This did not happen; I have not been here

TornPaper4 by Billy Alexander of Charlotte, NC courtesy stock.Xchng

As early as I can remember I have had one recurring nightmare and one memory that did not fit.

That might not sound like much at first glance, but I had this nightmare over and over and over. The nightmare made me so afraid to fall asleep some nights that I would invent elaborate games with myself to stay awake: pressing my fingers into my eyelids until I saw funky light patterns that I could watch for hours; sneaking a flashlight under my cover and reading a book all night long; sucking my thumb; memorizing poems and telling them to myself over and over; writing in my diary; telling myself the plots of plays and movies; singing songs to myself; holding my breath, then hyperventilating; counting. Anything, not to fall asleep and dream that I was trapped in a dark place without a way out, without a window, without a door, sealed in to the dark and the heat with no way out. I would wake from this nightmare plastered to the wall with my hands clawing for a door, a seam, some way to get out.

Over and over and over.

The memory that did not fit did not scare me in the same way, but I puzzled over it, picking at it like a knot in my hair or a stray piece of lettuce stuck in my teeth, worrying over it. What was weird about it was that it was like a movie scene. In my head, the memory, if it was that, seemed to be something that must have happened to someone else, because I did not remember the room, I did not remember the man, or at least what I could see of him, and the girl in the memory could not be me. Because I was a girl, and a virgin, and I have never seen a grown man’s penis. Had I?

When I spoke to my mother about either of these experiences, she said they were bad dreams. They didn’t happen, so I should just dismiss them; they had no power because they weren’t true.

After my mother packed us all up and ran away from my father, she destroyed every picture of him, including every picture of us in which he appeared, as if they didn’t happen.

Well, I had a father, and experiences with my father; my nightmare was a memory, and both of my memories were true. When I finally pieced the truth together and recovered my memories, my mother refused to discuss them. The past was done, she said.

This did not happen, was essentially what she had said, so long ago. But what she did, by severing my connections to what happened to me, was sever me from the truth, leaving me wounded forever.

And for much of my life, I was not all there.  I remember when Elizabeth Smart was found, her parents said that they planned not to discuss the trauma, and I thought this was the most horrible thing I had ever heard. She seems to have moved on well, although she also insists she doesn’t discuss it much, but she seems to be one of those who can move on. Good for her. If I had one thing to say to a parent of a child who has experienced trauma, I would say this: acknowledge what happened and look it in the eye. Otherwise you doom yourself to our fate. I’m here now, and my mother has been severed from my life. Because I can no longer hold court with lies. And now there are no pictures of my mother in my house.

It comes around.