121- Growing up with domestic violence and abuse (1)

***trigger alert*** 


I have discussed many aspects of my traumatic life, and have mentioned numerous times part of the psychological, emotional and physical abuses I was a directly subjected to - mostly by my father. 

If you want to read, or re-read those previous posts, they are all under the label abuse and more specifically posts 107, 102, 95, 67, 63. 

I also vaguely discussed some of the consequences of the abuse. Lack of self-esteem and trust issues, difficulties asking other's help, post-traumatic cycles, obvious post-traumatic stress, and I even had a period during which I couldn't control myself and bullied back fellow students in a school where I was bullied. 

In spite of these numerous posts, I never truly discussed another traumatic aspect of my youth. One that I learned is experienced by 1 person out of 7 : Domestic violence, or in short ''DV'' like its twitter hashtag. 



If you read my posts 120 & 119, you know that I'm currently reading Brian F. Martin's InVincible, a book the author aimed to help people un-learn the 10 lies that most children learn when they live in DV homes, just like himself, and ways to set one free from each of them by a series of small exercises - and at this stage, I'm going to share with you this less discussed part of my life.

Just like many people with trauma, I have blocked away the first few years of my life - locked in the vault of repressed memories that haven't surfaced, yet. 

I learn from people who knew about it, the domestic violence had started fairly fast as my father beat my mother up on many occasions and screamed at her for her lack of spiritual commitment (remember that he thinks of himself as the world's last savior, and that he was and still is a religious cult leader). This is the part that I totally repressed. I cannot say much about it as of yet, except through hearsay - which I might bring up another time.

For now, however,  I want to remain focused on what I do recall : my father's abuse on my step-mother, a woman I thought was my real mother for many years before I learned that had actually divorced my real mother, and remarried with my step-mother when I was very young. 

He blamed her as well for lack of spiritual commitment, but he went quite a lot farther than that by saying that the devil had entered and possessed her to test his willpower and resolve to be humanity's savior.... 

It all was really perverse, as his response was to beat her up, throw dishes at her, scream at her for absolutely no real reason or tiny stupid ones - and he'd tell me that it was all right, that he was driving the devil out of her, and that I had to go back to do whatever I was doing - which was often go back to bed... with the evident ''or else'' - because as I said in my aforementioned blog entries, he didn't target his violence only on her but also on me. 

During all my youth and teen years, I felt he had a great power over me and I was always scared for my life - so I witnessed all the abuse, in all its forms, and suffered in silence. 

I knew part of what was going on - though sometimes the fight would wake me up and I wouldn't know how that one had began - but I could guess that it had started just like the hundreds and thousands of the previous times. By my father being totally out of touch with reality. By him screaming and beating my poor stepmother who would often answer and try to protect herself as best she could - but she was no match for this big, violent and terrifying man, my father - or rather my sperm donor. 

I felt powerless, as I couldn't save the woman I believed was my mother, from any of the blows or disproportionate reactions to anything she had done... say, forget to check one ingredient in some food that he wanted, and it had a tiny % of something he didn't wish to have... and he'd fly off the handle for that. 

Or, for any number of other such cases - a tiny mistake, error, or forgotten action by her, would be severely reprimanded by him, followed by screams, and blows. 

I have ''actively witnessed'' all these abusive violent acts by him between once and several times a day - and a night, for many years. 

Brian F. Martin points out in InVincible (posts 120 & 119) how there isn't a proper term to define what children in a domestic violent household ''witness'', because they don't ''just witness'' from an outside perspective, but there is enough evidence to  prove that children in such situations are actually traumatized just as if they had been beaten up themselves. 

The stats, on which I won't dwell in this post are staggering as there are 1 billion people who are either adults who have gone through it, or children still suffering in DV homes. 

Half of these children have also been physically, verbally or emotionally abused by one or both parents - additionally to seeing the DV between their parents. 

This is my case : I both saw/ heard, and subjected to abuse myself. 

None of my siblings had been abused, but just like me, they ''witnessed'', or, until someone comes up with a better term ''actively witnessed'' as I said above. 

Unfortunately, I can do nothing for them. I have moved to live far away from all that part of my family and cut all ties as a self-preservation necessity. 

I see this post is far too long, so I'll discuss more about this issue another time... 

Thank you for reading me.

I would really appreciate any exchange you can have with me, either here by login-in and posting a comment, or chatting with me through twitter  or email  - it'll be part of my own un-learning and re-learning process.