As I was driving back to Maryland from my weekend in Pennsylvania today, I was of course reflecting upon life. Just be warned this reflection is not one of my more happier ones and while I don't dwell on it and don't think of it often, I did today so I thought I'd write about it.
I grew up in a blended family. I have 2 older step brothers, 1 older half brother (same mother), and 2 younger half brothers (same mother). My older half brother was abusive. He's 4 years older than myself and really would beat me up.
What I remembered today was this specific event in particular:
My mom was always good at helping me study, so we were sitting at the kitchen table and she was quizzing me on my school knowledge for an upcoming exam. A study technique that worked well for me all throughout my school days. I was about 11 or 12 at this time.
My brother was being punished for something at the time, it was always something...it made no sense to me why he was always getting into trouble. It was like he was looking for it half the time. Well, my mother was making him do his own laundry as part of his punishment. So, my mother's back is to him and I'm facing him when he comes out and declares all his whites are now pink while holding up one of his t-shirts that is indeed a very nice shade of light pink. I giggle because I think it's funny that he made that classic mistake. He FLYS across the kitchen, wraps his arm around me and puts me in what is called "choke hold" in wrestling. Everyone has at one time or another choked on something and felt that panic of not being able to breathe. It's scary! My mother is sitting across from this, gets up and is trying to get him off of me and yelling at him to stop! He's about 15 or 16 nowadays, so he's too strong for either of us! I pass out from him choking and thankfully my step father was upstairs and runs down to the kitchen to see what all the commotion is about and pulls my brother off of me! I giggled at his damn t-shirt being pink.
It was shortly after this that he was permanently put into foster care because the medical professionals couldn't find any mental illness to treat when he'd be at the hospital, but mom was afraid he'd kill one of my younger brothers or me.
We had a lock on the outside of his bedroom door to lock him in there sometimes until my step father got home...a chain lock, not just a door lock. I remember times I was about to call 911 because he was trying to throw mom down the stairs.
I think I have a fear of being under water because mom recalls a story about my brother trying to drown me before in the pool we used to have at the old house, which had to be before I was 8. She came out and same thing...I was passed out from him holding me underwater. Who knows what I did to deserve that. It was a daily occurence to get hit, kicked, punched and you know as a child you don't understand. He'd convince me to not even tell mom because then he'd be grounded and I'd be bored with no one to play with. He'd also tell me how sorry he was he did it. I actually looked up to him.
One time he did something to me and he was holding my arms, so I used my teeth and I bite a HUGE chunk of his armpit out! Haha, that was awesome and thankfully I already had escaped his hand over my mouth and called for mom when I did that!!!
What really sucks, is you'd think that today he would have guilt for all the crap he put me through, but he claims he doesn't even remember. I'm not sure I believe him or not, it's possible, he's done a lot of drugs, but I just keep my distance either way.
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