The People Behind My Eyes

What happened, it wasn’t your fathers fault.
Why are you defending him?
He didn’t know how to be a father.
He should have learned.

It’s true. He should have learned. The excuses we make for parents that fail to protect their children are excuses that allow that child to continue to be hurt. It almost seems to say, “Your father couldn’t help you because he couldn’t help himself so the pain you suffered is in someway justifiable.” A hand holding back protection is as guilty as the hand that rears back and draws blood. If this wasn’t true we wouldn’t resent and hate the parent that sat back and did nothing to help us.

Sometimes I think my abuse was more manageable as a child. I mean, at least back then I didn’t understand. I didn’t have anything to compaire my life to. I didn’t have years of experience to say, this isn’t right or the problem isn’t me. I didn’t have any clue that I was being abused until I was much older. As an adult I have all these reasoning abilities. I have a larger depth of understanding. I have comparisons, well defined ideas of right and wrong. In my opinion, remembering my abuse now is harder to because I of all the new questions and the answers that come with those questions. It is much easier to accept that the problem was me than to have to say, my mother didn’t love me and there was nothing I could do about it. I cant say I want to go back to being a kid, heck, being a child is one of the most unsafe life phases you can go through. I’d never want to be a child again. But I wish that I had that cover over my eyes sometimes. I wish that knowing the difference between happy and sad didn’t make me so damn angry. When I know how things should have been then I’m angry because they weren’t. It’s that kind of childhood cover I wish for. At least then there woldnt be new questions and new things to explore. Hell, back then I didn’t understand what was happening. I understand now but I understand it with adult emotions. I understand it with an adult body and to tell you the truth, it’s excruciating. It’s torture because I now know how things should have been. I have much more of a chance to be resentful and angry NOW that I have a clearer understanding of what abuse is and what it is not. They say knowledge is power but they don’t add that sometimes power is painful. I think that sometimes not knowing is easier than knowing.

In this movie the kid seemed to come out of his past so quickly. It was a movie. He dissociated and dang did I see so much of me in him. he asked about basic life things because he had no clue. It made me cry because the things he asked were legitimate questions. They’re not questions you just know by instinct, they have to be taught by example. The new mother, his adoptive aunt, assumed he knew them and assumed his behavior was based on rebellion and not lack of good life skills. He didn’t know you sleep at night. he didn’t know about portions when it came to food. His aunt/mother told him he couldn’t sleep until 3pm in the afternoon. He just kept walking. He showed no emotion at all. later we found out he didn’t know when he was supposed to sleep because no one ever told him when. It reminded me of when I have no idea about life habits that everyone else has down pat. People give me these statements as if I should know and I show no emotion what so ever. I feel stupid though. But like that boy I show no emotion what so ever.

When I was in a foster home with my sophomore English teacher her husband showed some irritation because he thought I was playing games. I sat at the dinner table and said nothing at all. I ate, excused myself and went back to my room and stayed. One night at dinner he said to me, “You know, we can play this game too. We can give you the silent treatment.” I wasn’t playing a game, I wasn’t being rebellious, I was staying out of the way because I didn’t want to ruin that family like I felt I ruined mine. I had a good thing and I knew it. I just didn’t want to ruin it.

I once said that I function in chaos because I know the rules. If you throw a child of chaos into a room of order, that child will not know how to function not without clear guidance and reassurance that order is not to be feared. I didn’t know so I stayed out of the way.

I was doing laundry in their basement and I dropped the plastic cup. It shattered. My heart froze. I hid the cup and went back upstairs like nothing ever happened. A few days later the foster mother (my English teacher) told me she was very disappointed in me because I didn’t tell her I broke the cup. I said nothing. I can imagine that my face was like stone, no emotion, nothing. I was waiting for her to go off. I was waiting for her to tell me to get out or to tell me how I was always breaking things and ungrateful. I stood there stone faced, emotionless. Had I been at home the consequences of breaking that cup would not have been a simple, ‘I’m disappointed that you didn’t tell me.” I was taken from chaos and put in an orderly house with no clear guidelines as to how to move from that chaos to their form of order.

They both had abusive pasts but they were adults with years of experience in life, with ways to compare what is good behavior and what is bad. They had a stronger reasoning ability, a greater sense of how things should be. With years of practice on how to act and how to be they forgot that people smaller then them didn’t share adult living skills. Do I blame them? Hell no, not even a little bit. The reason I brought it up was because I saw so much of that boy’s character in me. His responses were like things I said to my foster parents. The numb look on his face, his baggy clothes, the way his hair almost covered his eyes, the way he held onto small objects for dear life, it all reminded me of myself.

This has been another night where my emotions have run high. I seem to want to turn to cutting more and more lately. I have to set a plan in motion to not do that tonight. The day was basically good. My sleep was rough but I did manage to get up, mow the lawn, cut some weeds, visit with UK for a bit, cook dinner and watch a that Hallmark show. I think it would be good to play some online games before touching on the second part of this subject. The movie was triggering also in that it showed just how guilty the woman felt for not protecting her brother. I have issues with not protecting my older sister and my younger brother. But I’ll have to journal on that maybe tomorrow or something. I’ve done enough journaling for the evening.

Joan