Please note: this piece contains content that some readers may find upsetting.
I’ve been thinking recently about what shapes us. Why so many people who have had a tough upbringing, or had trauma of some kind, can be affected for many years. I was talking about this with others; we have experienced addiction, being homeless, beaten and abused. I am now dry ten years and I feel I am coming out the other end of my journey to recovery, but it hasn’t been easy. There are some things you can’t move on from.
Looking back, once I reached a certain age, I felt like I needed to take back control of my life. I am now strong enough to acknowledge that at the time of my trauma, I was a child. I had no control over many things, and I cannot let these things carry on hurting me.
I had a problematic life. I was an alcoholic from the age of 14 and both my parents were in addiction, living their own battle. When they separated, I went on to have just as dysfunctional step-parents, meaning I went from having two to four problem parents.
I never had any rules to abide by or role models to look up to. My mum moved us away to England, or should I say moved me, as I went down there a year before her to live with my great-grandad, gran, step-grandad, and uncle, to be joined later by mum. I remember her being skinny and very ill. We had moved to a wee mining village. It was the early '90s, the GP had no experience of heroin addiction. Mum was put into a psychiatric ward to be treated.
I loved being in my grandparents' house; it was the most settled I ever was in my life, even with the upheaval of moving countries and starting a new school. Things between my parents were rocky at this time as my dad got a long sentence in prison, and they eventually split.
This made way for my mum to meet my step-dad. He was an alcoholic and schizophrenic, and mum had a multiple personality disorder. So, together they were toxic. You see, my mum was never just addicted to one thing, more a collection of things as she jumped from addiction to addiction, like she was frightened of reality.
She was only a kid herself: pregnant at fourteen, having me at fifteen. Our house was a party house with people coming and going. Strangers and unsavory characters. There were no rules and lots of dodgy things going on. My friends thought it was cool that I didn’t have rules and didn’t have to be in for a certain time. I could smoke and generally do what I wanted. But I craved the stability and craved to have rules. I wished that my mum was a little like other parents were.
My mum and step-dad fought a lot. The injuries my mum sustained were quite horrific. I could never understand her, why she kept taking him back. It’s something I have never been able to get my head round. But my stepdad was a really caring guy until he had an episode.
Episodes such as the night when I was around eleven and he had attacked my mum in the kitchen. I could hear the crunch of her bones as he slammed her face into the tiled floor. Or the episode when he chased her up the stairs with a poker he had heated up in the coal fire, and she turned and kicked him in the face which resulted in him biting off part of his tongue. At an early age, I became good at first aid and jumping in to defend my mother.
One time, he broke my wrist after attacking her with a wheel wrench. He also threw me out the house when I was 15 and had nowhere else to go. To add to this, my mum and stepdad had my sister, so with her to look out for, I stopped going to school.
Things were crazy at home. The police would be phoned regularly and my step-dad would kick off at being arrested. This would make my mother kick off, and then, in time, I would do the same. One time, no one was left in the house, so my dog was put into the kennels for the night too. It was a family affair.
Being in jail, my dad was not around. But once he was in, despite his own battles with addiction, he was stable and reliable. My parents vaguely reconnected after his release. However, my stepdad put an end to that. He showed up and they were fighting with each other. I was arrested that day with my step-dad and his friend.
My parents went up to Glasgow, leaving me to care for my three-year-old sister. All the trouble at the house meant we were evicted while she was away. Luckily another of my mum’s friends took us in until she came back, and we lived there for a while.
Then I went to prison.
With me out the picture, social work removed my sister from my mother. By now, my step-dad had been murdered, so my sister was placed in long term care. This broke me; I loved her more than anything in the world, but I knew it was better for her and hoped she had a better life.
Coming back to overcoming trauma, it’s not ok for things to happen, but I think you can get help. I mean, I wasn’t just suddenly fixed; I had years of therapy in different forms. It may be that you live under a dark cloud, and you don’t want to revisit whatever has traumatised you, but, in the long run, not talking about it is only hurting you. I’m now living the best life and can’t wait to see what my future holds.
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