The Foundations Were Laid

22/06/24

TRIGGER WARNING: GRAPHIC DESCRIPTION OF PHYSICAL CHILD ABUSE

As my inner child work has continued, I’ve been tracing how certain harmful behaviours in my adult relationships are linked to traumatic childhood incidents.

While I’ve long known this particular occurrence was wrong, and far beyond acceptable parental chastisement of a child, I’ve only just started to take a pickaxe to the foundational beliefs it laid in me.

This was around the time I was eight or nine. We were living in a very small village where everybody knew everyone else’s business.

Mother and her husband, Rassgat, together with their friends Gordon and Mildred, decided they fancied strolling to the pub for an afternoon drink.

I would be left at home to play on my bike, along with Gordon and Mildred’s daughter, Olive.

My big sister Lena would ostensibly keep an eye on us, but we were being left to our own devices for a couple of hours.

It was a hot day, and after a while Olive said she fancied an ice-cream.

There was certainly nothing of the kind in my family freezer, so she then suggested we go to the tiny village shop and buy one.

When I pointed out that neither of us had any money, she shrugged and said there was some in a jar at her house, and she was allowed to use it. We could get some money for an ice-cream each.

So that’s what we did.

We happily sat on the milk churn stand, swinging our legs and stickily licking our lollies.

Afterwards, we made dens and fortresses with the empty milk churns, fighting off imaginary marauders until our parents arrived back.

All the parents ignored us and disappeared into my house for about ten minutes. Olive’s parents then emerged, calling her to go home.

They looked at me very sternly and said I was wanted inside, and I should go in immediately.

The last thing I heard as Olive skipped off, holding her parents’ hands, was Mildred asking what she’d like for tea. Olive responded happily, “Jam sandwiches!“.

I felt a stab of envy as I visualised the sliced white bread and the strawberry packed, shop bought jam that she’d be getting.

If I got a jam sandwich it would be made with leaden, homemade brown bread, full of husks and hard things. The jam would also be homemade, all tasting the same, no matter the alleged fruit content.

Due to poor preservation and storage techniques, the jam would almost inevitably grow a green cap of mould. This was apparently no reason to discard the product – the mould could be scraped from the top and the remains fed to the children.

The jam of my childhood was always Slight-Dusty-Hint-of-Mould flavour.

I soon forgot jam sandwiches when I saw Rassgat at the door, face like thunder, shouting at me to get in the house.

I had no idea what I’d done wrong but the terror flooding through me made it difficult to walk.

I made it through the door and was instructed to go upstairs to Rassgat and mother’s bedroom.

He sat on the edge of the bed and told me to stand in front of him.

My mind was racing through any possible naughty thing I could have done to make him this cross, but I was coming up blank.

The ensuing rapid fire line of questioning, and levelling of accusations, quickly made it clear to me that there’d been a terrible misunderstanding. Rassgat thought I’d persuaded Olive to steal money because I wanted an ice-cream.

Stumbling over my words I stammered out that no, it wasn’t like that, trying to tell him what had actually happened.

Over and over he yelled at me to tell him the truth. Over and over he demanded I look in his eyes while he was ‘talking’ to me.

I couldn’t. It felt like his eyes were boring into my soul, and all I saw in them was hatred.

When, for the umpteenth time I refused to ‘admit’ I’d stolen, still trying to get him to hear me, Rassgat exploded, screaming at me that I was a greedy, disgusting liar, as well as a dirty little thief.

In one sweeping movement he reached out, grabbed me by the back of the neck and pulled me across his knee.

Utterly shocked, I didn’t struggle until he’d already pulled my skirt up and my knickers down.

Then he started to spank me.

He put every ounce of strength he had into it. The first strike sent a flame of pain through me so fierce my entire body went rigid like a plank, but no noise escaped me.

After about the third strike the shock vanished and I began to fight to get away, screaming and clawing, expecting mother to coming running to stop this awful thing.

Over and over I’d fall to the floor, crawling to try to get to the door, to escape. Over and over he’d drag me back, resuming his beating with seemingly ever more vigour.

Over and over I looked to the door but mother never appeared.

Eventually I gave up. I guess you could say I disassociated.

I can remember bizarre, miniscule details like the hairs sprouting from from his big toes, and the discolouring of his toenails. I can remember the grain and exact yellowy colour of the varnished wooden floorboards. I can remember a fly beating itself against the window.

Eventually he stopped and I was told to go to my room.

A little while later mother stuck her head around my bedroom door.

I was laying on my bed, face down, sobbing inconsolably. My bottom and legs were so raw and sore, I hadn’t been able to put my knickers back on. The welts were raised and handprint shaped.

Mother took a brief look, tutted softly but said nothing. She went to get some cream, then sat on my bed and dispassionately applied it to my wounds. It made no difference; the pain was like nothing I’d ever experienced.

She didn’t cuddle me.

She didn’t ask me about Olive, the money and the ice-cream.

She told me that they knew it was me who’d decided to go into someone else’s house and steal, and had influenced Olive to go along with it.

Again, I tried to protest and explain. Again my protests fell on deaf ears.

I was told that when the lady in the shop had mentioned we’d been in to buy ice-creams, mother and Rassgat had immediately known it was me. They’d been forced to apologise to Gordon and Mildred. What shame I’d brought on my parents.

It seems Gordon and Mildred simply accepted this judgement of me, never considering that their daughter did actually have permission to take a little change for sweets.

Not one of the four adults considered asking Olive or I any questions, they simply condemned me.

This condemnation was based on my ‘track record’. The terrible ‘track record’ of me once taking some coppers from a jar in the kitchen, and once having taken some coppers from my own money box without permission.

Everyone failed to consider that my experience of being previously gossiped about/’grassed on’ by the shopkeeper, meant I knew there was no way I could buy illicit sweets without being found out. I wasn’t that dumb!

Also, at that point, I’d fully taken on board that stealing is wrong.

As mother stood to leave, she turned at the door and sorrowfully said, “I really hope you’ve learned your lesson this time.“

The sense of injustice and betrayal was enormous.

I hid myself in my room for as long as they would allow. During that time, certain beliefs were setting themselves deep into my core:

• people who love me will eventually see something so awful inside me, the ‘real’ me, that they’ll stop loving me. Even mummy did.
• what I think is right might not be right. Sometimes my thinking is wrong and other people have to make me think right.
• people in authority can do anything they want because they’re right. Even if I think I’m right, I’m probably mistaken. Grown ups are always right.
• people can see my real, bad, soul self through my eyes so it’s not safe to look at people. It’s probably better to avoid the risk by always looking at my feet, or off to one side, when in conversation.
• I’m bad, bad, bad. Other people get believed but because I’m a thief and a liar I can’t be trusted, and no one will believe anything I say, ever.
• if I try really hard to be good and nice, like Olive, then maybe people won’t hate me.

So, the point of this less than glorious trip down memory lane is that list.

It’s seeing, really seeing, the patterns that I’ve carried forward into adult relationships, because Little Jess still had me believing that I was rotten and bad.

It’s recognising how Little Jess did what she could to protect herself at the time, but that those self-defence mechanisms are no longer appropriate.

The defence mechanisms she presented involved extreme people pleasing, having no personal boundaries and tolerating terrible treatment because it was perceived to be deserved due to personal lack, or fault. She saw herself as broken.

At the same time, she developed a limited protective armoury.

When all appeasement attempts failed, eventually Little Jess would go all guns blazing into being that mean, vicious, razor tongued, dishonest bitch that others said she was.

Thus she would show herself, and others, that they were right in their judgement.

Back to the start…trying to be sorry enough, nice enough and good enough that people won’t hate her.

These polar opposite coping mechanisms have caused me harm in so many ways.

I know Little Jess means well. but she is a scared little kid. She shouldn’t be telling grown up me how to behave in grown up situations.

Once again, I’ve used a visualisation technique to go to Little Jess as she sobs in her bedroom.

I sit on her bed gently rubbing her back until she turns to look up at me.

I open my arms and she creeps half into them, half onto my lap.

I hold, her, sooth her, tend to her wounds with care and compassion, let her know I believe her.

I’ve voiced my outrage and indignation to her about the way she’s been treated, rocking her in my arms as I reassure her that she did not deserve this; that she did deserve to be listened to, and trusted.

I knew that after taking the money from the jar in her own kitchen, she’d understood it was stealing, and wrong and knew not to do it again. She’d never have gone into Gordon and Mildred’s house if Olive hadn’t told her it was allowed.

I asked her to hold onto me, the grown up. A grown up who can be trusted.

I reassured her that she can let me to take charge now, and trust me to make decisions that will keep us safe.

As previously, she held tight to my hand and cuddled in close.

Through these memories I’m reprocessing, I can see the childhood grooming that set me up for all varieties of subsequent abuse. The patterns, based on a warped self-image, and beliefs like those listed above, are clear.

As well as the visualisations, I continue to practice guided mindfulness, talk things out on Frazzled Café, listen to pertinent podcasts about building self-worth, self-image and true inner confidence.

I shall keep going with the microdosing, and I’m grateful to continue to benefit so much from my friendship with Altan. The value of the therapeutic assistance and unconditional acceptance he offers can’t be overstated..

My mind talk is remarkably improved recently. I find when I do slip into negativity, I can more readily catch it, and gently change it with simple reminders to Little Jess that, actually, we’re pretty awesome.

When I cook a really amazing meal for myself, or achieve some project or goal, I regularly high five Little Jess, making sure she enjoys the moment, relishing the fact we’re kicking ass.

I continue to struggle to look people in the eye when conversing. I know it can make me look shifty and I am working on it. As the self-worth grows, the fear that people will see the ‘badness’ inside me, via my eyes, recedes.

One day, in the not too distant future, Little Jess is going to be sure enough of my ability to handle things, confident enough of her trust in me, that she’ll let go of all the heavy, grown up stuff.

I really look forward to it, because then she’ll be able to express her beautiful, childlike wonder, joy and sense of fun. I’m ready for some of Little Jess’s true, playful self to be felt.

Until then, I’ll continue to hold little Jess in compassion, just as she always should have been.

We’ll journey forward together, healing and slowly becoming one.

We’re becoming more.

JP