Things that stay with you.

[penfriends]

What random things have struck a chord with you?

Mine is a Postsecret card that said:

"Everyone who knew me before 9/11 think I'm dead"

I read it years ago but I think about that person. Family, parents, siblings.

Just one sentence but it's stayed with me fore years.

My old headmaster. He was genuinely the best teacher I have ever met. Old school but humane and open to new ideas.

My son's Head Teacher telling me my son with autism, dyspraxia, hyper mobility and sensory processing disorder who could barely speak at the time aged 8, was manipulative and "knows exactly what he is doing!" Later that evening I undressed him for a bath and found bruises and abrasions on his body and he managed to tell me she had held him face down on a table and banged his head off it every time he tried to get up.

Jeesus, NickiFury, that's beyond awful, was the teacher punished?

No. The only witness was him and he was deemed "unreliable".

My mum chasing me with a slipper when I was 3. I can see it as if I was looking down on the scenario. I was terrified of her.

Seeing the doctor inject my gran with a sedative when my grandad passed away. It was like a light switched off inside her.

My dad saying "I'm not your dad anymore" to me when I was 12.

My mum forcing me out the door in a jumper and knickers when I was 14 in the pissing pouring rain. The kind policeman who came because the neighbours called them. And my mum convincing the duty social worker that I was 'the problem'.

The day I left home at 16 and felt like I could finally breathe.

"Your dad and I are splitting up - tell your sister" (I was 14, she was 11).

"You got a place at OxbridgeUni? Why didn't you apply for OtherOxbridgeUni, it's closer?' (My dad)

I remember being with my sister and out with my grandfather. He asked us if we would like something from the ice cream van.
I was probably about five.
My sister asked for a Heart ice cream. I asked for one too.
He crouched down so he was inches from my face and said.
"She can have one but you can't because I don't like you. No one likes you
Pagwatch"

On the other hand I remember talking to my son a few years ago because I'd been asked to write something for a website but I said no because I was too intimidated.
He said "I'm at uni with students and tutors who are some of the most intelligent people in the country and you are still one of the smartest people I know"
I was so surprised. I cried.

Reading these has really choked me up.

My stepdad screaming at me and repeatedly holding my head underwater for having a bit of dirt on my neck when I was 8. Thought I was going to die.

Stepdad punching my bunk bed to wake me up and calling me a 'dirty cow' because my teenage boyfriend had wanted to have sex with me, and I had confided in my mum as I was feeling unsure about it. I've felt like sex is bad and wrong ever since.

Stepdad telling me to 'get some friends' as he threw me out of the front door and shut it behind me. I wandered around the village alone for hours not knowing when I was allowed to go home.

My mum and stepdad sitting me down repeatedly and lecturing me for being a bad girl for not calling my stepdad 'dad' and cuddling him/ sitting on his lap etc despite all of the above and much much more.

My dad ranting at me in an email telling me that if he was invited to my wedding I better apologise to his wife for not being warmer to her (she terrified me and had actually shouted at me on one of the first times I met her). We are no longer in contact and no they weren't invited.

My ds when he was about 3, we were lounging on the bedroom floor and he suddenly put his hand on my shoulder and said 'I take care of mama'.

Some of these are horrific.

I remember very clearly my dad teaching me to ride a bike by pushing me down a hill in the park. And the bloke who caught me before I flew out of the gate!

And 20 years later my mum ringing me at work to tell me my dad had died; my boss making me tea and my colleague driving me home to an empty house-share, then driving me to my best friend's work.

Absolutely gripping thread. So sorry for what some of you have experienced. I remember a boy at school asking me out when I was about 11, then laughing and telling me he was just joking when I said yes. A man apologising for what he'd drunkenly said to me in my first year at uni then, as I had no idea what he meant, telling me he'd commented that ugly girls always make friends with pretty ones when my friend came to visit. And a random stranger in the street about a year later saying "not you - you're too ugly". No idea what he was referring to. Amazing what an effect throw away comments can have on an individual's self esteem.

After working with a young man with psychosis for three years who was also a violent offender and this was our last meeting. He had one of the most abusive childhoods I've ever heard of and I have heard of some horrendous stuff.

'I always knew I was bad, I was always told I was bad but you made me think I was good and I know you can't love me back but I love you'. This is a kid that didn't even look me in the eye for the first six months I knew him and often told me to fuck off and leave him alone in the first year!

I heard a few months ago he died of a heroin overdose aged 23. He WAS good. I won't ever forget him.

'I never liked you anyway.'
I was 12 and with that my father walked out. He doesn't remember it. I've never forgotten.

The drip drip of mostly verbal bullying I had at school. It didn't stop till A levels when most of them thankfully left school.
It was also a big contributor to the MH problems I have to this day.
Being told that "bullying is character forming, suck it up." and my parents take on it - "Stop being so much of a target/victim."
My Mum was always rather over critical when I was growing up. She saw it as encouraging me to do better, I felt it as never ever being good enough, so why bother?
One incident sticks in my mind very firmly. I was 8 or 9 at the oldest and the school were having Christmas hat competitions in each class. I had been sent in with a collection of materials and some very strict instructions to follow. I had made some tentative suggestions and had had them shot down with comments like "No, don't try to draw it, you can't draw for toffee."
Well, I did my best. It probably wasn't very good. It didn't win.
I brought it home, having actually enjoyed making it. My Mum went ape shit. Shouting, screaming, criticism, yelling at me that it was no good and what was I thinking? "Well if course it didn't win, in THAT STATE?"
I was sent upstairs in tears.
She re made the hat! Took it to bits, put the stuff on where she thought it should go and drew new decorations on it. It sat on the side for the whole Christmas holiday, I was too scared to mention it, then too angry. It vanished in January. I have no idea how she thought I'd react, perhaps she was hoping for "Wow Mum, you're right that really is so much better than I can do, I'm such a terrible daughter, aren't I?" with a massive smile.
The positives I will not forget -
Dh telling me he loved me for the first time.
DS1 reaching out for a cuddle for the first time. He was very late doing that.
DS1 coming downstairs and telling me I look pretty in my new top. He always notices when I have something new.
DS2 has been somewhat slow with his speech, but I got to hear the following this week:-
DS1 - DS2, Hello, I love you!
DS2 - Strangled version of DS1's name grins.
DS1 - Love you lots!
DS2 - Uvv ooo!

for everyone.

Cigars that's awful

Having to ask ask my mum why she loved my sister more than me, and her reply started with 'Because .....' I didn't listen to the rest.
I can't get over why anyone would ever say that to their child, even though she passed away 4 years ago, it still eats me up.

My dad when I got a much-worked-for promotion: 'Ooh, that's almost a proper job'.

Seeing my mum in her coffin 4 weeks after she'd died. It was the most surreal and disgusting thing I've ever seen and will never scrape that image from my eyeballs!

A positive one is when ds1 was born. I hadn't really believed I was pregnant (you'd think the huge belly and constant kicks in the ribs would give it away) and had been pushing for hours. All of a sudden it all happened at once and this hot little body was placed on my chest. I can't describe how magical it felt, it was such a shock to me for some reason and I couldn't believe I'd made this little person. I still get tears thinking about it and have to give him a squidge.

I was staying with family in Canada for a while a few years ago, and I went with my cousin to walk her 6 year old son to the bus stop. He hadn't long started school, so we just getting to know the other kids. Another little boy was there waiting for the school bus with his Grandad, and my cousin's DS started talking to this other boy and playing just a few metres away. We could see the bus coming up the hill, so my cousins DS said "I have to go give my mom a hug now, which one is your mom?". The little boy said so nonchalantly "I live with my Grandpa because my mommy doesn't love me" I have never heard anything so heartbreaking come from a child's mouth in my life. That will stick with me forever.

DH saying "god you look awful" when I was wearing just his boxers & a maternity bra when DS was about 10 days old - he denied it later when I challenged him.

Telling my dying (& very unreligious) Dad I was going to miss him, & him replying "I'm going to miss you, from wherever I am" .

My long term xbf who I loved text me after half ignoring me for weeks to say he'd had enough of me and would see me the next day so he could end it for good. I asked could we wait until the following week so I could be prepared for what he has to say and he said yes whenevers best for you. I never saw or heard from him again. Was very painful.

Completely different, but when DH and I were in India we went to see the Taj Mahal for sunrise. To protect the white marble from the effects of pollution there's a vehicle exclusion zone and you have to walk about 500m through a park to get to the entrance.
The path was lined with beggars, we weren't phased by that, we'd seen a lot of it in India, we wore our sunglasses so we didn't make eye contact with anyone.
What will stay with me forever is the moment the most deformed man I have ever seen, and very possibly made that way, literally threw himself at our feet as we walked along.
And I stepped over him.
I have everything materially anyone could need, I was rich beyond this man's dreams (pretty average for UK though). And he had less than nothing. And I stepped over this man to get to the Taj Mahal.
I will never forget that moment as long as I live.

SueFlay. I doubt he ever forget it either.

So sorry for all you lovely people who've had extremely bitter and twisted comments made, by people close to you aswell. Bet you can't fathom making similar comments to your own DC.

Lots but this I keep wondering what happened after...on the bus one night and there was a woman who was about 35 maybe, but heroin ravaged, sitting at the front. She was on her phone saying, " no, no I don't want to. Not tonight, please!" Eventually she relented and sadly said, " ok I will please don't I will I promise! " and hung up. On the way off, she looked at me and said, " alright driver? I bet you've got a dead nice life, I don't. I've got a shite life." And off she went. I wish I'd done something, anything. But I was stunned silent. Poor woman