Am I overreacting or are you abusive? If your hands rarely touch me, and not ever with the same force I grew up trying to protect my mother from, is it abuse? Are your hateful words becoming a pattern? I told myself I’d never be a statistic. Never allow myself to lose myself to a man the same way my mother did. She lost herself, I lost her. Never. Never would I allow myself to be so forgiving after the first time. Looking back over the past few months, I think I’ve broken that promise I made to myself. It’s empty, just like me. So if the terrifying truth is that I’m not overreacting, and you are abusing me, why do I stay? Growing up I always wondered why my mother stayed, kept bringing us back on the greyhound that felt more home than anywhere. The foul smell that lingered, the stained cloth that I sat on while I watched the states change from the window, the suitcases I dragged to the bottom of the bus.. that was more familiar to me than any foundation with a roof attached ever was. She didn’t stay because she wanted me to have a father. She didn’t stay because she thought he’d change. Maybe she stayed because he was her greyhound. He was familiar. The abuse was her stability because who could ever love her the way he did if what he would scream at her in the night was true? Why do I stay? What if you are abusive. What if I’m not overreacting and it’s a newfound pattern. A new familiar. My greyhound. The patience and love you shower me with outweighs the bad nights, but should those nights ever be that bad? Is that normal? Do people in happy and nurturing relationships ever slip up and treat each other that way? The greyhound never made me sit in the bath and question my worth or my life but then again you rarely ever do either. Maybe that’s enough for me to tell myself it isn’t abuse. After all, who could ever love my mothers daughter? I may be one thing on the outside, but underneath the makeup, the flesh and bone, I am scarred. I am broken. I am empty. I died long before you met me, I died with my mother and then again with my father. It feels as though my soul is tearing away the inside of me, scratching to break free of the shell it’s been caged in for so long, crying out for stability. Crying out for a greyhound that I lost and could never find again. Am I overreacting? Or is this abuse and you it’s owner?
![wishbzne:
“ plainwater: essays and poetry — the anthropology of water: kinds of water, anne carson
[ID: “I feel so lonely, like childhood again.” end ID]
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