Traumatic Memories

[Hiryu]

Anyone have any they want to get off of their chests, this is the place to do it. I'll start it off.

My earliest memory of psycological abuse was when I was about 4. I wondered away from home and my dad spanked me all the way home but, the spanking wasn't such a big deal. It's the way he acted while he was spanking me. I swear in my memories that he is laughing. Now maybe I'm wrong. Maybe he was crying or maybe he was drunk. All I know is that's the way I remember it.

Okay. I shared one now you share one. Lets exorcise these demons.

 

[bratgirl365]

I don't know if this a traumatic story but it's one that sticks out and still bugs me till this day!
I was about 6 maybe 7....my mother gave me money to get each of us an ice cream cone....I was so excited....while walking back from the corner store with the two cones in each hand....I dropped one of them. I was so upset. My mother tried to comfort me and just laughed it off. We shared the one cone but still I felt bad about it.
Like I said not traumatic but I still think about it and how bad I felt when I dropped that cone!

 

[Hiryu]

I'm sensitive like that too. I sometimes dwell on stuff that wouldn't bother a 'normal' person.

 

[isabeau]

well at the risk of being too open, my mom would go on late night rampages. she had a drinking and anger problem. so there were many traumatic happenings in my life, but one that sticks out is the time i ate onion rings. i later about around one in the morning got extremely sick and needed to throw up. i went into the bathroom to throw up and mom, in a rage, yelled at me. so a bit later, in my bedroom, i felt the urge to throw up again. i was too scared to go to the bathroom, so i used a christmas bag that was in my room. but yet again i had to throw up and so i crept into the bathroom, quietly trying not to wake up mom, i threw up crying, i always cried when i threw up, but this time she finally realized i was sick. now mom had a problem. she probably was delusional most of her adult life, with depression. this is just one of many things that happened, but the least personal that i feel i can post here. hope its not too open.

isabeau

i ended by throwing up a total of eight times that night, and havent touched onion rings since. plus the stale beer didnt help

 

[Hiryu]

Oh, that's terrible! No, it isn't too personal. That's what this thread is for. It's to help us to get the hurt out so we, don't have to carry it, locked up inside anymore. This is therapy. I wish someone could have been there to comfort you through that but, you got through it and you're still here and you're safe with us. You're among friends.

 

[isabeau]

Oh, that's terrible! No, it isn't too personal. That's what this thread is for. It's to help us to get the hurt out so we, don't have to carry it, locked up inside anymore. This is therapy. I wish someone could have been there to comfort you through that but, you got through it and you're still here and you're safe with us. You're among friends.

thank you i appreciate that. i came to understand that mom masked her illness with perscription drugs and alcohol. and now that she is dead, i can forgive her for those things. but at times, like just now, these memories will creep up on me.

isabeau

 

[drew70]

I guess I was about 3 or 4 when this happened. I don't know if it falls into the category of trauma, but it upset me quite a bit at the time. Whenever we'd drive home from anywhere, we'd always come up Grosvenor Lane which traversed a bridge over US-240. As a small child I would look with wonder down at the multi-lane highway, and I would always ask whomever was driving (Mom or Dad) if we could go down that road.

Finally one day, I asked my Dad, and he actually agreed. Now, there was no entrance ramp from Grosvenor Lane, we had to drive a few blocks to get on the highway. Soon we were passing underneath Grosvenor Lane which Dad pointed out to me. I was so excited. I loved my Dad for doing this for me. I don't remember how far we went, but I started wondering where we were.

"Daddy, where are we?" I asked excitedly. In truth, we were only in Rockville, but to me it seemed as if we'd left everything we knew behind us.

"I don't know where we are, son. This was your idea, remember?"

"But...but...I thought...." I couldn't put my feelings into words. I felt really bad, that we were now lost and it was all my fault. In retrospect, I'm sure Dad knew exactly where he was, and this was his way of shutting me up. But man, it shook me up at the time. God, I can remember this like it was yesterday.

Never again did I ask to go down that road. Ironically, US-240 was shortly thereafter absorbed into the Eisenhower Interstate system, and became Interstate 70S. Eight years or so after that it was renamed to Interstate 270, from which my TMF handle is derived. For over 25 years, I've been commuting to work via I-270. Sometimes I feel like it's my second skin. Here's what I-270 looks like today

 

[Hiryu]

I can see how that could be scarey for a small child. I don't think your dad was trying to shut you up. I think he was just picking and being so young you naturally fell for it.

My dad and brothers used to scare the hell out of me with boogie man stories but, the worst by far was Redeye Jim. They would pull their lower eyelids down to were the red shows and stare at me while saying "Redeye Jiiiiiiiim..... Redeye Jiiiiiiiiiiiim, REDEYE JIIIIIIIIM!!" I remember being about 3 or so when one of my elder brothers did that followed by "RRRRAAAGGGHHHRRRR!!!" and I screamed my little head off! It scared me shitless! Maybe that's why I like horror and ghost stories.

 

[Knox The Hatter]

The abuse I received at the hands of my parents couldn't really be called a "pattern", as such a thing would be termed. However, the times that they did lose their bearings left psychological scars that have never, ever healed...thirty five years and counting.

It only happened a few times...but my father would have me stand in front of him, while he verbally assaulted me, berated me, insulted me, for as long as a whole hour, or even longer. He jumped into my mind and vandalized it, trashed it, made me feel lower than the lowest human being on earth. And after it was all over, it was Get The Fuck Out Of My Sight. After it was all over, I was a basket case for quite some time. I can remember three instances when this happened...only three. Might as well have been a hundred and twenty seven. My sister was the kind of person to throw it back, to never take that kind of verbal abuse from anyone. I was the kind of child who beat myself up with it...and the physical evidence was certainly there...154 pounds and climbing at the age of eleven.

Of course, if confronted with this today, my father would talk about what bullshit this is, how I'm too sensitive, that he never meant anything he said, blah blah blah. I certainly would never allow this to happen again...not from anyone alive on this planet, much less him, or my mother...but the damage has been done. It can't be undone. All I can say is that I would never, ever talk to my own children this way, if my wife and I should be blessed to have them.

 

[Hiryu]

That really sucks, Knox. I never went through anything that bad that I can remember but, the way your father made you feel reminds me of the way my mother punished me when I was small.

When I misbehaved, she would take my belt off and beat me with it. I don't mean like beaten to a pulp but, I got it on the legs as well as the ass and if I got hit anywhere else while trying to escape then it was suposed to be my fault. After it was over, I would sink to the floor, crying. When I would look up at her, I was met with a cold stare. A stare that said "You are nothing! I am over you, I am greater than you and you are..." I don't know. Something. Maybe nothing but, I'm quite sure that's where the inferiority complex began. She insists she doesn't remember it. Same with my dad and the he-haw whoopin'. Funny how they 'forget' or how quickly they denie it without giving it a single thought.

 

[isabeau]

carrying my last baby dead for a week, knowing she was dead. the doctor thought it might make it easier on me, my cervix being more dilated and all. and when i gave birth, feeling her come out of my body, sliding out, that tiny baby girl. dead, head hanging over the side of the bedpan, where i had given birth to her. yup that was rather traumatic.
the third of three babies to die.

isabeau

 

[Hiryu]

I can't imagine anything more traumatic than that for a mother. My mother had a miscarriage in her fourth pregnancy. The story is that she was a few months pregnant when she went to the bathroom and it fell out of her and into the toilet. They say it looked like an orange ball. I don't know what happened to her but, my dad says that we he came to see her -at the hospital I presume- she screamed at him to get out of the room and not to even look at her. I sometimes wonder if that sibling were a brother or sister and there's no doubt in my mind that that child as well as yours are with the Lord right now. This reminds me of a true reinacted audio story that I heard on a christian station. It was called Tilly. It actually made me cry and I'm not much for crying. Sometimes it's hard to believe but, all a corpse really is is just a shell, a protective suit for this world. Those lost children are happier than any of us can possibly imagine.

EDIT: In a strange way it's somewhat merciful that they don't have live in this world with all of it's wars and murders and lies like we do.

 

[chicago]

Hmm..

I have lots.

We'll go with a more disturbing memory first.

I was about 4 and my father came home drunk. This was typical. Alcoholic Irishman...total cliche. Anyway, he was carrying a huge case of beer and hid it under the sink in our kitchen. He sees me staring up at him from the doorway and bends over, half loses his balance, looks at me kind of cross-eyed and goes "Now don't tell Mammy" and smiled very strangely.

It creeped me out, but my father was my best friend until my parents got divorced so I did it.

Memory Number Dos

I was about 10 and was outside when I wasn't supposed to be. My mother, who has always been physically and emotionally abusive, pulled my ear all the way home, about a block, but she pulled so hard that my earlobe was ripped off slightly. Everyone is born with either "free" or "attached" earlobes. It's a genetic thing. I was born with "attached" lobes but now I have one of each.

Memory Number Three

This is the worst one. I was sick for 2 weeks my sophomore year of high school. Coughing, wheezing, horrible headaches and earaches. My mother told me I was a hypochondriac and didn't take me to the doctor. I went to school every other day because it was the week before finals but I was miserable and in serious pain. I cried myself to sleep almost every night from the pain in my head, neck, and ears. My little sister need a refill of some medication that said no refills so my mother made an appointment. She said I could come with. The doctor looked in my ears and gasped. She said they were so bad they were almost bleeding and if I had waited any longer I could be permanently deaf. I had serious double ear infections and laryngitis. The doctor told my mother to look at my ears, she's a nurse so she'd know what to look for, but my mom just said coldly "I don't want to look at it." This is one thing I can't forgive her for. The thought that I'd never be able to listen to others voices, hear laughter, communicate properly or listen to music still makes scares me when I think of it... I only ended up going to the doctor by chance...

That's it for now.

 

[Storm_Cat]

Hmm..

I have lots.

We'll go with a more disturbing memory first.

I was about 4 and my father came home drunk. This was typical. Alcoholic Irishman...total cliche. Anyway, he was carrying a huge case of beer and hid it under the sink in our kitchen. He sees me staring up at him from the doorway and bends over, half loses his balance, looks at me kind of cross-eyed and goes "Now don't tell Mammy" and smiled very strangely.

It creeped me out, but my father was my best friend until my parents got divorced so I did it.

Memory Number Dos

I was about 10 and was outside when I wasn't supposed to be. My mother, who has always been physically and emotionally abusive, pulled my ear all the way home, about a block, but she pulled so hard that my earlobe was ripped off slightly. Everyone is born with either "free" or "attached" earlobes. It's a genetic thing. I was born with "attached" lobes but now I have one of each.

Memory Number Three

This is the worst one. I was sick for 2 weeks my sophomore year of high school. Coughing, wheezing, horrible headaches and earaches. My mother told me I was a hypochondriac and didn't take me to the doctor. I went to school every other day because it was the week before finals but I was miserable and in serious pain. I cried myself to sleep almost every night from the pain in my head, neck, and ears. My little sister need a refill of some medication that said no refills so my mother made an appointment. She said I could come with. The doctor looked in my ears and gasped. She said they were so bad they were almost bleeding and if I had waited any longer I could be permanently deaf. I had serious double ear infections and laryngitis. The doctor told my mother to look at my ears, she's a nurse so she'd know what to look for, but my mom just said coldly "I don't want to look at it." This is one thing I can't forgive her for. The thought that I'd never be able to listen to others voices, hear laughter, communicate properly or listen to music still makes scares me when I think of it... I only ended up going to the doctor by chance...

That's it for now.

I'd really like to say something about Memory Number 3 ... but I'm not going to ... !! It's not my place to say anything about that. (but to read it really pissed me off) 🙁

 

[chicago]

You can say whatever you want. I don't mind. I know my mother is a bad mother, I've just had to deal with it.

I'm kind of an emotional orphan as pathetic as that sounds...


But anyway, enough sympathy for Mairead.

 

[Storm_Cat]

okay .. ya wanna hear about some of my trauma ... (prolly naught)

when my dad died in May this year we were going through his papers and such. now, I've known I was adopted for along time now, but ... I found my adoption papers ... the name I have now, and the name I have always known myself as ... was not the name on the adoption papers ... !! I have no clue who that person is!

 

[lk70]

okay .. ya wanna hear about some of my trauma ... (prolly naught)

when my dad died in May this year we were going through his papers and such. now, I've known I was adopted for along time now, but ... I found my adoption papers ... the name I have now, and the name I have always known myself as ... was not the name on the adoption papers ... !! I have no clue who that person is!

My adoption papers are like that too. I'm told they used a code name (this was before the time of open adoptions.) I do have the name change paperwork that my parents filled out for my name now though.

 

[Storm_Cat]

My adoption papers are like that too. I'm told they used a code name (this was before the time of open adoptions.) I do have the name change paperwork that my parents filled out for my name now though.

I'm long over it now ... but it was quite a shock initially ... !!

Maybe it's a northeastern thing, as I was born/adopted in PA. I see you hail from Jersey; were you born there?

 

[Knox The Hatter]

You can say whatever you want. I don't mind. I know my mother is a bad mother, I've just had to deal with it.

I'm kind of an emotional orphan as pathetic as that sounds...


But anyway, enough sympathy for Mairead.

You see, KNOWING that you've been a bad parent, and how all the examples of your being a bad parent compound themselves, can really change you as a human being.

Mairead, is your mom still around, still in your life? I mean, is she a factor at all? And, is she able to look you in the eye at all?

Being able to look one in the eye around here's not a problem. My parents, in every facet of their lives, hold themselves blameless for anything. It seems to make things a whole lot easier.

 

[chicago]

Yeah. My mother is still in my life. I'm only 18. So I'm not completely on my own yet. I'm home at the moment and it's quite depressing, but I'll be back at my dorm in January, so no worries.

She doesn't thing she's done anything wrong and if I mentioned any of these incidents she'd tell me I was overreacting or that I was a liar.

I don't really talk to her too much.

 

[Knox The Hatter]

She sounds like someone you wouldn't want to talk to at all. Never mind much...

She might be someone who, in the future, you grow to pity. For you, I don't know if that would be an improvement on the current situation, or still more of a deterioration.

 

[chicago]

I really don't even care much anymore, I try to stay as far away from her as I can and as soon as I'm on my own, financially, etc. I'm going to tell her everything she's done to me and then tell her "Peace out"

 

[isabeau]

i cant think there is anything more traumatic than having to visit the intensive care unit of a mental hospital. seeing your mom there, and realizing she fits right in. everytime i had to visit her, there was always someone screaming. and this happened right after i lost my last baby. wow if it hadnt been for the greatest man in the world, i just might have landed there myself. and to make things worse, one night they needed to transfer a schizophrenic to another unit, and we the visitors had to go into the patients room and they locked us in!! and in there with my mom was this poor woman who was strapped to her bed because she would become violent. not the best way to handle that situation as i got rather claustrophobic and wanted the hell out of there fast. and to make the situation even worse, my dad had been admitted to a hospital just the day after we finally had mom committed. so there i was with two parents in two different hospitals around the holidays. my dad had never been hospitalized during my life time before. he was eventually diagnosed with non hodgkins lymphoma......

isabeau

to clarify the greatest man on earth would be my husband. who i wouldnt trade for all the johnny depps or chris cornells in the world. and only those type of guys could tempt me.

 

[lk70]

I'm long over it now ... but it was quite a shock initially ... !!

Maybe it's a northeastern thing, as I was born/adopted in PA. I see you hail from Jersey; were you born there?

Maryland, so definitely in the neighborhood. It didn't bother me at all, except it was an ugly name!

 

[Limeoutsider]

. My mother told me I was a hypochondriac and didn't take me to the doctor.
That's it for now.

Yea everytime I was sick, I got "Youre just faking so you dont have to go to school" So Id go to the school nurse every morning to be sent home. Amongst other things