Secrets

Have you ever looked back and thought about lies you told and secrets you kept in the past, and wondered why you told them or kept them – especially the ones that should have never been kept? She did. Everyday. Out of all of her past secrets and lies, there is one time in her life that stands out above the rest. One period where all she kept were secrets, and all she spoke were lies.

Growing up she was taught to hide things and keep things from other members of her family. It was just something that her family did, and it was normal for them. When she thinks about the biggest secret that she and her mother kept from the rest of their family, including her father, she can't help but wonder how different things could have been had her or her mother revealed that which they kept quiet for so long. She was only a child when it happened, the one moment when the secret that haunted her for years of her childhood first came to be. She never thought much about him making comments and teasing her about her weight, after all, he was still a nice guy and her mom's boyfriend.

She thought he was just trying to help her learn to stop overeating when he would call her things like “fat ass” and “piggy”. It never hit her until much later in life how much those words really affected and hurt her emotionally and the harm they did to her self-image. That's how the secret began - small insults tossed out here and there, but as time went on and her mom continued to date him, things got worse. It did not seem like a big enough deal to tell anyone about his comments, at least not when she felt that the things he said about her were true. Her mom and him decided to move in together, and that is when things became much worse, and the secrets became more than not telling the family about his insults.

It seemed like a normal day, she woke up in the morning and did what she did every morning - made a bowl of cereal for breakfast, ate it, and put the bowl in the sink. She then went into her room to get ready for school. She was putting on her make-up when he pushed open her bedroom door so hard that it put a hole in the wall behind it. He walked towards her, taking fast, long steps, something in his face that she had not seen before was there - it was pure anger. She turned and stood up and was about to ask him what was wrong, then suddenly out of nowhere she felt the hard, painful strike of his hand across her face. She fell backward onto her bed, looking up at him in shock. She saw him take his hand back and strike her again and again. He was hitting her over and over across her face, and body. He was pulling her hair, and screaming at her at the top of his lungs, vile and cruel insults.

She was in shock. He had never hit her before. It was always just insults and teasing but never physical violence. He was yelling and hitting her over the bowl being put in the sink, rather than being washed and put in the dishwasher. She could not believe that she was being beaten over doing something that she did every morning and had been doing the same way since she was old enough to feed herself. After about 10 minutes of nonstop screaming and physical abuse, he finally stopped and walked out of her room as if nothing was wrong. She lay there on her bed with tears streaming down her red face, feeling pain all over her body and head from the beating she had just received. She lay there petrified and shaken for about 30 minutes before she gathered herself together enough to try to fix her make-up and to cover up the redness and bruises so that she could go to school without anyone finding out about what had transpired at home. And so began the secret she kept from everyone, including her family for so many years - but she wasn't the only one to keep the abuse a secret.

It was not long before her mother witnessed the physical abuse she began to regularly suffer at his hand. It also wasn't long before her mother experienced his anger as well. Her mother suffered it for various reasons, some as harmless as chewing a piece of gum. He beat her mother when he saw her with gum in her mouth, as he accused her of cheating on him and using the gum to cover up the scent of alcohol and another man on her breath. Her mother never chewed gum again out of fear of his jealous rage if he caught her chewing gum again. While they both suffered by his hand, for some unexplained reason, he seemed to focus his anger and abuse on her. Her mother had occasional beatings for various “offenses”, however, she was beaten on a daily basis.

He seemed to look for a reason each day to physically harm her. To this day, she can't remember all of the reasons he would scream about during each daily beating, but she knows they were for anything from a crumb being on the floor to a spoon not sitting in the drawer straight. She was slapped, hit, pushed against walls, thrown onto the floor, and had her hair pulled out by him multiple times a day. Her mother often times was there watching the abuse but was too scared to do anything about it. She kept the abuse a secret, never breathing a word to the rest of the family, not even to her father. She does not know why she kept quiet, why they both all kept quiet for so long.

After suffering from daily abuse, her self-image worsened and soon she was stuck in the deepest, darkest place she had ever found herself. She suffered so much by his hands while keeping the secret of the abuse that was going on in their home quiet from everyone who cared about her for so long. After a while, the lies and secrets became all that she knew. She convinced herself that he was right - she deserved the beatings. She was the person who was wrong and doing bad things. She deserved to be punished. Maybe that was why she and her mother kept the abuse a secret and did not try to get help from the rest of their family when they needed it. After so much mental and physical abuse, they came to believe that they deserved what was happening. The rest of their family never knew about the secret they kept, the unyielding pain and abuse that was endured day after day - the pain and abuse they hid from the outside world. Her mother finally left him after several years, but only after she started seeing another man, a married man, but that is another story for another day. While the physical abuse from him was finally over, it was in no way forgotten, and the scars from the mental abuse he put her through remain to this day.

She never talked much about the physical and mental abuse she suffered at his hands. The rest of her family now knows that he was abusive, but the extent of it and the details of it she has never revealed. Her mother still to this day refuses to admit that he was abusive, rather, she says that he was simply “disciplining” her. Her mother has never spoken of the abuse she endured, though she was not on the receiving end as often. Her mother did not experience the verbal and physical assaults daily like she had endured. It does hurt her to hear her mother call it "discipline" now, but perhaps that is the way her mother excuses allowing the abuse of her daughter to happen for so many years. As for her, she remembers every painful strike of his hands and every hateful, vile word from his mouth.

Her reasons for remaining mostly silent about the true extent of the abuse she received are partly because of the pain of reliving each moment. The other reason is for her youngest sister, for he is her father. Her baby sister was just an infant when their mother finally left him after all the years of abuse, so her baby sister never saw that side of her father. She wanted to keep her baby sister from knowing what a monster her father was and the pain and anguish suffered because of him. She still keeps quiet about the nightmares that haunt her still to this day. She often wonders if the abuse would have continued for so many years had she revealed the truth to her father, grandparents, or even a teacher at school. If she had not endured the abuse for so many years, would she be where she is today? Would she be the damaged shell afraid to trust anyone? Or would the entire weaving of her life have been significantly altered by that one secret coming to light? With each and every slap, hit, and beating she received from his hands, the person she is today began to be formed, good and bad - she is who she became because of it.

And secrets and lies are what she hides behind still - to keep herself protected and safe.

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