Since I was very young I remember having that fear of her. At any moment things could get crazy. I think in a way this fear kept me from doing things that would mess up my life. Kept me from making decisions that would encourage her violence to come out. That's the good part of the fear.
The bad part is that you never really feel at ease or comfortable around her. You're not sure when or what will set her off. My brother and I were always asking her if she was ok, what was wrong. We were constantly worried. Had that knot in our stomachs.
As the oldest child, I took the brunt of her stress. I was the garbage can where she could dump all that frustration, sadness, anger and worry. I remember getting into trouble for the silliest most innocent things. It often turned into physical survival. At 8 I remember running away from her, running through the house and she caught me by the hair. Hitting me and pulling my hair out. Her boyfriend had to pull her off me. I'll never forget that. I have many many memories of her chasing me, catching me and then beating the crap out of me.
At 16 she chased me through the house and knocked me down by hitting me in the back with a bar stool. My friend went with me to the ER to make sure my kidneys weren't damaged.
There were so many times I gave her some reason to come and tear my room apart or the entire house. If I couldn't find a specific shirt, she'd come in a rage and pull all my drawers out and throw everything everywhere, knock down the dresser, sweep her arm across the top, things flying, me standing in a corner trying to weather the storm.
If I said something wrong, maybe in the wrong tone of voice even, she would throw things at me and knock furniture over. I'm pretty good at dodging. Of course, since it was my fault that she wrecked the house, I had to clean everything up. That's a fun way to spend your weekend as a child.
All of the physical violence was, of course, accompanied by screaming and yelling awful things. Crude names. I've been called most things including bitch, stupid, selfish, disrespectful and a load of others. She has such a scary face when the monstor comes out. Crazy eyes and spit flying as she screams how much she hates me.
Often the police were called. By a neighbor or by her in an attempt to scare me or show her power over me. As a kid under 13 they simply tell you to mind your mother. No matter what. At 16, they come pound on the bathroom door as you shower and make you come out with shampoo in your hair and dripping wet only to threaten you with juvenile hall. She builds the story against me. Like I was horrible. She denied being physically violent with me. They believed her.
She made sure I knew my place. Even though the place changed with severe unpredictability. She made sure I felt small and unimportant and weak. And I did. I was just a dumping ground afterall. No one was there to stand up for me.
As I got older and had more guts to fight back, I screamed back. I called her names and told her I hated her. I did. I told her,"No" when she would come at me to push me or slap me.
Somehow the fights were always about respect. She demanded respect. Even when the trigger was more related to the dishes not being as clean as she'd like or when she'd had a rough day and didn't like my tone of voice. It still is always about respect. Recently she turned the event of my son breaking a vase into a respect issue related to me.
She wants the power and has a terrible way of demanding it. It's pushed so many people away.
No comments:
Post a Comment