FIRST ENCOUNTERS

Meeting S.!

Dating has always been a serious commitment for me as I always felt that the person I was with would some day become my wife. Ever since my second girlfriend, I had closed myself off to really opening up and sharing. When I entered University, I dated one or two girls but the relationship always ended quickly and I began to feel it was not worth it. In fact, I decided that I would stop looking and just concentrate on my studies. However, when all hope had gone I looked up from my work in a tutorial one day and spied the most beautiful girl. I could not take my eyes off her and I tried to hide my glances. It was S. sitting so quiet and angelic, her wonderful smile and beautiful hair, lips and eyes had me dumbstruck. I thought to myself that I would only be able to admire her from afar since a beautiful girl like that had to have a boyfriend. Therefore, I decided to admire from afar and if possible sneak a chat here and there.

I would look at this graceful woman walking into the library and walking across campus. I got to know a few of her friends and in the process learned that S. needed some books I had. Now I had a large selection of history books which I never lent because I was fearful of losing them, but I just knew I could trust S. with them. So in lending my books to her I got my chance to talk to S., whose voice I remember was so sexy and warming that it melted my heart. I remember getting butterflies in my stomach and being unable to finish my words, which was an effort. Then one day while in the Library I ran into a friend of S's who had just come from where she was sitting, I just could not keep it in and I blurted out that I really liked her and that was one of the reasons I was lending her my books. G. was excited and I found out there and then that she was single, I know G. went back to tell her, from then things began to change.

I had decided that I would pursue this very slowly, if at all, since I had been messed up so many times before by girls and I did not want to put my all into it and if I did S. might not feel the same. I know the next time I spoke to S. there was a difference, one of attraction, and I looked into S. eyes to see how serious she was. I did feel the attraction, it became very easy to talk to S., and I expressed how I felt on more than one occasion. Talking about our dreams and what we wanted in a mate was so similar, I liked the feeling of no rushing and it did take a long time before I even held her hand. I really thought that S. was a fragile flower and I did not want to damage her in any way. Coming to the University for class was exciting since I now had a reason to do so. Spending time with S. felt like a holiday, a dream and I liked that I could sit and listen to her talk all day. S. had the most beautiful eyes, ones you could get lost in. Her hair was long and wavy just the way I liked it and her body was small and I wanted so many times to hold her and envelop her, but I had to restrain myself.

I found it easy to let my guard down and I began to tell her how I felt. I did not want to have sex before I got married, I did not smoke or drink, I could cook and I spoke of my scary mother in case one day S. would have to meet her. After a few months, I began to hold S's hand. I remember sitting once at a lunch table on campus and touching her finger and feeling spasms running along my spine. It was a wonderful feeling especially since I had not felt that way since D. I started to skip and jump and I really began to feel again. I wondered if there was hope that this would develop into a life-long relationship. I felt honoured when she told me about herself, her dreams, her hopes, her fears and about her family. I wanted this girl more than I wanted any I had dated before.

My friends however behaved oddly when it came to S. They would tell me to be careful that S. was too forceful and rushing things. I remember M. my best friend at the time questioning me on whether I was ready for a commitment and if I was serious about her. Others like C. and S. would wonder if she would fit in with the crowd and my family. In all cases, I told them that their fears were unwarranted and that S. was not rushing and she would fit in because she was like me. I began to speak about S. to my mom and grandparents and the response seemed to me very good. However, I was always mindful that my mother never approved of the girls I chose and the rest did not really care once it did not embarrass them. I do admit that there were times when I did choose my friends over S. and I know I was being selfish, especially when I chose to lime with M. rather than S., which really got S. upset since it really looked like I preferred M. than her. I had realized that M. was very obsessive about our friendship and did not like to share me with even my girlfriend. Other times I would lime with S. or C. instead of S believing that loyalty to them was more important, but honestly when I think of it I was more loyal and true than they were. I did feel guilty since S. was far more a true friend than anyone I had known before, but I did not do anything about it.

As our relationship bloomed, I really knew inside that this was the girl I was waiting for. I felt so at ease and relaxed. With S., all my problems went away and she was kind, loving, a friend and more. I was the type of person who liked giving gifts and flowers and I loved giving S. beautiful flowers. My first gift was a pair of earrings which I picked out with the help of my mother, but when I gave it to S. and I told her how my mom helped she got upset. I do understand since they were really not chosen by me but from a dominering mother who tried to take control of our relationship. The question really was who was dating S.? I felt that I had ruined my chances. When my grandfather died I remembered how S. wanted to come, all through the funeral I was looking out for her and I was saddened by the fact that she could not make it. It was just after this that I asked S. on our first date, it was the movie Forest Gump and I was nervous. I vaguely remembered her meeting my brother during this period and I know he liked her but his face really showed jealousy. I picked her up where she stayed near the University, a place mind you that never allowed boys to enter the gate. I waited for her outside and when she came out she looked so beautiful and I escorted her to the car and we were on our way. We went to a drive in movie and just before the end of the movie, I began to cry, I had not cried for my grandfather and I just let out my feelings of loss. It was the first time I had ever cried with a girl and I did not feel bad about it since S. made me feel so at home and wanted. After the show we traveled to a lookout by the sea where we had our first kiss. I was a bit nervious more because I did not want anyone to catch us especially my brother. The kiss was magical since S. lips were so soft and warm. I felt as though we were attached to each other and I know up to this day I still remember it. I felt all warm inside and I wanted to get more of her, and as for her mouth well let's just say she tasted great. After that kiss I dropped her home and when I left, I felt on cloud nine.

Around this time, (I believe around December), I also met members of her family at a Chinese restaurant. S. and J. were getting married and they wanted to meet me, it was a good night and I enjoyed the company, S. specially. From this one date I knew that I liked S.'s family and I could fit in. Then it was off to meet S.'s mom. I traveled to San Fernando where S. lived and when I reached, I was scared like hell. I know we had a date and that I tried my best to hide in the couch so no one would get at me. M. S.'s mom was very nice and made me feel comfortable and I left feeling as if I was accepted to an extent. At University I pulled S. aside and asked her to go steady with me and her reply was that she thought we were already. When my grandmother died 6 months after my grandfather, S. came to the funeral and all I could think about was her, it was so overwhelming and I liked only thinking of her.

I knew the next step was to bring her home to meet my mother, to me that was the true test since like it or not I wanted her approval. I am not too clear of the particular date but after really telling her about my mom she was really brave to want to meet her and I felt proud and honoured to be with a wonderful girl who dared to stand up to my mothers scrutiny. I was surprised at how well my mother took to S. and I wondered what the game was. For me the true test came when my mother asked me to invite S. on a trip to the islands, where they had a guesthouse. Yet, my mother had also invited a number of aunts and a friend of mine, C. I asked S. and I just felt her hesitation since I had explained to her how horrible my mother was and what to expect. When I took S. "Down the Islands" I was pleasantly surprised since for the next two days my mother took to her as well as my brother. They both told me S. was a nice girl and compared to the rest a real gem. I know my dad liked her because he talked to her more often than he talked to the girls I had brought home in the past. The only moment I did not like was when they spoke about not rushing into marriage and just dating, which seemed to me a message that they were not going to approve that.

With this approval, I felt even more relaxed, we started to visit each other and spend the weekend. When I visited S. I would sleep in her room while she slept with her mom and when she visited me, I would sleep on the floor while she slept in my bed. While this remained the same when I visited her at her home, my mom allowed both of us to take naps in the same bed. S. and I would spend a lot of time on the phone talking and we would write love notes and letters to each other. Each contained the deepest sentiments of love and affection and to this date we keep them in boxes. When S. came to visit, I would worry about her until she came, especially if she had to travel. When we graduated, we did it together and when her cousins were getting married, we went together. I loved being with S. and I felt proud she was at my side, what made it worth while was her wonderful smile and happiness when she saw me and I knew both of us felt wanted and needed. After graduation, I had to work on the North Coast and spend a whole two years away from her and I got very depressed. I would spend my nights thinking of S and what I could be doing at that moment with her. I would walk for 20 minutes to the nearest payphone to call her and just hear her voice and when my phone card ran out I would cry.

I knew from the time apart that I could not live without S. and I really wanted to marry this girl from South. We had discussed it when we were down the islands and I knew that she felt the same, but convincing our parents would be another hurdle. I had become brave enough in my relationship with S. to speak to my mom about us since I felt that my mom liked S. When I told C. that I wanted to get engaged and then wait a year to get married she just sat in the dark and never looked at me. All she said was ok and I left feeling very unsure of the future. I did not feel the same when S. and I told M. S.'s Mom.

I will leave off here for another post on our preparations for marriage and the problems, which we had.

THINKING OF MY WIFE S.

SITTING AND THINKING . . . .

Sitting here at my computer,studying some work and getting sleepy, I glance across into the next room where my wife is sleeping. S. looks so at peace when she is asleep and I feel so happy just watching her... mind you I plan to head right off to bed as soon as I finish this post. Anyway, my work and the tropical heat have really put me off from writing these days. I have been thinking of my wife and when we met about 12 years ago and it does bring back a lot of good memories.

Meeting my wife in a tutorial at the University and courting her were really wonderful and special. Writing about it is important because as I get older I want to look back to all the times I had with a wonderful woman God gave me as a gift. It is not enough just to write a few points as everything about my life with S. is important. I can write volumes on how much I love her, so in the next post I will.

We both have had trying times and I know I have been the cause of many of them. The fact remains, I love my wife and would not give her up for anything. As I have noted in a past post there is no one who would come close to her and when I say no one I mean both man and woman. Hopefully I can write more this week. I really want to take my time with this because leaving anything out really detracts from the life experience.

I just wanted to write this down as it was on my mind.

CONSORT

"MY WIFE"

I have been really tired of late and took some time out to sort out myself. Now that I am back I want to dedicate some time to "My Wife". S. is part of me in every way and loving her really has made me a whole person. Life without her would be dull and boring and not to mention not worth living. God is the centre of my heart but my wife is also in there. I know that I have hurt her in so many ways and building back trust and romance will take a while. I plan in the next few posts to write on how we met, our marriage, my adulterous actions and our rebuilding from scratch.

S. has been the corner stone of my life even when I was trying to push her away, but my heart did not let me. I know S. is a special woman one who has time and time again proven herself to God. I know in so many ways I don't deserve her and yet I do. For a long time I was a very selfish person not allowing anyone to love me or to get a handle on me. I did not want to feel vulnerable and at the mercy of anyone. I pushed love away even in the wonderful package that God gave me in S.

To push her away I did everything to make her see that I was not worthy and she should get rid of me. In the end it was God and her love that melted my walls and gates that I had carefully built up. S. has made me "feel" again, to love again and to hope again. The warm feeling I get inside when she is in the room can only be balanced by the feeling of burning passion I get when she touches me. Loving S. is so liberating and encompassing that no one can understand that personal feeling but me.

As I write S. and I are on a new journey one that God has set us on. This journey of exploration is about the two of us and the new love, the new relationship and the new unity God has put together in us. There are days when S. is at a low especially since I have done so much in the past to destroy her confidence in herself. I see the hurt and pain, the hate and love and the insecurities and fears she has. I am dedicated to our love and know that it is real, it is S. that I love no other. I can express this till the day I die but it is only in living it that it is real. I am the one who is now on the flip side of 3 years ago. I have to learn to wait for someone who has to rebuild love, romance, confidence and trust in someone who rejected it completely.

I know God gave me the choice either to leave or to stay, staying meant the uncertainty of S. not wanting me again and yet knowing and trusting that God would repair all. So things have come full circle in a journey that continues. I stand by my wife and I am here when she wants and not there when she does not want. i know also that I am the man God made for her as she is the woman God made for me.

My being gay never had a chance since my love for her overpowered it. I know that in the past that my gay feelings were real and that it nearly overpowered me. The thing is I have a more stable and wonderful life with S. I know if God had not miraculously taken away those demons and feelings, my life would have continued to be a miserable one because it could not compare with what I have with S. even in the worst moments. I know this because for the 3 years I went out and explored those feelings I never felt happy or contented. It is only when I am with S. that I do.

This is just an opening post on my wife who as I speak sleeps all wrapped up in a blanket. My love for her is so overpowering and being in love with her has renewed me and made me a true man. The thing is there are many people out there who would say that there is too much of a gulf, that it would be better to start a fresh new life, but I know there is no one out there like S. and I would prefer to be alone and miserable.

STASIS

Too Tired To Write . . . . . .

This week is shaping up to be a stressful week. I am away from work for 4 days because I am presently attending a conference. From 9 in the morning to 9 at night and I want to sleep all the time.

So all I have energy for is to read what I have written so far. Because of this I think I will leave the next post for when I am not tired and I have free time.

Message to myself is well noted. . . . . . . .

FAMILIAR

FRIENDSHIP ? ? ? ?

I was sitting in my bed today and considering my life growing up and what it is like now and something struck me. I realized that friendship is very much overrated and nonexistent. I grew up a loner and I liked it, I always had fun by myself and the few friends I did have never seemed to truly stay around for very long. Or, what was worse, they always seemed to be nice at first and when you thought you could trust them they would let you down. My dad always noted that the friends my brother and I seemed to attract were those who wanted to use us for some reason. I do admit on looking back that he was right in many instances.

In school, I was very different in that my conversations seemed either too mature or children categorized them as strange. I was made fun of by the boys in class and this caused me to never hang out with the guys at school. Most of my friends were girls who understood me better than myself. I did have guy friends like one boy called Joe who was from Britain; we were really good friends and talked a lot, we use to hang out with a girl called C. and the three of us were inseparable. However his parents were called back to England and we never saw him again. Up to my late teens I wondered how he was doing. Other than this I only had two good friends and both were girls. The few guys friends I did have in my teenage years were always hanging around for either a drop home, to borrow what I had or to just try to look good by making me look and feel bad. I always recognized it too late into the so called friendship but when I did, I would stop hanging out with them.

My idea of friendship was one where I felt the person was a buddy who understood you and cared enough to understand, listen and be there for you as a person. This individual was not there to use or abuse the friendship and should be there in good and bad times as well as be an impartial judge. But I also felt friendship should go so much further and I was never able to find that something further in anyone. Even the few friends I did have would sooner or later become very possessive and try to manipulate or control the friendship. I got very bored with people, not because they had to be exciting, but because they used me or brought nothing positive to my life. So called friends would want me to help them with things like homework or with a problem and when it was my turn they were never around.

I am a great listener and at one time gave great advice, I never judged and tried as best as possible to be unbiased. One guy who hung out with me in my late teens wanted to steal my girlfriend and another used me as a stepping stone to get into a particular type of crowd. As I moved into my twenties, many people used me too get an opening to hang out with my brother or worse hang out with my mom. They were never real and I grew to realize that friendship led to betrayal, yet, I did feel alone a lot and wanted that one true friend I could confide in. My search resulted in two friends whom I later realized were not good for me.

The first was a girl A. who was born on the same day as I but who was a few years older. I met her in a youth group and from the start we hit it off. I did not see her as a potential mate but a true friend. We confided in each other, called each other at all hours and hung out all the time. Yet when she got a boyfriend and she wanted me to make him part of the group, trouble began brewing. It manifested when they broke up and she demanded that I to stop liming with him. I could not because he had become a good buddy. This control was not what I wanted. We slowly lost track of each other and I moved on.

Then there was M., who I meet while at University and whom I felt was a good friend, one I could hang out with. I confided in him, had intellectual conversations with him and we helped each other when either had problems. But when I met my future wife he became possessive and kept asking me to go out when I was going to spend time with my girl. On many occasions he would question me on my feelings for her and ask if she was right for me. I thought he was just concerned for me and that he did not want me to get hurt. My wife S. noted later that M. never made her feel comfortable and she felt as though it were a competition for me. When M. and I started working together and shared a room I really felt I had found a true good friend. However, it was after my wife and I got married that I truly realized that M. was really sexually interested in me and hated the fact that I got married. He actually worked with my mother on many occasions to try to break us up. Once this was exposed I cut all ties with him.

I did not want friends because I could not trust people, I have realized that no one can be trusted, not even oneself. I thought I was a good friend to my wife because I always based my relationships on a good friendship but my secret gay affairs really destroyed all sense of trust and friendship between us. My wife noted this, that our friendship should have been strong enough to enable me to talk about the desires I was having for men. What my adultery proved was that not even I was a true friend.

My gay feelings really prevented me from having friends because it was this dark secret in a country that hates gays that made me scared to trust. Also, and I know this is a major cause, my mom and dad never made me feel as though I could trust them and certainly they were no role models for friendship. Even though I grew up wanting but not wanting a friend, I also believed that I could never truly be a friend myself. For a long time after my second girlfriend D. I could not trust anyone with my secrets or love, this was because it hurt so much to share love with someone and then have everything pulled away. I did not care to share myself with anyone or allow anyone to get to know me, many people would say how I just dropped them off the map or treated them like dirt, but it was a way to protect myself when I saw in them things that made me realize that they were not being true.

The only person who I could say in my whole entire life was a true human friend and continues to be is my wife S... S. is the only person I met who really helped me to open up once more, especially opening up to loving once again. I was even able to tell her about my struggle with gay feelings. After we got married I knew that I did not need anyone else in my life and having friends only took away from us. Yes, I would admit that there were times I even tried to bond with my brother's friends but in all of the cases I did not fit in or felt uncomfortable. It was through my affair that I truly learned that I was as bad as all the people who used me and I was even worse than they. The one person my wife thought she could count on in a crunch betrayed her in the worst way. I even used the argument that I needed male friends and how could she expect me to be stuck at home without friends. It was only after my wife really showed me how much I was not a friend that I felt ashamed of myself. I was ashamed because I had said I would never do such a thing to her as my dad did and I was always criticizing others for being fake, when I was the one who was fake.

What I know is that the only friend you can have is God and that you cannot trust people to be a friend, because at any one time those people can be a tool of the devil to destroy others. The only friendship with a human being is one that is ordained and defined by God. I know, because I have learned the hard way. It is even harder to rebuild a friendship with the person you love when you yourself destroyed it in the first place. If it were not for God, I know my wife and I would have long ago parted ways and certainly not be friends.

BEING REAL

“RECOLLECTION & REALISM . . . . . . . .”

I was pondering about all my interests from early childhood to now and this post deals with it. For many years if you were to ask me about who I was and what I liked I would mutter a few things but honestly I could not tell you much since I really did not like to think about me. You see for a long time I did not like who I was or the things I did, I had the tendency to make up things and become what I said I was. I did this as a defense against my mom and the world, so much so that my lies became real to me and I lived them out. I developed deception to the point that a lie was muddled with truth to become real. My wife had pointed this out to me so many times in the past that I refused to accept that this was true. In the past it would take S. to push me to realize my problems and it became frustrating since I got defensive and turned the situation to focus on her. I did not want to deal with issues and preferred to deflect, but in doing so I was slowly losing my identity and becoming a empty shell.

I would say here that if it were not for God in her life and his love for me I would be lost or dead by now, certainly divorced and alone. I have to admit I am a stubborn man, I like having control of my situation and I did not like any person or God to have a say in my life. I preferred to deal with problems and felt that only I should. I felt that if I could fix myself, I could then approach God as a good servant and in doing this I made it worse. God, I know now, would use my wife to bring up major areas in my life that needed to be brought up and dealt with. A cycle had emerged in my life of late where things would be going along without any fighting or issues emerging but still nothing was moving forward in our marriage. My wife and I were taking care of the children while we were working, I had become complacent in that I felt that my marriage would simply work itself out and that God would see us through. I felt that just opening up to God would enable all my hurts and pains and those between my wife and me to repair itself with minimum effort. In fact what I was doing was not dealing with it at all. My wife made a good point that God did not bring her into my life to become my psychologist and she did not want to become a shrink dealing with a child who would not grow up.

I understood this because for a long time I was afraid of growing up and taking responsibility for my actions. Yes, I was a coward in many respects, especially when it came to sharing and dealing with personal issues. For a long time I hated myself and had a low self-esteem issue which I allowed to flourish. Thus I would always put myself down and blame myself for problems; I was abusing myself. I also escaped to this area of my life because if I did not think I was a good person then I had an explanation for what I did. If I wanted to get out of this cycle and really become a man I needed to grow up, shake off all my insecurities and inner demons and confront all my closed boxes. A major part of dealing with this was recognizing that I was a very selfish person, one who did not think of others but me and protecting me from people. I had developed this in defense against my mother and held on to it. Even when I got married, I did not allow my wife in fully and kept many things quiet and to myself. This was unfair to her and really showed I did not trust, a foundation of any relationship. Dedicating my life to God was truly the turning point. I really let go of my stubborn nature and put my whole life in his hands. After that I turned to my wife who for so long had loved me unconditionally and who loved me in spite of all the pain I put her through. Since I had gotten married I had lost focus of the fact that my wife was part of me and that, as part of me, she shared in me. But I really had closed myself to love because of all my past experiences and in doing so I lost me for a while. I built a wall around my heart and yet I knew in that heart held a love for my wife that had to come out some time.

For years I had built up a cold iron foundation which allowed me to do wrong things without thinking about the consequences. I hated myself and went about telling myself that I was ugly, not worthy, evil and unlovable. I did not trust myself and I did not want to hear about love. For a long time when my wife told me I was handsome I did not believe her or put her down for it. I know this hurt her very much and if it were not for God telling her I was the one and to hold on we would have gone our separate ways a long time ago. At the beginning of this year I began truly opening up to my wife and telling her feelings I had suppressed and secrets I held back or felt she should not know. For a time I would stall for fear of hurting her but this has been slowly improving. For the first time since I was a child I understood how love was a natural and unconditional part of a person’s being. Letting go of my wall was a liberating experience; even more so that I could share fully with the one I love...something she and I thought would never happen.

For a long time loving myself and knowing myself were nonexistent. To really love God, my wife and our children I had to find myself and know the man God created. Dealing with all the hurts and pains I put my wife through will be dealt with separately in another post. What I am writing here is the man I am and the things that I like that made me a person. Below are my interests from childhood to now: some which, although I developed them out of hurt and pain, are real and those that I love and just suppressed over time.

As a child I loved nature, exploring and just living life. I did not want to miss anything and I would stay up till late at night because sleep stopped me from finding out things. I enjoyed the outdoors, especially the soil, you could catch me up late at night digging in the dirt. Once my parents found me digging dirt in the early morning while everyone else was sleeping. Also from an early age I loved scary movies and would find myself between my parents in their bed after having sneaked to watch one. I liked watching scary movies and even as late as my early thirties a good suspense was exciting. In my early years horrors and suspense movies excited me because they were, for one, fascinating and, second, they really made me wonder about the world we live in and the people and things out there that could create in people such fear. Also the types of monsters and the story line or plot really captivated me. I really found that after I watched a show my mind would run away with me and I imagined these things to be real and I would come up with all kinds of ways of destroying or vanquishing the enemy. I must admit I use to scare myself silly and was not able to sleep. In the last few years I have really come to understand that horrors can really influence people to explore the dark side of life to embrace evil and to really in some cases repeat or improve on them in the real world. I was always interested in Vampire movies, my first being “Barnabas” but these days many horror movies have no plot or story line, so I get very bored.

My childhood was full with playing with my dogs and even sleeping alongside them when I could. I loved animals and my parents always said they were amazed by the fact that animals did not run away from me. I would search for snakes and lizards and, when I could, catch frogs for fun. I would put lizards on my shoulder and walk around, they would sit there never trying to move. A few times I brought garden snakes inside and let them slither on my hand. I remember once I held a coral snake and brought it inside. My family including my grandparents saw it and freaked. They rushed towards me and shook it out of my hand and then killed it. I remember them saying they were amazed that it did not bite me. As I grew up, my love for animals grew, I would walk up to people’s dogs and pat them while the owners mouth dropped open and they would say that their pets never went to people. I also had a lot of other animals as pets including: pigeons, rabbits, chickens, squirrels, parrots, canaries and fish. But I loved dogs most of all and still do, all animals had a place and still do with me. I once even brought some baby rats home and my mother made me kill them and in another case I brought a kitten home and I had to return it because my mom hated cats.

My love of animals did not stop at just holding and keeping them as pets, I remember raising abandoned baby pigeons, feeding them from young and having them thinking I was their parent. When I watched movies about animals I got very upset and would cry if the animal died or got hurt. Even today I don’t watch movies that have animals in it. I take a determined interest, even now, to look at birds that fly in my yard and I get very upset with my dogs for killing a dove or black bird. Animals to me were just like humans and I would treat them as such. They were the only ones I could talk too, especially when I wanted to deal with a problem. I even thought they could understand and answer back. The first dog I remember having was a Doberman who died from poisoning. I still remember sitting with her in my lap and crying. Up to this day the emotions and images are still there. My brother and I would have mock funerals when our pets died and we would bury them in the yard. My rabbit, called Princess, had red eyes and followed me everywhere, Princess lived in the house, but one weekend while I was at the beach she died and when I returned home my dad told me he had to get rid of her. The story then changed later on to my mother no longer wanting me to have it in the house and she wanted him to get rid of it. Dad told me he took it to a rabbit farm where she could live out her days. To this day I remember how painful this moment was.

The real world was not a happy place for me, as I have noted in another post, and to escape this world I would day dream a lot. I would go in and out of a fantasy realm where I was the hero and where people like my mother could not get me. I loved to dream and make up stories, in my stories and dreams I was the hero and I was always on a quest to save someone. When I was in a stressful situation I would usually zone out and start a dream. I remember once in class at the age of 8 my teacher asking me a question in English class and I was not paying attention. I told her that I was not interested and that I was off on an adventure. Of course I got punished. My dreams became so real to me that when I was answering people in the real world I usually answered them in my head. This would get them upset because they would say they had to ask me a number of times the same question and I would say I answered it, when the answer I gave was in my head. The earliest dream I remember as a child was one where I was an angel saving two beautiful women from evil men. I was flying and was shot in the wings by these men, was forced to land but I had saved the girls and that’s all that mattered. I enjoyed dreams where I had wings and flying, escaping was always good since I was in control and free. My interest in dreams continued well into adulthood, I would remember every detail of my dreams which on numerous occasions I would try to write down. In one case I dreamt a friend’s house and an attack on her father. When I told her about it she told me that I freaked her out because I described it perfectly. A few weeks later her dad was attacked by robbers and when she came to school she told me to stay away from her because I was strange. There were many instances of this while I was growing up and after a while I stopped telling people my dreams because they thought I was weird. It was only when I met my wife that I again began talking to her about my dreams. I know a lot of people look to astrology or a dream book to understand dreams, for me dreams are either from the devil or God and they always have a meaning.

In my teenage years I started to dive into reading. This was a time when I would stay in my room and absorb myself in books by Enid Blyton. Fairy tales were always a good escape and I read a lot of adventure books including such books as “The Famous Five”. I also became interested in books like the “Lion, Witch and the Wardrobe” which made me cry, especially when the Lion was killed. In my late teens I was interested in Sci-Fi written by Isaac Asimov and books like this. I had once read Tolken’s “Lord of the Rings” and the “Hobbit” when I was 19 years old and read them over until I lost the books. It’s funny; I always said they should make it into a movie and who knew that nearly 12 years later they would. By my twenties I was suddenly interested in horror writers, books written by Steven King were intriguing and I would digest them and move on to the next, but they soon got boring and I lost interest after a few years. These days I read historical stories that closely follow historical events and a few fantasy books where the story line is out of this world. Books were good for me, as many of my ideas and thoughts came from them. Also I was able to escape and recover from my mother’s ‘licks’ and abuse. I numbed my mind and my flesh from all the pain. The world around me would disappear and I stood in the centre of the book’s plot. I became a character and no one from the real world could get me. Sometimes it would take a shaking from some one to bring me back to reality. These days I like relating stories to my children when I can and living life with my wife is great so that I do not need to escape into a book.

Along with reading came my interest in history and history books, this out of all my interests is my favouite. As a child my great grand-mother use to talk to me about the days when there were no cars and television. Granny A. would talk about her days riding in a carriage and a time when people lived a simple life. I was mesmerized by this and wanted to know more. In school the only subject I liked was history and my history teacher Mr. J. made it fun- especially the days of the Amerindians, the Spanish and the coming of the French and English to our shores. I did well at every level and continued my studies in history at the University level. I loved history books, not only on local history but all world history. Understanding world civilizations that went before really helped me understand why people behaved they way they did, added to which I was a history book collector. When I did my research on my family history, which I really enjoyed, I realized that I was good at remembering dates and times as well as events. I continued to pursue history because it was one area where my family could not touch me or say they were better. History continued to be my focus and the career I chose is made up of a large component of it. However, it did have its bad side- in that, because my focus and love for history was so single tracked, I put everything second place to it. My wife on many occasions told me literally I was making it my wife and I agree I was. I put more energy into it than any other area. It is only now that I can see the danger of an obsession like the one I had for history. The history of Russia is one of the most fascinating to me and I have fallen in love with its rich history and culture. One day I hope to visit Russia with my wife and experience its history.

History also had a part to play in my hobby of Stamp Collecting. From 1987 to about 1996 I was so focused on stamps and “First Day Cover” collections that I spent all my allowance on it. I liked stamps for their history and because of how rare they were. It was fun getting a stamp and reading about its history. I would admit I liked the idea of a stamp growing in value as it aged and hoped one day to own a stamp that was worth a lot of money. But by the time I was 26, I began to lose interest, and now, I may, when I remember, buy a stamp or First Day Cover but it is not a must. I also did not have the money to buy stamps all the time.

In my late teens I wanted to know more about my country and I joined a hiking club with a few friends from my church youth group. In the next couple of years we hiked, climbed and walked all over Trinidad’s Northern Range as well as other parts. I loved hiking because it brought me close to nature and God. I loved the peace, the quiet, the trees, the fresh air and the sounds of nature. I loved to explore and the freedom of movement really felt liberating. I liked reaching destinations where no one else ever went before and seeing the landscape especially the forest, caves, rivers and waterfalls just took my breath away. It was also something I could say I accomplished using my physical energy and would prove to everyone I was not lazy. For a time it was also a form of penance for my sins, working out my problems and the wrongs I did by a strenuous hike really seemed to help especially the long periods where I had time to think and process life. It was also something I did that no one else in my family would do so it gave me a sense of power and control, especially when I came home and told everyone about it. As I got older and I began to work, hiking became less and less practical. The last time I did anything closely related was when I kayaked down a river in Massachusetts in 2002. One day when my kids get a little older I want to take them on hikes, that’s if they are interested. I had a dream once to try out as many extreme sports as I could and if God would allow I would love to try hand-gliding, sky-diving and mountain climbing. A combination of history and hiking has me interested in traveling across Europe, Asia and South America.

I come from a long line of cooks and everyone home cooked, if you could not something was very wrong with you. I started from early childhood to watch my mom cook and record in my head the recipe and ingredients. My grandmother also was a good cook and she hired a lot of servants from Grenada and up the islands that cooked for her. I used to ask questions about what they put into food and I noted the taste in the food. By my teenage years when I was allowed to touch the utensils and stove I began to experiment with food. I loved to look at recipe books and try them. Of course my early attempts came out horribly but with time I got better. I like food and I found when I ate outside the food either tasted bad or I could improve it or it would taste good and I would want to copy it. A major reason I started cooking is due to the fact that my mom’s cooking was not that hot. When it came to cake and certain things, yes it was good, but you know that saying “when it was good it was very, very good but when it was bad it was horrid”. For as long as I remember I made food from scratch and liked following recipes. My cakes, puffs and Bar-B-Que were good and so were my brownies. I felt very complete and happy to see people satisfied and happy after they ate my food. Cooking also helped me deal with stress. I put all my emotions into my cooking and I really worked on being patient with it. I have actually done some catering on the side. After I got married I took to cooking less and less as I started to do other things. It is only now that I have found a renewed love of cooking not because of stress but because I love to cook for my wife and children.

These are just some of my major interests while growing up and which I have come to recognize are part of who I was. There are some good things I take from these and I still hold as interests. Others I have not mentioned are my love for planting and seeing things grow from seeds. It was said when I was a child that anything I planted grew and my grandmother said I had a green thumb. I loved growing my own vegetables and flowers but I stopped that when I was a teenager. I would love some day to plant my own garden, maybe when I retire. Also I love to take long drives and explore roads and tracks. I would also drive to the top of the lookout and just sit and allow the wind to blow in my hair or just think. It is while I am driving that I do my best thinking and have the best conversations with God. Television used to be very addictive but since my children really have control of the remote I only have time for an occasional movie, it is a real joy to see myself in them and also their reactions to the cartoons they watch. Many of my interests were once done out of pain and hurt, but now I have a new positive and God centered outlook towards my interests and will continue with those in my family who are interested. This is just a small part of who Daniel is.

BROTHER DEAREST

“My Mother's Only Son”

Honestly, as I write this post, I can truly say that my brother and I do not have a relationship and to tell the truth I don’t know him that well. To me A. was someone I lived with, more like a roommate who once you leave college you remember off and on, a sad fact, I know. A. and I were the only 2 children/boys my parents had and we were total opposites when it came to everything. In fact, piecing together life with my brother has been a tough order but one I had to unravel to have healing in my life. The major thing that comes to my mind when I think of A. is our physical fights and disagreements.

A. was born 2 years after me and in the same month as me. The only thing was A. was the same star sign as my mother and had the same temperament as her. As noted in another post the only things I remember about him before the age of 5 are what my mother told me. He was a very cautious child and did not go to every and anybody, which was unlike me. He cried for my mother a lot and did not eat every and anything, in fact, my mom found it hard to feed him since he fussed about what to eat. A. was a good observer and watched before he actually attempted anything. From early my parents had given him a teddy which he held on for dear life and which was his comfort zone till he was well into his late teens. I remember defending him against people who made fun of it. A. also sucked his thumb which like the teddy was something he carried into adulthood so much so that his thumb had become flat and double-jointed. As noted my mom had said I use to crawl into his crib and paste him with the lipstick and bite him which lead to punishment. I remember one story that my mom gave that once after picking us up from my grandparents my brother realized his teddy was missing and he cried until dad had to go back late at night to retrieve it.

I do remember a few good moments when A and I played together and had fun. However our pranks usually ended up turning into serious fights where we would physically beat each other up. There are so many stories of us biting, kicking and cuffing each other that to relate all would fill volumes. The most serious ones included me banging my brother into the bed head, him using a sling shot on me and bursting a vein, me chopping him with a cutlass and A. chopping me with a kitchen knife. As a child we once were spying on chickens so we could bother them; when it was A’s turn to look I was coming off some bricks when one crashed down on his finger destroying his finger nail. My mom blamed me for it saying I deliberately hurt him out of jealousy. I knew it was a mistake but up to this day she still tells the story of my “wicked” act towards my brother.

On another occasion my brother was climbing a plum tree when it broke and he fell out of the tree and broke his fall on my head. In the process he broke his hand and my mother blamed me for allowing him to climb the tree and breaking his arm on my head. It was clear to me that everything that happened to my brother was my fault, my responsibility. From early my mother would go on about how much my brother looked liked her and behaved like her. Mom would say that I was spoilt and A. was traumatized by this, since she said that he felt unwanted and uncared for. Mom said this was why he was so reserved and that she had to overcompensate for this. Yet in the process she pushed me aside and dedicated all her time to him. So in this case I was the criminal and not the plum tree, responsibility for it was mine. A. was taken to the hospital and a cast was put on, but the problem was that the hospital gave him the wrong medication and he became very sick. This was because he was allergic to the drugs. The doctor was called in and the drugs changed. I was very upset and felt responsible even though it was not my fault

My mom found all the differences between us and exploited them, this caused further division. From early, around 13 or 14 years, I saw in my brother similar traits as mom, he held grudges and waited till I had forgotten and took revenge. One example was where I had relieved myself in the yard, something my mom got angry with and when I had done something to him he used it against me. By this time we were totally different people. My brother liked mechanical things and he also loved taking them apart and rebuilding them. He loved riding his bike and skateboarding. His adventurous spirit drew people to him and he had a bunch of wild friends. I, on the other hand, was always in my room reading and even though I had a bike my mother had to force me out of the house. Usually she had to beg A. to take me along and I could see he resented it and I was cramping his style. We would get into fights on the street with friends and this led to further separation in terms of brotherly love. On one occasion A. rode his bike and mud splashed into my braces and I ran home to tell mom to deal with him. C. said she did not have time to deal with it and I said I would, in my anger I ran out of the house and did not realize that the door was closed. My hand went through the glass which nicely filleted my arm. I still live with a scar that reminds me of what anger does to me.

Yet there were moments when my brother and I got along. When it came to people saying bad things about our parents we would join together to defend them. Once my brother stoned a guy for bad mouthing my mom and I defended him. In another case a guy was attacking A. and I got enraged and kicked the boy into a drain and picked up a large rock to smash his head. My brother and others had to stop me. There were a lot of outings to watch movies by friends or to catch birds and fish where my brother and I collaborated. Once he was skateboarding and a car swerved into him, he fell and became unconscious, I remember becoming very concerned and upset over his state, till the doctor said he would be ok.

These were some of the moments I remember that stand out, most however is the anger I felt when he did me wrong and how happy I felt when I got him back… mind you when mom got involved I always felt that I was the one who got more of the punishment. Once, my brother and I were running around my grandmother’s dining room table when we hit her porcelain Ming Chinese vase, which fell and broke. The punishment other than licks entailed our first salary going to pay for it, yet all eyes fell on me.

By my teenage years the situation got worse; we stopped playing together and while I loved history, cooking, reading and staying to myself, A. was outgoing and always out. Now I was never upset about it until my mom kept throwing in my face that I should be more like him and look up to him. I regret not being that role model and being there for him but I was a young boy and I know I was not supposed to be responsible for him, I was not his dad. Mom began to confide in A. and tell him stuff about me and in the same way she talked about him to me. A shroud of suspicion developed and we both could not trust each other. I felt pure hatred and resentment from A. when he looked at me and in return, not understanding why he hated me so much, I felt anger towards him. This went on until I got my driver’s license and for a few short years after that I felt like my brother and I would be able to bond and get along.

When I got my driver’s license I literally became a new person, I really opened up and left my room behind me. In fact, my brother and I were able to move from roaming the neighborhood to driving all around the country. My brother and I went to different schools and unlike me A. was able to go through school without too many problems. Most of the schools were prestigious schools and A.’s school friends were a wild bunch. A. and I began to hang out and I made friends with his friends, we did a lot of wild things, some I am not proud of and some that were a little dangerous. My brother and I talked a lot during this time but it was all about the next lime or who to date. I never felt like I fit in and there were many times my brother looked like I was cramping his style.

It was during this period also that both of us started to date. Our first girlfriends came from the same crowd but even though we were serious I felt that the girls within the group were not for me. Then I met my second girlfriend and got so serious that hanging out with my brother became less and less important. Our routine changed to where I dropped him by his girlfriend and I went by mine. As I became more interested in D. as I will call her here my circle of friends changed to those I considered my age and whom I felt represented my style. Then D. and I joined the church youth group and surrounded ourselves with a totally different group of friends. My brother became very angry with me and mom told me once that A. felt I had deserted as well as abandoned him. Mind you I did feel that I had let him down but part of me also felt that I had become a glorified driver. There were occasions just before my brother got his license when we hung out but they became very tense moments. One time our mom told us not to go to Maracas Waterfalls and we disobeyed her. While there the car was broken into and we decided to tell mom that it happened at another place. We took an oath never to tell, when we told mom the brunt of the responsibility for the event fell on me. We were punished and mom told me later that A. told her the truth. I was so angry since it came across as though I was the villain and A. was manipulated by me.

There were some moments when I did feel close to A. like the time he confided in me about his first time with a girl or how he felt about his girlfriend. But these moments never lasted long and A. would become his usual cold self with me. I could not go into his room or borrow his clothes and if I did he would quarrel and complain. Yet at times he would borrow my clothes without asking and it seemed ok with everybody. A. had no problem being able to get mom to have parties yet if I asked she would complain and make it seem such a problem. The few times that she did quarrel with him I actually relished since I felt he got away with murder. For example when I got into a serious accident and my mom nearly disowned me for it, locking me out of the house and banning me from cars, it seemed like the end of the world. But a few years later when my brother hit 3 cars around the savannah I don’t remember him ever being buffed and soon after he got another car. Mom always told me that A. was the more sensible one, the more mature and helpful. This was thrown in my face to the point I actually stopped bothering to try. Everything became a competition, for example buying a gift for mom became a battle between who could get her the most expensive gift. I even got the impression that my gift was less valued that A.’s

When I was in A’Levels, many of A.s friends came and told me that my brother despised me and he actually went around telling people he did not have a brother. I felt very hurt about it and actually wondered what I had done that was so horrible to him. When I went on to University and my brother began to work I started to see less and less of him. His next girlfriend kept him away from home and his new circle of friends comprised a group who to me were only around him to use him. A. always had the tendency to show off and to really exploit a situation. The prestigious school he had gone to intensified in him a snobby attitude that he was better than everyone else; in fact my mother had the same attitude. A. was into the fast life: boats, cars, fame and reputation things which many strive for, but the thing is he also tended to rub it in where it hurt. If I were to try to enter a conversation or chat with them I was seen as the outsider and looked down on. At one point A. even told me I was a boring person and that my conversations were so limited and narrow minded. I was surprised at this since I was more of the intellectual than he and his conversations could only revolve around certain topics like mechanics.
When I met my future wife S. he seemed very pleased for me but looking into his face I saw only hate and coldness. At this point he had truly become my mother and spouted everything she said, in fact I felt it was his mission to protect her against me. I deluded myself into believing they liked my future wife but then I always had a suspicion that all of them were talking about me behind my back. I had ample evidence of this because there were pow-wow sessions where my mother and A’s friends would discuss his girlfriend and how stupid he was, I must admit I was part of these sessions but looking back at it now it was despicable.

A. and his second girlfriend L. went around for nearly 8 years and my mother in all her efforts worked on my brother to get rid of her because she felt she was not good enough for him. C. put on so much pressure that my brother had to bend and in the end gave her up. I believe one of the reasons why mom did not like her was because L. did not take mom on and mom could not control her. My brother’s girlfriend and future wife was hand chosen by his friends and mom and was her idea of a perfect daughter-in-law. In fact it was as though my brother married a clone of my mom.

A. tried to screen his friends from me, I don’t know if it was a fear that I could take them away but it was something both my mom and A. did and were proud of. I fear that because both of them could not influence me on my future wife they became very jealous and hated her. Both my mom and A. conspired to try to ruin our marriage, A. complained about the wedding and even though he knew I did not drink gave me a toxic combination on my bachelor night that resulted in symptoms resembling alcohol poisoning. Even after when my wife and I separated ourselves from mom he took her side and never once contacted us to see how we were doing in fact to this day other than ironic occasional presents for his nephews there is no contact. Even when we again started talking to mom, whenever we did visit he always looked at us like if we were aliens and never stayed around long enough to chat- as though we had a disease.

Since my wife and I no longer have any contact with my brother the only news I hear about him comes from my dad, who gives me unsolicited reports. A. is not all that perfect as my mom leads one to believe. Most of his enterprises tend to sink and usually result in my dad and mom bailing him out. At one time, one business enterprise had to be taken over by his friend and is , according to my dad, now flourishing. Even though A. now works for my dad and is poised to take over, my dad still has not retired, perhaps because he still feels A. is not ready. I must admit this has vindicated me since for a long time I felt he was better than me. Many of A’s ex-friends have come back after years to say that A. went around bad mouthing me, he told many people that I was gay and they said he was a gossip and was full of empty talk.

For a long time I had felt really guilty for not being a better role model or a brother that A. could look up too. I used to feel really guilty for being angry or hating my brother especially considering some of the pranks I used to play. For my part I buried a lot of what I related here and as usual put them in boxes to deal with later because confronting them hurt to much. I wrote my brother once on my feeling, telling him about my regrets and hurts and that I was sorry for all the hurts I put him through that were really my fault. However I did write that I can’t be responsible for all his problems and how his life turned out was not my fault or responsibility. This was the impression I got as the reason for his hating me. I never received a reply and silence did give me the answer. For a long time I felt it was something that I could deal with and by doing this it got worse. I really turned to God who has in the past year helped me to bring everything up and deal with it. Letting it go and not allowing it to fester helped me give up all my feelings of hurt, pain and anger. I love my brother and don’t hate him. I used to look for friends who would represent a true brother because deep down I really wanted a brother and friend. Today by releasing A. to God and really dealing with issues, I am free to say that whether I have a brother or not, God and my family are the only important things in life.

DADDY

MY DAD !!!

So I took a few days off from writing anything…Writing about my dad is really something new and out of the ordinary. I had for a long time believed that my dad was a cold man with no emotions and I had also believed much of the false programming my mother had formatted into my brother and I. I am not going into all my mother said as this post is really about my experiences with him. F. (as I will call him) is a very complex person, a man with whom I grew up and whom I always thought had no emotions or concerns for us. But yet in the last few years my dad opened up more and in fact expressed a lot more love and emotion than I ever thought possible from him.

My earliest memories of F. were when I was a child and he carried me on his head or his smiling at me. Yet this only lasted until I was about 7 because after that he rarely smiled and played with us. As children he did impose some discipline and I can remember when he used to argue with us and give us a lash or two. There was a few times he used a belt but my brother and I would hide it and once we even burnt it. But suddenly all discipline from F. stopped, the reason being that his dad was an abusive man and he did not want to turn out like him. So even though he would “buff” (verbally chastise) sometimes, my mom did all the beating.

F, did take us to the beach a lot, especially Maracas, Mayaro and Toco- three popular beaches in Trinidad- and we did have fun, yet… again I can’t say he ever went into the sea with us, it was always mom who supervised. What I liked most was when F. and mom would take us out to a restaurant as a family and also when we would go crab hunting on the North Coast of Trinidad with my grandparents. To me we always seemed happy then and close like a true family should be. But by 10 years of age I began to see a change; trips to the beach became less and less, as also to the restaurants. My parents used to go out a lot to dinners and parties, I know this because we always got dropped off by my grandparents; this too tapered off. The few cinema outings and crab hunting stopped and when I asked why, my parents would say that they were busy or tired.

F. at this point began to spend his time at the club drinking and also taking trips with his friends for a few days. Also, he would have only time for friends and his Lodge meetings. When he came home he would be drunk and this was something that continues till this day. He used to smoke but as a child I would deliberately cough and wave my hand in my face so he would stop; this annoyed him so much that he finally did stop. Every time we had to go out and he would come for us F. would be an hour late or would not come at all. The excuses were lame to say the least and I remember crying and wondering if I had done something wrong. When it came to school he used to drop me in the morning and pick me up after school, but this stopped and a driver from his business would pick and drop my brother and me off, F. said it was because of his job and that threats were being made to kidnap us and we needed protection. Yet it was just something that added up in my mind to him not caring. Visits to his office became rare occasions and even this stopped after a while.

At home, F. would just sleep the day away and when he woke up he would stroll around and then watch television. His favourite shows were westerns, especially John Wayne movies, and he also read Westerns. The few times he took us to church were odd since you could tell he was uncomfortable, but this ended soon enough. I remember him saying that only hypocrites went to church and his relationship with God was personal and not in church. In fact I did catch him a few times on his knees crying and praying to God. As my brother and I got older the fights and arguments between mom and him got worse, he never hit her and I remember mom saying she hit him once and would never do it again because he gave her such a cold look as if he could kill her. These arguments revolved around my brother and me or money problems; most of the money issues revolved around him drinking our family budget down the drain. There were arguments about me and I always wondered if I was responsible for all of them.

I can’t remember any conversations with him that really stuck in my head since many were when he was drunk and incoherent. As F. was a tall man , about 6 feet 4 inches and weighed about 350 pounds, this did scare me and when he was angry I usually hid. F. was a great business man and was a whiz at math, something I did not inherit. I looked like him and my mother as noted reminded me of it every day. He was very charitable and would help out all his relatives and friends, so much so that mom argued that he was neglecting us. Yet when you meet anyone on the streets they would say that my dad was a great man. I know he spent a lot of time at the club which put on a lot of charity lunches and his famous Bar B Que sauce which he made was very popular, on many occasions he would take me along and it was fun. Dad is a great cook and I learned a lot from him. One trip to Cedros in the South of Trinidad for a cricket match was also a lot of fun. There were a few guys “limes” (get-togethers) when he took my brother and me to get shrimp or just to help out poor people, these have stuck out in my mind. But his friends always tagged along in the car and when we were alone on a drive he did not say much.

Dad was never one to say he loved us or show any emotion. I never knew him to hug or kiss, except for the few times he kissed mom. I know he used to say that crying and kissing were not “macho” or “manly.” It is because of these attitudes and feelings that I preferred dealing with mom and I tried not to cry or have emotions. Every decision in the house was made by mom and dad only dished out the money. F’s attitude and behaviour really made what mom said about him seem true. As I got older I had little contact with him in that he was never home and when he was, he was sleeping or drunk. I felt as though I was boarding with a stranger.

Then, when I was in secondary school I discovered a dark secret of my dad’s which came by accident to me. My class had just gotten a new Spanish teacher, a very sexy one I might add, and I liked her a lot. I befriended her and I found out that she knew my uncle A. who was my dad’s brother. My driver began to drop my teacher home and on one occasion she told me she met my mom and dad. I asked when and where and when she said it was by my uncle I knew something was odd about it since I knew that my mom would not be caught dead by him. I asked her to describe this woman with my dad and the person she described was not my mother. I became very aware that my dad was having an affair and I did not know what to do. I actually believed it, more because of all that I knew about him and the fact that this teacher would not lie about something like that. She did apologize about it but the damage was done, I did not know what to do since, to tell the truth, it really had not hit home yet. I went to my brother and told him and for the first time in my life my brother and I had a discussion that was more than arguments over ownership of toys or clothes. We decided to tell mom together, which we were scared to do but felt we had to. When we sat down to tell her she was calm and listened as though she knew already. When we were finished C. said she knew and had known for some time now, that she was hiding it from us because she did not want us to be hurt and that dad was blackmailing her to stay.

Looking back at this eventful moment in time I know that I should have felt hurt, pain, even anger but honestly I did not feel anything. Like all hurts in my life I put it into a nice box and pushed it out of the way. Even after, when my mom and dad decided to split, since there was no reason to hide it any more or stay for the children, my attitude was very calm and normal. Dad told us he wanted to speak to us and sat at the end of my brother’s bed. He started to cry and said that he and mom could not get along anymore and that he was leaving. Neither my brother or I cried; we accepted it and went on with life. Dad packed up and left and for the next year, except for the occasional visit to give mom money, we did not see or hear from him. At the time it did not feel any different from when he spent all his time with the guys in the club; just, instead of coming home drunk, he simply did not come home. F. spent that year with his girlfriend, whom I was told was “ugly like hell,” but even this did not bother me. My mom however I must admit was no innocent, even before I found out about dad I felt something odd was going on with my mom and her best friend S. This guy who was a big business man who worked away, would, on coming back to Trinidad, visit my mom and she would send us out of the room when he did. This occurred when dad was away at work. When he left for the year the visits became more frequent and I really thought mom was dating him. Around this time, too, dad began to seriously court mom again, giving her expensive jewelry and seeking forgiveness. I thought it was great on two levels, first he was being romantic and second I would have a dad again. Mom on the other hand said she would take him back to teach him a lesson and to milk him for everything he had since she deserved it. So after a year of separation he moved back in. Mom also said it was because he could not keep up two budgets.

I know that dad tried his best and still does to make mom happy, but in the end they got separate beds and then separate rooms. It is only now, since they have moved that they could sleep in the same room but again in separate beds. Up to this day mom and dad still have verbal fights and the only time they ever stop is when mom throws in his face his “adulterous philandering”. Our relationship with him never improved- instead it got worse. We accepted the idea of milking him for all he had and like mom used his guilt in not being there and the affair to get him to do things. The fact is we were worse than what he did and this continued well into my twenties. F.’s drinking got progressively worse as did his time out also. He did have a circle of business friends that he got close to and F. got mom to start going with him for show. I never liked any of my dad’s friends or their children and that’s because they were all into power and money, showing off and sticking it to others. My mom would come home after such visits and gossip and speak badly about them, which made it even worse.

Interestingly enough, one day a few years later on while I was away working I heard on the radio that a plane had crashed on take off from another Caribbean Island and that all on board had been lost. When they called the names of those on board I recognized all as being my dad’s circle of friends. I did not hear my dads name but I know he was suppose to go on that outing, which was to see a cricket match, what saved him was F.’s fear of flying and small planes. I know God was giving him a second chance and waking him up to making a decision in his life, I also know he knew that because not only did he get really upset about it but he tried to really change his life, every night he would be on his knees praying. Yet a couple of years later he returned to drinking and surrounding himself with a new circle of friends.

Death has always stalked my dad, especially in the last 15 years. There were many times in his drunken state that he has come close to death. Once F. was so drunk he fell off a boat and sank to the bottom of the sea, my brother had to dive in and after a desperate search pulled him out only after feeling his hair. Another time, he and my mom were leaving a party and when she turned around he was at the bottom of a pool. Friends had to pull him out and resuscitate him. Doctors have told him he was living on borrowed time since his drinking was destroying his liver and yet he continues to drink. F. is very stubborn and hates being told what to do, even if God told him to do something he would do the opposite. I remember one night I heard screeching outside and when I went to see what it was, it was my dad coming home on his rims, I had to lift him inside and the story was he hit the curb and the tires burst but it was late and he decided to come home.

Even though he played the big strong man, things did bother him, he hated funerals and anything that brought emotions and he did take on things which made him sick. I know he hated funerals and going to visit sick friends. I saw this in how he dealt with mom, the more she berated him the more he drank and stayed away. On one occasion he was driving down the highway drunk and a woman, herself drunk, was crossing the road and he knocked her down and killed her. The case of manslaughter against him went on for years. My dad had nightmares for a long time and he would cry about it a lot in private, always trying to hide it. Every time he had to go to court he would get angry and uptight and you just had to stay away from him. In the end the case was thrown out since many witnesses had died in the case but even after dad still had nightmares and got upset around the anniversary of the event. F. also took on his business, when the workers were giving trouble or there were financial problems he got all worked up and drank more on these occasions. This drinking was as a result I believe of what he learned from his parents, his dad and mom were also alcoholics, and it was F. who had to make the drinks, naturally he learned to associate drinks with problems and since his parents encouraged him to drink he did.

Other than financial obligations my dad never really talked to us about love or even discussed feelings with us. I know he was homophobic, in fact he said he would prefer his sons were dead if he ever found out that we were gay. This freaked me out because I have seen my dad in action, one lash or cuff from him could kill. Added to this he said if we ever came home with earrings or tattoos he would rip them out. Mind you I dared not try to defy this order. There were a few times that he did try to take charge of the household, when we were having financial problems he called us together to sit down and budget, but because of my mothers barrage of comments it ended in a shouting match. Another time he tried to defend me. I had not gone to church for some time; in fact I had felt the church a farce. My mom was arguing with me on a point and I thought it was about church. When I admitted that I had not attended for some time my mother came down on me like brimstone and fire. Dad tried to intervene on my behalf telling her that the “boy can make decisions on his own and if he does not want to go you can’t force him”. Of course my mom laid waste to his comment and told him he had no rights in disciplining her son, that he gave up those rights a long time ago. Even though it was a glimmer I felt proud that he could dare stand up to her.

F. was very much interested in my having girlfriends, so much so that if I was spending time with any guy friends he would wonder if something was wrong with me. I remember him trying to get me to be more macho by drinking a hot beer at the club once, mind you it never had the desired effect. Once he even offered to take me to a house of ill-repute to have an experience with a nice young girl. He looked relieved when I did have a girlfriend but that was about all the concern he ever showed. When he meet S. my future wife he seemed more interested than before and would time to time ask me about her. He also looked relieved when I was getting married and seemed sincere when he met my wife’s father. My mom had said that my dad was the one who did not want me spending money on the wedding and he was not putting a cent into it. I have come to realize that was not true.

After my wife and I severed ties with the family, the last person I thought would ever talk to us or even dare defy my mom was my dad, I was surprised when he called. I started to really see that dad was a caring man; in fact I believed he was happy to have me to himself. Our first meeting after we severed ties was a strange one, in that he hugged me. It was a bit odd since we never did that before in my life. Then after a few more visits and chats on the phone I actually heard him say he loved me, something not even my mother ever did. Soon after this came kisses, in one swoop something I had asked God for was coming true. One thing I do know is all the people I thought would stick by us deserted us and yet the one person I felt would desert me, dad, did not. He actually gave S. and me a lot of financial help where no one else did, I remember when we needed a loan and F. said “he lived and died for his two sons and everything he had was ours,” this really touched me and I did cry. Even though all of this new found love and father/son bond felt good, I wondered when the bottom would fall out of the barrel. You see I was happy not to have my relatives in my life and everything I spoke to dad about I knew was going back to my mom. However, I realized that dad did not like conflict and he also liked to please, since he felt he was forever seeking mom’s approval so he did his best to influence me to make amends for peace’ sake. Many of his statements and concerns about us and our children came directly from my mother and I resented that he did not have a back bone to stand up for himself. Even the financial help held the hidden gift of obligations and ties that would draw me back to my family.

And yes I did see my mother again and after a second time and final severing from my mother he called to find out what happened. When I told him I had an affair (beating my mother to it since I knew she would embellish it to make it suit her) and explained how her reaction triggered a reinstatement of the separation, he sounded very upset and told me he was sorry to hear this and asked how was S. After this God put it in me to speak to him one on one and not holding back. We meet in the club and, as I said in a previous post, spoke to him about all that my mom had said about him. Dad really proved all the things mom said wrong; he spoke of his love for us and admitted many mistakes and faults and even cried, as I said, about things he never did and which demonized him. I did get to speak about my affair and I asked him if I embarrassed him because mom had said that he was embarrassed by me. This got him angry for he said he never said this, I also asked him if he thought I was mad and should be put away and he noted that if I were then the entire world should be put away. In the end he hugged me and I told him that the only person I wanted to have a relationship with was him, mom was dead to me. Since then dad and I meet or chat on the phone to discuss how we are, his grandchildren and how my wife S. is doing.

Dealing with my past, I truly pondered my dad and what he meant to my life. I really turned to God for this because in the past I would use logic to make sense of things. While growing up, I wanted that male bonding; I was grieving for the loss of my dad in my life. I cried out for that male influence and love that was really missing. That stability I needed in my life that only a dad could give. In my search for male love and fatherly influence I really began to look to guys with strong and domineering personalities to satisfy my desire.

What I know now is that the only true dad that I really needed, the one that is the greatest role model and gives the right love is God, no other. Putting a earthly dad first, and obsessing about it really makes man my god. I can truly say that yes I have a relationship with my dad but it is defined in the way God wants it to be, God is first in my life and if my earthly dad is there or not it does not matter. No man can shake my dedication and love for God. That empty feeling of loss and search for a dad has been replaced by the one true dad. I am no longer a slave to wanting the love or recognition from my dad and in releasing dad and these feelings, God has answered my prayers.

CONTEMPLATION

PERSPECTIVE . . . . . . .

Today I really took a good look at what I have been writing and I relived everything so vividly again. In the past I would store memories to deal with them later, but really never got back to them. But in the last few months really opening up, dusting off those boxes and dealing with the issues has really liberated me and made me more emboldened. I really have to thank God for always being there for me and sticking by me, with me and carrying me even when I did not want him in my life. His gentle prodding and using my wife S. really melted my stony heart to trust and love.

Its been a lot so far and there is a lot more to come. I want to dedicate some time and space in my blog to my wife and marriage as well as to my experience with homosexuality. But these are posts to come and I really want to take a little time to reflect, collect my thoughts and then write. This blog is very therapeutic and permanently closes a book. A new book with clear white pages awaits.

MUMMY DEAREST

“TOXIC MOTHER”

It has been a while since I have sat down to think or even write about my mother, I have long dealt with my hurt and pain which she inflicted on me. Before I write this post I want to just say that I do love my mother but in the way that God loves all his creations. I have forgiven her but I remember the suffering she caused me. I have no desire to be spiteful or vengeful but I can only accept hope through working through my memories so that I can reach a point I can truly say I can look back and have no remnant negativities. It’s not easy to really admit that you have had a parent who was abusive, and when I speak of abuse I mean here physical, psychological and emotional. For a long time I lived making excuses and really living that victims’ stance that it was “my fault”. People expect that a mother is supposed to protect and nurture, not abuse. I know it is not easy for anyone who lives under the shadow of their dominating mother to see anything else and I only recognized and took charge of my life, one she controlled, when I got married.

My mom brought me into the world and the first thing that comes to mind was that she said that she had forgotten to take her birth control pill on that occasion. Nice thing to say, don’t you think? I know from looking at early pictures of me as a child that she seemed happy to have me around, but then pictures can be deceiving. As a child, as I noted in another post, my hyper behaviour really frustrated my mother and she used to tear her hair out dealing with me. She had no patience with me and expressed it by giving me some good blows. Her erratic behaviour could be seen in her daily routine, one minute she would be loving and then in the next breath she would literally throw me in my room and shout or slap me for such minor things as wetting my bed. Even worse there were nights I had to sleep in the wet bed and I remember getting up and trying to change the sheets all before I reached the age of 8.

When my brother came along, C, as I will call her, told me that because I was the first grand child and spoilt she had to balance it out and take special care of my brother. Mind you it ended up where she treated him well while I began to feel left out and unwanted. There were times my curiosity with my brother led to mischief, on one occasion I climbed into his crib and plastered him with lipstick and my mother gave me licks. On another occasion I bit my brother and my mother bit me so hard that it left marks. There were many occasions she would brag about this to people and I would get very upset that she took pride in it. I was always told that I was the older son and thus must be more responsible and honest, so much so that when my brother and I got into trouble together it was usually me who got the harsher punishment. The most scary experience as a child occurred when I was with my mother and we went shopping in the capital city of Port of Spain at the age of 5 or 6. I got separated from my mother and began to frantically search for her and cry. People tried to help me and when I found her again she quarreled that I looked so foolish and said she was watching me all the time. Now that I look back at it she sounded as though she enjoyed my pain and fear.

Every time I got into trouble as a child the licks would be dished out, my dad had given up the right to punish us since he had said that his father abused him and he did not want to abuse us. There were times he did discipline us with his belt and my brother and I would hide it after, but for the rest of my child and teenage years it was my mother who disciplined. She always said it was her right that “she made us and she could kill us”. We were responsible for taking care of her and it was our duty to serve her even if we hated her for it in the end. She said she would have created a good person, one that would not embarrass her. Sometimes I believed her without question and when I did not and argued with her it usually led to blows and being sent to my room. Its scary to describe how she reacted. Without warning while she was talking to us she would swing around and hit me full force or if her hand caught something it was thrown at me. Usually I would get the full brunt of the blows and to try to prevent this I began to lie to escape. Mind you C. always said that we should tell the truth and it would be easy but to be honest or lie, the punishment was the same.

As I got older and my problems at school got worse she did try her best to push me to excel, however it was all wrong because it was all about her not being embarrassed. C. never tried to find out what I was interested in and believed people when they said I was a problem child. When teachers told her that I would get no where in life I remember her agreeing. Yet when I began to excel, finding my niche in life she would pretend that she always believed in me and it was others who did not. Expressing myself had to be according to what she believed and free expression of ideas were not very easy to express with her. Even though we had good conversations on history or geography most conversations revolved around what she knew. My mother was so self involved that no one else in the world was as good as her. C. always said for example, that she could not stand my grandmother because she gossiped a lot and she would not be caught dead doing that, yet C. spent every waking moment on the phone gossiping about others and never coming up for air. Many times I would tell her to stop, that she was really sounding bad but she never stopped. C. even gossiped about me with people I did not know and told them things I had done in such a way to embarrass me. I felt so much hatred towards her that I began to answer her in my head using profanities on every level.

The older I got, the worse it became. She deliberately exploited the differences between my brother and I, causing a series of rifts between us. C. would say that my brother looked so much like her and that he was even born under the same sign as her. I, on the other hand, looked like my father. I felt like the Ugly Duckling. C. would always say that dad’s family was a pack of bums and I would end up like them if I did not try to behave. This made me feel that I was genetically bred with a corrupt gene that would make me evil and that I had to resist it. All I can remember is my mother arguing and quarreling day in and day out. I could not understand why she hated my dad so because all she did was talk about him in a negative light. That he did not think, wasted money, “limed” too much, did not work hard enough, was fat and ugly, a bum like the rest of his family and a real waste of time. I wondered why she stayed with him, then. She would say that he had treated her badly and threatened her with taking my brother and I, and not giving her money to care for us. My brother and I literally hated him and what made it worse was that he came late to pick us up for outings or came home drunk. I learned later from asking him and seeing him really shocked and hurt that all these accusations were untrue and that she was trying to turn us against him.

I feared my mother and really tried not to antagonize her. Lies became so natural and escaping into a world I made up helped deal with the madness at home. This became real to me and when she reacted I would try to escape but C. would wait her anger festering until she could get her hands on us. I remember climbing up a guava tree and staying up there for the whole day in the hope she would cool down, yet it was not to be the licks would come one way or the other. Her determination to punish saw no bounds, as a child I hated breakfast and there was one time I did not want to eat my egg, C. made me sit at that table for the whole day until I had eaten it, cold and am sure stale. C. never said she was sorry even when she was wrong, in fact on the contrary the problem was with everybody else. I can remember once money was missing in the house and c. came to me and accused me of stealing money in my own home, I was hurt and confused, how could she be saying this to me, her flesh and blood, I really hated her. Other times I would run away from school and go home and she would beat me saying she was scared for me or if I went to play with a few friends from school just outside the school compound she would beat me in front of friends. There was one time while we were in church and my brother and I were talking she gave us back hand slaps for causing a disturbance in the mass, which I could tell was exceedingly embarrassing as she felt it reflected more on her than us.

I can’t say I remember seeing or feeling any expression of love from C. C. would say that the way she showed her emotions/love was through giving gifts on special occasions. In fact when I would try to kiss her she would clam up and become cold. There was once when I was on retreat that I got a letter from her expressing how much she cared, but later she said she was forced to do it. C. hated that I took an interest in God, she felt something was wrong with an interest in it more that Sunday mass. C. even banned us from talking to our neighbours who wanted to talk to us about the bible. When we visited people we had to be always on the best behaviour, in fact if we were given food or drink we were to refuse because it would look like we were not being fed. C. was always saying how much she sacrificed for us, gave up her life for us and that we owed her. If she had some money we would get a few nice things but C. always bought the most expensive things for herself. If C. was going away she would not take us saying that it was her time now and she waited all her life without going anywhere. When we grew up and made money we could travel. Every time we broke something in the house she kept a record of it and would say that one day we would have repay her, at one point I believe the amount was over $350, 000 and that was without interest.

We could not try anything without being afraid of her reaction. One time she threatened that if we ever destroyed our toys we would get nothing for Christmas, and so said so done. I had gotten a Robot toy for my birthday and while playing, I decided to throw it off the steps, of course it broke and my mother was so angry that I expected licks to rain down upon me. Yet all she said was that I would get nothing for Christmas and when Christmas came along I got nothing. It was devastating because we always grew up with the knowledge that love was connected with gifts.

I remember her saying that if we ever came home drunk she would lock the house up and throw our clothes outside. This became reality when I had an accident while driving home from a party one night and on being dropped home I called out to her to help me. C. just looked out the window, refused to open the door and said call my father. I stood out there realizing that she thought that I was drunk when I had just not had been sleeping properly for a few night previously. I wondered if my clothes were going to come flying out next. Food was another area C. made me feel guilty about. When she cooked and we ate, asking for seconds was like being Oliver Twist, she would say that there was not enough and I was a glutton, I became so aware of it that I would horde and over eat in one serving fearing I would not get anything again. Even in the girlfriend department she had a say, every girl had to be screened by her and if she did not like them she did a “Monster-In-Law” on them. Once she even made the racist comment that we should not bring home a African girl because she can’t comb any cane-row child head. I was shocked because I never thought my mother was a racist. At one point when I was a grown man she said that C. needed me to be there for her because C. needed a punching bag to release her frustrations.

My grandmother on my dad’s side had from an early period not liked my mom and the feeling was mutual. At one time we lived in the same house and mom would say some really horrible things about her. All of this I believed, because she was my mother.
One time my brother and I fell on an ice-box and broke it and my uncle and grandmother punished us. My mom became enraged and cursed them and she put us on notice that if my brother and I had any dealings with them she would cut us off. C. never forgave people who hurt her or did her something and you as her child had to follow suit.

I found out that my dad had had an affair and I told her about it she said she knew and that is why she loathed him and she only stayed because of us. Yet I began to understand that because I looked like my dad she took out all of her hurts on me and expressed it in physical and emotional form. I realized that C. was out to sabotage my future in a sense because she did not forgive and did not want to. I know C. was hurt bad and healing took time but to hurt your own son because of it was just wrong. This is also really why we could not speak to my father’s side of the family, it was a form of betrayal to her.

C. said that my grandmother hated her so much that she encouraged my dad to have an affair and that we could never speak to that side of the family again or suffer being thrown out and ostracized from her. Once, when Carnival came round, my grandmother on my mom’s side saw my other grandmother and wanted to take us to see her, but because we were in fear of what my mother said we pulled back and started to cry. Every single gift my grandmother sent was sent back and any mention of her was taboo. In dealing with my dad, C. pointed out how wicked he was and how she was tied to him financially and because of us. I really felt responsible for her and even guilty for looking like him. I wondered if I because half of me was part of him would become so wicked and vile.

Because of this I began to really feel that I was a child spawned from the devil himself. It felt like I could do nothing right, as I was always the one in trouble and giving my mother trouble. I remember getting up at night and crying, asking her why it was I was so bad and if I would always be this way. C. never told me it was not so, only that I should resist the “dark side”. I grew up thinking that because I looked like my dad that I was the bad one and my brother was the good one. Even in my thinking C. would make me feel as though my brother’s hands on approach was far superior than my dreaming, intellectual demeanor. These conflicting feelings exacerbated my confusion over having feelings for men. I wondered if it was my destiny to be always hiding my true personality and feelings, because even though my mom said to talk to her about everything, because of how she reacted to things I did not even feel comfortable speaking to her. Yet I was so amazed that when the few friends my brother and I brought home spoke to her they would say that she was so great like one of them so hip and great to “lime” with. After years of wondering why I resented this I realized that it was a competition for her to steal our friends for herself. Because C. with us at home and C. outside were two different people. In fact c. use to tell people that about me, when people tried to tell my mom how impressed they were with me she would say “you don’t know him, he’s only fooling you at home he is a horror” this would make me feel dejected and belittled. In fact I opened myself to a cycle of trying to prove my worth and obtain her respect. Nothing I did in life impressed her and C. was never proud of me. I remember her telling me and my wife that “I don’t stick to things long and I get bored with people and things”, C. was jealous and did not want me to be happy, as I have now come to recognize. At parties and gatherings C. would take pride in telling horrible and embarrassing stories about me and relished talking about how she punished me.

Reading back everything I have written so far brings back so many memories of my mom, I have tried to think of good times I had with her but they are so far and
few between that all I could remember is the bad. I remember I used lies to get her attention and once I told her people at school were stealing my food and when she rang the school and found out that it was a lie, I was beaten to the point that my grandmother had to intervene. That year I spent my whole time in my room and C. constantly made comments that she “hoped I had miserable children when I got married so that I would feel how miserable you make me”. These are the things I remember and they caused me to grow up very passive and not wanting to speak out or try new things. I felt beaten into the ground, I was the one who was always quarreling with her to hear my point and I really felt unheard. I began to hate her and curse her in my head and I began to really look for ways to escape her smothering me. C. was amazed that I could pass exams and when I entered University I knew she did not think I could ever make it. In fact, even after 10 years at a job I like and am good at she was at our last gathering still spouting the idea that I cannot handle it and it is a matter of time before I give it up. The image of me being her punching bag, replacing my dad has an escape for her for the rest of my life really disgusted me and freaked me out. I looked to escape and I did so in defying her with little things. When I was nearing 20 my reasoning could no longer be controlled by her and I recognized that even though she had taught me the basics of life there were a lot of things she left out so that I would be unable to function without her input. When my second girlfriend tried to show me this, my mother demonized her and I believe one of the reasons she broke up with me is because she could not compete with my mom. I did however defy my mother once when she refused to lend me the keys for the car to visit my girlfriend and I picked myself up and took a taxi to see her. I was 19 at the time. My mom later called, very humble, to see if I needed a drop home, which my girlfriend said I did.

To finally escape my mom I decided to take a job so isolated and far away from home that I had to live there during the week. I finally began to become independent, fully recognizing my worth without my mom interfering, yet when I did go home on weekends I reverted to my former passive self. I refused to lay a hand on my mom because I grew up respecting women and knowing that a man who hit a woman was a coward. Also the bible quote of “honour your mother and father” really played in my head. What my C. needed to read was the part right under that said, “parents do not drive your children to resentment”. I had so much resentment built up against her I really felt torn with dutiful love, fear, hate and guilt when it came to her. One thing I said to myself was that I would never treat my spouse or my children so; no one should be put under such torture.

By the time I was 25 years old my mom moved from hitting me to cuffing me for things that were my decisions. C. continued to say that the things I did represented her and don’t embarrass her in public. When I met my future wife it was not a problem it seemed that C. liked her and I was happy. They both seemed to get along and at that time approval from her was important to me. However the love that was developing for my future wife was beginning to threaten her and after 2 years of dating, when I told her we were getting engaged, C. had no emotion. I remember her sitting in the dark watching television; when I told her she never even looked at me. I had prepared my future wife about my mom and it was not a surprise but we decide to wait a year before we got married so that C. could warm up to it. C. never did and instead made life hell for my wife especially. C. spoke badly about her parents, especially her dad and even had my aunt talk to me about the different ethnic and cultural backgrounds that we were from and how it would not work. When it came down to the wedding she used my brother’s working relationship with my future wife’s dad to try to drive a wedge. Finally C. could not help but try with the wedding itself and threatened not to come if certain things were not exactly her way though she refused to contribute anything. C. tried to forbid me from contributing any money and since she did have control of my every being at times I nearly complied. However I loved S. so much that there was nothing my mother could do. You see my mom is a control freak - a woman bent on her own way and everything and everyone who threatens her must be taken out, mostly by destroying them with her tongue which was deadly like poison.

C. never looked happy for me at my wedding and even after, she treated my wife like an outsider. When it came to intimacy with my wife C. had a disastrous effect on how I viewed sex and my self-worth. Because of what my dad had done C. would say that there was nothing good about the male body and that men were built disgusting. I also remembered C. saying that the male genitals were sickening to watch and was like a spear which was deadly. In my minds eye then sex became a very scary and dirty thing, I hated my body and how I looked and because my dad was huge I felt that I was destined to be that way. My mom would say that I had funny hips and that I walked odd. This added to my feeling of especially when it was reinforced every other week. Thus when it came to sexual intercourse, even with my wife, I had a negative view. S. and I felt very awkward when it came to our first time, both of us were virgins, but S. sensed right off that our love making was missing something special. have come to realize this idea also had a part to play in my feelings for men. It became so real in my mind to think that if sex with a woman was so terrible, as my mother had programmed me to think, then sex with a man would be better. Mom really pulled my emotional strings and I allowed her to do so by not standing up to her.

There were many areas in my marriage that she tried to influence from how to budget to when we should have children. Even when I had to buy my wife gifts lie earrings and an engagement ring she was there. I know it upset my wife before and after our marriage and it really was as though I was more interested in my mother and not her. I just know my mom was making bets on how long our marriage would last because she once told my wife that I get bored with things and don’t stick with them for long, in reference to her. After our marriage we moved in with them until things came to ahead when my wife and I decided to give a gift to my third cousin.

I had worked with my third cousin for a year and knew her well. A few years later when she was getting married she could not invite too many people and thus invited my mom to represent the family. S. and I wanted to give a gift so we went to the bridal registry and bought one for her expecting for her to collect it after the wedding as it was so close. We ran into her every so often and just wanted to express our wishes for her happiness and to show our support for her and for marriage in general, especially as we had been so recently married and were still in stage of wanting to share our happiness with the world. We had ourselves really been touched by the unexpected gifts we received from a few well-wishers who had sent them in spite of not having been invited to the wedding because it was limited to close family and friends, and we wanted to pass this on. We included a card saying all of this. My cousin collected her gifts the day before her wedding and she noticed the present from S. and me. My aunt who loves scandal told my mother we had bought a present for my cousin. C. called me up and ranted and raved on how embarrassing it was and how I humiliated her. She said that you’re only supposed to buy a present if you are invited to the wedding. She continued to go on about how I should have asked her first and she would have directed me on the issue, then she proceeded to insult me by saying I do mad things and don’t think. This was an insult to my wife and me, since we made the decision as a couple and a new family. Tensions had risen in that house for some time before this issue and we had left to live elsewhere. S. and I were getting closer to God as a couple, and former friends we worked with who didn’t believe in a couple being too close or being too close to God my mom and said that we were walking around the village with bibles and trying to convert people. Yet we have always felt that people’s religion, politics, all personal business, is no one else’s and no one should try to influence or change anyone. Still, my mom who believed everyone else before her son decided to call me a liar about it and it was only when my wife told her it was untrue that she settled down. This led to us moving out, but with her new interference in our decisions to give gifts at a new stage, the last straw had been broken.

On my 28th birthday I finally got the nerve, boldness to go to speak to her as an adult to an adult about finding a compromise about her role in our marriage. When we reached I asked to speak to her and she became very defensive saying that this was her house and she did not have to listen. I tried to talk to her calmly and lovingly, letting her know that we loved her but she could no longer interfere with our marriage. C. proceeded to iron clothes and tell me that she could do what the hell she wanted and that I was her son. C. then proceeded to lunge at me. By this point, my wife had come in from the porch to suggest that we come back at another time to give my mom space, but my mother reacted by coming towards me threateningly, and when my wife saw what my mother was about (my mom was going to hit me ) stepped between us in automatic protection of me. C. held on to my wife’s arms and shook my wife violently saying don’t get between her and her son, he’s my son and I can do what I want (to him) and my wife said but he’s my husband. At this point my wife said honey, let’s go and my mom tauntingly said here are your presents which I said I did not want. They were then thrown at me while we were leaving. Outside my mother shouted to me that “when you get back your sense and your reason come back alone.” It was those words that really stuck in my head, I knew she hated my wife for loving me and caring to protect me. C. was jealous that someone found me of worth and that all that she said about me could no longer work to destroy me.

My wife and I cut all contact with her and even though it hurt in so many ways especially how she treated us I felt a weight lifted. However my mother being the ever superior Matriarch was able to turn the whole family against me. This just goes to show that even relatives had no mind of their own to decide.

A case in point occurred a year later when I received a letter from my great Aunt who represented all the “piety” in the family. In this long letter she tried to make me feel guilty for all that “I had done to my mother” and how wrong I was and so hurtful to her I was. In the letter were all these clips of prayers and a picture of Mary which I suppose was to make me feel guilty. In fact if the object was to get me to feel guilty it did the opposite. I penned a letter to my mother who I know put my Great Aunt up to the letter. In this letter I told her everything I felt and how much she hurt me, I even told her that if she did not get rid of her hurt, anger, bitterness and pain that it would fester. My wife had recently bought a Emily Post where it showed that gifts do not have to be solicited to be sent. We photocopied it and sent it in the letter because we knew she would not believe it unless she saw it herself.

Yet even before this issue arose, I had known how good her programming was. After I had gotten married, my grandmother on my dad’s side was very sick, in fact I had gotten the word that she might soon breathe her last. I decided that all these years of my mother preventing me from seeing her had gone on long enough. I decided to see her and was courteous enough to tell my mother, who got very cold about it but did not say anything else. My visit was a good one, I told my grandmother I forgave her for everything she had done and she acknowledged it. Then we caught up with everything in my life, I heard in her voice how much she regretted the past and saw her relief and peace at it being put in the past and when I left I felt that a chapter in my life had been closed. However, C. felt betrayed and had my brother tell me this, I was angry that she would have my brother do the dirty work and I really felt it was wrong to hold on to so much unforgiveness and to make me carry it on, it was over 20 of hatred against my grandmother. When my first son was born my wife and I visited and it was my grandmother’s first great-grandchild. Shortly after she died. I know that if I had not gone to speak to her the year before I would have missed that opportunity to have closure and would have forever regretted it and wondered.

My only contact to that family was my dad who really wanted to keep the peace and bring my mother and me back together. However in the time I spent communicating with him, I recognized that my dad was a very caring man who regretted his mistakes but lived in a world of guilt because my mother made him pay every day for it. C. refused to forgive him even when he bought diamonds and paid so much attention to her. With my wife’s help I really recognized that my mother was more of a liar than not only I, but a lot of people I knew. Much of what she told me in my life was based upon what she wanted us to know and twisted to suit her desires. She manipulated events and what people did and said to suit her, My dad was not the devil and he was a loving man, I recognized that he drank to escape her, because in his heart he still loved and loves her and he can’t live without her, though it is hard now to see how he could live with her. With my growing relationship with him developing I recognized he did love me and I heard it from his lips and he started to hug me a lot. With this humbling revelation and all that I was forced to see by my mother, my whole belief in my mother changed. I saw that she was a poisonous person spreading her toxins all over and destroying lives. I also recognized that after 3 years of marriage I was taking my frustrations from all that she had dished out on me on my wife. My wife became my mother in my head and I played out all my emotions, pains, hurts and hatred on her. My wife brought it to my attention and I for one did not want to recognize it, the fact that I was becoming my mother. I remember, too, my mother also saying that she would never become like her mother-in-law and yet she became worse. I for one needed to recognize it as a problem and I needed to confront all the hurt and pain or else it would destroy me and my marriage.

When my first son was born, I called and let her know she had a grandchild and she was welcome to come visit him in the nursery even if she did not want to see us, but she never came. When my wife was pregnant with our second child, she suggested we offer a chance to reestablish communication in case my mother had a change of heart and wanted the chance, and wary communication between my mother and my family began again, first it was phone calls then it was a visit to see her first grand child. But every time we left, a bad feeling followed and my wife would talk about how deliberately uncomfortable she was made to feel but insisted we give it time. As time went on, it became clear that in fact what we were doing was opening her and our sons to abuse. C. would constantly compare S. negatively with my brother’s fiancé or bring up people and past events which were upsetting to my wife. My son was not treated well, she tried to compare him to me using the same destructive criticisms as on me in relation to my father, and when we left, he always felt vaguely uncomfortable but wanted to visit her again because she was his grandmother. When our second son, was born she began to compare the two of them in negative terms and state how he was so much like her and so good etc. and ignore the older one and more overtly denigrate him. There were times she said that he was too fat and he would come home and ask why granny did not love him. In the face of this I realized I was doing a real disservice in bringing my wife and child to receive abuse and this time by my hands, but still I had fallen back into that trap of wanting my mother’s love and approval. My wife finally put her foot down and said she wasn’t going back or allowing her children to be put in that abusive situation anymore and told me I could go to visit my mother if I wanted to, but that the children and she wouldn’t. I said that I wasn’t going without her.

The thing is I was really living out all that C.predicted for me since I believed her so well and because I had such a low self-esteem. I began to try to pressure my children to live up to what I though would be something that would make my mother approve of the way I raise my children. The fact was I was becoming abusive and really destroying my marriage. A lot of my behaviour in my own marriage was based upon my interaction with my mother, which was always defensive and always trying to turn an argument to my advantage. Arguing with my children and quarreling with them sound like deja vu. Even my adulterous affair was part of that constant barrage she spouted that men are destined to cheat and that since my dad did it I would too. I had always said that I would not do that but a part of me believed her. Even C’s response convicted her, when I told her she was not shocked and asked if I loved this woman, but when I told her it was a guy all she said was why did I not experiment before I got married. C. never asked how my wife was and after 3 weeks passed she called again as if nothing had happened, it was not even to find out how my wife was or even I . It was at this point I just told her that she was not a nice person that she never told me sorry in her life and how she treated S. and our children. In the end I told her she did not know how to love that she would never know what it was and that S. really taught me about love by showing me how much she loved me by going through so much pain and hurt which I gave to her and yet sticking by me, then I told her I loved her and to have a great life and good-bye. She has never called back.

A while after that I really sat down and had a heart to heart talk with my dad. I told him all the things mom said about him while I was growing up and wanted to know if these accusations were true. He said even though he did have affairs, which he was sorry for, most of what she said was untrue. For the first time in my life my dad cried with me, something I never expected or thought he was capable of. I got to tell him how I felt, that he needed to be there and take up the father role and not allow mom to have such damaging power over us. What amazed me was his response that C. was so bitter and unforgiving, that she was so stubborn and was always quarreling. But the words that stuck was what he said next that “you can choose your friends but not choose the type of family members you get”. Then I asked why he married her and even though he said he loved her the look in his eyes was one of not being sure anymore.

That was 2½ years ago and since then I have spent my nights really sitting down with my wife and letting out all my hurts and pains. I admit that there are many issues that I unconsciously do like turn an argument against my wife or really say things that hurt my children which still stems from having to deal with C. I am always on the defensive as though every decision I make is wrong and I have to prove them, even argue them. At one point all women were my mother and I was angry all the time. Getting rid of toxins is a long process but I know its no longer going to kill me.