Predators on Innocence
You know that it's a fact that if you child is going to suffer sexual abuse. it will be at the hands of someone that you trust. A family friend, a regular visitor or worse still a family member. Those that had the responsibility to care and protect us were either pre-occupied, working or having a night out and leaving their charge with a trusted family member top babysit.
That was my fate at the hands of my maternal grandmother and her brother. Her penchant was to flick you penis and inflict pain where and when could especially when she'd been drinking. This usually happened when changing my nappy. His perverseness we far darker, he liked to put his penis in your mouth when his sister had passed out or fell asleep after guzzling too much vodka.
This nefarious ritual eventually was stopped by my Aunt Phil that has the perception to realise that something was not right. I do no know hoe she realised this as I have not had the opportunity to talk to my family...I pray that someday we are reconciled.
So I continued from a baby into a toddler and on the way to childhood. I was 5 years old when the next notable event occurred in my young life. Father was had retired from the USAF and was working as a fork lift driver at the local paper mill. He foot was badly injured but well enough to be released from hospital. I remember coming home from school and some strange man being in the lounge with my bather and his bandaged foot. The strange man told my Mother of the accident and that he'd have to take it easy. During the next few days my Father developed a blood clot in the wound that moved towards his lung. He was rushed to hospital and over the next few weeks I did not see him. I later learned that he had nearly died on the night he was taken in and here's the thing. When my Father awoke from his near death experience several days later clearly emblazoned on his hand was the sign of the cross. It appeared that the Holy Spirit had intervened and saved him from an untimely death. This changed my Father, he was no longer the martinet he once was. He was softer, more understanding and more labile to talk rather than hit. Iy was at this time that he discovered the poet in him. I still have the book of his poetry in storage in England.
About a year later when he recovered we moved back to the US and the old dad returned harder than before. By this time I was approaching 9 years old and had the penchant for doing, or saying, the wrong thing at precisely the wrong time and KABOOOOM!!! This was brought on by my older brother being taken into hospital with Rheumatic Fever which lead to the hospital finding a hole in his heart. This not only put pressure on the family coffers but also exacerbated the problems between my parents.
He was in about 6 weeks and when he finally came home it was another 6 months before he was normal and able to again participate in a normal childhood. By that time my relationship with me Father was one of just surviving the day without getting belted. You have to understand that my Father hated any form of sickness, you were allowed to be ill for about 24 hours then his mood started to grow darker. He could help himself, it was just something in his make up. Something that happened in his past.
There were times when the situation with my brother became almost intolerable to him and who'd come bouncing in with a bad school report, or God help me, a neighbour calling to complain about me and KABOOOOOM!!! I have to confess this with shame but there were times when I knew I'd been hit or beaten because of my brother and my Father not knowing what else to do. So when we were sent to bed I used to hit him and I remember it and I must say I do with shame. He did know what was going on, Just that Dad hit me so I hit him and told him to stop upsetting Dad!.
Eventually the beating stopped when I was about 15, We'd since moved back to London when I was 11. One day he lost his temper in the garden and I just picked him up. There was no direct thought, it was pure impulse. It worked from that day he'd shout but would not hit anymore. By that time the damage had been done but it took me another 30 years to realise what had happened.
Don't get me wrong, he was a good man and God fearing but these black moods would overtake him. This page reads badly, all he'd had to do was get me to steal for him and we'd be back in a Dickens novel. The sad fact was that my Father was damaged goods. I am now 48 years old and the history I have since learned about my Father makes my life pale by comparison. He did the best that he could. He fed me, clothed me, loved me and gave me things when he could afford it. Now how's this for adaptability, I soon realised that after these beating's he'd feel terrible and I learned that I could ask for what I wanted and get it. Perverse as it sounds, I actually looked forward to what I'd get when Dad was no longer made at me. Okay it's not perverse, it's sad but it made me who I am today and what I overcame to get to who am today.
I honour my My Father, I respect that he could have been much worse and I now have some idea of the pain that he'd felt. The misery of the past that haunted him. We are all product of our past but it does not mean that we have to be ruled by the past. Just pray for the strength and courage to overcome yours and find the way to the path you should have been on. God know and loved you, God wants the best for you. All you have to do is reach out and believe. It won't happen tomorrow and it won't come in a blinding thunderbolt from Heaven but it will come. In the march of a few weeks strength will start to come, hope will be kindled and you will feel it. It is at this point you will have found your true Father, in Heaven, and he will give you the strength to look into you past. To face the pain, to stand and say "I will not be imprisoned anymore".
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