Breaking the Silent Barriers – The Unresolved Conflict
Wounds and hurts of childhood leave behind scars. Scars that begin to scald from time to time, periodically surfacing and bringing back the painful memories even in one’s adult life. Breaking the silent barrier on my journey of a deprived childhood, something that bothers me till date. When you take away from a child, the carefree life, the innocence of an indifferent attitude and burden them with unnecessary issues, you are bound to snatch away from a child, his or her right to living a life as one.
What one experiences in childhood makes one what they are as an adult and how one copes with life and all its intricate and complex situations.
The all familiar sound of the early morning radio woke me up as usual. Just as I tried to get my groggy eyes to open, I heard the sounds of an escalating argument from my parent’s room. I scurried off to brush my teeth lest I got into the radar. As I ventured back in, I saw my father leaving to work, without his usual breakfast and no lunch. My mother refused to get out of bed. My sibling, older by a few years, was totally unaffected or appeared to be so. I went up to my mother, who turned a deaf ear to my pleadings. She refused to budge. Such mornings were a constant part of my growing up. I was too young to make any sense out of the situation at that point but with time, I learnt the ropes and all too easily. After all, one needs to survive.
Days, stretched to weeks and as I grew up, even months of such unpredictable kitchen curfews by my mother. By the age of 10, I had started getting a pocket money that allowed me the freedom to buy myself food at school. I wasn’t complaining. But the silence and strain at home was deafening and scary, often making me feel low and morose, being unable to comprehend what lay ahead. But food wasn’t the only need. There were days when I went to school with unkempt hair as I did not know how to braid my waist length hair. I had become a butt of jokes in the class on more then a few occasions. The class teacher one day, picked at me for not doing my hair. Many decades later, the humiliation still lingers. I knew my hurt was not something my mother could perceive for she was lost in her own conflicts. I found my solution in the maid who came every morning. I started getting my hair done by her until I finally learnt how to do it myself. By the time I turned 12, I had learnt how to fix a meal for the family. There was no looking back. I had honed a survival skill. Although, we were a nuclear family and the upbringing quite modern, I grew up in a family or under a mother who was a complete sucker for the male predominant scenario, and hugely gender biased. Everything that went wrong, had to be a woman’s fault. Men could never be wrong. Because women were stepping out of their roles, men were being forced out of jobs. A woman’s role was to stay home and look after the family while the man brought in the finances. I was labelled a rebel as I could never stop arguing for the rights of women. Sadly, my fight started at home with my own mother.
Festival times were a nightmare for more reasons than one. I was made to help my mother with preparing the lavish spreads while the men just sat around and lazed. If I put up an argument on why the brother was not being asked, I would be told, he is a man. I would be married off elsewhere and there our reputation will be at stake if you didn’t know how to cook. These were the smaller disagreements. As her kitchen curfews became frequent, my time in the kitchen got extended and I started brining in small changes. No change was allowed. It was my mother’s territorial ground. I was told, in no uncertain words and on more than a few times. This is not your home. You can make your changes in your own home when you get married off. So, in a nutshell, I lived my childhood in my so-called temporary abode wondering what the future held in store for me. With my foray into the kitchen, I was also subjected to a lot of criticism. Life wasn’t easy. Each time, my father appreciated the food I cooked, we would hear the tell-tale cribbing of how my mother had toiled for years and made the same stuff, but no one ever appreciated her. The child within cringed. Since when did I become my mother’s competitor. There seemed to be nothing I could do which made her happy. Every attempt at something was received with dismissal and strong criticism. This drove me to further challenge myself to gain her attention. My achievements at school were never ever lauded. As a second child and a xx chromosome, the focus had always been on the elder xy sibling.
Most of my experiences with my own mother, and watching how my friend’s mothers behaved, led me to an early understanding that something wasn’t right. I could never comprehend where I was going wrong or what I could do to win her love. There was no resolution and I could not see any light at the end of the tunnel. Life just went on. My experiences, living with my mother only made me a very emotionally insecure person, full of self-doubt and massively low on self-esteem, with a longing for a maternal bond that I was deprived of. While I lived most of my childhood years in bitterness and anger, with the passage of time, I realised she wasn’t a mean person. She was just too engrossed in her own conflicts and could never engage with me emotionally. Childhood, the very word reminds one of innocence and joy. A period in one’s life when a child is made to feel protected and loved by the family consequently helping shape one’s personality and relationships in adult life. Unlike the expectation of such an idealistic scenario, some children live in trauma, the early childhood experiences affecting them in their later lives. Most times, adults lack the comprehension of situations, so imagine the ramifications of such early trauma in a child’s life. Leave alone, trying to understand the reasoning, or process why it happened, there is an immense amount of self-blame from a child’s perspective. Most part of my childhood life was akin to living on eggshells. I was able to relate to the sensitivity to every interaction, became cautious about the moods of others and most times was fearful about the response it would elicit as there was a constant fear. Fear of losing the bond or the relationship. I learnt to adapt by withholding my own emotions.
Many decades later, I realise I have survived through it all and today as a mother myself, I tread extremely cautiously in my own parenting, trying to ensure my children don’t face the lack of warmth, protection and maternal deprivation that I had to endure. I survived! Not all are lucky!
A survivor, still seeking answers to her deprived childhood!
Days, stretched to weeks and as I grew up, even months of such unpredictable kitchen curfews by my mother. By the age of 10, I had started getting a pocket money that allowed me the freedom to buy myself food at school. I wasn’t complaining. But the silence and strain at home was deafening and scary, often making me feel low and morose, being unable to comprehend what lay ahead. But food wasn’t the only need. There were days when I went to school with unkempt hair as I did not know how to braid my waist length hair. I had become a butt of jokes in the class on more then a few occasions. The class teacher one day, picked at me for not doing my hair. Many decades later, the humiliation still lingers. I knew my hurt was not something my mother could perceive for she was lost in her own conflicts. I found my solution in the maid who came every morning. I started getting my hair done by her until I finally learnt how to do it myself. By the time I turned 12, I had learnt how to fix a meal for the family. There was no looking back. I had honed a survival skill. Although, we were a nuclear family and the upbringing quite modern, I grew up in a family or under a mother who was a complete sucker for the male predominant scenario, and hugely gender biased. Everything that went wrong, had to be a woman’s fault. Men could never be wrong. Because women were stepping out of their roles, men were being forced out of jobs. A woman’s role was to stay home and look after the family while the man brought in the finances. I was labelled a rebel as I could never stop arguing for the rights of women. Sadly, my fight started at home with my own mother.
Festival times were a nightmare for more reasons than one. I was made to help my mother with preparing the lavish spreads while the men just sat around and lazed. If I put up an argument on why the brother was not being asked, I would be told, he is a man. I would be married off elsewhere and there our reputation will be at stake if you didn’t know how to cook. These were the smaller disagreements. As her kitchen curfews became frequent, my time in the kitchen got extended and I started brining in small changes. No change was allowed. It was my mother’s territorial ground. I was told, in no uncertain words and on more than a few times. This is not your home. You can make your changes in your own home when you get married off. So, in a nutshell, I lived my childhood in my so-called temporary abode wondering what the future held in store for me. With my foray into the kitchen, I was also subjected to a lot of criticism. Life wasn’t easy. Each time, my father appreciated the food I cooked, we would hear the tell-tale cribbing of how my mother had toiled for years and made the same stuff, but no one ever appreciated her. The child within cringed. Since when did I become my mother’s competitor. There seemed to be nothing I could do which made her happy. Every attempt at something was received with dismissal and strong criticism. This drove me to further challenge myself to gain her attention. My achievements at school were never ever lauded. As a second child and a xx chromosome, the focus had always been on the elder xy sibling.
Most of my experiences with my own mother, and watching how my friend’s mothers behaved, led me to an early understanding that something wasn’t right. I could never comprehend where I was going wrong or what I could do to win her love. There was no resolution and I could not see any light at the end of the tunnel. Life just went on. My experiences, living with my mother only made me a very emotionally insecure person, full of self-doubt and massively low on self-esteem, with a longing for a maternal bond that I was deprived of. While I lived most of my childhood years in bitterness and anger, with the passage of time, I realised she wasn’t a mean person. She was just too engrossed in her own conflicts and could never engage with me emotionally. Childhood, the very word reminds one of innocence and joy. A period in one’s life when a child is made to feel protected and loved by the family consequently helping shape one’s personality and relationships in adult life. Unlike the expectation of such an idealistic scenario, some children live in trauma, the early childhood experiences affecting them in their later lives. Most times, adults lack the comprehension of situations, so imagine the ramifications of such early trauma in a child’s life. Leave alone, trying to understand the reasoning, or process why it happened, there is an immense amount of self-blame from a child’s perspective. Most part of my childhood life was akin to living on eggshells. I was able to relate to the sensitivity to every interaction, became cautious about the moods of others and most times was fearful about the response it would elicit as there was a constant fear. Fear of losing the bond or the relationship. I learnt to adapt by withholding my own emotions.
Many decades later, I realise I have survived through it all and today as a mother myself, I tread extremely cautiously in my own parenting, trying to ensure my children don’t face the lack of warmth, protection and maternal deprivation that I had to endure. I survived! Not all are lucky!
A survivor, still seeking answers to her deprived childhood!
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