"You`d better go to the toilet"
We would hear his car pull on the drive and then she would say those words
Then I would know what was coming
I would go to the little toilet that was at the end of the dark hall and sit having a wee while I heard him lift the door of the garage that was under the house and then drive the car in, the sound of the engine running directly under the kitchen making a low ominous rumbling sound. I knew what was coming.
He would ring the doorbell just as he put the key in the lock and I would wait quietly for it to begin, spending as long as I could sitting there, swinging my legs, listening to my Mother.
Sometimes her voice would be firm, hard and clear, barking her expectations of him. Other times she would be ranting and screeching adding little fake sobs of despair in for good measure. Or sometimes she whispered, they were the worst times. Whatever her approach the message was the same. I needed a damn good hiding and that was his job.
Why...well there was no rhyme or reason to that. I may have actually been naughty, answered back, given her a dirty look, knocked a drink over, not done as I was told or not done something to her satisfaction but also it may just be she was in a mood about something or someone else and if she started to rant her displeasure she would then begin to add in details about my flaws and past mistakes too as her temper built and she searched for more and more reasons to reinforce her right to be enraged with her lot. By the time he was home, the original issue was often forgotten and it was my fault.
He knew there would be no peace for him until she was satisfied I`d been taught a lesson and my beating had fed her sadistic, vengeful self.
He would call me and begin pointing his finger in my face, laying down the law and `drumming` into me how naughty I had been and how I wasn`t to keep upsetting "Ya Mother".
We would be in the hall, there was no natural light and it was dark, he would corner me against the wall near the stairs and towering over me he would grab my upper arm with his left hand and with his right he would begin raining down blows against my legs, bottom and back. I struggled and sobbed.
I wouldn`t of dared screamed though, screaming wasn`t allowed in any form because someone may hear and all my punishments were very secretive, had I screamed God knows what either of them would of done to shut me up.
One of the first times I took a beating in that dark corner I wet myself. I would of been about 6 or 7. I wet myself not just because of the pain but through sheer terror. He was a stocky man with big hands and I knew he was not the type of Dad who saved little girls, he was the cold bystander to my Mothers cruelty and at times such as these he was her enforcer, her bully boy. As a young girl being raised in this toxic, isolated, abusive household I truly did not know where it would end, I thought he may kill me one day, on her instruction. And if you think that is a wild statement, consider I never received any proof there was much good in me or that I was of value and loved. Instead I was treated as an errand girl and constant source of irritation and annoyance, so why would he not decide to kill me in my childlike understanding. I was a terrible daughter after all. I was a little girl who experienced fear and tension daily and precious little affection. I believed I was bad, flawed in some way and I was unlovable because of this. So yes, I really was terrified of how far this beating would go. And so I wet myself.
Becoming aware of this he stopped and looked down
Father: "OH CHRIST...IVY....ers bloody wet erself"
Mother: What ??? {in disbelief} WHAT? {enraged}..er ay as er????
I felt some more urine dribble down my leg as I crouched in fear of her arrival, imaging they were both about to lay into me now.
Mother: OH MY GOD, you nasty, dirty girl....
My Father yanked me out of the corner and surveyed the pool of wee soaking into the cheap carpet..
Mother: Go an fetch a bloody towel Geoff
There then proceeded to be a theatrical, dramatic, soaking up of the wee and scrubbing of the carpet whilst they ranted and moaned about how I had probably done it deliberately.
Years later as I watched Joan Crawford scrub the bathroom floor in the film `Mommy Dearest` I shivered, so eerily similar.
At no time was there a flicker of guilt or shame that they had driven a small child to wet themselves in terror in the midst of a good hiding, not a crumb of accountability or inclination that this was far from good parenting. I was just viewed as filthy and even more bad.
I was told to go to my room while they cleared up my mess.
I remember shame and guilt replacing the terror I had felt as I tried to rinse my urine soaked soaks out in the bathroom sink.
And so after that whenever I had been `bad` and she was going to tell my Father that I needed `sorting out` she would say coldly,
"Your Dad`s back, you`d better go to the toilet"
And I would dutifully empty my bladder so the when he was laying into me and I still urinated in fear there be little more than a splash, which I would then be told to clean up myself.
After all she couldn`t have me making a mess and extra work for her.
He knew there would be no peace for him until she was satisfied I`d been taught a lesson and my beating had fed her sadistic, vengeful self.
He would call me and begin pointing his finger in my face, laying down the law and `drumming` into me how naughty I had been and how I wasn`t to keep upsetting "Ya Mother".
I wouldn`t of dared screamed though, screaming wasn`t allowed in any form because someone may hear and all my punishments were very secretive, had I screamed God knows what either of them would of done to shut me up.
One of the first times I took a beating in that dark corner I wet myself. I would of been about 6 or 7. I wet myself not just because of the pain but through sheer terror. He was a stocky man with big hands and I knew he was not the type of Dad who saved little girls, he was the cold bystander to my Mothers cruelty and at times such as these he was her enforcer, her bully boy. As a young girl being raised in this toxic, isolated, abusive household I truly did not know where it would end, I thought he may kill me one day, on her instruction. And if you think that is a wild statement, consider I never received any proof there was much good in me or that I was of value and loved. Instead I was treated as an errand girl and constant source of irritation and annoyance, so why would he not decide to kill me in my childlike understanding. I was a terrible daughter after all. I was a little girl who experienced fear and tension daily and precious little affection. I believed I was bad, flawed in some way and I was unlovable because of this. So yes, I really was terrified of how far this beating would go. And so I wet myself.
Becoming aware of this he stopped and looked down
Father: "OH CHRIST...IVY....ers bloody wet erself"
Mother: What ??? {in disbelief} WHAT? {enraged}..er ay as er????
I felt some more urine dribble down my leg as I crouched in fear of her arrival, imaging they were both about to lay into me now.
Mother: OH MY GOD, you nasty, dirty girl....
My Father yanked me out of the corner and surveyed the pool of wee soaking into the cheap carpet..
Mother: Go an fetch a bloody towel Geoff
There then proceeded to be a theatrical, dramatic, soaking up of the wee and scrubbing of the carpet whilst they ranted and moaned about how I had probably done it deliberately.
Years later as I watched Joan Crawford scrub the bathroom floor in the film `Mommy Dearest` I shivered, so eerily similar.
I was told to go to my room while they cleared up my mess.
I remember shame and guilt replacing the terror I had felt as I tried to rinse my urine soaked soaks out in the bathroom sink.
And so after that whenever I had been `bad` and she was going to tell my Father that I needed `sorting out` she would say coldly,
"Your Dad`s back, you`d better go to the toilet"
And I would dutifully empty my bladder so the when he was laying into me and I still urinated in fear there be little more than a splash, which I would then be told to clean up myself.
After all she couldn`t have me making a mess and extra work for her.
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