Impact of sending email

Exhaustion. Very tired. Last night, I wanted to go to bed at 8.30pm which for me is unheard of. I'm carrying round all the reactions within me of how I used to react, the fear I used to feel, the guilt we all felt when we had "hurt" dad. It's a huge mash of dark, horrible, painful, lurching emotions.

We were so conditioned not to "hurt dad". We were aware that if we said or did certain things it would result in "hurting dad" - meaning an outburst of anger. The anger was always focussed on one of us. The result of the anger was to feel withered. Totally intimidated, completely powerless, without recourse or grace, no mercy or understanding. Just maximum force, like deciding to take peek at an active volcano - but directly above the spew of lava.

Then the guilt would wash over us. Look what you've done to dad. Don't you realise how hurt he is by what you did/said/acted? His anger, his lack of control, his pain.. this devastation now let loose is all because I did something to upset him. It doesn't matter if it was because I hadn't got a newspaper for him, or his slippers, or said the wrong thing, or asked for prayer for my angry dad or what. Anything which hurt him. We couldn't point out he was fat, grey, unfit.. couldn't criticise him in any way. None at all. Doing so unleashed the beast. So his reaction was our, my, fault.

That was as much mum's fault. It was as if the only way she could deal with dad's anger was a) not to provoke it, and b) if it was provoked pacify it, and c) pretend it didn't happen. The way not to provoke it was to ensure we as children never did anything which could cause the anger. That meant being right, good on everything. The result was obvious therefore, if dad did explode, it was our fault. The anger would pour out and we would be beating ourselves up as well as being beaten by dad (rarely physically). Afterwards mum would say "don't say anything, he does love you you know, ignore it and he'll calm down". That was as much talking about it was we were allowed.

So here I am. Almost forty years old and I'm sat here with deep groaning and angst because I have sent what I still believe to a rounded email to my dad saying I want a relationship with him but only if he is willing to both admit and work on where he is. The little boy within me is pertified, and all the old emotions and feelings are coursing through my body.

OOOOooooooooooooooooowwwwwwwwwwwww. It's painful. It hurts. It feels too much for me to contend with. I wish I were seeing my therapist today to help me with it, yet I know that if I were too I'd be scared stiff. It is just too big and hurts too much.

It's like I am taking on the beast of my childhood. The one whom I could not stand up to. The one whom I could not answer back to. The one whom I must not wake lest he eat me.

I guess that's the thing about explosions, for that is what we used to call them. An explosion is rarely controlled. It's usually when you least expect it, and it blows a part of you away. People lose possessions, limbs and lives when a bomb explodes. The resulting carnage requires years of grieving, support, loving and forgiveness. Many never recover. It's blasts through soft tissue like.. only a bomb can. Emotions are flung to one side. It's force is overwhelming - there's nothing to stand in it's way. It's arbitrary, it's full on, there's no reasoning, it's sickening in it's carnage. There is such a sense of loss. The senselessness of it all. Incomprehension. Why would someone want to do that? Guilt kicks in - "if only". If only I'd been somewhere else, taking a bit longer, been a bit faster. I blame myself. It was my fault. If only I'd done something different. It is impossible to make sense of it. Carnage. Loss. A black hole. A vacuum. A whirlpool of conflicting emotions. Thinking it over and over wondering what we could have done to change the outcome. Senseless. Unbelief. It can't be. It can't have. It didn't. It did. The pain. The vivid and torrid recollections. Oh it happened. But who can understand? I'm so alone. And I carry this pain deeper than the oceans, taller than the the sky, wider than the earth.

Myabe I got carried away there. But I can certainly relate to the sense of loss one experiences when a trauma hits. And living with my dad was a repeated trauma. Oh how I wish it were different. Wish it hadn't hapenned. Wish he's been nice and soft and caring - as I would be a different person today.

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