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When my brother, sister and I were little (3, 2 & 1 years of age), our mother went to prison and sent us to live with her mother. Unfortunately, "grandma" was with a pretty raging and abusive alcoholic named Charlie. I remember his boot well. His face, not so much..I didn't dare look him in the eye for fear of being beaten. We spent something like 4 or 5 years in that place, living like dogs in the front yard, a bunk bed our only shelter from the weather until snow fell. I remember one year, they had a puppy or something(?) and it got to live in the house while we lived in the yard.
We ate once a week if we were lucky. Twice a week if we were REALLY lucky. The only thing I ever remember eating there was bread, warm, crappy koolaid, and donuts, which Charlie would bring home in a big black trash bag. We were so grateful for every morsel.
We weren't allowed to leave the yard, and if we did, we were beaten...badly. (So we wouldn't do it again.) I remember the beating I got for going out on Mother's Day to get Betty(our grandmother) a rabbit to eat so she could stop being sad. Needless to say, 5 year olds aren't very good at catching rabbits. When I came home, I was beaten so badly that I had to crawl to the bunk bed on my belly.
I was beaten pretty severely every day for that 4 or 5 years. Went to the hospital; at least once. They said it was because of a bee sting that my face swelled up. It wasn't. It was because Charlie had beaten me half to death. I thought the nurses were angels..and that I was in heaven for that short time. I didn't know what else it could be.
My sister was sexually molested by two or three different men. I know this, because, like kids will..I got jealous of the "extra special attention" she was getting and decided to see how I could get that attention too. I hid under a bed and saw Charlie start touching her and telling her he was checking to see if she was clean. Some other guy had her do things to him too. She was 3, 4, 5 & 6 (maybe 7 too) when these abuses happened.
My brother was really little, and he didn't get beaten as much..but the psychological abuse he endured was such, that many years later, he still has some triggers that cause him to act out violently. And everyone that knows him...knows that he is NOT EVEN CLOSE to being that kind of man. When we would come back crying from a beating, he would always try to make us laugh, to cheer us up. 40 years later..he's still making people laugh. He's still trying to ease the suffering of others..despite his own internal suffering.
Daily beatings, rape, battery acid, lamp cords, ropes around the neck, boots to the face, cigarette burns. The horror of that place haunted me for years after we left. I remember that, until I was 14, I was afraid to go to sleep, because I was afraid I would wake up in that place again.
I didn't tell all of this to tell my story. I told it because it relates to an event that I believe has a lot to do with my issues with dealing with groups of people on a personal level. I can stand on a stage and perform, but have a hard time dealing with the audience chat afterward. That goes for any "interpersonal" dealings I have with groups of about 5 or more people. I'm VERY uncomfortable in those situations, and usually have to leave.
I think it all might have started with a really bizarre event that took place at a school whose name I remember as being "White Heath Elementary" in a place called Monticello.
We had been taken out of Charlie's place when I was 7 or 8. MY brother and sister went one way..I was sent another. I didn't see my sister again (other than a half dozen visits arranged by my adoptive father when I was 10 or 11) for 20 years. It would be 30 before I finally saw my brother again.
I was sent to an orphanage called "Adler Zone Center" where they tried to find me a foster home. At one of the foster homes, I remember they had a strawberry patch and would put me to work at the ripe old age of 8, filling 5 gallon buckets with rocks from the strawberry patch and carrying them to the house. I ate a strawberry once after a hot day of that and got punished. The natural children of this foster family were constantly blaming everything on me, when all I wanted was to please these people because, hard as it was there..it seemed like paradise compared to Charlie's house..and I desperately wanted to belong somewhere.
That family was the first I remember seeing the inside of a school. I might have gone earlier but don't remember.
I didn't fit in very well. While the rest of the kids had 8 years of learning to socialize with others, I'd been completely isolated socially for my entire life up to that time. No friends other than my brother and sister. No relatives other than those that showed up here and there at Charlie's. I had no social skills whatsoever.
You think school can be difficult and children can be cruel? Imagine being Mowgli the Dog Boy at an elementary school full of normally raised children. I really wanted to fit in. I really wanted to. But I simply didn't have the ability to. No one had ever taught me how. So I was at the social level of a 3 year old while everyone else was acting like 8 year olds. This didn't serve me very well in school, but I couldn't tell that yet.
It was one day out on the playground at recess that what I feel was a defining moment in my PTSD took place:
Here I was out of the hell hole, thinking I was in a better place when..
Some kids decided to start teasing me after acting like they were my friends. I tried to get away from them, but they started chasing me. And then it happened...something I have YET to see again in my 44 years: every kid on the playground saw what was happening and decided to join in. EVERY SINGLE KID ON THAT PLAYGROUND CHASED ME, LAUGHING AND JEERING. There must have been a couple of hundred at least, maybe more.
I didn't know what to do. I was so scared. I just ran and the blacktop emptied as everyone followed me. Next thing I know, I'm climbing the backstop of the school's little baseball diamond, growling and snarling at everyone..which just made them laugh and tease even more. I know the playground was empty, because I could see it from my spot 12 or so feet up..with all of the kids down below the backstop laughing and teasing.
I don't know if I ever recovered from that day. It may have been the most traumatic day of my life..including the beatings and my ex-wife's bloody attempt to kill herself by hacking off part of her arm. Those were bad, but somehow, I feel like this was much worse.
That's all. I'm hoping that sharing this will help me somehow. I don't know if it will, I just hope it does.
daf
P.S. 4 Days without pot and I'm doing ok..sort of.
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