I’m so very tired today. I’m having a lot of pain which just adds to the stress of the changes that are already happening. It’s always the way it goes with me.

Writing it down helps me process, so here I am. … writing like a freak. Remembering shit I don’t really want to remember but HAVE to in order to be whole. I don’t think I’ll ever be normal, whatever that means. All I can do is try to do the best I can with what’s left of my little broken girl heart.

I’ve been going back to the beginnings of my memories to try to put stuff back in order. My earliest memory is of my mom pushing me down the stairs on my trike. I remember being underneath the trike on the landing, maybe 8-10 steps down (wood) and having her glare down at me with her hands on her hips and then walking away. I don’t know how long I was down there but I remember my older brother helping me carry the trike back up. I think I was between 18 months and 2yrs. We left that house when I was 2 ½ so prior to that (and I was wearing red corrective shoes - strange the things that stick). I know she pushed me down there more than once and I was terrified of stairs for a long time. They still freak me out a little.

I remember being locked in the closet for hours on end… sometimes sleeping in there. I was almost three when my mom gave me to my older brother to take care of. My younger brother had been born and she was done taking care of me. So, since I was 3, I’ve never had anyone to count on. I was never hugged or kissed or loved by my parents (I was by my Grandfather, and I think that‘s why I‘m still here). I never got to be a kid.

This is where it starts to get foggy …. There are specifics I remember (my brother trying to drown me, trying to kill my cat, running me over with his bike - repeatedly until I was unconscious, and generally beating the living crap out of me any chance he got, without censure.

One specific incident of him running me over was when I was maybe 5 or so. Walking down our gravel road and he is coming for me… I try to run but I’m not fast enough. He hits me. I’m down but he’s circling around and coming for me again, this time he runs me over and slams my head into the ground, closely followed by one of his friends driving his bike over me like a speed bump. I’m out cold. One of the neighborhood dads scooped me up and carried me inside my house, my nose and head bleeding, and sets me on the couch. My mom flirts with him and sends him home, then promptly yells at me for embarrassing her and trying to get all the attention and STOP BLEEDING ON MY SOFA. My brother was not in trouble, I was just really clumsy.

I thought this was how all families were. I never knew this was not normal until I was in college. I told some of the stories of my brother/mother and the horrified looks of my sorority sisters was completely perplexing.

I don’t think it’s so important to rehash all the crap they did to me. Right now it serves me better to feel it and let it go. Know it happened, know it can’t change but that it’s over. Deal with the blocked out stuff as it comes, feel it and let it go. I can’t help but feel sad - sometimes I wallow in my own little pile of pity - and mourn the little girl I didn’t get to be.

One day at a time. One prayer at a time.