Boxes Under Our Beds

There's not much I remember about my childhood, not many happy memories that stand out. I remember there were a lot of arguments. Between my mom and, well, everyone. Yelling, constant yelling. I remember hiding in my room, as much as possible, from the chaos, always trying to hide away, lest I be caught doing something wrong...like breathing. Because then came more yelling, and beatings, and the hair pulling, how much I loathed the hair pulling; dragging me around the house by my hair, being screamed at until I could feel the screams ache in my bones, almost as much as I could feel the welts on my back and buttocks. To this day I have an aversion to loud noises, even the noises that accompany fun events. The noise causes a ripple of pain, loud voices, pounding, it hurts again.

I never understood why my parents were married. Well, to be clear, I grew up knowing my stepdad as my father. I didn't know anything about my biological father except that he drank, flew off in rages and beat my mom while destroying everything in the house, often in front of my older brother and me, and even while we were still in the womb. Despite being barely over a year apart, my brother remembers things vividly, while I remember very little of my childhood. Except the conflicts, constant conflicts. Those conflicts are why I never understood why my parents were married, until I got older. It wasn't until looking back that I saw how codependent they were. My mother was an abuser, and my father was her enabler. Sometimes I wonder how much smaller my emotional wounds would be had I had an advocate, had my father ever stepped in to stop the abuse. It's almost as though he saw it as a therapeutic necessity. Releasing her rage calmed her, gave him the opportunity to soothe her, at our expense.

The only advocate I ever really had was my maternal grandma. She would intervene in the screamings and beatings, somehow manage to calm her down, somehow manage to help me escape to the safety of my room while she distracted her with company. She was the only one. She always said she had a special love for me and my brother. I think she just saw what everyone did, that we took the majority of the abuse, it was a special pity she mistook for love, or maybe a pitiful love. I often wondered if my mother saw our biological father in our features; maybe that somehow made it easier to release her rage on us. It was unfortunate that my mother and father made their home across the country from my grandma. There were a lot of things I looked forward to in her visits, the singing, the cooking, the much needed positive attention. But nothing I looked forward to more than the buffer from the abuse, the calm I would only experience a couple times a year.

I don't remember many holidays or birthdays. I had six younger brothers and sisters, my special days faded into the background. I grew to hate Christmas. I don't remember a single one I enjoyed. I was always cooking and cleaning and, after my father's kids were born, Christmas was all about them anyways. My mom told me holidays were for kids. The only Christmas I remember was seventh grade. Everyone was bragging about their gifts at school, as I tried to fade into the background, when someone asked what I had gotten. I wanted to lie, I wanted to cry. The sweatshirt I was wearing. It was a puffy paint Christmas sweatshirt, probably from Kmart. My father had bought it. It was my gift. You would think we were poor, but it was more a reflection of how little they valued me. His kids got everything on Santa's list. I still wore that sweatshirt; it was one of the four outfits I owned. I rotated them. I hated Christmas.

There was one birthday that remains in my memory. It was my sixth grade year. I was turning 12. We had just moved into a new house and my first sister was born. I was so excited the day she was born; I squealed with joy at the announcement that I had a sister. Until I realized she was my father's daughter. She was moved into my room. I was told everything that was mine was hers. Even my bed. There were other rooms, but my room was hers. I knew they were showing me my place. That year, for some reason, my mom sensed my pain. She threw me the party she knew I wanted, a Cabbage Patch party. The cake was Cabbage Patch, the decorations were Cabbage Patch; my party was all the rage, and I got a first edition autographed Cabbage Patch that looked just like me, green eyes and all. All the neighborhood kids came, we swam in the community pool, we laughed, we played. It's the only day of my childhood I remember being nothing but a child.

Later that evening my mom tucked me in bed. It's the only time I remember her tucking me in bed. Usually I went to bed to her screams, "Go to bed!". But that night was different. She sat on the side of my bed; I was exhausted but still smiling, hugging my new Cabbage Patch close. She had one more gift to give me. I couldn't believe it. This particular day I hadn't thought could get any better. She held a small box wrapped in brown paper, tied with a twine bow. I looked eagerly at it, wondering what was inside.

"This box was given to me by your grandmother," she said, "It was given to her by her mother, and now I'm giving it to you." I imagined it was a beautiful necklace. Or a crown. Something sparkling and amazing.

"What's in it?" I asked. She gazed at the box, as though it held so much, yet she knew so little.

"I don't know," she said, as my forehead squinted in confusion. "No one has ever opened it; I've kept it under my bed since it was given to me. Now I'm going to put it under your bed, and some day you'll give it to your child, and they'll keep it under their bed."

I thought it strange, a present never opened. But I watched as she placed it under my bed, my eyes weighted with a long day full of surprises...The next day I woke, the little wrapped box lay undisturbed under my bed where it would remain for years to come, forgotten, as life returned to its normal abnormal.

Five years later I laid in my new home I had moved in with my boyfriend; I was pregnant, scared, crying. I felt like a child having a child, and I remembered that one birthday, the only special day I enjoyed. I wanted to make all my child's days like that day. And I remembered that box. The box that had never been opened; the box I was meant to give my child. I wiped my tears and started rummaging through the closets; I knew the box was there, I had packed it when I was kicked out, but, like everything else, it was thrown haphazardly into my new life, and I had no idea where. After what seemed like endless, exhausting unpacking and searching, I peered into a large box, and there lay my Cabbage Patch kid among other memoirs. I removed her as a tear trickled down my cheek, warm with memory, and there, laying beneath her, was the little box, still wrapped in brown paper and tied with a twine bow. I set down the doll and picked up the box. How had this box been passed through so many generations and never been opened? I fumbled with it and turned it in my hands, wondering if I was to pass it on, as is, or should I open it and see what lays within? I sat down, holding the box, rubbing my belly, thinking about how much I wanted to be a better mom, and wondering if I was even capable. After many moments passed, I realized that in order for change to occur, I needed to make changes, I needed to be the change. I was going to open that little box. Hesitantly, I pulled the twine, and removed the brown paper encircling it. I sighed as I gazed at it, uneasy of what may lay inside, yet determined to be the first to discover what it was. Slowly I lifted the lid and peered inside. Dark shadows emerged. Abuse, sadness, rage, insecurity, and more leaked out from under the lid. I saw in that box all the generational trauma that had been passed through the wombs of my ancestors to their children and their children's children, and I shuttered. So much grief had been passed on generationally without anyone having been brave enough to unwrap and release it. So much pain tied up with a little twine bow. As those shadows seeped out, I cried. I cried for a childhood that had been taken. I cried for a child having a child. I cried because that box had never been opened before, and had caused so much trauma. And I cried with deep relief that that box would never stay hidden under the bed of my child. I ventured to untie that twine so my child wouldn't have to. In that moment, just by acknowledging and opening that box and releasing the secrets it contained, I broke the curse of generational trauma passed through the wombs of my ancestors, and created a new beginning within mine.