Even as a young child I figured out that yelling and screaming wasn’t part of everyone’s home.
One April afternoon three of my friends came over to spend a couple hours hanging out at my house. We were sitting on the floor of my small bedroom talking – just talking like late elementary kids do. By the slamming of the front door I knew Dad was home and he wasn’t happy. Shit. Not now.
In this scenario my first reaction wasn’t fear- I’d long since discovered that the fear around my father was not an effective way for me to prepare from what was coming. I had friends here so I needed to get out of the situation as quickly as possible. With Dad stomping down the hall I knew he was on the war path. Surely with my friends here, he won’t yell, scream, or hit me. They were my safety net. The door swung open and he was clearly class “A” pissed.
“Hi Dad, did you need to help with something,” I said smiling the best ‘for the love of everything – not now’ smile I could muster. Certainly, he was well aware that my little room was full of my friends.
“Where the fuck did you put my tax papers!” He screamed, completely unfazed by my visitors or my extreme embarrassment. My today self would have replied, ‘I’m a child, what the fuck is a 1040!’
In reality, I jumped to service, like I always did. “I don’t know about tax papers but I can help look.” I replied as he grabbed me by the arm. I was out of the room but I was sure to shut the bed room door. Surely I don’t want them to see this. I was far more concerned about what my friends would think of me than what I was about to endure. I was used to it. Dad screamed repeatedly, “Where’s those fucking tax forms, you worth less cunt!” I had no idea what paper work he was talking about. I was at a complete loss at where to begin. I knew he just lost something important and he needed to blow off steam. I kept my head low, ran into the small messy “office” and picked and down papers as if I’d be able to identify the document if it were right in front of me. He wasn’t satisfied. He grabbed me again and threw me to the brown carpet that smelled strongly of cat feces. He threw a large black plastic garbage bag full of papers at me and hissed, “FIND IT!”
He dumped the bag over my head and I used all the strength inside not to cry because that would make this real. I looked focused on finding the mysterious form. He kicked the pile of paper, missing me by inches and stormed off but not before calling me a worthless cunt loud enough to ensure my friends heard it. With a few loud stomps he was out the door, probably off to scream about the papers to my mother who was at work. I stood up, shut the door to the office, collected by myself and walked in my room with a smile, “sorry about that, so where were we”. The looks on their faces were for sincere concern. Kristen asked, “Are you Ok?”
“Oh yeah, totally fine!” I lied. Just the looks of concern on their faces made me have to hold back tears and paste that smile on my face. Think quick, I need a distraction. Let’s go outside and play! It worked, especially since we heard by Dad’s truck spin out of the drive way.
I’m 40 years old now, and old enough to know that my father’s behavior was abuse. If you are living through experiences like this, talk to someone. A teacher, pastor, a friends parent, anyone you trust. If nothing comes of that conversation then tell someone else. You deserve better. Yes, I know, they are not always like that. Stop making excuses for them and protect your current and future self.
My Journey 