Where did THAT come from?
There were so many questions Mom had left unanswered. Why did she stay with him? Why didn’t she protect me? Why didn’t she stand up to him? She died, and all I had was frustration and judgments about her “weakness.”
Many times, the things I wrestled with during the day would haunt my sleep. And in those dreams, things seemed so intensely real, especially because they were saturated with fully concentrated, unrestricted emotions. In dreams, there is no frontal cortex that can keep the terror and rage at bay. It’s all there in all of its raw fury.
I have lived with those nightmares for years. In fact, I think I would be shocked if they disappeared. But what I wasn’t prepared for in the two following sets of nightmares was the sense that these “performances” were not my experiences, but Mom’s. Yes, there were bits of my reality woven through their storylines, but the actual emotional experiences weren’t mine.
And after each one, I could not shake the feelings those dreams left behind. It was as if I’d stepped into someone else’s nightmares during my own.
As strange as it might sound to another person, I found myself wondering:
Is there an afterlife where she could ‘show me,’ from beyond the grave, what she had lived through, what it did to her, and why she was trapped?
The first nightmare…
From my 08/25/2024 journal entry:
We were living with family friends. Mom and Dad had died, and these people were now our guardians. It was a rare moment of hope – finally away from Dad’s abuse. But instead, THIS!!! I am so enraged!!!
The man comes home drunk. A lot. And when he gets home, then he stands in the kitchen pouring more wine.
He’s surly. Not responsive to anybody. Just there, drinking even more. He’s like a Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde person – decent enough if he is sober, but when he’s not, he’s a totally different “Zombie” person. He’s so remote that there is NO connecting with him or getting through to him.
It’s frightening – to have this person who is decent one minute, but then the next, is this totally unreachable, possibly dangerous stranger? If I needed him to hear me, I don’t think I could break through his boozed brain. And would he hurt me because he’s in a state where he doesn’t even know or remember what he’s doing?
All I know is that in those moments, I am scared, and there is no hope of reaching a “good man.”
There is also the wife and the tension in the house with her all the time. She is trapped, scared, and submissive.
And I am frightened for my siblings. I need to protect them. So I warn them to pick up their mess and not trigger him. He is so unpredictable; I don’t know what might happen next.
It’s like how it was in our own house with Dad. We had to be sure to pick up everything before he got home, OR ELSE!
I can’t stand this! How do we get out of this? I need money! But where?! And how do I make sure my siblings are safe? I can’t leave them!
These people are our guardians, but I don’t feel safe at all. Just trapped. Terrified. And I am so angry I just want to beat him because nothing about life is predictable. I want to beat the shit out of that angry drunk man!
Sometimes I even find myself looking for a chance to do just that. I almost taunt him into coming at me so that then I can punch him hard in the jaw. His wife is useless. Helpless. No security or protection there!
I could just crawl right out of my skin! It is just never-ending despair — existing, struggling, and afraid. It is an interminable life – endless days of walking on eggshells, staying out of his way, desperate for a way out, and there is none. I could SCREAM from the frustration of being TRAPPED, and I am just drowning in rage because I can’t escape!
The second nightmare…
From my 3/12/2023 and 08/25/2024 journal entries:
He…hit…me. He HIT me! I…What… just happened???!!!!
I …did I cause it?
Where did THAT come from?
What…what do I even do now?!
It’s… it’s all different all of a sudden. We can’t go back to “before.” There is suddenly this chasm…this place now of no return. And NO ability to bridge the gap and go back to what was before.
But he apologized. Said it was just a fluke.
Was it? What is the truth?
NOBODY’s ever HIT me before! Where did this come from? How do I avoid it again?
It feels like everything’s different now…forever.
And I am just…so…SAD. I thought he loved me. That we were okay. We had a good life but… I thought I finally got to a better place in life. No more chaos like home was.
But now…this?
I can’t think straight. I can’t stop shaking. And my brain won’t work. I feel like everything is spinning and I have no ground under me, like I’m just falling…and falling…
I have to get a grip… I mean, he works hard. He doesn’t drink. But…he HIT me? What do I do with this?
He said it was stress. That I had just made him lose control because of things here. And sometimes, you just have to blow off steam. But he didn’t mean it.
I must have done something wrong. Maybe he’s right? I wasn’t being understanding about all he is dealing with. I was telling him about my problems. Home with babies. Loneliness. Fear. Maybe I pushed him too hard.
I just wish I could run away. I feel so trapped again!
Okay. I need to just pull myself together. I must handle this, and I have to do this myself. I can’t ever tell anyone!
*If only we could go back in time….to before he hit me….could we have changed something? Avoided this?
And if only I could believe him that he didn’t mean it. But his face…he was SO full of RAGE! I never saw that before. It was like a stranger…I didn’t even know who he was! WHERE did that come from?!
I just know I can’t ever let that happen again. From now on, I need to be on guard. Watching. Make sure I don’t do whatever I did this time to set him off!. There is no going back now. This is how it will have to be. Now, it is different…
Feeling HER reality
It took me DAYS to shed the intensity of emotions those nightmares left me in. The fear, shame, and total SHOCK I felt. Especially the shock. Reeling emotions. Waves of disorientation and confusion. And also – SHAME. INTENSE SHAME.
When he hit me in that dream, I felt SUCH shame – like I had somehow caused it. AND failed as a wife. I felt changed, permanently, because we had crossed a line and now I had to live with this secret. It was the moment of never going back to what was. I kept wishing we could turn the moment back to just “before he did that”…before we moved to a place where it would never be quite the same again. Something died. And no matter how I tried, I would never totally see us the same way again.
And in those dreams the words “if only…if only…if only” kept running through my brain. The dreams were a horror show of disappointment, disillusionment, fear, and LONELINESS. Such total isolation. These were things I could never tell ANYONE, ever. I would look like a failure. He would be enraged. And he would look bad. After all, he wasn’t a bad person. He worked hard. Didn’t drink. And there were good moments, too, when he could be fun and loving.
It’s just that he was so tired… that must be it. And so stressed. He’d been working so hard. I must have failed him. I would have to try harder now. I couldn’t let anyone know. And I wouldn’t let this happen again. I have to just figure out what made him mad at me and do it differently in the future so he doesn’t ever get that mad again.
And that haunting question had a different answer
So many times since her death, I had asked myself if I could forgive her for not protecting me. I was so angry at her “weakness” and her inability to just LEAVE HIM. Why was she so WEAK?!
And also so many times, as I considered that maybe there was more to the story that I wasn’t taking into account, I wondered that haunting question: Could I have done any better if I’d been in her shoes? In the late 1950s and 1960s? When women often had no means of income? No ability to get loans or credit cards in their names? In a patriarchal, Slovak, Catholic culture that said a good wife stays with the man and just suffers quietly? In a situation where no one, NO ONE, was there for you?
Up next
About those “good old days” of the 1950s and 60s…
Note:
I am seeking financial support to complete my memoir, work with an editor, and make a visit to my home state for fact-checking. Your help would mean the world to me as I take this step toward healing and giving voice to my journey.
Please like, comment, and share this post to help spread the word. The link for my fundraiser is on GoFundMe. Thank you for your support.
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