affairs. I felt sadder about the affairs than the drugs. I felt heartbroken. My mom kept telling me she was doing it for my sister and me. I started to feel bad. Then I thought, Wait, aren’t you supposed to protect us? Is it ‘going above and beyond’ to protect your children? If my school hadn’t called, would you have done this?
My sister and I were floored. We were not angry with her for wanting to divorce him over all of that- we totally got it. But it was still a shock. I could barely process the information. I had so many of my own problems going on that I couldn’t even really think about my dad. I knew he wasn’t the same man I knew as a child. I knew there was a new anger to him and a creepy sexual edge to him that wasn’t there before. I knew I didn’t ever want to be alone with him and did my best to avoid him. Still, I never thought he would be a drug addict and it still surprised me that he would have affairs, even after the way he behaved. It was hard to hear concrete facts about this man who was supposed to be the person I admired, the person who was supposed to protect me from the outside world. It fucked with my perception of reality. Everything seemed to be swirling in my head like a horrible whirlpool.
My mom was a basket case. She was especially mean to me during that time. She told me that she was going to kick me out along with my dad. She told me to just go with him, wherever he was going. My dad was around for another month or so, as if he didn’t believe he was being kicked out of the house. One day my mother was in her room crying. My sister and I were sitting in the living room, feeling uncomfortable. My father took me aside and told me she was crying because of me . Although I did feel she didn’t like me because I blew the lid wide open on our family problems, I didn’t buy it. My dad was manipulative and hurtful. I wished he would hurry up and leave.
One night I went out with some guy and I think we went to a drive-in or something, I can’t remember. We were drinking and hooking up and I didn’t get home until very late, probably three in the morning. Before I left, my mother told me if I didn’t come home by my new curfew (I was thinking, you are trying to implement a curfew ? I am so far beyond that, I am in deep fucking trouble here!), she would put all of my belongings on the front lawn in garbage bags. I wasn’t sure where she got the idea, but she was starting to mention “tough love” a lot, so maybe she had received some pamphlet on it and this was one of the suggestions.
I was too chicken to tell the guy to get me home on time. I was scared I would look childish or unsophisticated or whatever, so I waited for him to take me home when he felt like it, which happened to be three in the morning. I entered my room wearing only my tight black dress with white skulls all over it. When I flicked on the light, I saw that my room was completely bare. Everything off the walls, all the furniture out, no clothes, no belongings, no nothing. Just a bare mattress remained. My beloved stuffed animals, my favorite stacks of books, and framed pictures of old movie stars- they were all gone. I panicked. They were my only comfort. I was really into “things” as a way to comfort myself, which was never healthy, but that is the way I was.
I started screaming at my mother that I needed my birth control pills and she tried to remind me that I broke the rule. I was thinking, What the hell are these flimsy rules? These are so ridiculous and they are coming way too late. The damage is already done. These rules will not protect me, I have already suffered and have been abused and wronged and stripped of my dignity and my soul and my innocence. I need guidance, I need help , I am very lost and I am in trouble. I am sinking, I am drowning, I am up to my neck in quicksand. You are offering me what should be a rope but instead is thread that will snap if I try to use it. I
My sister and I were floored. We were not angry with her for wanting to divorce him over all of that- we totally got it. But it was still a shock. I could barely process the information. I had so many of my own problems going on that I couldn’t even really think about my dad. I knew he wasn’t the same man I knew as a child. I knew there was a new anger to him and a creepy sexual edge to him that wasn’t there before. I knew I didn’t ever want to be alone with him and did my best to avoid him. Still, I never thought he would be a drug addict and it still surprised me that he would have affairs, even after the way he behaved. It was hard to hear concrete facts about this man who was supposed to be the person I admired, the person who was supposed to protect me from the outside world. It fucked with my perception of reality. Everything seemed to be swirling in my head like a horrible whirlpool.
My mom was a basket case. She was especially mean to me during that time. She told me that she was going to kick me out along with my dad. She told me to just go with him, wherever he was going. My dad was around for another month or so, as if he didn’t believe he was being kicked out of the house. One day my mother was in her room crying. My sister and I were sitting in the living room, feeling uncomfortable. My father took me aside and told me she was crying because of me . Although I did feel she didn’t like me because I blew the lid wide open on our family problems, I didn’t buy it. My dad was manipulative and hurtful. I wished he would hurry up and leave.
One night I went out with some guy and I think we went to a drive-in or something, I can’t remember. We were drinking and hooking up and I didn’t get home until very late, probably three in the morning. Before I left, my mother told me if I didn’t come home by my new curfew (I was thinking, you are trying to implement a curfew ? I am so far beyond that, I am in deep fucking trouble here!), she would put all of my belongings on the front lawn in garbage bags. I wasn’t sure where she got the idea, but she was starting to mention “tough love” a lot, so maybe she had received some pamphlet on it and this was one of the suggestions.
I was too chicken to tell the guy to get me home on time. I was scared I would look childish or unsophisticated or whatever, so I waited for him to take me home when he felt like it, which happened to be three in the morning. I entered my room wearing only my tight black dress with white skulls all over it. When I flicked on the light, I saw that my room was completely bare. Everything off the walls, all the furniture out, no clothes, no belongings, no nothing. Just a bare mattress remained. My beloved stuffed animals, my favorite stacks of books, and framed pictures of old movie stars- they were all gone. I panicked. They were my only comfort. I was really into “things” as a way to comfort myself, which was never healthy, but that is the way I was.
I started screaming at my mother that I needed my birth control pills and she tried to remind me that I broke the rule. I was thinking, What the hell are these flimsy rules? These are so ridiculous and they are coming way too late. The damage is already done. These rules will not protect me, I have already suffered and have been abused and wronged and stripped of my dignity and my soul and my innocence. I need guidance, I need help , I am very lost and I am in trouble. I am sinking, I am drowning, I am up to my neck in quicksand. You are offering me what should be a rope but instead is thread that will snap if I try to use it. I
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