The unspoken childhood, part 1: Younger years

My childhood, while filled with fun family memories, also has a lot hiding in the shadows of my brain; ones I desperately desire to forget, ones that have stayed with me for years and never been said out loud.

This might even be the only time I ever talk about some things, a bit because I feel it's not important to my growth and healing, and also because I just don't want to keep reliving them.
I'm hoping that by me typing about it will help remove them from the back of my mind and allow me to forgive myself for things I've done.

And I know some of what I say will make me sound horrible, I've done some bad things and I'm far from proud of what I've done in order to fit in as a teenager; but the past can't be changed; only learnt from.

So best place to start is at the beginning. I was a sick baby when I was first born from what I've been told; either that or I was just a little shit, once again, according to my parents.
After putting my mum through three days of labour; I finally came into the world, except I was half dead due to the umbilical cord being wrapped around my neck. I was blue in the face. I was dying in front of my mothers eyes.
My mum wasn't even allowed to hold me after they unwrapped the cord from my neck because I was whisked away to ICU.
I had a couple problems due to my mum developing a bladder infection whilst carrying me, so I wasn't very well. I refused to eat for a while; I wouldn't take my mums nipple or a bottle, I was starving myself until a nurse pretty much shoved it into my mouth and I began to drink.

So needless to say I caused my mum a lot of worry within a short amount of time.

As I grew up, my parents began to realise I didn't seem to know when I needed to pee until I was bursting and barely able to hold it in. I wet myself a lot, as I did my bed. Turns out I had a small bladder and my nerves and neurons that told me when I needed to pee didn't work properly.
It was embarrassing, being 7 years old and waking up to a drenched bed where I had dreamt about going to the toilet and my body went in real life.

I don't know why, because I know what I'm about to say isn't true, but I've always had a "memory" of being put in a diaper because "If I couldn't control myself then I should be in a nappy like the baby I am." "Only babies wet themselves."
In the memory, my dad said both of these, I was 5 or 6 years old; but it never actually happened, so why do i remember that happening? Was it my minds way of telling me how embarrassed I am of myself? Punishing and mocking myself for something I couldn't control? I don't know.

I realised a few years ago that all my nightmares or "memories" always contained my dad when i was growing up. One nightmare that I remember and haunts me was I had done something to disappoint my dad, I made him angry somehow and to punish me, he tore up my teddies in front of me. Ripping them to shreds, burning them, stabbing, everything. He always started with my favourite. Bambi, who I still have to this day. I would wake up soaked in my own tears. I could never stop it, I could never wake up until it was over, and it always felt real. I could never tell it was a dream until I'd woken up.

As I grew up and started school I'd always seemed a target for bullying in some way, I had very few friends and although most of the bullying in primary school was pretty harmless; some wasn't.

The first was in year 1, I want to state now, I had stupidly long hair. It had never been cut, only trimmed and I loved my hair. It was precious to me.
There was this girl who was our years bully; she was mean and spiteful. One day, she got me to follow her back into the classroom and sit down, she then came up behind me and said she wanted to play hairdresser. I wasn't allowed to leave. I had to sit very still so she didn't get me with the scissors. I was only 6 and I was honestly scared. She then cut a chunk of my hair off behind my hair. My hair that was down to my waist had been cut to the scalp. I cried, a teacher came and told her off.
She eventually left the school, whether they moved or she was kicked out I have no idea but I was glad she was gone.

I was never really bullied after in primary, the only thing that sucked was the boys being boys and saying how ugly I was; no one would ever like me; they certainly didn't like me as a human being in general. It hurt, and made me feel disgusting about how I looked but I know that kids are just that. Kids. They didn't know what affect that would have in my life, how painful their words really were.

I had one good experience in that school. My first crush.
I got along with most of the girls but most of them were really girly, like most little girls are. I was pretty much the odd one out except for my friend Victoria. She was an oddball like me. She never liked her full name, I always called her Vickie for the first few years I knew her, and eventually it was completely shortened to Tor.

We were the only tomboys, until i met the twins. I don't know if they were there the whole time, I'm pretty sure they were but I only ever really noticed them until year 4. They were identical twins, Sophia and Claudia. Considering they were identical, they couldn't be anymore different personality wise. Claudia was a girly girl; loved dresses, found bugs creepy and hated sports, but Sophia was more like me. A tomboy, didn't care if she got dirty and loved to play football. I loved her.
I remember me and her laying on the grass one summer, just chatting and I looked at her, I remember finding it strange how different she looked from her sister despite them being identical, I had noticed the tiny differences between them. I wanted so desperately to hold her hand, I even felt compelled to kiss her cheek.
I never did, I never knew if she felt the same way or never even noticed, but I really liked her.

As a class, we were horrible. The only teacher who could handle us was Mr McCabb, an Irish teacher who knew how to deal with our outbursts. He was pretty strict when he needed to be, but also a really good laugh.

In year 5 we were playing bulldog at break, I was running to the over side of the playground when a kid suddenly stopped in front of me because of a bulldog/tagger was about to get him. I didn't stop in time and my face connected with the back of his head. It knocked me out and left me with a massive swelling and bruising around my right eye. Mr McCabb gave me a nickname the day I came back to school sporting this bruise. Shiner. He would shout Shiner instead of my name during roll call. I was pretty funny but I was looking forward to getting a new teacher in year 6.
Well, guess who I got in year 6? Him. I was greeted the first day with "Morning, Shiner."

He taught me and my class in year 5 and 6 because, as I said, he was the only one who could handle us. I'm fairly certain the head mistress wanted to kill us at points, especially Oscar. He had anger issues and that's putting it mildly. Once, he climbed onto the roof of the school and then jumped down on the other side of the fence and walked home because a teacher yelled at him after this kid had flipped a table and then threw a chair at a supply teacher. He was insane.

One day, we found out we were going to have a supply teacher so of course before we all went into class we all decided to see how long it would take until we could make her leave.
It took one lesson. That's it. A single lesson, an hour, 60 minutes until she ran out of the classroom in tears. I feel bad to this day about it; we all saw how nervous she was, it must of been one of her first teaching spots and we tore into her like a pack of starving hyenas. Yet we were proud of ourselves. She left and we all cheered and celebrated that we broke her before laughing and high fiving.
It was so fucked, but that's what we did. We were the nightmare class and we relished that title.
Every guest speaker, every supply teacher, every chance we had, we took. We harassed, and tormented and heckled. Oliver always took it the furthest, throwing stuff and screaming until he was red in the face.

But there was one time I led the charge.
Back in those days, knowing the teachers first name was the key to the world, and one day, we had a supply teacher who I knew. Miss Joe Star. She was at the amateur dramatics group I went to with my family so I knew her decently well.
She never really liked me, but after what I did. She hated me.
Because she knew me she would constantly get me to answer questions, hand up or not. If I got it wrong, she would shake her head and say how she expected better from me. She humiliated me by doing this.
By now the class had caught onto how Miss Star sounded very much like Mister, so, in our usual game of torture the supply teacher, everyone said Mister. She noticed this of course and blamed me for starting it.
During lunch, I decided to tell everyone her first name and how it's a "boys" name. Mister Joe kicked off immediately. I could feel the hatred burning into me as she glared at me,it was obvious it was me who told everyone her first name but I didn't care. In my eyes, I had my revenge. She was a lot colder towards me back at the acting group after that.


Family life was difficult at points, my sister is 7 years older than me so was already a teenager by the time I was in year 5. It put a wall between us, she was a rebellious teenager and I was her little kid sister who cramped her style. I always wanted to hang out with her and her friends but she never let me except for a few times were I would then be laughed at. I didn't get why they were laughing at the time, but it was funny exploiting my innocent mind to them.

I remember the day they put me in a "sexual" situation and laughed. I had a crush on my sisters boyfriend at the time, and I mean a mega crush. Cheeks red, shyness kind of crush. Him and some of her friends were in her bedroom hanging out and I wanted to join and sit next to him. They let me even though my sister didn't want me there. Eventually everyone was laying on the bed, legs hanging off the side. I was excited to be slightly cuddled up to him. My sister had already told them that her dumb sister had a crush on her boyfriend. One of them then suggested I cuddle him properly. I was surprised they'd let me so I did. Then they said about putting my leg across him. So his side/leg was between mine. I was confused as to why they were giggling but I moved my leg slightly over him.
They encouraged me to move my leg over more before eventually one girl took my ankle and pulled my leg straight out across his belly. I was pressed against his side and everyone was laughing. I suddenly didn't feel like they were laughing with me so I got up and left. I didn't understand why they were laughing at me. I thought it might of been because they found me having a crush on an older boy funny. But it wasn't just that, they were laughing at a little girl having her leg draped over a teenage boy with her private parts pressed up against his hip.
I can't remember if my sister was laughing at that point, or if she was just annoyed I was there, or maybe even annoyed that I was cuddling her boyfriend. But she didn't stop anything.