Redbyrde's blog

Regina Regina, not of our bloodRegina Regina, you’re nothing but crudWe didn’t think we could haveChildren of our fleshSo we adopted youAnd oh, what a messBecause you are garbage and trashNot worth the trouble you causeGood only to bashBecause you are 5 year old trashWe live in such a small townAnd we know that what we do isn’t rightSo we will act loving on the streetAnd keep the abuse out of sightRegina Regina we love to beat yaRegina Regina this is the way to treat youWe now have two kids that are oursAnd we love them trulyTo bad we didn’t knowYou would have been spared the crueltyOur kids do nothing wrongAnd you do nothing rightYou are garbage that belongs in the gutterYou fill our hearts with spiteSo now we are stuck with youBut you know we don’t want you hereBut we can’t get rid of you now...What would people think, is our biggest fearSo you will be dressed so niceAnd always have pretty clothesBut be told every day that we hate youIn public, we must keep up the poseWe will teach your sisters to hate youAfter all, that is the way to behaveIf they want something, you get itYou worthless ugly slaveNo one will ever want youHeaven knows that we do notYou are too worthless and unworthyOh, we really put up with a lotYou live here in our home, you thingAnd we have your nasty mouth to feedSo we will call you names at breakfastThen go to church to practice our creedNincompoop, imbecile and always trashEven though you are only fiveWhat a mistake on God’s partThat you are even aliveWell, we will see to itThat you will never know a familyBut we will keep you locked here in our hate...And not set you freeWhat would people think’If they knew how things really wereSo let’s paint a pictureAnd make a liar out of herIf no one will believe herTheir pity we will receiveFor this child we took inAnd how she causes us to grieveAnd be sure the sisters know to hateTrain them when they are smallThat they should call her namesThey will never know her at allFor it is OK to hit that thingIt has no feelings, you knowIt really is not a human like usSo please, let your contempt showRegina Regina, on you we will spitAnd get others to admire usFor our fortitude and gritRegina ReginaYou are always on the outside looking inNo matter how you try to win our loveYou will never win

Do you know what it is likeTo be in a crowdYet to be all aloneScreamingNo one can hear youNo one can see the smokeOf your soul as it is on fireKindled by the whispersAnd the laughs of thoseWho belongNo one can see the charringA blackened lifeSeared on the grillOf being unwantedCryingInvisible tearsAlways reachingFor a hand that is not there

 A few events happened during this phase of my life. In the summer before my 2nd grade year, I was out in the barn in the hayloft. My dad was baling hay and he had my older cousin, N, to help him. I had decided to climb up in the loft part of the barn. When I climbed down, I fell. I landed on my tailbone. I remember how it hurt so bad that I could not get up. I screamed and screamed untill N came and picked me up and carried me into the house. I was screaming that I was hurt, and any parent with a lick of sense can tell when a child is crying because of a "booboo" or is really hurt. My mother told N to put me in my bed, and they left me in there crying while they had their dinner. My mother told me to shut up when she came back to try to quiet me. I was disturbing their lunch. They left me there. I was unable to get up. I remember wetting the bed and being afraid to tell them, so I marinated in it. I was afraid of being spanked, and I hurt so badly.They left me there all night. The next afternoon when I still couldn't get up, they decided something was wrong, and I was not faking it, as I had been accused of. Up untill this point, they had insisted that I only wanted attention, and that I wasn't really hurt. I was only putting on. They threatened me with everything in the book, and I still couldn't get up. They pulled me up into a sitting position, and dressed me in a shirt and jeans. They sat me down in the back seat of the car, and drove to C, a town almost an hour away. They took me into the children's clinic, where I waited to be seen. The doctor that saw me was very compassionate, and told them to take me to the hospital right away. When I arrived, they had called the doctor that they used in our town. He arrived and proceeded to examine me. They did not use X rays for some reason that I can not fathom. I have thought about trying to get those medical records, but have decided that there is no point. First of all, the statute of limitations has run, and secondly, the only other reason is proof. I will not try to prove that any of this is true. I know that it is, and I am writing this as trying to find some sort of healing, and not for vengeance, or even justice. This doctor inserted two fingers into my rectum. Keep in mind that I was only 6 years old. He probed and probed. I screamed and screamed. I will never forget laying on that table on my stomach feeling like that doctor had grabbed ahold of my tailbone and spine and was pulling it right out of my body. I was never given any sedative or anesthetic. He removed his fingers and told my parents that my tail bone was broken in 2 places. It was severely out of place. He then inserted his index finger and his thumb into my rectum, and started moving the bones to set them. This was after I had had this injury well over 24 hours. The pain that I felt, mercifully, time has wiped a lot of that out. I think that they had insisted on their own doctor so that no one would question all the bruises and welts on my back, buttocks and thighs. To anyone who has lived in a city this has to sound so unbelievable. I am not sure if anyone told me this, had I had a normal upbringing, I would have believed them. I probably would have thought that no one could have been put through this. I would have thought that they were the one that needed help. As for the doctor coming from W to C, this was in 1966 and a small town of 900. House calls were the norm. I remember the bill that my parents received for the drive to and from C. $48.00. That was the total bill for the doctor that day. Drive time and so forth. (Not for the hospital, clinic, etc) The break was so severe that I was admitted to the hospital. I stayed for a week. I did not ever want to leave. The sisters were so nice to me. They didn't call me names or hit me, and they didn't even criticize me. I was living my dream of being like everyone else. I began to dread when my mother would come, and to cringe when she came near. She saw this, and slapped my face, and said that I was not to say anything to the sisters. She told me over and over again. "Noone will ever believe you. Your daddy is an elder of the church. No one will ever ever believe you. You are just a child. You are a lying child as well. I know that you are cringing and acting scared just to get the attention of the nurses." Funny, but the nurses were hardly ever there when she was. I haven't figured out how my cringing from her was going to get their attention. Now I know that she was scared to death that I was going to talk. Maybe if I had I would have been saved of a lifetime of grief. We were out of that small town, and no outsider could have stood by and not intervened, I hope.Unfortunately, it never even entered my mind to tell anyone. I still believed there was something wrong with me. I knew in my 6 year old mind that there was something inherently wrong with me. The sisters just didn't know me yet, and know how bad I was. However, I loved being in the hospital..I was in a large bed that seemed almost like a crib, with a window that looked out onto a Mulberry tree. I watched the birds come eat the mulberries. I remember one sister who came to help me bathe. She helped me out of the bed. What a nice feeling. I was so starved for affection that just the physical contact of a nurse lifting me and washing me stood out in my mind. They would come in and ask me how I was doing, and so forth. When it came time to leave, I remember being so upset that I screamed and cried, even knowing there would be a price to pay later. My instructions were not to sit for another week, and not to sit straddle for two weeks. Three days after I was home, my parents set off for their family vacation. This was to go to Arizona to visit my dad's sister, w. husband ,x and their two children, Y and Z.M_________ rode up front with my parents, in those days long before seat belt laws and child seats. Digressing a bit, I don't remember ever using a seat belt while I lived in Kansas. To go back to the subject at hand, I was in the back seat with K++++++and Grandma S. I was put in the middle, on the lump, because "K__________ wanted the window. "Her wants to see the scenery" Was what I was told. Well, "her" saw the scenery. I sat on the hard lump and hurt more and more. If anyone has experienced a broken tail bone, they will know that that is one of the most painful injuries that you can have. All the nerves for the legs pass through there. I had to sit very still, and not squirm. This would have been hard enough for a child to begin with, on a drive down kansas, through Oklahoma, then through Texas. They crossed texas, New Mexico, with at stop at Carlsbad caverns. I remember thinking how neat it was that a cave had these neat paved roads with rocks on the sides, thinking that it was a natural formation. I also remember each step being an agony. It was like a form of slow torture. If I moved in the car, K_____ would cry and scream if I so much as touched her. She would scratch and bite, and my mother would turn around and slap my face. If I bumped Grandma, she would do her own slapping. My father never intervened, never said a word; never lifted a finger to stop the slapping, and I never realized that it was wrong what they were doing to me. When we were in Arizona, I remember being taken to this mountain range. There were little puddles about 2 inches deep that were full of little tiny fish. There was a stream that in one part was about 2 feet deep, and then went over a series of tiny waterfalls to a large pool that seemed very deep to me.There was a little shelf that looked almost like a cup that I wanted to slide into so badly. Cousins Y, Z and K_______ were playing happily in the water. I wanted to so badly. My mother put her arm around me, for W and X's benefit, and said, "Honey, we can't let you. You were hurt so badly. We can't take a chance on you getting injured again." I remember my mother being nice to me, and my grandmother also, when anyone else was around. I wondered why, and I loved it that W andX treated me like anyone else. They treated me no different than K+. I remember Uncle X coming in to me and reading to me Fox in Socks that was some pages that were torn out of something. I remember never wanting to leave W and X's. Just being in a household where I was only slapped when I was alone with Mom or Grandma was like heaven to me. I begged to stay and live with them. I know that W and X had to know that something was abnormal. I don't forgive them for not investigating. I will never understand why no one did anything. I was beaten untill I was black and blue, starting at the age of four. I know now that there was nothing I could have ever done at the age of four to warrant such physical and emotional abuse. When I was 7 and still in second grade, my mother caught me picking my nose. She waited untill I went into the bathroom and she went in there with me. She had on a pink latex rubber glove. She picked up a piece of my bowel movement out of the toilet and made me take a bite of it. She had my hair by one hand, and with her other hand, forced my mouth open and the feces into my mouth. I vomited and vomited. The other thing my mother did a lot in those early years was give me enemas. She would get this red rubber bag. When I would see her go to the linen closet and emerge with the box that held the hot water bottle and the hose and nozzles, I would run. She would fill the hot water bottle with cold water that had dish soap in it. She would make me kneel on the bathroom floor, with my head on the floor. She would insert the nozzle, and empty the entire quart of cold water into my body, then physically hold me there. I can almost still feel the cramping. This happened 2 or 3 times a week. I never told anyone. I was sure that either I would be blamed somehow, or that they would tell my parents, and I would be in so much trouble. My parents were known by everyone in the town. My dad owned a business, was a member of the Chamber of Commerce, and my mother was active in the church. She was a member of a group called Coterie, and she also belonged to some ladies group that met in one another's homes, and this was called Unit. They did a float for the annual parade in late August. My mother had an almost psychopathical ability to hide her sadism and cruelty. She was always smiling at church, and around people, I was treated ok by her. I found out later, from a daughter of the aunt, who sent her children to watch tv at Grandmas, that my father's family did not want him marrying my mother. Grandma was divorced in the 1940's, when you did not divorce. So she was a scandal in herself. My grandfather, Pearl, whom I had met one time, was an alcoholic neer-do-well.I know that the S------'s were thought of as the scum of the county, and they had nothing. My mother and her sister, D, had the most God awful hatred for their father. Apparently, according to the hearsay from my cousin B, most of the 14 children were a result of rape. I know that some kind of abuse went on. To this day, P___________ S___________ is never spoken of. Only the older ones have the bitter hatred. The younger siblings did not seem to have the bitter hatred. Realizing that my mother suffered serious abuse has helped me understand. However, the abuse I suffered has made me determined that my children will never suffer what I have been through. She had knick knacks all through her house. Posessions were obsessively important to her. She had breakables all through the house. Ceramic figurines, porcelain figurines, just shelves and shelves of them. Some of the most severe beatings that I got were when I or one of my sisters broke one and blamed it on me. M______ and K__________ soon learned that they could blame anything on me, and they could sit and watch me get beaten, while I was screamed at. "Nincompoop, imbecile, worthless piece of trash that won't amount to a hill of beans" Were some of her favorite. M___________ didn't really set me up much, as there was an almost 7 year difference in our ages, but K____________ had inherited her mother's sadistic streak, and enjoyed setting me up. We had hen houses, and one of my jobs was to gather the eggs every evening. I remember K_______ taking the eggs out of the refrigerator in the garage, where we kept all the dozens of eggs, which we sold, and putting them back in the hen coop. She told my mother that I didn't gather the eggs. I said "Yes, I did" She checked and the hen house had eggs. I got one of the first beatings that I received with a belt buckle at this time. They said that the belt was not for gathering the eggs, and the buckle was for lying about it. I always tried to watch K__________ so I could undo or minimize the damage. However, she would pick up something from one of the shelves, drop it, and with a smirk, call for mommy to come see what Regina had done. I had gotten to the point where if I read or heard the word family, I would feel bitterness flow up in me like a vast infection that was not allowed to come out. I hated the words Mommy or Mother especially. I began to hate my sister with a hatred that I realize I still have. I thought I was numb to her, but as I write, I realize that the hatred is still there. I have had no contact with her and we have not spoken or exchanged mail in 35 years. I have no intention of ever communicating with her again unless she initiates it. In later years, people who have known me as an adult have known that I have emotional problems. I have heard statements that I should have had help as a child. My parents did not know how to deal with me. If they knew what they know now, I wouldn't have had to go through with the rough times. My response to this is that no child deserved what I was put through. No small child is bad, and if you take a child at age 4 and start drilling into their head that they are different, and bad, and this message is reinforced at home and at school and church, they will believe it. I had developed a why try attitude. I did in school what I had to to just get by. I walked in a cringing posture, and tried not to draw any attention to myself. When I got up in the morning, I was slapped and called names. No matter what I put on to go to school, it was wrong. Not only was I made to change, but I was humiliated and made fun of,both by my mother and my sisters, K______ in particular. I then went to school, where E_____ P_______ reigned supreme in her classroom, then went back home to more torment. The only peace I had in my life when I could escape was when I went into the world that I had made inside of my mind. I spent more and more time there, and got in more and more trouble in school for not paying attention. I was in someplace that was pleasant. I would fantasize about such things that people take for granted. One fantasy was, when we walked to have lunch at the high school, which was the cafeteria for elementary and junior high, as the school was so small. I imagined having a friend to walk with. We were to walk in pairs, holding hands. When there were an odd number of children, I would walk by myself. When there was an even number of children, Mrs. P______ would let them walk with one group of three children. I would walk, usually somewhere in the middle of the group, surrounded by people, all alone. I couldn't articulate my pain, but I became more and more withdrawn and quiet. I remember one teacher commenting that I never smiled, as she walked past me with another teacher, as I sat alone watching the kids play a game that I would never be a part of. In my fantasy, I had a friend that held my hand as we walked to the cafeteria. We talked, and other children would talk to me, and I would talk back to them, and they were friendly to me. I can write no more today as my throat has closed up and I have such a knot in my stomach that I am almost physically sick. These memories are so painful, and I have kept them inside of me for so long, that this epistle is a lancing of a huge, infected boil. I am in the lancing process now. I have fallen back into the pain of 1967

I was adopted into an all white small town in Kansas in 1961. It is hard to imagine the backwards nature of this town. The adults at the time were from the war era. A small town in kansas was far behind both coasts in their ways of thinking. Sometimes it seems like ______________, Kansas existed in another dimension, and had it's own reality. I have never been able to speak of this before. Not only because of how intensely painful that it is, but because of the sheer magnitude of the mob mentality. I have always been afraid of not being believed. This fear goes to the very heart of my soul. To not be believed is the betrayal of the worst nature. No infidelity or abuse can touch the pain that not being believed brings. To not be believed, to me, says that I am crazy, or if I am not crazy, I am not a good person. No good person would make up things of this nature. My adoptive parents, R_________ and A___ D__________, owned a jewelry store and a sheep farm. My dad did watch and clock repair in his shop, and at the time of my adoption, owned sheep, a few cattle, a couple of horses and ponies, as well as chickens, geese, and ducks.My parents had been unable to have a child of their own having suffered a couple of miscarriages.When they brought me to _________________, most of the population was of the belief that I was somehow "Bad" or "Of bad seed" and obviously illegitimate. Any child who was illegitimate was a product of sin. My maternal grandmother was of this mentality. When I was left in her care, she was often visited by a sister of my dads and her children. They went over to Grandma S_________s to watch her black and white tv as they had none of their own. I was too young to remember, but Grandma had no problem voicing her opinions in front of them. "You dirty little rat. You are just a little illegitimate rat. You will never amount to a hill of beans. All you will do is have a bunch of illegitimate brats of your own. I hate you, you dirty little rat"This was said even when I was too little to understand it. As I got older, I began to understand that there was something different about me from my cousins. Some of them called me names, mocked me, hit me, and Grandma looked on with approval. She would put her arms around one of my cousins, and in a very sweet voice, make comments such as "Aren't you my sweet little pumpkin. Thank heavens you aren't a dirty little rat like Regina."I longed to be like everyone else and did not understand why I was different; I just knew that I was. The year I entered kindergarten, my mother carried a pregnancy to term and gave birth to my sister, K_______. Suddenly, mommy was like everyone else. She held the baby close to her, and wouldn't let me come near, like I carried some infectious disease. She constantly made comments like "You nincompoop! You little moron. This is my sweet baby. Her is my own. Her is my little girl" I would be glared at. I soon learned to stay away from both mom and K_____________. I need to add I was only 4 at the time. My birthday was December 28th, and I started school at 4. The kindergarten teacher, Miss B________, put me at a table in the back of the room by myself. On the occasions that other children would reach out to me, Miss B_____________ would tell them to get away from me. So by the age of 4, I knew that there was something different about myself. I didn't know why, but I was not as good as everyone else. There was something bad about me that I could not fix. I was called to the front of the room on almost a daily basis. Corporal punishment was allowed at that time, and I was spanked in front of the class nearly every day. I was not allowed to play with the other children. Now as an adult with children of my own, it seems inconceivable that the other parents and the school administration allowed this to go on. This is the mob mentality that I have spoken of. I have seen a movie called "The Lottery" Most other people that have seen this movie consider it almost science fiction, and ask how an entire town could go so crazy. I think that an outsider coming in to this would have tried to put a stop to it, but this was a town of 900 trapped in the dark ages. When I left school, I went home to be taunted, put down, called names, and hit. I had my face slapped 6 or 7 times a day AT THE AGE OF 4.What could a 4 year old could have possibly done? At the time, I thought that it was because I was me. I watched other kids make friends, play games, and be spoken to nicely. I thought how nice it must be to have someone speak kindly. I never even imagined anyone speaking nicely to me. It never crossed my mind. In first grade, it was no better. The teacher had me come to the front of the class, bow 3 times, and say "I am a big fat goose" 3 times, usually 3 to 4 times a week. At this time, I began to experience physical abuse from the other children. They would hit me or trip me, and God help me if I cried. These people did not see me as a human with feelings. They thought I was something different, and bad, and by their treating me badly, they were showing that they were good children. By halfway through the first grade, I barely was passing. I was told daily that I was stupid, an imbecile, (I didn't even know what that meant, but I knew that it was something terrible) and I didn't understand why I had to be born to be this terrible thing. The parents had encouraged this behavior with their hangups about my supposed illegitimacy. The children, in their defense at this behavior in their very early ages, thought that they were supposed to treat me badly. The worse that they could treat me, the higher their esteem with their peers. At home, the abuse became worse as K___________ grew/ All I ever heard was how K___________ could do no wrong and I could do no right. My mother had these conversations with the adults in her church and with all the aunts and uncles, and noone seemed to really think anything of it. If anyone did have a problem with the constant emotional abuse in front of everyone, they never did or said anything about it. I did find out later that one of my aunts, the one who sent her children to watch Grandma's TV, was horrified, but she was afraid to do anything about it for fear that it would make my situation worse. My father just stood by and even though he did not actively abuse me, he never said a word to anyone to prevent it. In second grade, when I was only 6, my mother gave birth to another child, M_____________a. Even though M__________________ttained the "Never can do any wrong" status of Kristie, Melissa was clearly an insider and I was on the outside looking in. K_______ and M__________ weren't called names, slapped, kicked, and punched. K___________ began to develop what probably was a typical disposition of a child who is completely catered to, and every whim is satisfied. She called me names too, even at the age of 2. She would scratch and bite, and my only defense was to run. How humiliating, to run at the age of 6 from a 2year old, but if I ever tried to defend myself, even to push her away, I was spanked. My parents called it spanking, but it was really a beating. However, she never got in trouble for scratching or biting, even when it drew blood. That is, on me. She was not allowed to treat M)________ badly. I don't think it really occurred to her to treat M__________ badly. M______________ was her sister. I don't know what she thought of me as. School went from bad to worse. That was the year of E_________ P___________. That name to this day still has the power to invoke very strong emotions in me. I can't even put a name to the emotions. I don't know what they are. Elsie was sadistic, and had a habit of making one child the class scapegoat. She was in her heyday with me. Here was a child that she could humiliate and abuse to her hearts content, and the other children thought that she was behaving properly. She didn't fear any retaliation from either my parents or the school administration. When I was taken to school the first day, my mother let it be known to her that I was a trouble maker, would not cooperate, and in general, had to be taken in hand. Even though I kept my mouth shut, and tried my best to not draw any attention to myself, I was always doing something wrong. I did not think I could do anything right. Even something as simple as a math worksheet, which she caught me doing. Instead of starting at the top left, I was skipping over the paper, doing the sums at random. She held up the sheet and told the class what a horrible student I was. "Class, are we supposed to do the problems from left to right, or are we to skip all over like Regina did?" The class would say "from left to right' and P____________ would lead me to the front of the class to be paddled with a huge paddle she kept up by her desk. I tried so hard not to cry, as the class would start to laugh, and it would make the teacher taunt me infront of the class. "Oh, is wittle baby going to cwy? Did big mean nasty teacher hurt it's wittle feewings? Look, class, wittle baby is cwying? This was the classes cue to laugh and to mock me with saying Waaah and other taunts. I had made a mistake on some assignment. I do not remember what the particulars were on this occasion. I remember P_________ holding up the assignment and saying "Class, look what Regina Di________s did. What should we do?" The class was shouting out suggestions. K_______S_________ shouted out "Let us all spank her!" P__________ cooed over what a wonderful idea that K____________ had and told the class to take me into the coat closet and spank me. I remember K_______t holding the paddle. The entire class of 21 other students mobbed me. They drug me out of my chair, and into the closet. I remember having my legs, arms, hair, head, and dress all pulled. I was hit repeatedly with the paddle untill it shattered into fragments. When they finally decided that I had had enough, they went back to their seats, and they and E________ P______________ talked about how I deserved it. She came into the coat room, and grabbed my hair. She pulled me to my seat. She then told me how I had better not tell anyone. She said that everyone knew that I deserved it and whoever I told would spank me again. I did not tell anyone at home for fear of more of the same treatment. Now I realize that she had gone too far and was afraid. That did not cross my mind at the age of 6. I did not expect any other treatment. I limped home, a mile walk that seemed to be 5 miles in the pain that I was in. I turned 7 in December. When we came back from Christmas break, I was wearing a poncho that my mother had gotten God knows where. P__________ had me come to the front of the class. She made fun of my poncho, and had all the class laughing and poking fun. At this time, ____________ B_________ came up with the bright idea of saying spray as a way of cleansing himself from "My germs" When ever I came near someone, they began to scream and to shout "Spray spray" as they ran away from me like I was leprous. I remember sitting on the edge of the playground watching the children play tag. When one would tag the other, they would shout "You got D_________'s germs" The child tagged would scream, and run to tag someone else, and they would all scream. At the end of recess, they would all gather and "Spray" each other to cleanse my germs off of them. I began to withdraw. I did not cry, either at home or at school. It drew attention to me. Believe me, I did not want this attention. At recess, I began to create my own world. I went off by myself to a deserted end of the school yard, and created my own world, which was far better than the hell I lived in. In this dream world, I was like every one else. I had friends. I was invited to parties and sleepovers, and my mother said nice things to me, and the teachers would compliment me on work well done. Towards the end of the school year, a new student arrived. I remember her name still> J_______ W____.We were brought up to the front of the class in front of the blackboard row by row. We were to tell her our names, and what our fathers did. I turned sideways and was daydreaming, and running my hand up and down the trough that held the chalk and erasers. Suddenly, I felt a hand grab my hair. I was jerked around, and E______ P____________ socked me in the face with her fist with all her strength. My nose spouted blood like a fountain. My lips were bleeding. I was terrified. Was I going to get in more trouble for bleeding on the floor or my dress? E___________ P_______________ took me to the restroom, cleaned me up, and kept saying that I shouldn’t have turned around, but that her hitting me was accidental, and I had better not tell anyone or I would be expelled. I told no one. I didn't want more of the same.