Episode 2: Two is company; Three is....

In today's episode I discuss some of the challenges I faced growing up as an only child. Please be warned, I speak about domestic violence in varying forms during this episode.

My hope for anyone watching this is that You are only responsible for your actions and reactions...no-one ele's!

Happy watching.

Transcript

SPEAKER_00 0:02

Welcome back to episode two of Unapologetically Imperfect. I would like to acknowledge the Dark People, the traditional custodians of the land on which this podcast is recorded. I would like to pay respect to elders, past, present, and emerging, and offer that respect to anyone listening today. Today I'm going to delve into my childhood, and unfortunately, it does involve domestic violence. I apologize if anything I say hits a nerve with you, but I really hope that through this episode there is a little seed of hope that you can take away that you can actually use and learn and grow. Thank you. First of all, um, I'm actually very humbled. Thank you to everyone who listened to episode one. Um the feedback I've received so far has been really awesome. I'm obviously starting out, it's very rough, it's very raw, and it's real, but I want people to be able to relate. So thank you. Um, for those of you, if you're only just joining me, I'm Shell, 42, and I want to share my journey and my story, and hopefully encourage people to be able to do things more than what they imagine and let people know they're not alone. As I said, today's episode, I'm gonna start delving into my childhood a little bit. What I've done to get to where I am and what I've faced as a child. So I am an only child. I grew up with a mum and a dad, and thankfully I had extended family. Um, my grandparents, my aunties and uncles were absolutely amazing, and I had some epic close family friends. But at home, it wasn't great. There were three of us: me, mum, dad. That combination never was good. Dad didn't want me around. I was told on many, many, many occasions that I was a mistake, that I wasn't wanted. And I grew up believing that. I really truly grew up believing that I wasn't wanted, and I was a complete mistake. He saw me as a wedge between him and mum. He can't cope not being the center of attention um back then and unfortunately, even still today. But any combination of two, no issue. As soon as there were three of us, well, let's just say I learned to become the invisible man. It was kind of like Casper the ghost, but in a human form. So it's pretty crazy. Being at home, it wasn't a great place. There was emotional, verbal, and physical abuse at times. More often verbal and emotional. I remember once I was about four or five, and mum got an old car. And back in those days, back in the late 80s, um, the steering wheels of cars were really, really hard plastic, like really hard. And mum and dad had this huge big fight, and mum was like, I just just gotta get out. And she came and got me out of my room, and we went and sat in the car, and she was about to start it up, and dad's come out ranting, raving. Anyway, he grabbed the back of mum's head and slammed it into the steering wheel. That was pretty hard. The sound it made, it still rings in my ears. That was 37 years ago, but I remember it like it was yesterday. Fun fact, neither of my parents remember it. But I do. I remember it very, very vividly. It wasn't uncommon for voices to be raised, emotional abuse to be hurled. Physical wasn't normally that extensive. Um, but when he got in a rage, he got in a rage. So funny thing is, after about 10 minutes, he'd forget anything had ever happened. And it made it really, really hard. So it was age five. I was dealing with this. By age seven, it became so much more apparent that he really didn't want me around. He really saw me as a block, as a wedge. So much so that one afternoon before he went to pick up mum for work, he turned to me and said, Don't speak to your mother when she comes home because I want to speak to her. Okay. Cool. I learned to become invisible even more. I knew I had about a 15-minute window from the time he left to pick up mum and the time he came back. House was all locked up. I was completely safe. I knew I had about a 15-minute window. I knew that by the time they got home, make myself scarce. Just save the arguments, just make myself scarce. And that's what I did. I'd spent hours and hours and hours in my bedroom alone, playing with my toys, when I got old enough listening to music, drawing on my chalkboard, just using my imagination, reading books, anything to make myself invisible. I even used to sort of open my door and sort of peer out just so I could go to the bathroom sometimes, if things were that bad. Around the same age, I had a two-liter lemonade bottle. I think it was like seven-up bottles, the big fat two-liter bottles. I had one of them come flying through the air one day at my head. I honestly don't remember why. But I was led to believe that I deserved it. I deserved to be treated this way. It was my fault, and I deserve this. I'm seven. Seven years of age. I just continued to go, okay, it's it's obviously my mistake. I I have stuffed up somewhere. I've screwed up. I deserve to be treated this way. I deserve to be treated this way, I deserve to be rejected. Obviously, now I know that isn't the case, and I know that's all lies. But as a kid, that's what I was led to believe. I wasn't allowed to show any emotion. Not with dad, anyway. Mum, always, she was great. But dad, nah, not an ounce. If I was too happy, I'd get a sidewards glance of, you know, why are you happy? You shouldn't be happy. I wasn't allowed to be sad, angry, or even cry because I'd just get in trouble for it. So I learned to just deadpan. I learned to wear a mask at a young age and hide how I really felt and what was really, really going on. Unfortunately, because of the home situation, I couldn't even speak to mum about what was going on. I enjoyed weekends and holidays being up at grandma and grandpa'cause because I had a break. But at the same time, I wanted home to be better. Yeah, I saw all my friends with all their families having great times. And mine was so not like that at all. And the problem is when you come from a family that's perfect, as so, you don't understand what it's like until you're in that situation. You don't understand the imperfectness until you see it. And I was living it every day, every week. That was pretty awful. I remember I was age 10, um, it was the October of my tenth year, so 1994. And uh I fell off a cupboard at church and I broke my arm. I broke my left arm and knocked my growth played out of position quite significantly. Uh, and I ended up having to have surgery. It was like, yeah, okay, cool. We've got to get this fixed. That was mum's attitude. Dad dropped us off at Mount George Hospital and went, call me when you're ready to come home. Call me when you're ready to come home. I was so out of it with pain. I was nearly passing out. I was in so much pain, but I remember those words. At the time, the pain took over. There was no hurt or upset, but it was there. It was there. Mum stayed with me the entire day. I think we left Mount Gerard Hospital about 10:30, 11 o'clock at night. I had a plaster cast on my arm. It was pretty nasty. Feeling so bad for mum because her sister, my auntie, was in Katoomba hospital giving birth to my cousin. It was also the day before my mum's birthday. And I always try and make my mum's birthday special. But this particular time, I broke my arm the day before mum's birthday, and I felt horrible. I shouldn't feel horrible for that. But I was made to feel horrible because of what I'd already experienced. As I said, I usually got to spend my holidays um every Friday night, most Wednesday nights as well, with my grandparents. Uh when I was young, like really young, they had a caravan um down Shell Harbor way, down the South Coast, which was right. It was great. I loved it, right? I'm not even going to edit that out, that I just stuffed that up because I want this to be real. Um, but I'd go down the caravan or I'd be over at their place during the daytime when mum and dad were working. I'd be over there. That was sweet. I loved it. But there were times where dad's like, he worked for a very large telecommunication company and did all wiring and stuff. And he's like, no, no, I'll um I'll take Poss to work with me. Poss is my nickname, Possum, Poss. Right, I'll I'll take it to work with me, no problem. What he failed to mention was he would actually be dropping me off at one of his many girlfriends' places throughout the years and making me spend time with them. Whoever was the flavor of the month, he'd dump me with them. But he'd say to mum that I'll take posse to work with me. It's pretty hard. It was really hard. He would then constantly bag out my mum. Whenever we're in the car and it was just him and I, he would just be constantly ratting out mum, bagging her out, blaming her for things that she hadn't done, calling her all these horrible names. And I was regularly the meat in the sandwich. And I believed it was all my fault. I believed that he his perception of everything was my fault. At the same time, I was so sad for mum. I was heartbroken because I got one parent saying all this horrible nasty stuff about the other parent, and I couldn't do anything about it. I wanted to stand up to him and be like, you can't say that. But I couldn't. I was afraid of him. When he got into his fits of rage, they were scary. They were scary as. So I couldn't stand up to him. I was afraid. All through my life, he never came to any major events in my life. I think he was there for the first couple of birthdays, and then after that, it was like, nah, fire brigade's too important. I might miss a fire call. It wasn't until my 21st birthday he actually showed up for something. And that was because I sent him an invitation. And oh boy, did he chuck the cranks about that? One that he got an invitation, and two that his name wasn't on it. At that point in time, I didn't want his name on my invitation. I did my own invitations. I didn't want his name on it. But I let him believe that it was Mum who left him off. But no, it was actually me. Because I didn't want him on there. And I said to him, I finally said to him, I'm giving you an invitation because you always say you'll come, but you never show. You never show. The night of my 21st, I remember he rang me and he said, Look, there's only a couple of us around for Fire Brigade tonight. I just need, you know, I'm only gonna be able to come for half an hour or whatever. I'm like, cool, that's great. I'm just grateful that you're even gonna bother to come. He came. He was there for about an hour and a half. He was catching up with some old friends who he hadn't seen for a long time, and that meant the absolute world. But it wasn't always like that. It wasn't always like that at all. Backtrack a little bit. When I started high school, um, the school I went to, we had a jazz band, and I joined, and practice was on a Wednesday night, um, which was cool because what else do you do on a Wednesday night when you're in your seven? A 12-year-old. Dad was meant to pick me up after Jazz Band. He told mom, oh, it's alright, I'll pick her up. Like I'll be up at the fire station, I'll come and pick her up. All good. It's cool, you know, it finishes at nine o'clock. Be there, pick her up. Yep, cool, got it. My high school has a very, very dark bus bay. There weren't many lights back then. And time was ticking. Five past nine, ten past nine, quarter past nine. I was starting to get very scared. I don't like being out in the dark anyway, at such a young age. I was even more petrified. Yes, I was afraid of being outside alone in the dark. I was scared I'd been forgotten. I knew it was a seven-minute walk home. I knew exactly how to get home. But I also knew I would be in so much trouble if I went home and he came and got me. So I waited. In the shadows, I waited alone. Kept waiting. By about 9:30, quarter to ten, all of a sudden the firetruck turned up. Mum had to call him to ask him if he had me with him. And he was like, oh nah, completely forgot. Ah, it's alright, I'll go get her now. So he rocked up in the fire truck at 9:30, quarter to ten at night. By this point, I had tears streaming down my face because I was just so scared. And I was angry and I was upset, and I just felt rejected again. Like there wasn't an ounce left that didn't feel happy. That did feel happy, I should say. I just, it broke me. It absolutely broke me. Anyway, I knew I couldn't let him see that. So as I saw the fire truck pull in, I quickly like in the shadows, just wiped my eyes and my face. And I just quickly climbed up into the truck. Yeah, yeah, it was good. It was a good night. Yeah, yeah, yeah, it was cool. Anyway, he dropped me home. And mum knew straight away. I was really, really upset. It had an impact. It was reiterating the story that I was a problem, that I was a mistake, I was a I deserved to be treated that way. I deserved to be forgotten, I deserved to be rejected. Around the same sort of age, so 12, 13 years of age. I remember asking when it was it was Father's Day or his birthday. It was one of the two. And I said, you know, what time are you going? What time are you going to get up in the morning? Because I'd bought this super cool Peter Barock framed poster. Like it was huge, right? Something I was really proud of. I'd worked hard to get the money and save it. I just wanted to know what time he was getting up so I could give it to him. Well, this started a great World War III, didn't it, in our house? Um, he actually went off his tree and just started swearing and carrying on. And then he turned on mum when she tried to say, Look, your daughter just wants to know what time you're getting up so she can give you your present. That was it. It escalated even further. I don't think he got his present on the actual day from memory. I'm pretty sure he got it a couple of days later. I think he'd stormed off and was having a salt somewhere, but it was horrible. So not only was I being rejected, but my gifts was even being rejected. And that was something he was passionate about back then was motor racing. It was really hard. Again, reiterating to me that I'm not good enough, I'm a problem, I'm at fault. It's pretty horrid. When 9-11 happened, um he and I had had a big run in at home and I just went, I'm done, I'm out. At this point, thankfully, I had my driver's license and I had my car. So I grabbed what I needed and I actually went up and stayed at grandma and grandpa's for the night. Thankfully, they only lived five-minute drive up the road. But I couldn't, I couldn't stay there. I could not stay there. I was not going to be used as an emotional um punching bag again. But I felt horrible that I had to leave mum there. I felt horrible knowing that I was safe. I just hoped, hoped and prayed to God that she was. So I mentioned before he had girlfriends that all the way through his marriage with mum. He had many girlfriends. He would come, he would go. He'd live with us, he'd leave. He'd come, he'd live with us, he'd leave again. I got over this. And I finally started to find my voice when I was in year 11, year 12. And I remember saying to Mum, look, I've gone back to high school to do my HSC. I left after a term of um year 11. And I went back the following year, back into year 11 and did year 11, year 12. I said, I can't do my HSC with him living here. I'm sorry, but I can't. He either needs to leave or I'm gonna have to go and live with grandma and grandpa, and we both know that's not gonna go down well. My grandparents were awesome, they were lovely people, but also very much in your face wanted to know what you're doing, who you're going to be with, everything like, and probably due to something else that had happened, which I'll explain in another episode, but it would have been very detrimental to my mental health. Um, so anyway, mum basically said to him, Look, I'm sorry, you can't stay. And she did it in a lovely, caring way, and sure enough, he turned on me and started lashing out, um, swearing, and absolutely just verbally and emotionally abusing me again. Um, and I just felt destroyed. I I had worked on myself so much in my teenage years that I just felt destroyed again. But I also felt relief that I finally did stand up for myself. Was it the greatest? Nope. But I did it. Uh prior to that, um, literally the morning of my 18th birthday. Got up, got dressed, walked out to the kitchen. As soon as I walked out, he's trapped the divorce papers on the kitchen table. The morning of my 18th birthday. Why? Because at 18, he didn't have to pay child support. Um, we'd never had a lot of money growing up. There were weeks we had $20 left a fortnight that we had to survive on. That was rent, pet food, our food, everything. Um, we didn't have a lot of money. But the morning of my 18th. Now, if that doesn't hammer home how much of a problem I was, supposedly, how much of a problem I was, nothing does, hey. It was pretty nasty. But at the same time, I was so glad I could not wait. I could not wait for him just to leave. All right. I'd had enough of him coming and going, and I'd had enough of him treating mum like crap and mate like crap. No one deserved it. All through my life, mum and I had to schedule time to spend together because we couldn't just spend time together without dad getting cranky or chucking a major hissy fit. So it was always scheduled. It's also one of the reasons I'm very, very protective of my days out with my mum now because she worked five and a half days a week growing up. But she had to fit in with dad and his schedule. It was easier to say jump how high when he beckoned than it was to put up an argument or a fight. Even now we schedule our time in. Um, some people think that's really weird. Um, but it's actually really Good, because we know this is our time. Grandma and grandpa always used to take me to the Easter show as a little kid. And um mum and I have continued this tradition as well. Uh we still go every year, and that is our day. No one can take that away from us. It's a case of are you going to the church? Yeah, we are. No one. I apologize to my friends who have often said, Oh, can we come? No, when it's mum's and my day, it's mum's and my day. That's it. I'm very protective at that time. I know I've made my dad to sound like a monster. And at times he really was. But I'm happy to say he and I do have a better relationship these days. But I tell you what, the ongoing strength and perseverance that I have to ensure that I have so that I can set boundaries to protect myself and my mental health, which if you know me, I do fail at at times. I am a human. But on, we certainly get on better now than we used to. I can't keep giving chance after chance after chance. There's been too much damage. It's funny, we're out on our motorbikes recently, and he even said to me that wasn't a good dad when I was younger. He doesn't do young kids, but he thinks he's a better dad now that I'm older. And look, I have to agree to an extent. It's better. But a leopard doesn't change its spots. Well, mum has apologised to me so many times for all these things that I've gone through. But I always reply with I don't blame her. We did the best she could with minimal support and minimal money. She was being controlled. It wasn't her fault. We both grew up believing that a child needs parents in like needs both parents in the home to grow up and be successful. But in my case, to be honest, once they split, it was the best thing ever. Like it was the best thing ever. I never have blamed mom, and I still don't to this day. She did her best, and she did everything she could. So my takeaway for you from this episode. I'm sorry, it's been a bit of a long and dry one, but my takeaway was that I grew up believing that I wasn't at fault for their marriage not working and for dad's poor behavior. I believed that I deserved to be treated the way I was, that because I was a wedge, I was a mistake, and I definitely didn't matter. The reality is that is a load of crap. No one ever could blame me for this. None of it was my fault. I've learned that I'm not responsible for the actions and reactions of others, but I am responsible for my actions and reactions, and I own them. If I stuff up, I own them. I don't deserve to be treated that way. But with love, care, and respect. The same goes for you. I want to encourage you. If you've ever been made to feel invisible or like you are a problem, stop. You're not. And you are not responsible for the actions and reactions of anyone else, just yourself. There's no need to continue to beat ourselves up over things we aren't at a fault for. Don't let our mistakes, don't let others' mistakes rob you of joy in life. Because I'm telling you firsthand, it absolutely sucks. If I hadn't let things get me at a young age, I probably would have been different, and I did. But now I know it is not my fault. It was never my fault. I'm only responsible for my actions and my reactions. So I really hope there's been some sort of a jelly bean of hope or encouragement in this episode for you. I really look forward to bringing you more episodes. I apologize this one's a day late. I'm trying to get things done on a Monday, but life does happen. For next time, remember to be unapologetically imperfect. It's the best way to be.