiving. 

 

After all that has happened to me through out my life, I not only forgave but find a true balance between allowing even someone so close to me as the Punisher, and  living my life stress free.

 

 

  I thought all was pretty much settled.  Until the latest email…  Dated November 4. That is what burned within me for days. 

 

It came on the computer.  I read it.  I cried.  I saw red.  I was furious.

 

 

It’s author, the Punisher.  

 

 

 After all these years still knows and can pull the string representing my heart and the Punisher can still break it. 

That is why I finally decided. 

 

 

 The best way to help the situation to do the most good is if someone reads this and realizes: 

 You are no longer a prisoner. 

 

You are no longer defeated just because someone else said

 or continues to say that You are defeated. 

 

 

You are not what (fill in blank with your punisher’s name here) says You are! 

 

You truly can be free from all the punishment and all the years that the Punisher made you and everyone else think you were the one going mad.

 

 

I cannot publish ALL of this letter because half was directed at someone else.  If you have not read the other posts, here, please do read them at your leisure.  I cannot guarantee that this letter will make any sense to you otherwise:

Liar-Part 1

Mask-Part 2

Control-Part 3

Oppression-Part 4

Despised-Part 5

Exodus-Part 6

Heroes-Part 7

Expectations-Part 8

Leashed-Part 9

Facades-Part 10

 

 

November 4, 2008

(in the punisher’s words) 

 

I can say now, that we do forgive you, for your part.  I related to the family the truth!  That you were alwys a head strong kid who never understood WHO was in charge. 

 

 

 And for physical punishment, it was totally accepted in the days when parents and the law were not liberal and clueless.  (like today)

 

 

  I POINTED OUT TO THEM THAT YOU TWO WERE VERY SIMILAR IN PERSONALITY AND CHARACTER, AT THE TIME.  NOT THE CASE ANYMORE.  YOU WERE NEVER IN DANGER, RENEE, EVEN THO YOU FORCED US TO GET DAMN TOUGH AT TIMES. 

 

 

 We also believed in persistance and control over the minor children was a parents duty.  Most of your punishment were in your room, or grounded later on.

 

  That you were NOT a cooperative person, did not ever obey us without some form of protest or revenge tactic.  That you were rebellious & basically our problem child.  And problem children DO lie and try to get others to sympathize…and you know you did this a lot….

 

 

So even after you were older, later on in years, you would do or say things that were not true…so basically your attitude was like________ “tell lies until other people listen” or seek revenge, whatever a liberal can do to win. 

 

 

I told people how things have changed, how Renee is not a liberal minded nut anymore,  how we changed about certain things…

although we still believe raising kids according to liberal ways is HOW this country created so many criminals and rowdy, lawless brats on the streets and in the schools.  And there is much in the Bible that backs up our beliefs too. 

After all, look what God does to people when they are “naughty”… We could never begin to do that as humans.  He’s tough!

Plus, I straightened out these people from what their “Old Bag” mother was telling them about abusing you as a mere baby! 

 

 

NOT SO!  You were two [years old] and you were doing your usual crap, literally, all over the walls, Well you got your little ass beat and then a bath to clean it up.  THIS IS NOT ABUSE!  ABUSE IS “UNNECESSARY” TREATMENT WHICH GOES OVERBOARD”  ANYHOW, nothing ever came of this even thoug_________called the authorities…

 

In a separate email, the punisher writes:

 

 

I do want to CLARIFY that you may “look” at the childhood as a bad one , but you did have pretty pathetic problems that had to be dealt with in the way we DID (including hard measures and extremes)  We did resent the fact that you had to seek revenge a lot. 

 

 

AS FOR US, GOD FORGAVE US FOR “ANYTHING” WE DID IN OUR LIVES…SO AS AR AS WE ARE CONCERNED “IT NEVER HAPPENED” AND GOD WILL BACK US UP ON THAT…THE SAME WITH YOU AND ALL YOUR WRONG DOINGS,  tHEY NEVER HAPPENED!  AMEN! 

 

(end of email)

 

Come now, someone give me a cyber hug!!! 

I need several in fact because I really despise that email with every fiber of my being.

  The punisher continues to be able to hurt with (lies) mere words and go on like it is nothing. 

   Tommorrow,  I will tell you what I have done about all this and plan to do in the future…

Hugs and kisses tonight to anyone who’s been through similar abuse with someone.  You aren’t crazy.  You deserve healing, and you have a friend in me and God.

♥SG

Facades~Part 10

Facades are sometimes confusing. 

 

 

 In the best of families you realize that a hell of a lot more could be going on then anyone can see on the outside.

  On the one hand, my life was filled with normalcy, needs being met, and play.

  On the other hand,  my life was filled with turmoil, abuse, and sadness.

 

 

 As I grew older, the abuse had increased until it threatened to snuff the life out of me.

   Now that I was a grown up and about to be married for a second time,  i had high hopes for having a normal relationship with the Punisher, and often considered it a shortcoming of mine, if I found myself feeling any type of animosity with what had transpired in my life.

 

 

  In fact, it was the “normal” parts of my life, that seemed out of place, and had me thinking:  Maybe I am crazy. 

 

 

 But as more and more people observed the punisher’s behavior both through the letters to me, and in person,  I realized, I wasn’t over dramatizing anything. 

 I had been abused and I had lived through years of abuse. 

 The sooner I could come to terms with it, the better.  I had a lot of healing to do.

 

 

  Not long after Doug and I married, he came with me to meet the punisher and the other grown up who happened to be moving out of the city at that time. 

 I was 5 months pregnant with big A. 

 When I happened to leave the house for a short time on an errand, the punisher and the other grown up both sat Doug down and told him what a horrible person I was as a kid and teenager.

 

 Doug was mortified

  I couldn’t understand why in the world this would have to even be said to Doug. 

 He was mad, I was mad. 

 

 

 I’d been abused, kicked out of the house at 17 with no where to go,

and now I was THIRTY years old and the punisher felt it was soooo necessary to talk about how horrible I was supposedly was 15-20 years before I even met Doug. 

 

 

  Months later, we tried the visit again.

  Big A was 4 months old.  My 10 year old and 7 year old kids were also there. 

My brothers and their wives were there also. 

 The punisher should have been the proudest person in the world that the family was gathered in the home all together as adults. 

 I know I would have been.

  Because as of this writing, I haven’t seen my soldier son for years, 

 I see my 20 year old daughter once a year. 

 By the time that visit was over, I would vow not to ever see the Punisher again unless the Punisher received therapy and counseling. 

 

 

 Because the Punisher put on a display of histrionics and narcissistic behavior unparalled before that day. 

 

 

 I told Doug to put our belongings in the car as discretely as we could. 

We were leaving as soon as we went to the go-cart park with my brothers and their wives for one last visit. 

 

 

 As it turned out, the punisher and the other grown up showed up at the park and made a very public show out of grabbing me, yelling at me in public and making me cry hysterically. 

 The crime? 

 

 

I didn’t want to leave my infant daughter with the punisher to babysit.

  In our hasty escape, Doug had accidentally thrown some of the Punisher’s clothes in with our laundry, and the punisher wanted it back.

 

 

  I was pulled in the direction of the door and the parking lot until Doug slapped the punisher’s hand away. 

 ”You’re not taking her anywhere!”  

Things escalated until Doug and I finally said our goodbyes with our brothers and left.

 

 

  No one had fun at that go-cart park that day.

  Neither was anything the same.

 

 

  I paid for standing up to the punisher that day.  I paid for it with extended harassment by phone from the punisher.

  I paid for it by long letters, highlighted, blaming me in all caps, demanding I apologize for the fit that the Punisher actually concocted, escalated and finished. 

 It was the first time I actually stood up for myself…a sign of true healing.

Leashed~Part 9

The power of the written word is incredible.

  More than any other form of communication, it forces you to focus on absorbing what someone is saying through their writing. 

 

 

  For years, my healing of abuse went unresolved because I didn’t KNOW I had the power to accept or not accept these letters from the “Punisher”.

 

 

   So for years, I accepted that I was simply unlovable, fucked up, incapable of change, and all because someone WROTE that I was this.

 

  The punisher took every opportunity to disagree with me on everything, using the circumstances to reject me on the grounds of principle. 

 

 

 The situation with my black number one husband and the child/children that I had with him, was one such rejection.

 

 

  I remember calling from Germany on the morning of my son’s birth,  (a mixed race child). 

I know it was early there in the states.  I fucked up and I called too early.

  The punisher was livid. 

 The words spit out like venom: 

 

“You’re calling me to tell me you’re putting a black baby in my Christmas stocking!!  Thanks.” and hung up.

 

   I was truly alone, alone,  alone in this world. 

 

 

 There were no baby showers, no congrats, only 2 months later when the pictures were sent to the punisher, (the baby appeared VERY light skinned in those pictures) 

 did the punisher relent and send a gift.

“He’s beautiful”  the card read. 

 

  15 months later,  when I went home to the punisher during a visit, that I was going to marry the baby’s father come hell or high water. (a decision the punisher vehemently disagreed with)  I felt the kid should have a father his own race.  His race, culture and heritage should be preserved, and if the father was willing to marry me, well, that was as good as it could get for my son.

 

 I got a little too close in proximity to the Punisher. 

 In fact, I was in the Punisher’s face, with my finger. 

 

 The punisher, one day before my 20th birthday began to pound me mercilessly, scratching and slapping me to the ground. 

 I retreated to the room in the house where I was staying, and through tears looked at my sleeping toddler. 

 

 I was still a prisoner. 

 

 

 As long as the punisher was in arm’s length of me, I was a prisoner.

  I never even thought about calling the police.  I was warned not to leave the house before I was supposed to fly back. 

 

  By the time the second child with the mixed marriage came, the Punisher and I were no longer speaking and wouldn’t speak for YEARS.

 

   I sent a birth announcement and picture of the second baby, a little girl this time to the Punisher in 1988, anyway.

 

  What I got in return was a vicious dig on me. 

 It was a card. 

 The card said “Thanks” on the outside. 

 

 

On the inside, my baby’s picture returned to me, and a note:  
“but no thanks” it read.  

 

That one written attack alone should have changed me for life.  I should have hated the Punisher for the rest of my life after that. 

 But I didn’t. 

 

Somehow, I was just numb all over, all the time, about everything.  I lacked the capacity to feel emotions. 

 

All of that had been stolen from me as a young child. 

  Ironically, Yvonne had taken me under her wing from afar.  I stayed in touch and had a great relationship with the mother of the punisher. 

 

  I had a good job, but the marriage was a sham and he dissolved it after 6 years.

 By the time I was divorced with my black husband, the punisher got word of the divorce and called me.

 

 Words cannot begin to describe the mixed emotions I felt as this person resumed communication with me as though nothing ever happened, after having kicked me to the curb years earlier like so much garbage in a ghetto. 

 

 

 The punisher was apparently pleased as can be about the dissolution of my mixed race marriage. 

 

 

 I was just a fish being reeled in again.  The punisher had a hook in my mouth, an invisible hook, ready to reel me in at the punisher’s slightest command. 

  Believe it or not, it would still be years more before I learned to finally jump off that hook without guilt. 

Expectations~Part 8

*The continuation of the series I began writing weeks ago.  If you haven’t read this before, I linked to all the parts below.  I hadn’t forgot about finishing this story OR the catalyst that finally made me tell it.  All that is coming soon, and as deep as this story is, I still hope it helps someone.

 

When a reprieve comes along out of the blue, the cliche ‘good things come to those who wait’ might be able to be applied to life.

 

  What about when that reprieve gives way to the past coming back and trying to choke the life out of you? 

  Should the cliche ‘all good things must come to an end’ apply?

 

 

  Understand, that unless a problem is chopped off at the root, it comes back until it is resolved.  There is no getting around true problems.

 

 

 

The Punisher came from a long line of abuse. 

  The Punisher was born into a large family of 7 children, one of which was handicapped and later died as a teenager. 

 The father of this family was a workaholic, alcoholic who beat his children regularly. 

 Not much is known about Yvonne, the mother of the Punisher, Except that the punisher has described the mother, Yvonne (the girl’s grandmother) as abusive also. 

  DECADES of abuse later, the Punisher still had never had any kind of professional or private counseling, or therapy. 

There was nothing to do but pass everything the Punisher ever knew about life on to the next generation…

Which was the girl described in this story, me, Sweetiegirlz.

 

  Like a lot of abusers, “The Punisher” seemed to live off and enjoy conflict over the next many years. 

 The Punisher alternated between riddling the girl with shame-on-you letters and telling her she’d never change, never become anything real in life.

 

 

 When the Punisher found something to be really angry about, such as no longer having the girl in her verbal control,  communication would be cut off with a venomous,

 ”have a nice life” or

 ”we’re cutting you out of the will”  

 Sometimes the girl saved the letters, most of which were alternately laden with ALL CAPS sentences. 

 Ended sentences with “AMEN!” 

 and “PERIOD, THE END!!” as if by screaming on paper, the matter would be solved and the girl would bow down once again to nonsense.

  The letters were occasionally typed or highlighted in parts emphasizing sentences meant to make the girl react in anger.  Some were Pages long.

 

  It would take years for the girl to learn how to stand up for herself.  Meanwhile, she saved the letters.

 

  For to throw them away, would mean there’d be no proof at all of the Punisher’s scathing remarks.  

 

 This put the girl into a quandry, for if she was a Christian as she claimed, how could forgiveness come about by holding on to the written evidence of such evil words against someone? 

She eventually destroyed the pile of highlighted letters.

 

As it turned out,  time really does heal all wounds; but not before the wound is cleaned and dressed, which some of you know, can be a VERY painful process indeed…  

 

Heroes ~Part 7

Exodus ~Part 6

Despised ~Part 5

Oppression ~Part 4

Control ~Part 3

Mask ~Part 2

Liar ~Part 1

Heroes (part 7)

*image from here

Ruth and the girl met over lunch one day after the social worker found her for the girl. 

 The girl thought she’d came directly from Heaven.

 

 

  Ruth was a nurse who worked for a hospital on the night shift. 

  She had 3 boys.  They were 7, 8, and 14 years old. 

 

 

 She needed someone to be at home for them at night. 

 The girl needed a home, period.

 

 

  Over a steak dinner at a nice restaurant,(which was to become the norm over the next few months) they chatted amicably.

  There were a few caveats to the girl staying there with Ruth and the boys.

  1. The girl must go to church with the family

2. She had a curfew

3. She had to get the boys off to school in the morning before she herself went to school.

 

 

 

  The girl readily agreed.  The next few months were peace. 

 She had a home.  She finished school.(which was in walking distance of the home) 

 

 

 

Ruth treated her like a daughter.  She bought a health insurance policy for her.  She allowed the girl to drive her vehicle and had her put on her car insurance. 

 

They went out to eat 6 nights per week at wonderful restaurants.  

 

 On the 7th day (Sunday)  Ruth’s mother  came over and take them all to a Baptist church nearby.

 

  Afterwards, the dutch heritage women cooked a delicious meal.

 

  After dinner, the girl lay on the couch with her head in the older woman’s lap, while the woman stroked her long hair and hugged her. 

 

 Inside, the girl began to heal a bit.  She appeared less nervous, and started to enjoy life again.

*image from here

  Throughout the school year, the girl had enough credits to actually skip the first class of each morning of her senior year.  With out this one detail, she wouldn’t have been able to get Ruth’s boys off to school each morning.

 

 

 The girl marveled at the way things had worked out.  She thought about how there was more than one hero involved in the exodus of the girl from the punisher’s home. 

 

 

 

First of all, there was God and there were Angels helping the girl.  ( I wish this thing had a double underline feature.)  I cannot emphasize this point enough.  Without God, there are no heroes.

  Seriously though,  no one helps another, or is helped BY another without some kind of “awareness” of the fact that they are being prompted by something greater than they…  else where would their hope lay?

  In mankind?  tsk tsk.  It’s deeper than that…WAY deeper.

 

 

well, also:

There was her school counselor.  A kind, blonde, curly haired man who sometimes cancelled his appointments with other students for a crying, dark haired girl who bolted into his office some mornings.

 

 

There was GK, the boyfriend who held her, loved her, protected her feelings, kissed her between classes and passed encouraging notes. 

 

 

 There was Yvonne, the girl’s grandmother, who was strong willed and loving and nurturing and protective of the girl. 

 

Yvonne had told the girl much later in her life of some of the early abuse the punisher had done.  She’d explained that the punisher had bragged to her in a letter about how she’d beat the toddlers ass on top of her diaper rash.

 Had she known of the ongoing abuse through out the girl’s life,  Yvonne would’ve no doubt rescued the girl herself at the risk of starting WW3 between the punisher and herself. 

 When Yvonne passed away, the girl was one of only TWO GRANDCHILDREN who received any money from the estate.

 

 

There was Brad, before even GK, whose Father had told her of how to receive Jesus Christ as Savior into her heart.

  Brad who also held her when she cried, passed long notes to her in school, introduced her to church, invited her to dinner, invited her to activities at his house on the lake. 

 

 

 

There was Molly.  One grade her junior who constantly spent time with the girl and whose parents encouraged the girl and stayed interested in her for years to come. 

These were heroes. 

These were people who, if you asked them would never admit to being a hero.  But they were.  More than they would ever know. 

 Months later, the girl finally graduated High School. 

 

 

 She went into the Army after graduation, and a few more minor shifts and bumps in the road.  

 Like a kid in the proverbial candy store, lived like a bat out of hell, since she’d been so sheltered most of her life.

 

 

  Little did she know, the punisher’s hold on her life would soon reach it’s long arm out once again and affect her for years afterward…

 and not in a good way.

Despised (part 5)

image from here

One of the girl’s favorite things to do was to lie under the Christmas tree in a darkened room looking up through the branches, lit by the muted multi colored lights, and just think. 

 

There’d be presents, wrapped, under there like most homes. 

They’d be equally dealt between the girl and her brothers. 

 But one thing the girl could count on besides this were the rages of the punisher becoming more frequent during this season, or at least bigger in seriousness. 

 

 

 Something would inevitably push the punisher to the pissed off edge where jumping off with both feet meant TNT…BOOM!  

The punisher would rush to the Christmas tree and start unfurling garland, and tossing off ornaments to the ground. 

“Christmas is CANCELLED!!”  was the declaration.

  The girl who was used to such behavior would retreat to her room while the punisher ran around scooping up presents like a real life Grinch. 

    

 

 

  Somehow Christmas always made it back to the house though.  

 The girl looked forward to the holidays until one year.  When the punisher began giving presents that were well thought out stabs to the spirit of a teenage girl. 

 One year the girl unwrapped a plastic wastebasket. 

 

 Along with the wastebasket was a macrame plant hanger. 

 

 

 Along with the plant hanger was a lamp.

*note* pictures of “gifts” not the real ones but close proximity obtained from google

  The girl cried secretly later as she stared at the obvious dig on her intelligence and her spirit.  Her brothers were busy playing with the interesting things they’d received. 

 

 

 The punisher had found a new way to hurt her. 

Meanwhile, the punisher often became irate if the “right” gift wasn’t bought for the punisher.

  

  OR if a gift was bought for  the punisher and the girl then fucked up something,  the punisher destroyed the gift in front of her. 

 

 

 The girl would never forget the day she’d done something the punisher didn’t appreciate.  The punisher put a heart shaped locket that was given for some occasion, on the counter and smashed it with a hammer in front of the girl. 

 

 

 It was those times and mostly those times only that truly elicited tears of pain for the girl.

 

 

  Yet she didn’t ever question why or how this person could possibly be so mean to her.  The hurts went on and on and on. 

 As things piled up, the girl sought out counseling from the high school counselor (more about him later)  But the bizarre double standard the punisher had separating the brothers from the girl was taking it’s toll. 

 The punisher’s complete apathy for the feelings of the girl also was sinister. 

 Once when the girl walked to the mall by herself, she got to the parking lot which was 3 or 4 blocks away from home. 

 

 She was approached by 3 teenagers on bicycles who surrounded her quickly and touched her breasts until she screamed and they rode away.

  Shaking,  the girl went into the mall to find a security guard.  She walked home afraid and crying. 

The incident, however was played down and met with complete indifference by the punisher.

  It seemed that anything that meant anything to the girl at all in terms of emotions was quickly snuffed out by the punisher.

  Yet at times, the basic needs would be met more than usual. there’d be the girl’s clothes neatly ironed on her bed, or new clothes, or now and then the punisher would tell her to come to the mall  and they’d eat lunch in a restaurant mostly in silence. 

 It felt like having lunch with the devil.

    It was in the middle of her teens that the girl began to think about stepping off the curb into roads where the speed limit was 35 miles an hour.

 

 

  She didn’t want to die, exactly, maybe just break a leg,  lay in the hospital with bruises, some tubes, someone standing over her. 

  She only wanted someone to fucking care for her.  Whether that meant a doctor, a nurse, or anyone else.  She mostly just wanted someone to care. 

 

 

It would still be years before the situation would change. 

Oppression (part 4)

There’s a thin line between what is real and what is only a poorly constructed facade in a disfunctional family.  The way the girl was provided for, with clothes, food and shelter was equal to her brothers. 

 

 

 The way the girl accepted the verbal abuse and torment was just another part of life up until she began to tango with the teenage hormones…

 

There was the girl’s home life,  Wretched, tumultous, raging.  Then, there was the part of life that the girl was “allowed” to show others. 

 

   The girl was allowed to have friends, but rarely did she bring them home to hang out.  She had a 7 or 8 o’clock bedtime most times, due to being punished.

 

 

 

   Most of the time, the contact with friends was fleeting because the girl pissed the punisher off so much that she was punished almost constantly.

 

  Once let “off” punishment however, she’d stay over night sometimes with a classmate, babysat for relatives or neighbors or  she’d walk to the mall for hours, just looking at everything. 

 

 The punisher didn’t approve of too many of the girl’s friends.  One in particular, was banned from the girl ever contacting again, despite having no reason to make such a decision.  It was the punisher’s way of controlling every aspect of the girl’s life, as the girl was given more “freedom”.

 

 

 There was also the time for a couple boys to get interested in the girl. One in particular was her rock. 

 

 The most gentle, compassionate teenage human being she’d ever met.  When the girl was with him,  the world was different, and it was beautiful.  He had the ability to soothe her. They began to be intimate with one another.  If not for this boy, the girl might’ve lost her mind.

 

One day the boy gave her a whole notebook of lyrics from Queen, his favorite music.  When the punisher and the grown up at home found it, they threw it away.  The lyrics were not to their liking.  (remember this, GK?)  Thus they began to dislike the boy.  The girl ran away to the boy’s house.  She begged his parents to just give her one night’s rest without calling the punisher. 

They did, grudgingly.  That night, as she lay with the boy, she wished that she could’ve stopped time right there. 

 The next day, when the girl went back, she was grounded for 6 months.

 

 

Over a few years time, there was some teenage experimenting the girl did.  First, she began to smoke to make herself look older and “cool” and feel accepted.

 

 The girl was 13 when she did this.  Her punishment for smoking? 

Was it a stern talking to?  A plea to quit?  Grounded for a weekend?

 

No.

 

 

 The punisher made her EAT a cigarrette. 

 

 She was also grounded for a long time.

 

  She was made to write sentences nowdays.  The punisher had long ago discovered a fairly new way of punishing the girl.

 

  The sentences were never simple.  They ranged in length and ridiculousness.  It wasn’t 50, 100 or 200 sentences to be written. 

 

 

It was 1000, 2000, 5000 long ass sentences that taught her nothing but how to hate the punisher even more. 

 

 She wanted to stuff the papers full of sentences down the punisher’s throat.

 

 

  Once the girl ran out of paper on which to write sentences on.  The punisher became irate and sent the girl out into the snow to “get some paper from somewhere!” or else face a beating.

 

 

  The girl’s room became truly a prison for her and frustrating to even stomach being there anymore.  She began to write stories on the paper while she was supposed to be writing sentences.  This small time of escape, although it was only in her mind helped the girl cope with things.

 When the punisher came, she quickly shoved the stories under the bed to hide them. 

 

While at the mall, sometimes, the girl took to shoplifting.  The act was all about being able to control some aspect of her own life and it was fun, and thrilling to be able to hold a posession in her hand that she had obtained scott-free of her own sneakiness. 

 

Shortly, one of the girl’s “friends” told  the punisher about the girl’s shoplifting.  Weeks of grounding, sentences, and verbal torment ensued.   

 

Short of this punishment came the declaration over and over;  liar, retard, no good, will never change, witch, bitch. 

One particular day, a friend asked the girl to come with her to see her newborn niece in the hospital. 

 

 The baby had pneumonia. 

 

 When the girl ran home to ask the punisher for permission,  The punisher began to pummel her with fists, clawing at her, insisting that she admit that this was just an excuse.

 

  The hospital?? The punisher sneered. 

 

 ADMIT THAT YOU NEED TO GO BECAUSE YOU HAVE V.D.!!. 

 

 When the girl wouldn’t admit to the ridiculous accusation, the punisher beat her up. 

 

 When the girl’s friend showed up a few moments later, the only thing the punisher said to the girl sobbing on the floor was ”Just get out of here!  You’re such a liar, no one can believe you anyway!!” 

 

There was never an apology from the punisher.  Never an admission of being wrong.

 

It was ironic that everything the punisher ever accused her of, the girl hadn’t done.

And everything the punisher Did NOT think the girl did,  She had DONE and gotten away with. 

There were stupid accusations.  If there were a red spot on the girl’s neck, even an irritation or bug bite, the accusation was that the girl was making out in the woods with a boy.    The punisher liked to pound a fist on the table right next to the girl’s plate, during dinner while the girl was trying to eat. 

 

The boys, who became accustomed to getting away with verbal abuse too, became indifferent to the girl’s treatment.

 

 

   One brother had called her a witch one day.  The girl attempted to tell her mother when company was over, since that might’ve afforded some kind of action other than the punisher ignoring the incident.  Instead, the punisher said to her, “If the shoe fits!  Wear it!”

 

 

When the girl was punished to her room and sent to bed as early as 6 p.m., the brothers were quick to tell on the girl when she even got up to go to the bathroom. 

 

 

  She became good at sneaking through the house because of this.  The girl knew every crack and squeak in the floorboards, every hinge that needed to be quieted and just how far to open or close the door before it made a noise.

 

 

The girl never felt this was her home.  It was the punisher’s and the other grown ups home.  Among symptoms that happened for years to the girl were:  nonstop crying, sleepwalking, no appetite, nervous behavior, and an indifferent attitude.

 

 

  Shortly, the girl began to wish for harm and even death to come to her.

Control (part 3)

  

*art from here

There’s a method to an abuser’s madness. 

 It applies to child abuse as well as domestic abuse. 

Abuser’s control their victims in a variety of ways.

 

 

  First, there is isolation. 

 Isolation was used on a regular basis with “the punisher” 

 

When the punisher had the little girl in her sight maybe she felt guilty, and maybe she didn’t, but in any case, the girl was banished often to her room, often for the whole day, many times ordered to go to sleep before the sun even went down. 

 

 The girl’s favorite posession was a small battery operated radio (about the size of a drink coaster) that she got for Christmas one year that she stuffed into her pillow at night to listen to music.  The music soothed her to sleep. 

 

 

 In the summertime, this was torture for the girl to hear kids playing outside and having fun, swimming in the back yard pool, laughing. 

 

 

During certain times, the girl’s older brother would request that the girl be allowed to go places with him instead of being punished to her basement room. 

 When he made such requests,  8 times out of ten, the punisher would relent, and allow the girl to go with him for 2 or 3 hours either to a movie, or swimming or a friend’s house.

 

 

 Otherwise, the girl stayed in her room (first upstairs and later a basement room). 

 

 

 It helped the her to cope with this arrangement to fantasize about things, such as what kind of man she’d marry.  How many kids she’d have, and what she would name them.  The perfect day. (usually involving the ocean) 

  

The girl got really good at sneaking food out of the cupboards and refrigerator to take to the basement room and eat, while the punisher’s family was outside, enjoying the summer evenings.  It was a game to the girl, to not get caught, and also it was a way for the girl to stay in some kind of control over her own life.

 

 

 When school was out for the summer, the punisher ordered the girl into the backyard in a lawn chair for hours.  When the punisher got tired of seeing the girl there, she was told to leave for a short time, but the girl had few places to go.

 

  She had very few friends that she hung out with.  Her best friend became the library and the woods.  At the library, she got lost in the hundreds of books there.

  It was a nice reprieve but a lonely one. 

No one talked to the girl. 

No one befriended her. 

 

  Walking in the woods, was peaceful for her, but even lonelier than the library.

   Eventually, the isolation that the punisher put forth was the norm.

 

  The girl rarely escaped from her ongoing punishment of isolation since the punisher always found some reason to have her stay there in her room.  Some of her infractions included “acting snotty” or  “not doing her chores right”

 

  Years later, when the girl was free, a grown adult.  The punisher told her:  “You are just mad at us because we kept you a prisoner in the basement” 

 

 The statement was made with all the indifference of someone saying:  “You are just mad at us for giving you a cheeseburger instead of Peanut butter and Jelly sandwhich” 

 

 The punisher never understood nor fully grasped what the impact of the abuse actually was to the girl… 

 

The next part of the control was actual REAL controls.

  The punisher controlled the girl’s showering, telling her she could only shower on Monday , wednesday and Fridays, while no such control was ever given to her brothers.

  Even the way she used a towel was controlled.  The punisher instructed her to NOT dry her hair with the towel FIRST because the towel would get soaked and when hung up to dry would not dry fast enough.

 

 

During adolescence when showering and bathing is not only a must, but when kids are so self conscious of the way that they look, it was hard for the girl to accept that she couldn’t wash herself when she might’ve needed to because it wasn’t the right day. 

 The punisher also frequently controlled the clothing the girl wore, but not in the way that parents do when they are exasperated with the kid’s wearing one pair of blue jeans for a week… 

 

This was way worse than that.  The punisher sometimes picked outlandish combinations of clothing, to humiliate the girl.  Such as a lime green and yellow short skirt with brown suede clunky shoes.

 

There were many ways that the punisher humiliated the girl. 

 Humiliation of the girl was also a form of control. (see part one)  The punisher continued to call the girl a liar, a bitch, a witch, a jerk, no good, and told her that she would never change nor grow up to be anything.    The punisher also blamed the girl for all of her ongoing abuse, insisting that it was needed because the girl was so rotten. 

 When the punisher got really mad, she dug her fingernails into the girl’s face, pulled her hair until there were swellings where the hair was pulled almost out by the root, scratched, pummeled, nearly pushed down the stairs until the other grown person in the home, separated them. 

  There was no one to soothe the girl’s injuries. 

 No doctor was never called. 

The police were never informed. 

 The girl never told anyone what the punisher did because the abuse was humiliating for her to recount to anyone.   

 

The punisher controlled the others in the house to a much less obvious extent. 

 There were times when heavy guilt was used to express the punisher’s own unhappiness with life.

  The entire household was able to witness the screaming rants which followed with the punisher locking the bedroom door and threatening to shoot/commit suicide behind the locked door. 

The gesture happened more than a few times, and left the family torn between the stress of the abuse, and the stress of wondering if the punisher would ever really pull the trigger, or was it just more bad “theater”.

 

 Never could the girl imagine that life would turn even worse for her during her teens, but it did. 

   Way worse.