(Added on March 20, 2013.)
[Note: The bracketed edits are not new. Except this one.]
Ah, my first DadStory. I
hope I can encourage you to make fun of my dad's psychotic antics, as
well as the Special Education dopes who never found out what was going
on. As my childhood was nothing but being confused, used and abused,
it's all one really can do....
` And laugh from time to time, will ya?
When
I was three or four, I was playing on a wooden swing-set made many
years ago by my dad, who was at the time having a bout of logorrhea
(lit. 'verbal diarrhea'). He was talking about utter craziness that most
people would be trying to escape from, although I, having an
Impressionable Young Mind, took everything he said religiously.
` It
was all quite disturbing - he was telling me I didn't have rights in
this country even though he did; that's why I wasn't allowed to do
such-and-such, and I remember quite distinctly this exchange:
` I was saying; "But why don't I have rights?"
` He said; "Because I own you."
` I said; "And so does Mom, right?"
` And he said; "No, see, because I own you and Mom, just like I own the house!"
` So I said; "But I thought Mom owned the house, too!"
` And he said; "She does, in a way, just not the same way as I do."
I
never asked what he meant by that exactly, but I know that he did mean
that he owned me in some way. The way he talked to me in the third
person, calling me 'she' and 'her' instead of 'you', really did seem to
mark me as less than human.
` He wouldn't let me do the things I was supposed to do, instead getting in front of me and doing them, or even moving my arms and hands like a marionette so that he could still do what I was doing even if I was technically touching whatever-it-was.
...Yeah. Ha. Well, I guess that is more sad than funny. And this, most of all:
`
I remember hating life so much as a small child that it wasn't long
before I found myself at the top of the stairs, wondering if I should
throw myself down them.
` I kept thinking; "This will hurt. But what if I don't die? But I have to die! I've lived long enough. I know enough. That's good enough for me!"
` Then my dad came up the stairs and I said to him; "Dad, I feel like I want to kill myself."
` And he said; "Well, everyone does, from time to time."
` I said; "No, I mean, all the time."
` He said; "No you don't, quit makin' stuff up!" and continued on.
From that day, I vowed not to kill myself - but not so much because I wanted to
live! It was because I wanted him to make sure he knew that I was
capable of feeling. I hated it when he didn't believe me - which was several times a day...
And
my mom? I never talked to her unless I had to, so she didn't know much
about my life, despite living in the same house. My dad didn't trust
either of us, so neither did I: He told me practically every day that my
mom was schizophrenic and could not be trusted.
` Constantly, he'd
bring up examples of how insane she was because; "She doesn't remember
that happening, but I do!" or, "She doesn't remember me telling her
that! I tol' her and tol' her and tol' her that! And she says; [mocking
in an unflattering way] 'Oh, I don't remember!'"
`
His conclusion? "She has multiple personalities: She's a
schizophrenic!" Not that dissociative identity disorder (a personality
disorder) and schizophrenia (a psychotic disorder) have that much in
common. But being a kid, I didn't know that.
`
In fact, I thought Dear Old Dad was some kind of genius because I never
really knew what he was talking about on any subject. (Guess what?
Neither did anyone else!!) And as time went on, he got worse.
`
He would always be telling me that he remembered things happening that I
didn't. What was his explanation? I must be crazy, too! So must
everybody else who he had the same problem with, which consisted of about... everybody else!
Ha... Hilarious!
And
then, of course, he'd also blame people for things they didn't do,
which would necessarily involve being Loud and Anti-Logical. Off the top
of my head, I recall an incident from when I was nine: It was an hour
after I'd eaten dinner, and I had just remembered that there was still
some rainbow sherbet in the freezer. Naturally, I opened up the freezer
door -- but... it wasn't in there!
` So, I went upstairs where my
parents were, to ask Dad where the sherbet was, only to find him in the
hallway/laundry/junk room, talking to my mom. However, he didn't notice
me because he was directing Large Quantities of Logorrhea at my mom.
` A little later, I heard this huge roar of anger: "Where's the sherber'?"
` Well, that's what I had wondered!
` He marched me downstairs and showed me the freezer. "Where is it?" he demanded.
I
said; "Actually, I wanted some sherbet today and it wasn't there, and I
went up to ask you if you ate it or something, but you didn't hear me
because you were talking to Mom, so I didn't think it was important
enough."
` So here's a really typical example of his logic: "Well, since you didn't tell me before, you must be lying!"
` And I was like; "No! I did, but you weren't listening, because..."
` And he said; "Well, I don't remember, so I must be right!" (I'm not kidding!) Then he had this huge, terrifying grin as I sputtered in disbelief.
`
He kept insisting that I confess to eating the sherbert, and I was
panicking and crying, squealing like a Really Unhappy Pig; "I really
didn't!"
` This dragged on
into the night - though apparently oblivious, Dad didn't even turn on
the light. He just made me sit at the table, the only light coming from
the parking lot of the junior high school, pacing back and
forth between the kitchen and dining room (which were by his crappy
design, and which he never thought was important enough to finish).` "What did you do with the sherber'?" he kept barking.
` "I don't know what happened to it!" I cried. "I thought I saw you eating some last night! I was going to ask you..."
`
"Well, Mahm [Mom] sure as hell didn't eat it! But if you didn't, who
did? Huh? How could you not remember eating an entire half-gallon
[typical exaggeration] of sherber'? Huh? I know why! It's because you're
a damn schizophrenic!
` "Maybe it was one of your other personalities! Was it [E]? Or was it [other E]? [Last name]?"
`
"NO!" I shrieked, seriously not remembering having eaten any sherbert
for at least a week (considering that I didn't like it very much).
`
It was late before the repetitive grilling cycles were too much for
Dad, and he finally allowed me to go to bed. Even so, the accusations
didn't stop. For over a week, every time he'd walk through a room where
I'd be minding my own business, he would stand in the doorway and give
me the ugliest look, as if to say; 'You know you did it!'
` And then I
would start crying, desperately pleading; "I didn't do it! Why won't
you believe me? I'm telling the truth!" (Of course, even if he could see
see that someone was telling the truth, that did not generally affect
his opinion!)
` It stopped,
however, just after I looked up from a TV show to see that he was
loudly staring at me. I tearfully tried to protest even louder than
this, and he walked off, disgusted, into the hallway/laundry/junk room.
My mom also happened to be there, and she asked; "What's that all
about?" Immediately, he began complaining about my behavior to her, and
then, just as suddenly, he stopped talking.
` Wow!
` Then, he
shuffled back into the room extra-slowly, staring at the floor. Most
amazingly of all, he said in a barely-audible whisper; "I'm sorry."
`
Wow! To think that Jerry ever apologized to me occasionally! That
didn't keep him from getting angry over these things, though: For many
years after the Sherbet Incident, he would gripe to me about how my mom
had held this most vital secret in our sherbet status - he even made fun
of the way she'd finally 'confessed'; "Well, I guess I'm your culprit."
That
was my life, basically. I was blamed for many things, most of which I
didn't do, which was especially evident in the accusations requiring me
to break the laws of physics (stuff like me giving him physical and
mental difficulties), yet I must have done these things, obviously,
because I was a bad kid who was plotting against him.
` But again, I didn't know that. I was a kid. And he did a really good job convincing me that he was God.
Needless to say, he always told me to be a 'good person' like him. Well, I succeeded in imitating him exactly, and it wound up getting me into Special Ed.
` But he wasn't the only reason. I also have a severe reaction to hormones in non-organic milk.
[Edit: Actually a psychosomatic disorder with symptoms as described
below. Oh, and hormones - in general - don't actually leak out into milk
anyway, though they are present in meat.]
` This 'milk-drunkenness'
is very well-known to anyone who knew me as a kid; my eyelids would
swell up and develop almost black circles under them, my judgement would
be extremely impaired, my skin would get very itchy and irritated at
light (but not heavy) touches, and my anxiety/irritability levels got to
the point where I would laugh nervously, plot my next suicide attempt,
and scream profanity at my very Special Educators.
` It was an awful
feeling, it felt like my head was filled with wool; my thought processes
would barely slog along, and I was so irritated and pissed off that I
couldn't stand it! It was about the most
intense feeling I've ever had, besides the feeling I got when my dad
would blame stuff on me, or when some horrible disaster (i.e. torture)
has befallen me and someone thinks I'm making up some kind of excuse to
get attention!
Anyway... some of my classmates had the same problem with milk and wheat and stuff, so... guess why they were there?
[Allergies? Though I will note that two children who were treated for
allergies showed remarkable transformations in only days.]
` Even
though my teachers knew the problems they would have with us after
lunch, we were still ordered to do schoolwork. I don't know about anyone
else, but all I could think about was running around, crying and
nervously laughing (everyone thought it meant I was 'happy' - even me!).
`
When I got so shaky I couldn't stay put, I'd get this huge 'fear
grimace-thing' and hide. In third grade, when I went to Garfield
Elementary in Medina, there was this pine-green laundry bag filled with
sheets for the kids to punch when they were angry, and I'd take the
sheets out and hide in it.
`
Mr. Peterson, a schoolroom volunteer from the Baptist church next door,
would then just pull the drawstring and drag me into the hall, or
sometimes down the stairs, as that's where the school time-out room was.
Ouchie.
` What did the principal think of this? He would sometimes assist Mr. Peterson in dragging me down the steps when I wasn't
in a bag! Once locked in the allergen-filled time-out room (which had
been stripped bare, with plaster falling all around my ears), I would
sneeze and cough, visibly discolored from all the bruises, hives and
rugburns, and Mr. Peterson would tell me that they had called my mom and
told her 'eeeeverything' that happened.
`
Of course, by 'eeeeverything,' I assumed he'd meant 'eeeeverything', so
I didn't think I needed to bother telling her. Which I didn't, since
these episodes were way too embarrassing for me to willingly talk about.
`
Eventually, this led to me being sent to my room after school every
day. Since I wasn't allowed back out of my room, my dad could go in
there as long as he wanted and there wasn't anything I could do to
escape.
` Did he lecture me for hours? Yes. Did he offer any
discipline? No. I suppose he pretended to, but in reality, this was
mostly an important chance in his day to vent about how bad his
co-workers at the phone company had teased and mocked him.
` Yes, that's right. He'd complain for hours about his personal problems to his kid!
`
It went like this: "Bill Grimsley told me I didn't know how to handle
this Trouble Ticket, but that's because he doesn't know anything!" or
"All day today, they kept saying these nonsense words and then laugh
when I asked what they were saying!"
` That sort of thing. He did the same thing to my brother, too, actually.
`
By the time it was dark outside, I would be really tired and off my
guard. That's when he'd grab me and spank me as hard as he possibly
could. I'd say; "Not as hard as last time!" and he'd say; "I won't!"
though I didn't think my begging for mercy had any effect (he'd argue
otherwise).
By the time I was seventeen, I hadn't
significantly matured or developed beyond this sorry state. I was in my
fifth year of staying at home all day while my parents were at work; my
main way of learning about the outside world was through television.
` It was in the fall of this year (1999?) when
I
found out that my mom had no idea I'd been regularly abused in school.
She was just beginning to say that she thought my dad was 'ill', and I
would tell her things that she said confirmed it.
` For once, we had a
reason to talk, and one of these times, I'd made a joke about bags and
me being in them, but to my surprise, she didn't understand what I was
referencing. When I told her, she said; "If I had known that, I'd have
pulled you out of that school right away!"
`
I was surprised because I could have sworn my dad used to tell me how
stupid and wrong people were for doing stuff like that to me - yet
apparently, he didn't think it was worth discussing with my mom.
` It was because of his 'Yer teachers are wrong!' logorrheic spiel that I had no respect for teachers or their assistants. They were 'stupid', after all, so apparently being dragged down stairs and such was not grounds for getting them in trouble for any reason.
` Criminal? Stupid? Same thing!
Meanwhile, my dad upped three of his logorrhea topics. The first concerned how 'stupid' I
was because I 'sassed back' - read; was frequently in a panic because I
was unable to correct some misinformation he had created, whether
intellectual or 'myfaultal'.
` The second was how 'smart' I was,
because I had an IQ of 160 in first grade, not that he cared unless
there was someone else around to brag to.
` The third was about how
'crazy' I was supposed to be, seeing that I wasn't telepathically tapped
into his delusions and so could not anticipate what to avoid saying
around him. (He probably came up with new ones all the time, too, for
the sake of starting an argument.)
` I never understood these
lectures of his. The only message I could derive was that I was 'bad'
and there wasn't a thing I could do in order to change, unless I had his
help. Except, his help turned out to be a series of traps designed to
destroy my sense of self-worth. They were very effective.
`
Basically, they went like this: "Come try this, it's easy! Hey, what are
you doing, you stupid bitch? You're not capable of doing that!" or,
"What do you think you're doing? No, of course I don't remember ever
letting you do that - why don't you ask one of your other
personalities?"
` Worst of
all, he'd constantly be groaning that he was unable to break my spirit.
Literally. I specifically remember this happening a lot over the years:
` "You're fight'n and fight'n wit' me, all the time!" he'd say. "You're just so stubborn and belligerant. Horses..."
` Here would be one of those maddening pauses of his, before finally continuing: "People
break their spirits so that the horse just gives up and will do
anything they tell it to. Nau, I've been try'na break your spirit for
such a long time, so you'll behave, so I can control you, but all you do is rebel! You just think I'm being mean, but I'm try'na help you!"
`
I really had believed that was true, because whenever I told a Special
Ed teacher or counselor about how he yelled at me all the time, they
repeatedly assured me that he only did it because he loved me.
` Yeah... he must have loved me more than anyone in the world! Which of course, is why I believed him when he said; "I
love you more than anyone else, even Mahm! More than anyone ever, ever
will, because no one will ever be able to stand you. You actually think
you're gonna get married? If by some miracle you do, your husband will
wind up being a wife-beater, because no one can stand you! No one!"
` Holy
frell!
This
was bad news for me, because in fifth grade, Ms. Kauffman (who later
married Mr. Porter from the next room and had a baby girl), taught me,
as 50% of the classroom's female student body, that I shouldn't learn
with the boys because the only thing girls were good for is being
uneducated housewives. (I wonder if she's the same way with her
daughter?)
` I was kind of
glad the first time I walked through the door of my sixth-grade class in
Garfield, and found her sitting at the teacher's desk... and she told
me in no uncertain terms to get out! What did I think I was doing? Going
to school?
` Apparently, I wasn't enrolled in Garfield
anymore, little did I know. Neither did my mom. So she found this little
crappy 'retard school' on Remsen Road called C-FIT to send me to. Mr.
Galbraith and his assistant, Mike Swanson, were two characters which
greatly aggravated us kids to the point where people would have to sit
on us!
My mom didn't
know any of this for years either, until I told her that I ran into Dave
Fowler from Mr G's class, and that he told me that they shut the school
down for abusing the students. She was very shocked. She said; "No
wonder you said you hated the teachers!"
` Yeah... all I'd told her
about was how we weren't allowed outside for recess or anything all day,
and that they'd make us sing along with a tape about stuff like 'And
that's why there are no unicorns!' and... 'Kickin' down the
cobblestones. (Da-da-da-dum!) Lookin' for fun, feelin' groovy! Hey there
lamp-post, not so fast! (Da-da-da-dum!) Try to make the morning last!'
` Not to mention... my LEAST FAVORITE OF ALL:
You are my special friend, (Special friend!)
And when I think about what knowing you has meant,
I thank my lucky star (Wa-oo!)
That you are who you are! (Wa-oo!)
You are my...RRRRRGGGGHHH!!!
That kind of crap. Which is pretty aggravating in its own right.
` Anyway, even though my mom didn't know about the abuse at C-FIT, I was "home-schooled" after that.
` Good things: No more abusive teachers, just nice people - and some really annoying ones as well.
` Bad things: Dad, and Dad-related bull$&!# such as him saying there was a show on TV about me... myself... and how I thought there were cameras set up all around the house so he could watch me.
` (Well, I had
been on a hidden camera before and lied to about it, which Mr. G and
Mike had laughed in my face about; plus, it is the kind of thing Jerry
would have done if he didn't have to 'gettarountuit.')
`
So for six years, I sat around all day while my parents were at work,
thinking that they were somehow able to watch me from work or somewhere.
I'd just sit there at my desk, screaming at the room, thinking I was
getting through to them and then being disappointed when they'd 'ignore
my pleas'.
` I'd be like; 'Well, that's just because they
don't want me to know that I'm right about the cameras. Jerks!' The only
time I ever left the house was when my mom would drive me to go
'socialize' in meetings like H.E.A.R.T.S. group, a homeschooler's book
club, some other stupid thing that I guess was a book club at some time,
and later, 4-H.
` Luckily, this boy named Phil went to all of those meetings, so I got to know him pretty well.
`
I started going out with him when I was seventeen, when the roof was
coming off my world and I needed a sane person to talk to about the
level of insanity exhibited by PsychoDad.
` Phil had several stories
of his own to share, mostly incidences where my dad would be spouting
off utter insanity with a straight face. For example:
"So,
Phil, you have sinus congestion? Maybe you have allergies... I have
something you might try... See, before, I couldn't go outside and get
things done because I was too stuffed up. But now, I take this; [places
product on the table in front of him] Nasal-Crom: It changed my life!"
...Uh, yeah. Now do a Raisin Bran commercial!
Anyway, I have to go to a therapist in about six hours, no thanks to Jerry the Rat.
Hey,Girlfriend:
Just read everything above.
May I suggest that you have hardcopy of what you wrote. It needs a 'tad' organization, (re: which happened at which school)
Great
reading. And, I can relate really well. I do know what it's like to be
accused over and over and not be guilty. It's one of the reasons I am a
recluse.
Hugs, ( and you know how many miles it is from here to there?) Geez. four days travel at break-neck speed-o.
Mucho' hugs
