Child Abuse Story From Kaleigh

by Kaleigh
(Missouri, USA)

Where do I start? My mom wasn't always bad. She herself had been emotionally abused, along with her three siblings, by her mother when her father went off to fight in the wars. That doesn't excuse her behavior. The difference between me and her is that I don't make excuses for my abuser. My mother grew up with low self-esteem, and that led to her marrying my step-father.

He had no problem telling her bullshit and putting her down, and in turn delivering the same blows to me and my brother. Always yelling at us, pushing us, kicking us if we didn't move fast enough, and withholding food when he could get away with it.

I was six. My brother was four. It still continues, and everyday at college, I hope I never have to return. I dread the holidays when the dorms shut down and I'm forced out.

We were forced to move to a new town when I was in second grade. During that time, he enjoyed calling me and my brother "bed wetters" and "warthogs", "cry babies" and he even called me a "cry baby ass bitch" on my seventh birthday, in front of some kids. I cried in a corner. When school started, I marched to the counsellor and told her what he had said to me. She didn't even look up from her papers. In a flat, dead voice she said, "There's nothing I can do." That day, I knew I couldn't rely on anyone but myself because they wouldn't even believe me. I stopped telling. That summer, he tried to suffocate me, and when I bit him to save my life and then told my mother, she didn't believe me either; sent me into a 'time out'.

When I was a teenager (middle school) was when he pulled out the "fat" card. Always sneering at how I looked and how "heavy" I was getting. I weighed 160 pounds due to P.C.O.S. (Polycystic Ovary Syndrome), which I didn't find out about until later. But not loosing the weight didn't help me cope.

By the time I was in high school, I was completely withdrawn and couldn't do social things well. I couldn't understand how kids could be so carefree. And every night I would whisper to myself, "God, if there is a God, let me go to sleep and never wake up."
And when I did open my eyes every morning after, I felt so depressed that I thought I was going to cry. But I had forgotten how to cry; I can't do it even now. I feel if I give into any emotion, I am weak.

I've also developed a tendency to focus on one "best friend." I want to be with that "best friend" constantly, but my choices have always ended badly; they always put me second to themselves.

I can't even contemplate any physical relationships. I feel worthless and not worthy of someone else's love. But what I want the most is for someone to hug me and always be there for me, no matter what.

As a college student, I am almost on my way out forever, out of the put downs and humiliation by him in front of my own family, where no one will even speak up. I've had to learn how to defend myself verbally and mentally since I was six. I sometimes rage inwardly at the girl I could have been if my mother hadn't married him and had waited for someone who would have truly loved her and us.

I feel bad about leaving my brother in their clutches. I try calling him any chance I get. He's in therapy now because he's 'rebellious.' I wonder why? The counsellor says that it's his (and I use this term sneeringly and disgustedly) parents' "divine right" to punish him. I thought we got over that in the middle ages, that's why we don't have kings over here. I wanted to go knock him one. My brother can't disconnect like I can. He feels too much and he was left hurt when someone said that these people could do whatever they wanted with him. Kinda how I felt with his counsellor.

Throughout school, I've been driving myself constantly so I could "get out" and get a job immediately after college. I will continue to do so because I will not rest easy until I'm beyond it all and maybe then I can start over. Learn how to be human again and let it all fade. Because if I don't do this I will die. I know that for a fact. My living pisses them both off to no end; they've both told me so. SO I am going to continue and I will be what they cannot be: a good person.

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