Family Secrets SPILLING (Part Two)

I guess I still feel like writing. I think it's important, at this point, that my family doesn't get the upperhand in the custody of my son, by portraying themselves as being "supportive" and just "concerned" about me. I think it is important that people understand I didn't turn my back on my family because I need counseling, but that it was the smart thing to do, after what I've put up with. Considering what I've been through, and what people have attempted to displace and cover up, there is absolutely nothing wrong with me. And don't trust my family to have any insights about me. They never knew me. I have friends who knew me better and respected me more.

So here is the second installment, about my mother, primarily. Oh, I'll get to her sister, but I think it's best to get through my immediate family first. As for the family abuse, you can ask any one of my friends from high school. I never talked about it, but some of them knew.

I was never given a choice in going to church or not. It was required. I didn't even dare ask. My parents didn't favor a particular denomination. On my father's side, they were Presbyterian way back, and the rest didn't go to church at all until my Dad became a christian at age 18. There was such an actual transformation in my father, that his father, and his step-mother, and a brother also became christian. My very old nana went back to church in her 90s when I was worried for her and told her on the phone. Nana was an English teacher. There is a higher level of education on this side of the family. They're all teachers, artists, and musicians and have college degrees and graduate degrees, and those who didn't, were still able to teach at university, with an 8th grade education, because of some prodigy here and there.

My father was an artist and painted murals and smoked pot and was identified as gifted from an early age. They tried to skip him ahead 2 grades but his father would only allow one grade skip, thinking he'd be at odds, socially if he was 2 grades ahead. When he became a christian, he quit art and took up music instead. He never went back to art and I don't know why. His father was military and he took on some of the same attributes, making sure he was the one in control (even though everyone knew, including him, it was really my mother in control).

My mother was the first person he dated after becoming a christian. He was leaning Lutheran. My mother was Baptist but switched churches to chase a guy. She was after someone else, but then my father showed interest. Her family, the Bairds, were a hodgepodge. They were Presbyterian on Granny's side until one became very Baptist. The Baptist and Catholic married, and Granny was born. Granny was Baptist and her husband wasn't particularly religious until after he married. Grandpa's family wasn't very religious. He liked drinking and dancing and became an alcoholic during his service in the war and then went cold turkey and never drank again. He didn't care if Granny had wine now and then. Granny had a religious experience and went to extremes, as if she were a missionary. She passed out tracts, and witnessed in the town, and at least she showed a practical side of christianity--she would go out to buy groceries and end up buying them for someone else who was poor instead. So my grandfather cut off all her accounts and put his wife on a small allowance. His business began to fail and after a year, Granny reminded him of the blessings and prosperity they'd had when she'd been able to give to others. My grandfather, for once in his life, broke down and sent Granny on a huge shopping spree. It was half her money anyway, but she and my grandfather are extremely old fashioned. Granny is a brain but constantly diminishes herself. She would always tell me to never let a man know I knew more than he did. She said their egos were far too fragile, but she also subjugated herself to the total control of her husband as a result. Her opinion was that I frightened men away with my intelligence and she told me if I were to ever want anything from a man, make sure he thought it was his idea.

When Granny went pentacostal, everyone did. Grandpa, her kids, and my mother. My mother then influenced my father, but he had some of these leanings too, even though he was a logical type. He was going to Lutheran seminary and dropped out when he had kids. Then he considered going to college for architecture or psychology or archeology, but my mother scoffed. She told him he already analyzed her and picked her apart and said why didn't he just get a job. My father only went to college 2 years and because of natural abilities, ended up being the computer expert somehow, when computers were fairly new. I've not seen qualities for expertise myself, but back then, he was an asset and hired on.

In the meantime, my brother and I grew up with very, extremely, religious parents. My father and mother would go on different kicks--for the longest time, there was no secular music allowed, of any kind. The first time I heard a secular song, it was on the bus, my first day of school and I never forgot it. It was "I Love Rock and Roll" by Joan Jett. I was thrilled. If I went to my room, angry about something, my parents would pipe in christian praise music, knowing it infuriated me. My father had wired the music system in the house so each room had music. At some time the rules relaxed and we were allowed 50s music.

We had television when I was very young but then my parents decided it wasn't a good influence so they got rid of the t.v. I remember trying to act out my part in "My Little Pony" and "The A-Team" on the playground and not knowing who I was trying to play. I was once nominated to be "Mr. T". Which is probably why I decided to play soccer on an all boys team instead, at recess. I was very good at soccer, in the first grade, but my parents wouldn't allow lessons, thinking it was too tomboy. We didn't have t.v. until I was about 10 years old. It was supposed to be for movies only and was in a rec room, and then it kept getting used more. My brother and I watched Gilligan's Island in black and white and I Love Jeannie and that was about it. Maybe the Flintsons and Jetsons and we got to watch cartoons all day on Saturdays. On holidays, it was a non-stop movie fest. We rented movies and watched at least 5 or 6 movies a day. We watched movies and ate food from sun up to sun down. I've seen every John Wayne movie ever made, and World War based movie, and some action, and all the old Disney movies, and musicals, and some comedy and drama and romantic movies. I also saw a lot of old classic movies. Anything which wasn't "R" rated. Later though, it became apparent that while sex was a no-no, violence was not. Much later, my parents were lax about both and watch R movies (it's such a slippery slope).

We were taught to pray when we were little and I had a strong sense of right and wrong. I had a soft heart. If I did something wrong, I turned myself in. If I did something wrong in front of family, I didn't hide it. My brother, on the other hand, was crafty. My mother showed favoritism from the start, because he was the boy. I remember being a little girl and asking my mother why she didn't hold me, as my brother was curled on my mother's lap, and my mother said, "You don't like to be held." My mother continued to show affection towards my brother but never towards me. I tried all the time, to talk to my mother, but I was never interesting to her. So I'd do things to get her attention and she'd say, "Don't be weird". My mother kept her face in a book or on the phone. I heard her talk to others and knew she had things to say and stories to tell, but I heard all of them secondhand, as I was nearby listening in. It wasn't until I was homecoming queen, probably, that I was suddenly worth talking to.

Back to prayer, the family prayer for meals was "Jesus, thank you for this food and bless it to our bodies, Amen." My father made it up, and kept it brief and to the point. We all held hands around the table. I prayed on my own, just talking to God like I was talking to a person. I wrote letters to God and burned them, in my own style of ritual, and imagined God would put the pieces together in heaven. I read the Bible and struggled with it until I got the King James version. Then it all opened up to me one day when I prayed to be able to understand it. The language was so beautiful I understood it all. However, religion, while there were some good aspects, was also a used as a sword.

My parents would take scripture out of context, to enforce their own opinions. I repeatedly heard, "Children obey your parents" and "Honor thy mother and father that thy life may be long". After I was older and had read the Bible myself, I used it back at them. I said, "It also says, 'Parents, do not provoke your children to anger." They never liked that. They wanted to dish out the proverbs, to maximum effect, but didn't and couldn't receive the same in return. I was always the one to apologize and take up the slack if there was a fight. The fight could have been over anything, and I was the peacemaker. I couldn't wait on my parents to do it, because they gave the silent treatment. Especially my mother. While I know my father apologized to me, and to others, and even cried and felt sorry, my mother never did. I have maybe seen my mother cry and act sorry once, and that was when she thought I was having some influence over my father in her separation. I don't even know it was genuine and not a ploy and sadness over her own mistreatment of me or what. It was the silent treatment. They did the same thing to my brother. My brother was young and only 15 or 16 and he left the house, and went to another town. My parents were too proud to call, or make amends. They took it as a personal insult and neither one of them made an attempt to reach out to their own son.

I was the one who did. I couldn't believe it, that they were not concerned and did not check up on their own son, and I found out where my brother was, and went to him in person and gave him some things and begged him to come back. Later, I gave him a place to stay at my house when he was detoxing off of drugs. I was never involved in drugs, and like I've said a million times, I never did any illegal drug except pot, until after my son was taken from me. Not before. And my use of narcotics was for serious and legitimate pain, not because I was addicted or using it recreationally or for emotional reasons. And the lie about alcohol by Wenatchee is ridiculous. I drank one day on the weekend before moving to Wenatchee, and in Wenatchee there was no place to go dancing, so I didn't drink either, except maybe 3 times. I didn't drink during the week and I never binged and got sick. CPS tried to say I was an alcoholic because I wrote in my blog that I had a half glass of wine with OTCs and they pointed to THAT as evidence. A bottle of wine would last me at least a MONTH or more, and I'd end up throwing it out, and there was zero evidence of "alcohol abuse" but ever since the midwife injured me in childbirth, she was trying to tell people I had issues and postpartum depression (not true) and she told everyone I had alcohol issues because I marked the box for "social drinker".

At any rate, no one in my family drank, and I didn't either, and it was only my brother who got involved in drugs for a very short period of time and he crediting me for helping him out of it.

"Be not drunk with wine but be drunk with the holy spirit," was the motto.

I liked going to the Presbyterian church when I was little, but I didn't like being forced to go forward for the children's service, which was held in front of adults by the pastor's altar. I never wanted to be in the limelight or in the center and I'd try to hide. I would try to stay seated with my parents and they'd make me go forward. At least I was allowed to draw in church. I would draw with my father (who was probably as bored as I was) and play thumb wrestling.

But then they decided to go to another church, after my father resigned. He'd been nominated to be assistant to the pastor, by a very rare unanimous vote by the congregation, but he got disgusted after finding out how many people in the choir were having affairs. So he quit what was then his full-time job (I was sort of a pastor's daughter) and took the first thing and we went to a church I didn't like. Everyone was rowdy and raising their hands and praying gibberish, and then, the worst part, when I was older, I noticed, this man in the congregation started to have a heart attack or stroke or something and fell down, and everyone noticed and the pastor commanded the attention be brought back to him. I was horrified and hated the pastor after that. I didn't want to go to church but I had no choice.

My parents got bored with churches after awhile and we'd go to a number of different ones. I know every church there is, and what the protocol is, with regard to Protestant churches. I am familiar with what is acceptable and what will win the approval of the group, and invariably, every single church thinks their pastor is the best and that if a family leaves, perhaps they've "backslidden", even if they go to another church.

Religion was good and it was bad in my family. It was used as a strong foundation and support and it was also used to manipulate me and others. My parents also had a college group at their house, which was a basic Bible study, and I sat in on some things. I remember one time, leaving the door open when everyone was praying, they couldn't see, but I knew they could hear, and I peed in controlled bursts, in the middle of their prayer. PEE! pause PEE! pause PEE! pause PEE! and I forcefully stopped and started until I heard giggling and I'd broken up the prayer until my father said, in embarrassment and exasperation, "Cameo, close the door please." I was snickering to myself, and no one ever knew it was intentional. Not until now at least. I wasn't doing it to be obnoxious, but only to amuse myself. It was done in more of a fun spirit than anything else. I was doing my kegels at age 8.

I was singing in church at a young age, even though I didn't like being in front of people. I got over it, for singing. And then there was choir. But church, more than being a social statement of piety, was a place where my mother was always trying to hook my up with someone. MY mother didn't care about my mind. All she cared about was how I looked. "Curl your hair!" and "Put on some make-up" all the time. It was all about appearance. "Wear a padded bra" (I refused), and "Are you wearing THAT?" It was a reflection of her. And she wanted me to go for either someone goodlooking or simply rich. Rich was best. My parents were extremely excited when a doctor was pursuing me. It didn't matter that I didn't care for him and stared at his back hair cropping out of the neck of his shirt in back, in church, with wide eyes. They just cared about the money and potential for them.

My mother wasn't the type to give. If every parent had to take a turn carpooling, she would find a way out. She always wanted the kids to play at someone else's house and I remember hearing other mothers complain when I was young. My mother wanted everyone else to do the work and put her own kids off onto others.

I wanted to be adopted by Wayne Freeman when I was little. I met him when I was in a play, and he even told my parents he would adopt me. I told my parents, then, if they died, I wanted Wayne Freeman to adopt me. He saw something special and gave me attention and good-natured affection. My father loved me but I had never believed my mother did. And I was sometimes tired of the religious manipulation and emphasis on appearance when other things were happening which they should have known were wrong. Aside from spankings, which I sometimes padded up for, desperately, the worst part was the pressure to do what THEY wanted me to do and their desires for my life were completely opposite from my own. They didn't even want to allow me to embrace my full personality and were only interested in social conformity.