Awful Normal - An Independent Film
(Update:
Contact Celesta Davis Personally Here)
This is about slaying Dragons...
...and yes a lot of families *are* ‘Awful Normal’...
This (above) is the title of a movie/documentary from a brave woman by the name of Celesta Davis. Last night when I was flipping through ‘crap’ on TV, I came across Prime Time Live…I don’t watch a lot of this stuff – I consider this type of TV show to use ‘hard core’ journalism as entertainment/shock factor approach/sensationalistic…I don’t like that type of ‘reporting’….but this subject and this story stopped me dead in my tracks.
Why? Because it’s *my* story as well.
Celesta Davis was molested by a very close family friend. She decided to make a film about how that impacted and formed her life. The molestation was one of her earliest memories. Can you imagine your earliest childhood memory being that of having been made to perform oral sex on a man old enough to be your father *by* a close family friend. Think about that for a moment...think about that for a very long moment. Wrap your mind around that.
It would seem this week on
Colette’s Grave it’s all about making people squirm a little.
Yes it’s *MY* story too. I was molested by my uncle at the age of 5 years old. I was not made to perform oral sex on him (or at least the memories my subconscious allows me to have do not detail anything quite so heinous). I was made to sit on his lap while he fondled me and stuck his fingers up inside of me. I was 5 years old (perhaps younger when it started) – he’d tell me to hush while he did it – I did not know what he was doing or why nor did I know it was ‘wrong’...I did not say anything to anyone at the time because, (as Ms. Davis so brilliantly points out), what 5-year old has the vocabulary for that type of thing? Well at least most 5-year olds didn’t back then...I am not sure what he did continued much past a few incidents – but again there’s that pesky unconscious mind to tend with.
It came out in me in other ways. I never wanted to go to gatherings over at ‘that’ side of the families’ houses. He’d find me. I’d bite my nails to the quick. I had stomach aches. I was (for a 5 year old), a nervous wreck. I was afraid of everyone – I was painfully shy. But somehow I went on – I pushed the ‘things’ that were happening to me down inside where I could not ‘feel’ them any more – I made them go away. I was a weird child – I did not have many friends – today I reason that that was because children, like animals, can sense when another amongst them is ‘sick’ or ‘tainted’ I was teased – tortured actually by other kids. I did not make any decent friends until I was almost 12 years old.
We moved away from Pennsylvania when I was 14. My mother died when I was 15. I went on to have boyfriends and become sexually active. I was abused a lot by the guys I was with. I felt too that I *had* to be with them. I kept having bad relationships.
Time marched on – I was with Tommie, I had my daughter – that ended in disaster. Then, I got married to my son’s dad. Shortly after we got married I had a dreams/flashbacks to those ‘episodes’ with my uncle. At the time I panicked. Why was I remembering this stuff now? I wondered….what the hell was I suppose to do with this info. I was 25 years old, I was finally with a ‘decent’ guy WTF??? I told my husband that I was falling apart. I told him I felt I was ‘damaged goods’ and he was free to divorce me. He of course did no such thing but he didn’t offer any advice (not that it was his job to do so) –I felt lost. I did have one friend who was wonderful to me at that time and she turned me onto John Bradshaw. I used Mr. Bradshaw’s techniques for healing without ever doing the ‘leg-work’ – it seemed to help me hang on for a while and soon I found myself pregnant. Everything changed. I became more an island. I nurtured myself and the growing life within me I ignored everything and everyone else including my daughter and my husband. I know now that was wrong back then it seemed like I was in survival mode. We ended up moving from Houston to Cleveland because I was adamant that I wanted my kids raised near family (how ironic) and besides both of our parents were getting older and we both wanted our kids to get to know their grandparents. We moved to Cleveland, we eventually bought a house. That’s when it began happening. I began having nightmares, I began waking up screaming in the middle of the night. I knew I had to go into counseling. I wanted to kill myself and I knew what was at the root of all of it...it was the recovered memory(ies). I told my husband I needed help and I could not let him touch me (he is Sicilian and reminded me of my uncle that did this to me) – I told him we needed help as a couple. He refused to go with me to counseling. He said in his family they did not ‘talk’ about such things (
an aside: this is one of the biggest problems with society’s handling of these issues and why they still go on – I call it the ‘conspiracy of silence’ and it’s destroying families, folks, as Ms. Davis’ film shows – a lot of families simply ‘ignore’ this stuff –they hope it will go away – it doesn’t). I sought out a counselor on my own. I went in and began to talk – I knew I had to talk about this I knew I had to get help because every morning I could not get out of bed, I wanted to die, I wanted to kill myself and I knew I could not do that to my then 3-year old son – I knew I had to take care of him but I could not hardly bring myself to get out of bed to do so...I knew I had to do something or I was going to die. *THAT’S* how scared and paralyzed I was. The counselor did not help much – either she was not adept at handling cases of repressed memory or she just was a crappy therapist. She handed me tissues while I cried. I paid her $85/half-hour to do so. I became convinced I needed to confront my uncle. I told my counselor this – she counseled me against (most will by the way). She said I’d be possibly set back (yeah OK I could not understand how much worse off I could get then wanting to die inside every day) and that he’d most likely deny it (most of them do). I was insistent. I was doing this. I began talking to my family – slowly I had to know if the same thing happened to my own sister – she said no. I told my brothers. I did not tell my dad I was afraid of how he’d react – this was his sister’s husband and I am not sure he liked him much to begin with. I talked with one of my very close male friends at the time – he told me he felt I needed to do this too. I told my pseudo mom (who in my mother’s death had become one hell of a friend to me) – she was to champion my cause and she offered to go with me. I felt numb but driven – it made no sense. I called my aunt in PA I told her I was planning on coming down for a visit could I stop and see her and my uncle. She was thrilled. A couple of weekends later with this wonderful woman by my side I went to my uncle’s house (my husband had no input in this at all – in fact he’d probably would have rather I buried it and forgotten about it – I couldn’t).
My aunt let us in – seeing my friend, I could tell she was kind of confused. We all sat down. We exchanged the niceties. Then I said:
“Aunt J – I lied to you – I am not here on a ‘visit’ I am here to talk to Uncle C – and ask him about some things.”
She looked rather quizzical and said:
“What is it honey?”
I said:
“Uncle C – I’ve been remembering ‘things’ from my childhood – and I’ve remembered things you’ve done to me and I want you to explain to me why you did them.”
My aunt got a really horrified look on her face (who wouldn’t):
“What sort of ‘things’, C- ????”
“Aunt J – with all due respect I want Uncle C - to answer me”
My aunt said something to my uncle – he got a blank look on his face – my aunt then said to me:
“You are going to have to say it very loud - your uncle is going deaf”
It was perhaps a this moment I had a sense of futility and questioned what I was doing but I knew if I left without resolving this I’d not do well and to me it was a matter of *MY* life or death. So this ‘moment’ passed, quickly….
I actually shouted:
‘Uncle C – I want to know if you remember touching me when I was a little girl – I want to know why you did what you did”
My aunt then intervened – she said “C – I don’t know what you are remembering – you must have just dreamed this up or imagined it. Uncle J - would have never done that to you honey” she had a panicked look on her face
This time it was my mom’s friend who said to my aunt:
“Please m’am let him answer her”
He sat there – I looked at him and he looked at me – he knew, and he knew that I knew and he did not flinch and he didn’t look away. He said.
“Yes C – I remember holding you and touching you – I am sorry, I never meant to hurt you”
I looked at this man – this man that I loved – this man that loved me but in a very sick way – this man that destroyed me and this man that was allowing me to rise up from the ashes of that destruction by validating what happened. I yelled:
“How could you do that to a child??? How could you??? You had a wife – you are supposed to do things like that with your wife NOT with children – you knew better than that! How many of my other cousins did you do this to???? How dare you!!!!!” I was shaking I was beginning to cry.
He said: “I am sorry I did not mean to hurt you. I am sorry”
My aunt looked like I had driven a knife into her heart – I probably had.
(A bit of a history about my aunt which I did not know at the time I did this – when she first got married to my uncle she had been found to have breast cancer – back then they did radical mastectomies on women no matter what – no breast reconstruction – so she must have seemed disfigured to him – also they were unable to have children – not that this guy had any business being around children but that also much have impacted their marriage.)
I had nothing else to say. My aunt was struggling with what had just transpired and she was looking ill. I got up – I actually thanked them for listening to me. My aunt walked us to the door – before I left I turned to hug her – I was crying and she was crying – she begged me not to tell my dad (and again this is how these things remain secrets in families) – I wanted to talk to everyone I knew about this – especially my other girl cousins - her own sister’s kids – and by the way these cousins have to this day never married, they still live at home, they have never really had ‘boyfriends’ and one of them is gay (no I am not saying that that’s the reason why – but I don’t know my other two girl cousins from this particular family spent almost every weekend at this uncle’s house and I am telling you that in my heart and mind I KNOW he did things to them too). I promised her I would not tell my dad – she later extracted promises from me not to tell my other aunts (her sisters) as well. I felt so guilty for having laid this at my aunt’s feet (she was after all my favourite aunt). (My dad went to his grave not knowing...)
I floated down the stairs to my car leaving my aunt’s house. I knew I would never have to go back to that house again. I felt a great weight had been lifted from me – I also felt a bit like I really *should* talk to my cousins – not that I needed validation – but that I did not want this to go unnoticed in this family. I knew I’d never let my children meet this man and I did not think he should be around other children I was absolutely freaked out about the idea of him doing this (or worse) to anyone else. I suppose thoughts like 'vigilante' and 'retribution' started entering my mind...
My friend held my hand – she asked me if I was OK – we stopped for lunch and I was still numb, still upset, still scarred but somehow I saw light at the end of the tunnel – somehow I knew *I’d* be OK now…
The next evening I got a call from my aunt. My husband took the call – after getting home I began crying a lot so he knew I was still pretty fragile – he asked me if I wanted to talk to her. I agreed. I got on the phone:
“Hi C – “ she said – testing...
“Hello Aunt J – “
“Are you OK?”
“Not really”
“Uncle C wants to talk to you, is that OK?”
I drew in a sharp breath – I felt the anger, the pain the fear again – Jesus would this ever end? I hesitated…barely audible:
“Yeah OK…”
He got on the line – for someone who had never been a big talker this must have been really tough on him”
“C ? Is that you? “ I answered that it was...
“Will you forgive me?”
A wave of shock kind of took over...forgive him??? Already??? I had just told this bastard what he had done to me – it took me years to even get up the nerve – forgive him???? What audacity!
“Uncle C – it’s just too soon – I just can’t right now and I don’t know if I ever will – can you understand that?”
My aunt (who was listening on the phone) said she understood – again she asked me not to tell my dad – again I promised I wouldn’t.
I was afraid for my daughter – a lot – I would talk to her about telling me if anyone ever touched her in a ‘bad’ way or in places where they shouldn’t be touching her – I still worry about children getting molested.
Time passed – my marriage failed – yes in part it was due to what I had become and what we had not become together to face this crisis and our lack of being able to connect. It wasn’t his fault, it wasn’t my fault – it’s just what was. (Since that time we’ve grown close and I think he knows how much I was hurting back then).
My life went on. I met and fell in love with my current ex (and that relationship was doomed too – but I feel more from him not being a ‘whole’ person than me not being a 'whole' person - but obviously I was still attracted to the 'wrong' type of guy for me...)
My sister was going to get re-married – I told her I could not attend if he was going to be there. They were not invited.
My dad finally passed away. My uncle’s secret remained safe. I called my aunt. I told her that he was not welcome at my dad’s funeral. She came with her two sisters – they too did not bring their husbands. My dad’s brother’s had either passed before him or were too sick to attend. My one aunt kept giving me the ‘evil eye’ I am sure she knew what was going on – I am sure her sister told her – I wanted to go over and ask her what her problem was – I wanted to ask her if her own daughters had been tainted by this – but I already felt I knew the answer and quite frankly I didn’t care what she thought of me.
Damage is a funny thing in human terms. There’s a Billy Joel song called ‘
Pressure’ and there’s a line ‘You have no scars on your face…’ - well there are scars on my soul, there are scars on my psyche, there are scars on my heart from this – I *am* damaged. I will probably always have trust issues.
Forgiveness is also a funny thing – I came to realize that by holding onto all this anger it kept me a prisoner of what he had done – I had to let go. Eventually I did. Eventually my aunt and I became close again – she began dealing with colon cancer – I kept in constant touch with her. There was a function to go to in honor of my other aunt’s (the one who was giving me the evil eye) 50th wedding anniversary – my new husband and I were invited – we went. I actually hugged him – I wasn’t afraid. When my other uncle died we went to his funeral – I was able to be in the same room with him then although I don’t think we hugged.
Finally, my aunt J- passed away. I was not sure altogether about going but I did go to her funeral – I went to pay respects to her I was not going for him – although I felt his loss. He came to me – my brother was next to me – I tensed as he went to hug me – but I hugged him back. I cried for the loss of my aunt.
I have not spoken to him or seen him since. When he passes away I will not attend his funeral – in my soul (to this day) - I pray he is not allowed near little children any more but I don’t know how much damage he’s been able to cause other than what he did to me.
I’ve cried a lot about this over the years. I come to realize he robbed me of my innocence in many ways he robbed me of being a care-free little girl. I don’t’ hate him anymore. I don’t even blame him anymore. I am not sure I’ve completely forgiven him but I know I’ve been able to let go. I have, to a great extent, slayed the dragon that kept me hostage for so long. I am free of it – not of all the damage it’s caused – but I am able to function – I’ve been able to go on and love others – I am even starting to feel eventually I will completely trust someone again – as long as it’s the ‘right’ relationship. In other words we all have baggage – it’s up to you how you want to carry it and up to you to not force others to have to deal with things that aren’t their fault. I don’t lug a lodestone around with me anymore. It’s more like a pebble in my shoe...
