It’s no big secret that a very large amount of people suffer from some form of mental illness. I’m not talking about these new-age kids who all claim they are depressed yet live ideal lives. I’m talking about the silent fighters, the ones who have had a broken childhood. Whether from sexual, physical, or emotional abuse. Everyone is different and we all have different ways of dealing with it. Some bottle it up and let it eat away at them over years and years, while others lash out at those closest to them. Then there are others who bottle it up for short periods until they have, what I call, a mini breakdown.
I personally tried to bottle it up and pretend it never happened. When people ask me about my childhood, I can’t answer them because I don’t remember. The first 12 years of my life are a broken, short, memory of abuse.
I was shaken as an infant by my biological father because I did what all infants do… I cried. I remember days of being attacked and belittled over something as simple as I spilled a glass of drink. I have been hung from the back of my shirt on a clothes rack because I wanted to see the end of a TV show. I especially remember one day, T (I’ll call him), coming into my room, gathering up all my favourite toys and collectibles and forcing me to throw them in the fireplace in our lounge room.
I wasn’t the only one who suffered at T's hand though. My brother, one day, was beaten with a fire poker because he was running a little late to leave for school. He was about 10. My mother always has bruises and marks and was forever trying to cover them up. There is not a day, that I can remember, that T was not screaming or attacking one of us for one reason or another.
After 16 years of abuse, I finally broke. I lashed out at the one who had spent his years hurting my family. After a brief scuffle, where he kept ‘fronting’ me, I lashed out and punched him in the eye. I was detained by police and told that if I ever did that sort of thing again, I would be locked up. I found it very ironic that I spent my whole life being beaten and belittled, yet a single strike back and I was the bad guy.
Now don’t get me wrong, we called the local police more times than any of us care to count. Only once did they take T away. He gave mum a rather severe beating and left us kids, four of us, the youngest being five years old, cowering in one of our rooms. They took statements from all of us, on our own to start with, then as a family unit. When we got home after a few hours, there was printed notes left for us telling us how we were his world and he wouldn’t know what he would do if he lost us. He played our innocence and emotions like a damn fiddle.
Things were OK for a few days, a week maybe but very quickly they went right back to where they were. The emotional abuse was even worse from the parts I do remember.
Today I am diagnosed with PTSD and severe depression.
More recently, my fiancé left me, which lead me into a bad spiral. All the abuse I had suffered and repressed very quickly found its way to the surface and I ended up in hospital for attempted suicide. The split was about as mutual as it could be, both of us suffering from severe childhood trauma and lashing out for no good reason being the main reason. Sure I have found it very hard to deal with the person I had planned to spend my life with leaving and picking up the pieces of a four-year relationship has been the most difficult thing I have ever done. We are still friends, as much as a broken relationship can be and we still talk. We catch up once in a blue moon and it’s nice. Most importantly though she has helped me in my greatest times of need. At my worst, she has still been there to support me, and I don’t know if she knows just how much I appreciate her being there. I have tried to be there for her, but she is a little more resilient to having me support her. As I said, we all deal with our problems a little differently.
I guess what I’m trying to say in all of this is that you are not alone. There are people all over the world dealing with similar issues and who need just as much support. why not reach out to someone? Ask how they are doing. Not just ask how they are doing but ask how they are really doing.
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