Anonymous blogger
Booze. Broads. Bullshit. That’s what we used to say made my father’s world go ’round.
One of my earliest childhood memories has my parents squaring off for a physical confrontation, like two prize fighters walking into the ring. These battles got worse with every new mistress and most, at least on my father’s part, were alcohol-fueled. Knockdown drag-outs were the norm.
To her credit, my mother tried to leave several times. Trapped between religious vows, my father’s continuous threats, and the vicious cycle that domestic violence is, she always went back.
During one of these great escapes, we moved into the upstairs of a small, one-bedroom duplex close to my grandparents. I started first grade. Not far into the school year, I fell and seriously fractured my left elbow. I had a cast that stopped short of my shoulder.
Meanwhile, my dad wanted my mom to reconcile yet again. She resisted.
The day after I got my cast off, he came to our apartment. I remember being glad to see him when I got there. He had been drinking and was already riled after being rebuffed yet again by my mother. With the ever hopeful naiveté of a 6-year-old, I thought I knew a way to get him to stay and play with me.
I went into “my little room”, which was really a tiny, misshapen closet in the apartment’s only bedroom. My mom transformed it into a little playroom for me with blow-up furniture, a wooden child-sized table and chairs and even a fuzzy white rug shaped like a foot. (It was the ’70s.) I loved that place – until that day.
I emerged from my space with my penny pig which I took to my dad. “You can buy some beer and we can play a game,” I said hopefully though he was already at the door. He ignored me, so I yanked at the hem of his jacket, preparing to repeat my offer.
My fingers hadn’t completely released his jacket when he lashed out at me. He grabbed my left shoulder – where just a day before my cast had stopped – and hefted me into the landing. I hit the wall and rolled halfway downstairs, coming to rest on my still healing elbow. The pain was excruciating and I started to cry, setting off a horribly violent battle. My mother attacked him like a riled mama grizzly and yelled for me to go hide.
I didn’t hesitate. I probably should have stayed and tried to break it up. (It was one of the few times that I didn’t.) Instead, I ran to my little room and barricaded myself inside. I pushed all the little furniture in front of the door even throwing the foot rug on top, as if that would help. I don’t know how long I was there before I heard voices calling me.
I think it was the police, but I wouldn’t answer them. Finally, my grandmother came, carefully removed the furniture from the doorway and pulled me out. I gave her a fright, because when she did, she grabbed my still throbbing arm. I screamed.
But that was nothing compared to what my mom got.
Their fight had gone out the front door, down the street and up the next, ending in the public school parking lot. The police broke it up. My mother went to the hospital. She had a few broken ribs, two blacked eyes, bruises all over her throat and up and down her arms and legs … it was awful. This was in the days before domestic abuse laws, so my father was driven to the border of the next town and released.
About a week later, my father returned. As usual, a fight broke out. Only this time, my mother shot him.
I wasn’t there. I’ve heard multiple accounts. One version has them fighting over the gun and it went off – accidentally. (This was my father’s story to the police when he declined to press charges.) Thankfully, this ended police involvement. He came there to kill her. It wouldn’t be the last time he tried.
My mother could have gone to jail – or the morgue. My mother kept leaving. After nearly two decades of trying, she succeeded: she got a divorce.
We were lucky. Every day, other women – and some men, too – are not. If you are in a violent relationship, please get help. There are hundreds of organizations and services to help you. They don’t judge. Like you, they just want your nightmare to stop.
Pick one. Please. Now.
21 Responses to “Anonymous blogger”
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Wow.
Thank you for sharing your story.
the truth laid bare. raw, powerful stuff.
So, so sorry.
Oh my gosh. You sent chills over my entire body. How horrible it must be to have memories like these be the ones that you recall from your childhood.
Thank you so much for sharing this story. I’m sure that your words will help someone to stand up for themselves and to save their children from enduring such tragic events.
Thank goodness that you and your mother survived. Your words will be someone’s rock to lean on!!
THANK YOU for telling your story, Anonymous.
Wishing you peace.
I’m so sorry for what you went through. You are very brave to share your story and I know from experience that it’s something that is so difficult to relive. I can’t help but get teary eyed and cringe at the recounting of your story because it brings back so many memories…I can’t help but feel sad for the little girl that you were and how that changed her. Blessings, love, and Light to you. Thank you for sharing your story.
These stories of abuse cause me to be amazed every time by the resilience of the human soul. For you to have survived that, and then tell about it so eloquently? Wow. Thank you for telling your story.
The thing that jumped out at me when I read this the first time — and the second — and the third — was, “I probably should have stayed and tried to break it up. (It was one of the few times that I didn’t.)”
Who changed the job description for six-year-old girls to include referee for warring parents? I ask you, how screwed up is it to expect a child to be the voice of reason? That is not the natural order of things. Not in my universe anyway.
But then, you didn’t exactly grow up in the same universe I did either, did you? Yours was a pretty dark and scary place, and what you should have had was parents that made it less dark and scary, not more.
I ache for the little girl in the closet, but I marvel at the woman she’s become. And just in case it needs saying, thank you for letting some other mother or daughter know that they don’t have to take this. Thank you most of all for the last five sentences you wrote. Someone who needed to hear those words will now. Because you had the courage to speak them.
I agree with Mojo. It was never your job to stop them. THEY were the adults and you were the child.
Thank you for your story.
Thanks for sharing. I had an abusive alcoholic father who was very simular. Im you and your mother are safe now.
What an incredible woman your mom is to have pressed on for twenty years to get away. She must have an indominable spirit.
wow. oh wow.
oh how i wish i could pluck that little girl from this story and tell her how wonderful she is.
but you as a grown woman, you ARE wonderful and brave for sharing this story. thank you. and your mother…thank goodness she left. religion or not, NO one deserves to be treated like that and no one should be expected to stay in a relationship that awful.
may you find much healing as you live out the rest of your story…
you deserved to have a happy childhood. I am glad you were able to overcome and in turn help others.
What a powerful message you share. I back your belief that there are many of us who want ANYONE living such a nightmare to get out. Now. Please.
Bless you, anonymous.
Thank you for sharing your story.
I don’t have anything to say except I’m sorry to hear that happened. I hope you are healing.
Oh god. I am so sorry for this, and very proud of your mother. And you.
That is a dark and nasty world you lived in as a little girl. I hope the telling of your
experience ultimately removes you further from it all. If you are as brave now as you were then, you must be one hell of a brave woman.
Eaton.
I remember my dad slamming my mom up against the wall when I was about six years old, and coming between them. It’s not the job of six year old girls to referee, but they just do because that’s your mama. So glad your mom finally got out. Thanks for telling your story, and I hope your heart has healed.
Like you, I witnessed my mother’s abuse. She made the right choice thankfully, and I as a grown woman have to. Thank you for telling this story…I hope you have both found peace now.
Lil
I am glad she finally escaped. Thanks for sharing your story.