Should a Survivor of Abuse Have Children By: Lori j Loesch
I’ve been on a journey, and I am finally going to write about it. I am going to write about my life. I have a lot of information, and things that I placed far back in the lockers of my mind, have been slowly, sliding to the forefront. It feels as though this is the book that I was destined to write. Like other children that write tell all books about their unfortunate upbringings, there are those that will be hurt and angry by the information I write. I don’t want to hurt my mother, but this is my truth and what I endured, through this journey called life.
As I mentioned, memories are finding their way to the forefront of my mind. I have to write about them. It actually felt good when I wrote about, something that I had never talked to any one about. I had only talked to my mom about it once when I was in my twenties. Just two nights ago, I was watching a movie, late at night, I think it was “Black Waters”, and I realized that although I suffered abuse from my step, adopted, dad, I also experienced what it’s like to live with a young mother, who surely had mental issues. I had a difficult time writing that sentence. It hurts me to write about her. The movie was about a mother who was separated from her husband, living with her daughter. The mother suffered depression from past abuse from her parents. The movie showed me the inner process of a depressed mother. She later killed herself. I wrote, that night about my mother’s attempted suicide. I had never told a soul about this, not even my husband, until recently and only once.
While I was writing about her attempted suicide, I started to feel relief, as if, letting it out of my brain was a lot like letting the air out of a balloon, it defused the hold that it had on me, even though I had never thought or talked about her attempted suicide, it did have a hold on me. I was in the ninth grade, when after track practice, my aunt came to pick me up, saying that “we can’t find your mother.”
I have never taken on such a large project as writing a book, but I have started to write. To write everything and then put it into order. I have a feeling, writing the book will help me as much, if not more, than others. I want to write the book, and sell the book, and help other people. I read a lot of information and I get enlightened by some of what I read, and I hope to pass it along. If I can help one person who is struggling, like myself, then it is all worth it.
There’s something about coming forward and telling your truth that will set you free. When the Jerry Sandusky child abuse scandal came forward, it did something to me. Something wonderful, horrible and yet I have started my freedom journey. I want to thank the first young boy who broke the story, because of him, I am strong enough to face my abusers. If Jerry Sandusky, Joe Paterno, Graham Spanier, Tim Curley, Gary Schultz, can be brought to their knees, then surely I can face my mom, grandmother and step dad. My husband said that he never saw anything shake me like this scandal did. I got to the point, where at first I read the paper everyday, and every article, then came the day, the months, where I stopped picking up the paper to read it. I just couldn’t take another article about Jerry and Joe. I had to think of Ed being Jerry and Gran and mom, Joe and the others. It made a difference in me. It was hell for years. And being a mom, I didn’t like how my life affected my kids. I started to sleep a lot, started to take antidepressants. I no longer take anti-depressants. It’s a good thing, at this time in my life. I sleep less, but have always needed 9 hours of sleep a night and if I don’t get it, I don’t function and feel as though I need a nap and my family hates it and I hate it too. Even if no one is paying attention to me, they don’t want me to be asleep. My mom took naps and I always hated it too. Now I struggle with the same dilemma. It really sucks. I wanted to be a good mom.
Maybe a child from abuse shouldn’t become a mother. I waited until I was thirty one and I guess I didn’t wait long enough. Forty two, didn’t make a difference either. I guess there’s never a right time to be a mom. I try everyday to do the right thing. It’s harder for me, because I didn’t have a good rule model. Just loving your kids doesn’t seem to be enough. My son told me two nights ago that I wasn’t there for him. I said what do you mean? After I had Faith? He agreed, that when I had Faith, eleven years after him, he felt like I dropped him. I did. He and I were always together, doing everything. Then Faith was born six weeks earlier than she was supposed to. Life took a direction that I could never have imagined. It was pure stress.
Wait a minute! My kids are kind hearted, friendly, giving, loving, intelligent, maybe an abused child did right! I must have done something right! I talk about not having a good rule model to follow, and this is an example of what I’m writing about: When Jules was 3 years old, I talked to a pastor of the pre-school he was attending. I had all these problems that I was not doing right. As I proceeded to tell him what it was I was doing wrong with my son, his answer to me was, ” Lori, you’re talking about normal stuff that we all do.” and he gave me examples of how he, a pastor, had fallen off the good dad pedestal and let his kid down. It didn’t help me.
What is helping me is letting it out! Letting go of the power hold, and telling my truth, no matter who likes or dislikes it. It is my truth and no one can take it away. No one can say ” that didn’t happen” because it did, and they weren’t there. Another odd place where I found quality knowledge was on a recent airing of “Criminal Minds”. The detective told an abused child that by holding in what a man did to him, when he was a child, nearly destroyed him. Bingo! I have held in, all that I had to live through and endure. It wasn’t just the abusive dad, it was the abusive family. I was only around his family and mostly my mothers family. There was a lot of mental illness in his family, there were no good rule models, for me, but I’m doing alright.
It’s ironic how I came to live in State College. Maybe there is a grand plan in the universe. I was meant to live in State College, when the Jerry Sandusky scandal erupted. I was meant to move to the secluded country with my baby daughter. Another episode of “Criminal Minds”, I heard another detective tell a daughter that she won’t face the abuse unless she goes back to where the abuse took place. By going back…the abuse will come to the forefront. Moving to this secluded country in Centre Hall, brought me back to the abuse. Moving here, forced the truth to come forward. Most of my abuse happened when we lived in a run down, country house, secluded from society.
I’m a bit happier now. My daughter is going to a Charter School in State College, which delights me! I love, love, love, driving to State College two times a day. I nearly killed myself after the daily, once a morning drive to Penns Valley. When I got home after dropping her off, I would go into a depression. Lately, I am active. I feed the birds, daily, as I used to do. I’ve been cleaning the house, a little more, and making dinner almost every night, even if it’s not the best dinner I have ever made. I have to start all over again. It’s as if I never was a good cook and I need to start from scratch until I reach good cook status again. We’ve been going out for dinner on the weekends as we used to do. It’s a good life. It’s a struggle, that my kids are going to go through with me, rather I want them to or not. Hopefully they will be stronger and not allow anyone to hold them down.
Laying at the Daggers’ edge, will probably be the title of my book. Not only was my step, adopted, dad holding the dagger, my entire family was. They never wanted the horrible truth to come to the surface. They held me down, and it worked. It’s funny, Ed’s family were avid race car drivers and race car builders. I hated everything race car! But yesterday I had this mind opening explosion…I love to gear head! Shifting through the gears, taking on the turns, is exciting to me! I like to drive like a man. Maybe I didn’t hate it at all. Maybe I, not my half brother, the royal, precious son, would have been the better driver! They will never know. I want to search out race car driving and who knows, I may start racing. Not dirt track, but country turns, with a foreign sports car, convertible down! I can’t wait! Maybe that’s one reason I love to drive my daughter to school, there is a Mercedes-Benz dealer that I pass. I almost miss the new red light because I’m not used to it being there, and I’m busy looking at that two-seater, convertible. It’s got my name on it.
Maybe by coming to terms with my childhood, and realizing that even though I hated my dad, I lived his lifestyle. I was in the car, backseat, scared, as Ed was passing traffic on a double yellow, two lane road, at night. I was around the car body shop, watching, taking in, everything related to cars, the thing I really hated. I feel as if the scale of a dry cocoon is ripping off of me. I will be a beautiful, free butterfly, someday, I promise.
Tags: abuse, Jerry Sandusky, Joe Paterno, mental illness, telling your truth, young mother
