The other piece to my anger (still leaping off your comment here) is that my parents don’t seem to get, despite knowing it, that I have done years of therapy and worked with survivor communities for over a decade. Because who would do all that and NOT check a daycare out?
As I say this I realize maybe given the diary-x archives are not up here, that history might not be clear.
To be clear: my paternal grandfather abused me/us badly. Any past incidents will be a matter of memory and that is definitely difficult, but I think I am fairly confident in saying that it was pretty serious and should have been hard to miss. I have literal scars. Â
One incident of which I am pretty clear, is that the abuse includes having his hand up my hoo-ha while my dad was in the same room reading… an actually minor sexual act, but a kind of devastating betrayal of trust/lack of parenting. (I realize if you have never been lifelong abused the question might be “why did you not say something” to my 9 yr old self, but let’s leave that aside for now.) I realize it was the 70s, so there was not the awareness that there is now, but regardless.
The reason I am sure of this is that my father at one point remembered it and mentioned it. That he had thought perhaps my grandfather had his hand down my pants. And continued to take my sister and I there – and send us there alone – for 10 more years. Of course my dad was his son and I kind of understand that probably he had a horrible childhood (I don’t think he remembers it) and that there are reasons but… that was still a stunning betrayal of trust.
That is kind of the tip of the parental iceberg though. This abuse came out after my sister attempted suicide and at that point I disclosed what I remembered at that point, which now seems sort of tame. To give my parents credit, they did not doubt me… they did however call everyone in the family and go down to have it out (my grandfather admitted to it in broad general terms), which I don’t feel was a great help. About a year and a half later they kicked my sister – then 16 - out of the house for smoking a single tobacco cigarette, and fighting with them about it.
In the subsequent family counselling, for which I paid half out of my then minimum wage job, the counsellor suggested to my mother that she might have a few issues, at which point she terminated therapy, and also tried to lay charges against my sister’s (independent) counsellor.Â
(This is kind of how I think this daycare thing is going to go down, actually. Now that my parents have taken a stand, they won’t psychologically be able to back down.)
That Christmas and most Christmases since, my mother has commented on how she misses the lovely Christmases we used to have… at my grandfather’s. To me.
Also, after my grandfather was moved into a nursing home my parents inherited his furniture. Unbeknownest to me at the time, this included the chair and ottoman on which he and I were sitting in the aforementioned pants incident (by the way, that was how we sat… every night… but I digress), and over which I (using I loosely) have memories of being sodomized. My parents, after a couple of years, put that chair and ottoman in their living room. I told them at the time that I had been raped (I don’t think I actually used the term sodomized) on that chair and would not enter their house while it as there.
It stayed there for 3 years while I refused to enter the house. Finally, it left. Except the ottoman is still in their living room. Right now.
All this is only peripherally related, of course, but I think it might begin to explain why it is that my parents have sort of forfeited the right to tell me what environment is best for my son without being, let’s say, a little respectful about it. Â
The balancing act for me though, is, that even fucked up people sometimes get it right.
First off let me say I don’t believe any sexual abuse is in any way minor!
Having been raped daily by my father for over 17 years I do understand the complexities of trying to live life full of horrible memories.
What your parents did and continue to do is tremendously horrible. That you have maintained any contact with them is to me a testament to your(all) strength.
I agree with you that your parents have given up any right whatsoever to tell how to parent Noah in any shape or form.
I do hope your parents will back off and not cause you any more problems.
Gah what WERE all these people doing? I’m so sorry about that. :P
Thank you.
Shandra – fucked up people do sometimes get it right, but you are absolutely right to rely on other evidence to verify their claims. This is especially when they are hysterical and their motivation is cloudy to say the least. It’s obvious to anyone reading your story that your parents are sitting on unknown amounts of repressed guilt, projection of blame, denial and self-righteous posturing.
I’d say too, that your anger is justifiable on so many counts, and that it is telling you that the way they communicated their conclusion was WRONG. Not just bad, unconscious communication, not just thoughtless and manipulative, but inaccurate. I bet your anger is finely honed in that regard. I bet your bullshit metre is dead-on accurate. I think you can trust it to tell you when something’s wrong. And I think you can trust all the other well-reasoned and closely-observed evidence, your own, Carl’s, your friend’s, to tell you that Noah is fine, though maybe having a difficult transition.
If you have a punching bag I wouldn’t be surprised if it were in shreds by now.
I’m curious about something, though not questioning your comment about Noah and splitting. I’ve never heard of a genetic predisposition to dissociation (unlike mental disorders like, say, schizophrenia). Or do you mean Noah is easily hypnotisable? Is this a real fear? Do you have a source I can read?
Meanwhile, would you like to borrow my punching bag?
*hugs*
This sucks. I think you are right not to dismiss their concerns completely out of hand, but given the ways in which they’re freaking out, it does sound like it is about them and their own baggage about their behaviour in the past (including things which you might not personally be tuned into, Shan) and not really so much about the school itself. I do really know the concern about genetic multiplicity stuff — I’ve thought about that myself.
I think getting other people to check it out, especially other parents, is a really good idea. Could V. go by, maybe, one of her cleaning days? You checked her out pretty thoroughly, I think, so perhaps her judgement might have some internal weight? And I assume you’ve already talked to Lynn about this, but I think she’d have some real insight about the atmosphere.
Love you lots, sweetie, and hope we can hook up online when I’m home again.
Oh, and:
1. Your parents approached it in a completely screwed up way. Other people have said tis, but I thought I’d reiterate. They are making it about *them*, not about Noah at all.
2. The idea that on some level they know — sort of, maybe — that while in your care you were badly abused AND still want to have sole care of Noah is *so fucked up*. I understand why you can’t call them on this, but … just consider the judgement in that and then how much judgement they might have about a day care situation?
Er, while in *their* care. You know, I hope, what I meant.
I am going to take my jet-lagged self away from the computer now, despite the urge to hang around here continuing to write words at you.