Author: KJ

Brother

~ KJ ~ 1 Comment

I wasn’t an only child.  My mother decided to bring two children into this world to torture.

My brother is seven years older than me.  Growing up, we were never that close; that probably has to do with the age and gender difference more than anything.  Like me, he was the target of physical and emotional abuse from both parents.  For us, it was our “normal”.  We grew up being drilled not to talk to anyone about anything, that whatever happens at home stays at home.  So how were we supposed to know any different?

I do know my parents treated my brother differently than me.  He was allowed to have friends over; that was never an option for me.  He was allowed to go outside; I was stuck in home-prison.  He had much more freedom than I ever did.  With that being said, using the word freedom may be an overreach.  That was the extent of his freedom.  Even now, as an adult in his mid-30s, he has to report his actions back to General Mom.

My brother has always done the minimum he needed to do to get by…academically, socially, and occupationally.  He failed out of college two or three times.  He’s worked at a grocery store for more than fifteen years and I guess he’s okay with that.  He’s never made attempts to move on or improve.  He wastes his money shopping for frivolous things – a habit which he inherited from our mother.  He could do better, he just won’t.

On some level, I do relate to my brother.  I can see his pain.  He has self-injured for at least the last 12 years.  I remember the first time I became aware of it.  He locked himself in the bathroom and began bashing his head into the wall dozens of times, until he came out swollen, bloodied, and bruised.  What did my parents do?  They screamed at him and banished him to his room.

After that, I became more aware of his other injuries – the cuts on his arms and legs, the burns on his hands.  One morning, he came home from work with his hand all mangled up.  He had “accidentally” slipped it in a commercial mixer at work.  In my heart, I believe he did it on purpose.  His story just didn’t add up.  Neither of my parents ever acknowledged his actions, even though it was quite obvious what was going on.  He was struggling through the trauma, just like I was.

You would think, in our shared experiences, that my brother and I would be close and able to relate.  We couldn’t be farther apart.  I stopped talking to my brother about anything significant years ago.  Unlike me, he is completely attached to my mother.  They share everything about each other.  They have nightly “conferences” (that is what my father calls them) in which they meet in my brother’s bedroom with the door closed.  I don’t dare assume what goes on – they do not want to be disturbed – and I don’t think I really want to know.  All I know is that it is not normal.  I have even had outsiders comment to me how it seems like my mother and brother are married; if they only knew what went on at home.

I don’t understand the connection between my brother and my mother, and it angers me.  How can you be this way to a person that hurt you so much?  It’s sick.  Sometimes, I conclude that he must be brainwashed by her.  That is the only explanation I can come up with.

Where do I start?

~ KJ ~ Leave a comment

While a few people know parts of my story, no one knows every piece of the puzzle of my life.  Hell, I don’t even know every piece.  There are significant time periods in my life that I have no memory of, especially in my childhood.  Sometimes, my mind likes to torture me in the form of flashbacks – because experiencing it the first time wasn’t enough.  I probably should have been more specific when I begged myself to remember more.

I wish I could remember more than I have.  Most of my memories are traumatic ones.  I remember few, if any, periods in my life where I was happy and felt safe and loved.  Did I ever experience that?  I would like to think that I did, but I will probably never know for sure.

I could focus this blog only on the future, and on the positive experiences of my life, but what good will that do?  I feel like in order to understand my present situation, you have to understand my past.  In recovery, they encourage you to focus on the future.  People rarely want to talk about the trauma, the pain, the reality of their pasts.  But I do.  I want people to know that things like this actually happen.  That parents aren’t perfect.  That mothers hurt their own children.  If we refuse to talk about it, people will never acknowledge that it happens, and victims will continue to stay victims instead of becoming survivors.

I used to be ashamed of my past.  To be perfectly honest, I still go through periods of intense shame and self-blame.  I probably will for the rest of my life.  But something in me changed.  I am no longer afraid to acknowledge the reality of my past because it will always be a part of who I am.  I have come to accept that maybe, just maybe, there is a greater reason that I endured all the shit that I have endured.  I need to be the voice for those that cannot find theirs.

It was a Friday…

~ KJ ~ 3 Comments

On Friday morning, July 10th, at 7:30 in the morning, I began a new life.

Running on less than two hours of sleep, I managed to stop shaking long enough to carry my three bags through the narrow hallway and towards the front door.  My father was there; he heard me in the shower earlier and stayed up to see what I was doing (nothing goes unnoticed or unquestioned in that home).  I struggled to get my bags out the door as I underwent his interrogation.

“Where are you going?” he asked me.  Luckily, I had already prepared myself for an interrogation and rehearsed my answers.

“I have an internship.”  Apparently, that wasn’t enough of an answer, as he repeated his initial question and added extra emphasis on the where.

“School.”  I kept my answers short.  The less detail the better.  But even that answer was a lie.  Then he asked me about work.  By this point, I had already been out of work for two weeks.  He believed I was on vacation. In reality, I resigned.

“How long are you going to be gone?” he continued.  By this point, I had one bag left to carry out the door.  Then I would be done.  My mother was just starting to wake up and I knew I had no chance with her.  I struggled to keep my emotions in check.  I mumbled “four weeks” as I made my final exit through the door.  I knew it wasn’t going to be four weeks – it would be forever.

It took two trips up and down four flights of stairs, but my adrenaline was so high at that point that I couldn’t feel a thing.  I threw the bags in the back of my friend’s car and we took off.  There were no goodbyes, no hugs or well wishes.  We were not that type of family and this was not that type of situation.  That was the last day I saw my family, and hopefully that continues to be the last day for the rest of my life.

Many people do not understand what would drive a person to up and leave their family behind without as little as an explanation.  For me, leaving was the only option I had left.  Very few people knew the reality I had been living for the 29 years of life.  I was at a point where I knew if I didn’t get out, I wouldn’t make it to 30.  This was the day I had been imagining since I was a child – the day I would finally be free from the hurt, the pain, and the abuse that had become my normal.

I would be lying if I said I was free from hurt.  Even now that I am out, the hurt and the pain are still a part of me.  There are scars that will likely never heal, and emotional damage that cannot be reversed.  Every day is a struggle for me, but I am taking steps.  I want to live a life without hurt.  That is the life that I deserve.