Scattershot

 Music has always been at the center of any household I've lived in.

It's where all my good relationships begin, and it's how my children began to get to know me when they still lived with me.

I had to hide so much of my personality from my former daughter that, through music, I could express myself.

And so, when she wanted to play music for me, I didn't want to let her.  I was trying to tell her who I was, that she may model herself, and she wasn't much interested of course, because this isn't the way you're supposed to go about things.

She said I yelled at her about the music.  The truth is, I probably did.  I didn't want to hear it, when I got time away from my sons it was about me time.  The boys were always more interested in the soundtracks to video games than they were in any music with lyrics in it.  And to me, music with lyrics is leagues above the music without.  Although now I do listen to video game OSTs when I think of them.

I wanted so badly for my kids to grow up and have vast emotional fortitude.  That was more important to me than how intelligent or attractive they were/are. 

I know I can't always be there for them.  I knew I couldn't always explain ways that they could be abused by their friends or other family members, but I knew that if they were emotionally strong they could handle those things and just keep on moving.  If I gave them healthy tools to deal with stress, upset, and sadness, they would be able to handle things no matter what came at them.

Music has been a huge part of my life since I was born.  I came into the world to my Grandmother and others singing "Oh Danny Boy", when they thought I was a boy.  Imagine their surprise when I was another soft, but sturdy girl after an ultrasound that showed a male child!

And if that isn't odd enough, my middle son was supposed to be Katherine.

He came out, and for like an hour because he was a modest little guy, he hid his bits from us and we thought he was a she.

That was an awkward call back to my ex-mother in law, lemme tell ya.

My kids always surprised me with their ability to understand things.  I was always as honest as I could be while being age-appropriate.  Sometimes that line gets hella blurry.  How do you explain to a 6 year old that their father had been molesting their sister for years under my nose?  I settled with "Your Dad hurt your sister in a way that you can't see very badly for a very long time."  But they always wanted details.

And knowing that "bad wisdom" is a thing that agencies look at to determine if a child has been abused and that these kids had not yet had an interview with the said agency... How the fuck do you explain that?

Something that I often said to many, there is no manual for this shit.  There should be, but because nothing is one size fits all....

Yeah.

I guess if I had to write a manual for what to do if your child has been sexually abused it would be...

1. Always believe your child.  Always.  Even if you don't see it being true, it could be and it's better to allow your child to feel validated that it is to invalidate their feelings.  You can feel the way you do in private, but when your kid shows up you always believe them.  You never let them even suspect you think they may be lying.  Even if you know for a fact what they are saying is false and have proof, you believe them, get them into therapy which DOESN'T report to you or anyone else, and you let them sort that out on their own.  Always believe your kid.  Things may have happened and they may not have been as severe as you think they were, or as severe as they think they were, both can be true.

The perceived pedophile/criminal may not have done what you think they did, but your kid isn't lying either.  Believe both, and yes BOTH can exist simultaneously.  Either case, if your kid comes to you and says something ain't right, you need to believe them, because either case, it's a cry for HELP.

And these are adult matters which kids are not equipped to handle on their own.  Really.  

So even if I postulate that maybe things weren't as severe as my kid says, things weren't as heinous, if your kid said that person hurt them, they did.  The severity doesn't matter, your kid was hurt end of the story.  And your kid WILL resent you forever regardless if you act immediately or not, but if you act immediately you'll lessen the blow.

 It's your fucking job to be a Mama or Papa bear.  You gotta protect your kid from whoever injured them in that way.  You HAVE TO.  It's literally your ONE JOB.

2. Your kid will resent you.  It's normal for them to do so.  This is why.  You allowed that person the opportunity to abuse the kid.  Whether or not you meant to does not matter.  Your child was hurt in direct response to your lack of diligence.

Before you get angry at me, I want to remind you I AM ALSO IN THIS BOAT, and even though I acted, I acted too late to stop harm from happening for a very long time.  My former daughter will resent me forever and in her case, use it as a bargaining chip.  For others, this may come out as unbridled rage, acting out, and a number of other problems ranging is severity.  

When your kid ends up in this situation, a situation that you should have been able to spot as a dangerous situation, they will resent you.  At that point, your parenting style has to shift.  You have to make sure that they can be as independent as possible so that if they decide to write you off in their young adulthood (which is NORMAL, by the way) they can survive it and maybe come back to you someday in one piece.  You need to try to provide as safe a space for them as possible while they are with you.  If they are angry, let them yell at you and don't fight back.  Be a calming and reassuring voice as they try on all manner of disguises.  Support them as much as you can, even if you do not agree with their decisions.

3. Don't talk about your plans out loud with your support people until you are SURE of what you are doing.  Yes, it's helpful to bounce ideas off of people, but do not have these people in your support group.  Turn to Reddit or seriously anyone else.  Some folks will hear something like "Maybe I'll just move hours away from here and restart my life with my kids." said in passing as "I am moving to Chicago tomorrow and you can't stop me, also you'll never see me or my kids again."

Support people react to that.  If your support people and the abuser are in your family group, your support group, they may hear that as a rally to get your kids and take custody of them when you were merely spitballing ideas.  They'll grow to resent you and sooner or later, they may end up with your kids, and guess what?  They won't let you see them.

I bet you can now see the straw that broke the camel's back in my case.  YEP.  While out on a cigarette break with my former mother in law, a person I loved, respected, and thought I could never survive without, I postulated that maybe I would just move hours away to give myself and the kids a place to grow and heal.

She took it as gospel.  It was never my intention.  I really REALLY felt I couldn't survive without her.

I never TOLD her that though, and now she's gone.  My support group now is literally my current husband, my ex-husband (yes, the ABUSER), and my family.  It works, kinda.  It's not the kind of support I'm used to, and my current husband carries the brunt of the weight, but it works.

I MISS having someone I could just bounce ideas off of, that I could joke around with and try to find the bright sides of situations.  I was so grateful for Jeanne.  I still am.  I don't think I would have found my way out of this without learning her coping techniques.

But, I feel incredibly betrayed by that.  She told CPS that I wasn't washing the kid's sheets and that I was letting the kids just run around the house doing whatever all of the time.  None of that was true.  I did not have laundry in the building that was free, and I was also, understandably broke as I was responsible for 4 children and her son's well-being on my 45k a year.  I already had the cheapest 3 bedroom apartment a person could find in the region and was paying 1300 a month.  Considering I made just short of 4 grand a month... Half of that was earmarked for rent.

She used to bring the sheets over to her house to wash, and that was our pattern.  She exploited my C-PTSD.

Let me explain. C-PTSD expresses very similarly to ADHD.  That is, if you get distracted you find yourself  unable to remember important things like "MAKE SURE TO GRAB THE SHEETS."

The C-PTSD was caused by years of worrying if my husband would not wake up the next day, and I don't mean just being lazy, but being dead.

It was also caused by years of hypervigilance I had from the physical abuse I endured from my former daughter's father.

It was also caused by hypervigilance of taking care of a gaggle of kids by and large by myself when I was home because between my ex and I, we were 1 functional adult.  At the time, I felt my ex was pretty lazy, but I now understand that it wasn't laziness, it was neuroatypicality.

He too had C-PTSD from having seizures all of the time and not being able to predict with accuracy when the next would occur.  He too would fixate on things he could control, like the hockey forum, he suffered from depression as well.  It wasn't disregarded, it was coping and I didn't have the wisdom to identify that at the time.

So yeah, the sheets were very important and were a hyper fixation for me, but not as much of a hyper fixation as the dishes, because my first ex-mother in law told me that little thing about CPS coming and taking your kids if you ended up with Maggots in your sink.

This list is, by and large incomplete.  But it's a good primer.  Now go out there, attempt to kick ass and fall flat on your face in a pool of tears.  Yeah, that happens too.  You'll see a kid the age your kid was when they were abused and immediately become emotional.  It happens.  You can't prep for it.  You can only know that grief is a constant friend, who always comes when called, but she'll still come check in on you when you don't expect her.