So many people have a hard time around the holidays. I didn't always. I can say that as a small child I enjoyed the holidays. My mother always made them special. The smell of homemade cookies and breads. I remember how we always had a real tree. Mom always had the tree lights, ornaments and even the wrapping paper all color co-ordinated. I remember Christmas eve at my grandparents house.We always got new pj's, it was one of the things I loved most. We would come home Christmas eve after spending it with grandma and grandpa, change into our new pj's, even if they were alittle scratchy. Then the three of us kids would rush downstairs so that we could open one present before we would go to bed and try to sleep. Yes, for the most part the holidays were good.
My feelings about the holidays didn't change until I was 17, that is the year that my world and my family changed.
I can't tell you what day it was, or why I had decided that day was the day to blow the lid off of my world. I don't know where the inner strength came from, or if it was just the need for the abuse to stop. I will, though, share with you what I do remember.........
I sat on the curb outside, across the street from school, smoking a cigarett. It was a cold, cloudy, drizzly mid west day, it must have been early November. I didn't care how cold it was, or that I was getting soaking wet, as a matter of fact it felt good. I knew that this was the day something was going to change. I just had no idea how things would change.
I was sitting in Math class and I don't really recall what I said, but I do remember getting up and walking out. I went down to the school's guidance counselor's office. They told me I would have to wait to speak with him. I had spoken to him many times before and for whatever reason I trusted him. I knew that I had to tell someone what was going on and he was the only person I could think of. I knew that if I waited to long the moment would pass. It was hard to wait, so walked across the street to smoke another cigarette. I came back into the school and told the lady in the office that I needed to see the guidance counselor right now and that I could not wait. She must have seen my distress because she went and got him right away.
I remembe sitting in his office. I'm sure that I was telling him all of the things that had been going on for years at home. I just don't exactly remember what I told him, what his reaction was, what my reaction was. I only remember bits and pieces. Like a glass that has been dropped on the floor and shattered, some pieces easy to see and then there are the little shards that you can barely see. I don't remember feeling anything, at least not until the police officers came. I felt humiliated, shame, dirty, as the two male officers started asking questions wanting details so that they could be sure I was not making a false report. Like I would make that shit up. I do remember the kids in school looking at me as I walked down the hall with the police officers. All of them looking on with a questioning glance. Hmmmm...If they only knew.
The police station is a blur. I don't have any real memory of it, up to the time when my mother got there. I remember her face as she walked into the office where I was at. There was a look of pain and distress, I can't quite put it into words. She said nothing when she walked in. She came to me and wrapped her arms around me, that is when I remember feeling something. I was so overwhelmed with emotion that all I could do was cry and say "I'm sorry" she told me that I had nothing to be sorry for that I had done nothing wrong. I knew that life had changed and that it not only changed my life but, it would impact the whole family. I remember seeing my fathers face as they brought him into the police station, sad, scared, frightened. Once again the memory shatters. I don't recall anything from the rest of that day.
I do remember, unfotunately, just how horrible that Christmas was. I don't really remember Thanksgiving but, Christmas was the hardest to live through. Our world was in shambles, a complete wreck, horrifing, disbelief in the ugly truth. My mother has shared with me just how dark and hard that Christmas was for her. She says it was a year that forever changed Christmas for her. Her idea of family was torn apart and as if that was not enough, her mother died that holiday season and I wrecked her car while she was out of state at her mother's funeral. There was pain all around me. I was blaming myself, the old "if I had just kept my mouth shut" was all I could hear in my head. I know that this is not right and I no longer feel this way, but at the time it was overwhelming. What I had hoped would end my pain, only change my pain. I had no idea how long it would take me to move out of that pain, the feelings of being victimized and start to try to live life.
I'm glad that I can write about it, but I can tell that the scars are still there, those little shards of glass, the ones that get under your skin and you can't quite see. Yes, I have an uneasy feeling in my chest, but nothing that I can't deal with. I needed to write about this day in my life, it was a day when everything changed, no matter what followed. My life, my world, my family, would never be the same.
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