As we grew up, our family communication soured rapidly. My dad did not handle sarcastic, belligerent teenagers well. He dished back way more than we ever gave. He started swearing more and more in front of us, and then finally would swear AT us. This was a HUGE deal in our home. It is largely frowned in our religion to use unkind words of any kind, but it is especially taboo to use vile swear words or to take the Lord's name in vain. I was thirteen when I heard my dad use the "F" word for the first time. I cringed upon hearing it. Not my dad. He would never use THAT word. I trembled and literally felt sick to my stomach. That's how much that one little word effected me. I wish that had been the only time he used it. Nope. He became more comfortable using THAT word, and many others in the heat of anger as time went on. I remember many nights tearfully falling asleep in the fetal position, not because of an encounter of molestation, but because my dad was swearing up a storm again at my Mom for one thing or another. Words hurt. It didn't matter whether the words were directed at me or someone else. Usually it effected me more when it was someone else getting verbally attacked. I wanted so badly to step in. I wanted to stop it, just like I wanted to stop the sexual abuse. But I didn't. I couldn't. And because I couldn't or wouldn't protect my loved ones, it thought it was ALL MY FAULT.
My dad started developing a paranoid personality. He would go off on rants about idiot drivers, or rude teenagers, or evil behaviors in general. He hated traffic, and hated crowds more. His anxiety would build up and the vile words would poor out. The worst was when he started getting paranoid about his own family. He just "knew" that my mother's siblings laughed at him and thought they were better than him. They argued about that incessantly the last few years of their marriage. My dad really had paranoid delusions about my brother. When my brother was only 15 or 16, my dad accused him of sleeping with girls. Then he started accusing him of being gay. My dad accused him of many obscure, unwarranted actions. Several times, the verbal attacks between my dad and brother became physical too. Usually their altercations were right in front of the rest of us. We would helplessly gape at them, not knowing what to do.
I think what disturbs me the most about the verbal abuse we endured is the look on my father's face when he lost control. He literally turned into a monster. His face became bright red. His eyes were bulging, penetrating, piercing into the soul. His brow was furrowed, and his eyebrows menacing. It seemed that even his teeth and tongue were lashing out like a rabid mongrel. It was traumatic to watch someone I loved transform themselves into such a manic creature like that.
The other greatly disturbing thing was how he would be the next morning, or even an hour or two after an "episode." He was back to normal. No, not normal, even more gentile and soft and humble than normal. He would call us all together and apologize. He would gracefully tell us how inexcusable his behavior was. He didn't mean what he said. He would never do it again. We were expected to hug him and tell him that it was alright. We were expected to believe him. I desperately believed him for a while. Each time I "knew" he meant it. I knew he would change. I clung to the hope that the verbal onslaughts would end. After a year or two I knew better. His apologies were so hollow and so hypocritical, they wounded me as much as the verbal abuse itself. His fake apologies were a massive betrayal in and of themselves. Why did he even bother? Didn't he know we saw right through his act?
After an apology, we all instinctively "walked on eggshells." None of us wanted to be THE one to elicit his wrath next time. Initially these calm periods lasted weeks, if not months. It would take a pretty major event to finally cause him to lose it. But again, escalation set in. What used to last months, now lasted only days, sometimes only hours between blow ups. What used to be a pretty major thing to unsettle my dad, now could be a single dirty dish on the couch, or one sarcastic comment. This cycle of apology, eggshells, and blow-up was hell to live with. In fact, the more I write about it, the more I do wonder if living this life by day was indeed more wound-inflicting than the sexual abuse I lived with at night. There were many times when I wished that I was physically abused. Then there would be outward wounds, evidence to the pain I lived with on a daily basis. If only I had a few bruises or a broken bone, then someone might notice. Then someone might feel sorry for me, even rescue me.
I was convinced that bruises and broken bones would have healed much easier than my kind of wounds.
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My biggest issue now is NOT following in my father's footsteps. Occasionally, I feel my anger bottle up inside. Sometimes I get especially stressed if we're running late or I find a huge unexpected mess, or a child forgets something important. I feel the negative pressure rise within. Sometimes I can't control it. I start yelling. It's not as much that I raise my voice, but that my words turn mean. I hear the words come out of my mouth and no matter how badly I want to stop, sometimes I can't. I don't swear. I don't accuse them of vulgar things. I do belittle them. I do verbally play the martyr. I verbally shame them. This is a weakness of mine I continue to work on. I'm working on being less negative and having my verbal fits much less often. Yes, thankfully we're practicing DEescalation in our home now.