Being bullied

TW: Sexual assault, violence, self harm.

When I was five, I looked like this.

Then, when I was eleven, I looked like this:

Now, I look like this (on a good day):

But in my head, I will always look like this:

You see, I was born with a malformed top jaw. Not something you notice much when your milk teeth come through, but my god, when I got my adult teeth, it was about as noticeable as you could get. I developed trichotillomania when I was 11 and scalped myself. So, going into secondary school I had the teeth of a deformed chipmunk and the hairline of Friar Tuck.

I suppose, all things considered, bullying was inevitable.

But this is the thing. I was bullied from starting school.

I don't know why. I was a fairly innocuous child. I was probably fucking annoying and a know it all because some things never change, but for some reason, a few girls in the year above me took against me and took up arms. I remember, aged five, being held, face-first, against a wall. I remember them telling me to come to the toilet with them in lunch, to be told a secret, and instead called names until I cried. 

Then my adult teeth came and lo, the bullying went up accordingly. I was already an easy target, probably because I didn't have many friends and didn't socialise outside school. But it's one thing to be targeted by a couple of bored girls, and something else to be targeted by everyone. They even stole my fucking lunch. It reached something of a nadir in year six, when I was first sexually assaulted on school grounds, and later had the shit beaten out of me by four boys, on the local park for the crime of being there. It followed me everywhere. At least when I was on holiday or at home, I could get my older brother to come and look threateningly at people. At school, I was mostly on my own. 

No wonder I ripped out half my hair.

And then. Secondary school. Oh the endless fucking DELIGHT of starting school looking like a morlock and having six foot tall, sixteen year old boys think nothing of calling me names across the playground, because all year seven girls need that on their plate. I developed a cruel and crude sense of humour to deal with it, and tried to give it back as good as I got. It occasionally got me into trouble, and being called names is not the worst thing that's ever happened. Of course, it felt like it at the time. Nobody ever had a crush on me, for example, because of the awful shame associated with being attracted to a morlock. I used to get in fights outside school, because I didn't want them to call me names anymore. There was a small crowd of 'cool' boys, who really took umbrage at my existence, particularly in shared lessons. One of them decided the best way to make his mates laugh was to put a piece of the cheesewire we used for cutting up modelling foam in DT around my neck. I couldn't breathe. I nearly knifed him in the face with a handy craftknife. I believe they left me alone after that.

I developed a few bad habits to deal with the constant angsty pain of existence. A bullied teenager is a most unhappy sight. I drank. I drank a lot. I drank often. I used drugs, now and then, mainly to deal with crippling social anxiety (sorry mum). And I beat myself bloody, because I hated myself so much I wanted to be anything else. 

Now. I am 31 years old. I have grown up. I have three gorgeous children. Despite being so hideously ugly, it has been constantly remarked on since I was five, I have got through two husbands. I know! The greed! Three years ago, I went back to my old secondary school for a reunion. I didn't want to go. I got so drunk the night before, I ripped a hole in my stomach lining. Then I got drunk in the car park before we went in. I couldn't bear the thought of being back in the torture chamber. I drank more as we went around to deal with it, disguised as orange juice. Then we went to the pub. It was that sort of a weekend.

And do you know something? There were quite a few of my former tormentors there, and none of them said a thing. They smiled. They nodded. They moved on. They remembered me, because I'm fairly memorable, but they don't remember every word they said to me fifteen years ago. That would be silly. They have moved on.

I have not.

I will never be wholly comfortable with the way I look because I was told every day for twelve years that I was hideous, either directly, or through a look, or a snigger, or a whispered comment. I will never really believe that I am worth a second glance. I hope I will stop hating myself for the way I look, but then worry that my children will be bullied in turn when people tell me how much they look like me. I doubt I will ever be cured of the anxiety I now recognise has been part of my life since I was pre-pubescent. Anxiety that people will shout at me, that they will follow me down the street threatening me. Anxiety about walking through a group of teenagers, because even at 31, they make me feel fourteen and a target again. I rarely go back to the town I grew up in, partly because it's a shithole, but mostly because it's full of memories. That's the alley I ran down when those boys were chasing me. That's the street those men threatened me on.That's the part of the park I was beaten up on. That's where I used to sit on my own with the dog because I had no friends. That's my loneliness. That's my pain. That's my lack of safety. That's my teenage years in a shitty nutshell. 

And therein lies the problem with bullying. Kids will be kids. Kids will shout names at others. Kids will take against what is different. Kids will hurt. Kids will fight.  Kids don't mean it. 

They didn't mean it.

Divorce

Since my divorce was finalised a few weeks ago, I've been trying to write an entry about the whole experience. This is my ham-fisted attempt at putting the last three and a half years into words.

My marriage ended due to adultery. There is no way to make it less stark. He cheated on me, repeatedly, over several weeks, and when I found out, something inside me snapped. I knew immediately that I could not remain with someone who could do that. It explained much of his foulness towards me, which I had been willing to live with for the sake of our marriage and children, but adultery was the final straw. So, off I went to hide at my mother's.
Our son was 18 months old, and I was 15 weeks pregnant. Both our children were planned, which made the rejection much harder to bear. For the first twelve hours, I went silent. I tried to cry, but nothing came out. I tried to scream, but nothing came out. I smashed some pictures up. I stayed awake all night. I didn't eat or drink. I am eternally grateful to my parents, who put me on suicide watch, and my siblings who simply rallied round without question. The first twelve hours passed, and then came a difficult and painful phone call which I cried throughout. I asked all the horrible questions that I didn't want the answers to, to try and get the extent of the pain out in one go. When did it start? How long? How often? How did you meet her? Why her? How could you?
Why? Why? Why?
Funnily enough, I never really got an answer to the last one.
I was left with no real income (£500 a month from my job), and more than double that in outgoings a month. I had to go and see a solicitor, to make him pay the mortgage and give me money to live on. I couldn't increase my working hours because I had no recourse for childcare outside what I already had. Phoning the tax credit office to explain that I was now a single parent was horrible. Phoning the council tax office to say the same, equally awful. Not being able to tell them where he was living because I simply had no idea...awful. Somehow, I found the energy to do all the practical bits, to tidy up and make order out of chaos and at least guarantee me and my son had somewhere to live and something to eat.
Emotionally, I was a mess. For three days, I was simply convinced I would die. How could I survive pain like that? I couldn't. I would have to die. That was the easy bit.
Then I realised that I wouldn't actually just die. I would have to live or I would have to kill myself. This became a constant circular chorus in my head. "If I live, I'm not good enough to raise two children by myself, I should die. If I die, I fuck them up for life - I should live." Equally, I had the constant chorus of "I cannot take care of two children, I should have an abortion. If I have an abortion, I will not be able to live with the decision."
I chose to live. I chose to keep my baby. These were the most difficult decisions I have ever had to make, indeed it never really felt like I was the one making the decision.
I spent a week crying. I spent another week crying, with occasional smiles. In those weeks, I met up with my ex, which ripped me open. A pattern was established. Very light healing, and then dramatic ripping open of scabs. Eventually, I scarred up over the pain. It became part of me, something in my history that I cannot erase, but must live with.

After two weeks, I went back to work, couldn't hack it and took another week off. Certain members of staff were wonderful, and have my lifelong love and respect. Others could not understand my decision to continue to talk to my ex, or why I was keeping my child, or why I chose to move away from the area. Work became something I did to get me out of the house, and to bury myself in. At home, I was surrounded by 'our' things. It stopped feeling like home without him. I did small things like put up new pictures, and buy new bed linen, but it was a ghost of a home.
Pregnancy was awful. I didn't want the baby. I just didn't. I didn't want to be pregnant, I didn't want to have to give birth, I didn't want to find out what happened next. His 20 week scan was an utter blur, brightened by the sonographer assuming me and my best friend were lovers. After I hit 24 weeks, the cut off for legal termination, I became increasingly depressed and suicidal. My ex's family lived far closer to me than my family. They struggled, understandably, with the elephant in the room that was the unwanted foetus - the literal elephant as I got bigger and bigger. My ex disengaged completely from the pregnancy. He felt the baby kick once, and that was the sum total of his post-separation involvement. My pregnancy did not stop him causing me huge amounts of stress. We saw each other regularly, and it was horrible.
In March 2011, I went for a regular antenatal check. My midwifery team knew how I was feeling, and were supportive and kind to me. The baby, however, was a bit too small and apparently breech, so I went for a checkup. I saw him for the first time since the unhappy scan in November, and he was beautiful and looked like his brother and I wanted him. It took me five months to want him. Six weeks later, he was born (two weeks late) in the middle of the night, at home and completely naturally. When he was born, his cord had two knots. One knot is frequently fatal. My little boy had somehow survived all the stress, plus this murderous cord. I don't know how he did it.
However, life continued to be difficult. My ex was awol during the birth, and finally caught up with us some ten hours later. His contact was erratic and brief. I moved house when the baby was six weeks old, and had copious support from my family and friends, and felt free. Birth itself was tremendously cathartic. I felt like I was pushing out the pain, and the agony, and the grief.
I filed for divorce when my baby turned a year old. I felt it was time.

There was two shining lights throughout the whole experience. The first was my eldest son. My clingy, silly, giggly little mummy's boy, who stayed glued to my side throughout the whole thing, and who accepted his baby brother without flinching. He was very brave himself. It must be terrifying to see your mother go through such hell at such a young age. I had to be strong for him in turn. He gave me purpose where there was none.
The second was my Tom. I went to school with Tom, and he lost his job as I lost my husband. We connected over this shared life-ruinery. Our first date was four weeks after my ex left. FILTHY HASTE according to some, but I was on the rebound, and twanging around the dating possibilities like a pinball. He lived two hundred miles away for the first two and a half years: a safe distance. But he was a constant source of comfort, laughter and distraction. He made me laugh, continuously, when nobody else could. We are getting married in August, by which time we will have been together almost four years. These have been simultaneously the best and worst years of my life. I hope the years we have together from now on are solely the best.

Losing your husband (or indeed, wife) abruptly breaks you. My husband didn't die, but it felt like he had. I didn't recognise him anymore. We had been together for nine years, and literally grown up together. All our shared memories and experiences were gone. All our in-jokes, gone. Our friends didn't exactly take sides, but it was difficult for them to remain neutral.
As time has gone on, we've forged a relationship that works for the children, but it is nothing like our marriage. We are like distant cousins. It's not always a smooth relationship, but arguments are rare. We have to be in each other's lives for as long as our children need their parents, and that is more important than bellowing at each other over old bitterness.
When he left, my entire life up to that point dissolved. I had to find a new one, and that is impossibly hard. He went directly into a co-habiting relationship, straight into a life not dissimilar to the one he left behind. I could not. I had to learn independence, something I'd never required until that point.

It still hurts. I still get upset, because it is hard work parenting in this manner. It is hard work ensuring they get enough time with their dad and his family to build a lasting attachment. It is hard work assuming most of the responsibility for two other lives, and making sure they understand the concept of step-parenting. I expect many more issues will arise as they get older.

Am I a better person for having gone through this? Unquestionably. One thing you learn very quickly when something like this happens is who your friends are. I am a lot pickier about who I keep close to me now, and more ruthless about cutting people out if necessary. I discovered that I can live by myself, that I do not need a boyfriend or husband to make me whole. I also discovered that not all relationships are poisoned by inequality. I can say, without doubt, that I would not being two thirds through a degree if I hadn't been divorced. My ex would not have supported me studying. It is due to all these things that I do not regret the end of my marriage. Neither do I regret it happening in the first place.
However, I lost everything. I lost my home, my community, my job, my sense of personal security, my financial security, many friends, memories, and feeling like I belonged. I have gradually built all that back up again, but in a way that cannot be taken away from me on a capricious whim.

I have not lost my faith in marriage.

Should anyone read this, going through something similar, wondering if they will ever feel whole again, I can assure you that you will. It takes time, but you will.

Conceptual memory and schemas

Evidently, our minds hold information more readily if it's split into categories. The example given in the course is a random list of words, which are remembered more easily if you already know that the words fall under one of four categories, of which you are given the names.
Schemas follow on from this, as your mind forms and then stores information into categories (schemata), as you go along.

My mind is a maverick and refuses to conform to this ideal of conceptual memory. I have a massive knowledge of medical terminology, primarily because I understand the latin prefixes, roots and suffixes, but also because I picture the body part or procedure when I am remembering the word. Colonostomy? Mmm, bag in the colon! Rhinoplasty? Change that nose!
I once remembered the entire skeletal system by re-learning the old "Knee bone connected to the thigh bone" song with the proper words in place of knee bone. My ability to name almost anything in terminology gets annoying - ask my boyfriend.

No. Not like that.

I've always had trouble learning things systematically. Taking the terminology idea, you're SUPPOSED to learn it by body system. Therefore, all the bones and fractures are learned under the skeletal system etc. When I've done courses on terminology, and given courses on terminology, this is how I've learnt/taught it, but it's not how I hold the information myself. My memory of it is far less specific and visualised.

So, I have a visual memory. I suppose that's good to know.

Improving memory

I have always been something of an adoring Derren Brown fan, since Trick Of The Mind was first shown when I was a teenager. It may all be sorcery and witchcraft, but he's mesmerising. I gobbled up both his mainstream books, having little interest in the practical aspects of magic. One thing that really stood out for me was the memory technique of linking things to remember with strong visual images. It was the basis of the more complicated memory palace, as described in Hannibal by Thomas Harris - at the time, one of my favourite books - only, I couldn't think of a single practical application for such a technique.

Last night, while idly working my way through another unit on the psychology course, the same memory technique was recounted, with an exercise to remember a shopping list. It gave the list of visuals to produce, so I quietly sat and thought about them, then utterly forgot about re-testing myself later on and dragged my exhausted hide to bed.

For some reason, the exercise came to mind again this afternoon. I have no idea why, I was just sitting watching Waybuloo with my boys, and I thought "Hmm, wonder if I can remember that list".

And I could. I remembered every single item on it, vividly. From opening the door with a banana handle, to a tap that poured chocolate instead of water; that list was imprinted on my memory by the simple act of thinking about some images.

If only I could actually apply it to real life, I might be able to implement it some way to benefit myself. As recounted earlier, my memory is pretty shocking. There are whole years of my adult life that consist of nothing more than wisps of fragmented memories wafting about my brain, lacking any cohesion. One of the only ways I recall many events is by the detailed diaries I've kept over the years. Where there's no diary, there's no memory. If I could adapt my memory into a more visual experience, I might actually retain information.

Huzzah!