The Flashbacks Begin

The following may be triggering for some. Please proceed with caution.

The memories of my abuse came back in flashes when all the right elements came together to act as triggers. Trigger one is that I was dating a man who had dark eyes (like my dad), was very controlling, and struggled with healthy boundaries. I always felt a little on edge with him. Trigger two was when my Dad made a sexual comment toward my daughter. Trigger three was the night my father was arrested for beating up his 91 year old mother.


I got the phone call while at the boyfriend’s house. My son said, “Grandpa’s been trying to get a hold of you. He is in jail and he wants you to come pick him up.”

“Why is he in jail?” I asked thinking he had been picked up for drunk driving.

“He beat up Grandma; she is in the hospital.”

“I’ll be right home,” I said.

I gave my boyfriend a kiss goodbye. He put his arms around me and said, “Maybe I’ll just keep you here,” and at that point I had a horrible flashback about one of my dad’s drug friends. Those who have endured abuse know what happened; they don’t need me to go into gory detail. For those of you who do not know, I’ll explain the part I always remembered and you can imagine the rest. Right before Mom divorced dad, he had drug parties at our house on a frequent basis while Mom was at work trying to keep food on the table and a roof over our heads. Dad had a friend (I don’t recall his name) who was about 20 years old. Keep in mind he could have been older or younger, but my six year old mind thought he was about 20. He had greasy dish-water blond hair, a scraggly beard that couldn’t grow in properly, and severely pock marked skin from acne scars. His white t-shirt was spotted with dirt and sweat. He stunk. He would grab a hold of me and try to kiss me. One day he offered Dad $20 for me. Dad took the money. My flashback was about this horror of a human being and what happened after the money exchanged hands.

I felt like I was suffocating - like I was still locked close to the yucky man. I looked at my boyfriend and said, “I have to go.”

“Are you all right?” he asked.

I’m fine; I’ll call you later,” I said as I hurried out the door.

I wasn’t fine. I was a mess. When I arrived home, I called my sister Mary and asked, “What happened?”

Apparently Dad was standing over Grandma and screaming in her face. She told him to back off, but he kept screaming at her. Grandma tiny and frail; she stood less than five feet tall. Dad was larger and very loud. Grandma lost her temper and slapped him in the face. Dad hit her back, knocking her to the floor, breaking her ribs and tearing open her arm. He left her there. He didn't even try to help her. He unplugged all the phones and hid them, and then left the apartment in order to raid her bank account.

Over the course of three days, he let her suffer while each day he withdrew the maximum amount from her account. On the third day, Grandma was able to find a phone and call for help. An ambulance and the police were dispatched and the family was notified. It was hard for Grandma to admit that her dear sweet child, who she loved more than anything, had hurt her. The police took Dad to jail. He handed his wallet to Mary when he was arrested. She put his wallet on his dresser and didn’t even think to look inside. All of the money from Grandma’s account was in that wallet.

Dad began calling from the jail. He wanted me or Mary to come bail him out. He said, “Mary has my money. Call her and get it to bail me out. This place is horrible. I know I’ll have another heart attack if I stay here.”

I said, “I can’t come get you. I am sick and my van has broken down. Besides, Mary said she doesn't have your money.”

“That lying bitch. I handed it to her when the police took me. Take a taxi and come get me out!” he said as hiis anger escalated because I refused to come and get him.

“You need to learn to control your temper.”

“I hope you die with a rat in your mouth!” he shouted. "I'll just call someone else to come get me."

“Good luck finding someone,” I said as I hung up the phone.

I could not forgive him for hurting Grandma. I loved her more than I loved either one of my parents. Grandma was my everything. She was my normal – the person I tried to be like – my pattern of how to be an okay person. She was regal, royal, and completely undeserving of being hurt. Besides, now I was processing flashbacks that were coming more and more frequently. I remembered the abuse I had suffered at his hands and in my mind the only thing worse than hitting a child was hitting an elderly person. A child’s bones are more flexible whereas a person in their nineties has brittle bones and fragile skin. He finally stopped calling me after about a week. He said there were rats at the jail, and although I didn't express it to him, I thought it was fitting for him to be with rats so that he could be the one to die with a rat in his mouth.

Rage filled every fiber of my being. The things I remembered combined with what he did to Grandma and had done to my sisters were too much for me to take in. When I walked the halls at work – at the store – anywhere I went, I wanted to smash things to pieces. I wanted to break windows, break walls, break everything. I felt a scream deep inside me that made me afraid that if I let it out, it would never stop. I longed to go to Dad, take a razor, and X out his face – make him not real anymore. The violence I felt toward him was staggering. I am not a violent person, but I visualized going to his apartment and bashing his head against the brick wall with a giant log. I thought, “If I had a rabid dog, I would kill it, yet I know my dad is rabid and here we sit waiting for him to hurt someone else. I knew I needed help. I didn’t feel big enough to contain all the rage that boiled within me.

Yet at work, I continued to do a good job and acted completely unaffected by all the turmoil in my life. As soon as I got in my car to go home, the tears and anger would surface and remain out until the car reached my street at which point I would again compose myself so that I could appear normal to my children.

To be continued.