Therapy

I need to figure out what I want to work on in therapy. Writing anything down about my family is incredibly uncomfortable for me but they are at the beginning of my story, and I think I should start at the beginning. It is important to me to lead with love here as I process this. I already have the feeling that this is something that has been in the deep dark for too long. I will do my best to lead with love for my family and for myself.

I have always been drawn to writing, I think it’s actually a love-language for me. To distill a feeling or thought into it’s sharpest point to share with someone is such a beautiful gift; to give them a window into the truest sense of yourself.

And that’s where the fear is, because I can’t go halfway here. I feel a lot of things percolating… I keep wanting to keep this succinct and make a plan first but Rick Rubin says when creativity comes you should let it flow until it’s done'; it’s best to get a sloppy full first-copy than to make just the beginning of something and say you’ll come back to it. Walking away is how good things get lost sometimes.

I don’t have a lot of happy memories from my childhood but I do have a few. The one that popped into my mind just now was the big smile of my grandfather on my dad’s side…. he was a lovely man. I remember winning the swim-meet doing the backstroke when I was little; that was huge. There are more and I could go on but that’s not the point of writing right now. I know I had happy times despite having few happy memories because I have pictures of me happy to prove it.

Despite this, my biggest memories are moments of shame, pain, and insecurity. I want to write about one of those hard ones now.

I have a beautiful family, I was raised by two parents who loved me a whole lot, and who I truly believe want the best for me. I have two wonderful sisters too. What a gift that is- I won the birth-lottery in a lot of ways. Most people have a much harder life than I have had. I have nothing to complain about.

And yet- it came with difficulties. Right now I’m stalling… I’m stalling because I don’t want to say that one time my dad hurt me. I’m coming to realize more-and-more the depth of my father-wound. My dad has always loved me and he still does — even though he won’t say it. The only thing my dad has ever wanted was to keep me safe and get me ready for the world. My dad wants me to do what makes me happy. I’m still stalling.

I don’t remember how old I was, but I feel like it’s around 6. I don’t totally trust this memory, despite it being very clear….stalling. The memory starts at the kitchen table. It’s lunch, I’m eating a sandwich and looking out the window of the back door that goes to the deck. I have a glass of milk and there are some crumbs on the table. The sun is streaking into the house and across the table. It is a sunny day but not hot, cool in fact, maybe spring? I remember that the sun was a welcome part of the day. My dad was working in the yard and I didn’t want to eat my crust.

It was just me and my dad at the house. I don’t know where everyone else was but I remember it being just us. I ate all I wanted of my sandwich. I drank all I wanted of my milk. I left the crust on the plate and some milk in the glass and went outside to tell my dad I was done. He came in to check my work and discovered that I had not finished my lunch. I have no memory of the morning leading up to this… I have no idea of the mood up until now.

My dad is a particular man, he can be very short-tempered and honestly kind of mean. He also loves his family so much and would do anything for them. I truly believe my dad only wants the best for me.

Classic kid/dad stand-off over sandwich crust. He insisted I finish the crust and my milk, I resisted. I imagine there were tears and some sort of other more-routine-but-not-great “encouragements” to do it. It was clear to me that finishing this crust was not optional. He left me with clear instructions and went back outside. I have no idea how long this part went on. I remember that the milk was warm and smelled bad by the time I had to swallow it- not spoiled but warm and gross.

I could not get the crust down, I remember trying and feeling like it was going to make me throw up. I went to the trash can in the kitchen, dug down a little ways and found an empty orange-juice concentrate can. I put my sandwich crust into the can, gently fluffed some trash into the top of the can to cover the crust, then put the can back down into the trash about as deep as I had found it- I was already pretty good at hiding then. I went outside and told my dad I was done.

I remember standing in the kitchen while my dad dug through the trash. I remember him finding the crust in the orange juice can. I remember lying and saying it was my friend’s crust from the other day. I remember tears. I remember fear. I remember having my pants around my ankles in the cramped downstairs bathroom. I was laying over my dad’s lap. I remember how small the room felt. I remember how awful it was. I can still feel it.

My dad spanked my bare bottom for what felt like a long time; hard strikes. While being spanked I was interrogated about the crust. I was forced to admit my lie. I kept lying for at least a little bit, and for every lie more pain was dispensed. The feeling of fear was absolutely crushing, I can still feel it. I don’t know how long this went on but it felt like forever. I know it ended with me admitting it was my crust.

I remember sitting on my dad’s lap afterwards, still in the bathroom. I think my pants were back up. I remember my dad holding me there, apologizing and repeating to me that he loved me. I remember him explaining that he just wanted me to tell him the truth. I remember him saying it wasn’t about the sandwich. I remember him saying it was about telling him the truth. If I had only told him the truth this wouldn’t have happened.

I remember that I was frozen and crying. I remember feeling disconnected from my body. Then there is just a fade to numbness and darkness. I spent most days of my life after that doing whatever I could to hide from him. I was too little to hide physically but I sure did hide emotionally. I think that was probably easier because my dad is not in tune with his emotions When my dad could see me I did my best to meet his performance expectations. I just wanted to get away after that, it was exhausting.

This incident has only been addressed by him once. He casually told me once 5-10 years ago that he thought he “lost it on me a little bit once”. I sort of breathlessly laughed it off and dismissed it. I rubbed some dirt on it and did the adult version of running away.

I have felt for many years now that is the source of a big chunk of my pain but not known what to do with it. Now I have written it all down and put it on the internet. Seems like the start of something. Ooof.