Hall of Memories

On September 20th, 2019, I called an Uberxl. On previous days I had been secretly packing my belongings in garbage bags and putting them outside the side door. At around 4 A.M. the car showed up, and I loaded it with my belongings and headed to my new home. This was the day I escaped my old home and my parents. I was 35.

Fact of the matter is, while you leave their physical bodies and limit contact to help protect yourself, there is a hall of memories suppressed in the mind. This forgotten room exists and has to be addressed in order to begin healing. Here are some of those memories in that forgotten room.

Voices of Hopelessness:

You are the least loved child.

I was often told this not just as a child but as an adult too. I have 2 older brothers and a twin sister.

It's an embarrassment to be your mother!

I heard this multiple times as a kid. My first time was at age 4. I attribute hearing it to the end of my childhood.

Why can't you be normal?

Mental health was not common in Africa where my parents were from. My dad never understood why I was so different. It could be something so trivial as folding a paper.

I would rather have 10 of your brother!

One of my brothers had histrionic tendencies but oddly enough my arents catered to his every demand. He was known to throw tantrums if he lost at video games or didn't get his way. He is one family member I do not feel I would ever miss.

I wish I could kill myself because of you!

I dropped out of the nursing program at school, not due to poor grades but due to poor fine motor skills and inability to do practicums. My mom told everyone I was becoming a nurse-I had told her not to. When I dropped out people asked and this was her response to me.

Voices of fear:

You will end up a prostitute.

I got fired from a job for losing my cool too many times. When you are in an unstable environment and then have to go to work with those memories, chances are you are going to break. I was a high performer so the pay was decent, but as I had reprimands, I was terminated. My parents told me I would never keep a job and would thus have to sell my body. Currently I work 2 jobs-1 from home and 1 part time at a store.

Nobody will ever like you.

Especially in my earlier schooling years, my mom would tell me I would never have friends and I was a detestable person.

Who would want to marry you?

While I admit I am not one who would ever want a commitment, my mom used this one often on me. It hurt only because it came from a person I loved.

Your friends will get fed up of you.

My mom felt my friends were not really my real friends. To this day I have a fair few friends, one whose family I spend Christmas with.

You are better off dead.

For much of my life I truly believed this, yet the suicide ideation has ended. I was told that I was good for nothing and a burden so I was better off being 6 feet under.

voices of confusion:

If I am an awful person, why do I live?

Self persecutory thoughts tend to happen when you reflect on the trauma you have endured.

Why am I always so angry?

This is an enduring battle. There are limited supports available for people my age for Complex PTSD issues. Often I tense up and grate my teeth in anger. I guess I have to learn to live with it.

How do I get this pain to stop? One minute I am happy, seconds later angry, moments later I am in tears.

This is how trauma ends up. Emotions are complex, and if you don't have a healthy place to express them, they come across as fleeting. You have trouble identifying the emotion and are always on high alert.

Summing up, I forgive my parents and am trying to bury the hatchet. They both passed this year and while they loved me, they could not figure out how to raise me. They too were raised in a bad environment and never got to heal.