Poetry: I Didn’t Tell Her by Mary Beth O'Connor

I Didn’t Tell Her

        

        For the first six months of my life, my mother left me at a convent and visited just once a week.

​When I was three, a teenage boy grabbed me up and ran off with me, which I know because my mother entertained company with this story.

​When, at four, I ran to her in the middle of the night to report that a crazed red-haired woman was at my bedroom window, she ordered me back because I’d left my little sister alone.

​When I was five, I awoke to the sounds of arguing downthe hall, opened the door, and saw my mother holding a knife over her wrist.

​When I was six, at my grandfather’s funeral, she informed me that she was divorcing my father and I’d live with my grandmother. 

​Then she left me there for three years, visiting once everycouple of weeks. 

​When my friend told me that divorced parents were supposed to visit every weekend, I collapsed in anguished knowledge that I wasn’t important enough for her to fulfill this duty.

​During my mother’s visits, when I tried to tell her what I was doing in school she shushed a “don’t bother me right now.”

​When I described dramas with my friends, she responded, “I don’t have time to listen to your nonsense.”

​When I was eight, in the car, her boyfriend beat her for something she said.

​Within six months, she married him anyway.

​At nine, after we moved in with my stepfather, she never interfered when he shoved me into a corner and screamed at me.

​She never challenged him when he berated me for a minor or imaginary infraction.

​She didn’t even complain when he hit me, hard, across the face or head or back.

​She pretended not to notice when he pushed me, and I fell down the cellar stairs.

​By ten, she often screamed at me or smacked me with her hand or the nearest hard object.

By then, I’d learned to choke down my sobs because she meant it when she said, “if you don’t stop crying, I’ll give you something to cry about.”

​The next year, when he beat and strangled her until the police arrested him, we left for just a week.

​When she searched for my diary and read that I’d had sex at thirteen, she beat me over the head and back, but never mentioned it again.

​So, when my stepfather’s violence escalated, and he kicked me in the stomach for spilling milk, I didn’t tell her.

​When I had sex with multiple partners, many of them adults, by the age of 16, I didn’t tell her.

When my stepfather choked me and whispered, “don’t bother screaming because the neighbors are too afraid of me to help you,” I didn’t tell her.

When I had sex with men because I was afraid they’d beat me if I didn’t, I didn’t tell her.

When my stepfather punched me for putting a dish away with a speck of dirt on it, I didn’t tell her.

When I taught my sister to put one dish away at a time, so we didn’t wake him and get a beating, I didn’t tell her.

​When I started drinking alcohol to deal with my pain, I didn’t tell her.

When I developed a belief that I had to arrange the items on my dresser in a particular way or my brother would die, I didn’t tell her.

​When I started smoking weed, I didn’t tell her.

​When my stepfather molested me, at twelve, I didn’t tell her. 

​When I started popping pills, I didn’t tell her.

​When an uncle grabbed my breasts while I was talking to her on the phone, I didn’t tell her.

​When I started taking LSD, I didn’t tell her.​

​When my stepfather made ongoing sexual threats until I left home for college, I didn’t tell her.

​When I started using methamphetamine, I didn’t tell her.

​When I was raped during a family vacation, I didn’t tell her.

​When I started injecting methamphetamine, I didn’t tell her.

​When I was kidnapped and raped by three men, for six hours, in college, I didn’t tell her.

​When my college boyfriend beat me, repeatedly, I didn’ttell her.

​When I was mugged, twice, I didn’t tell her.

​When I started buying beer in glass bottles rather than cans,so I could smash an empty one and cut myself, I didn’t tell her.

​In fact, it never occurred to me to tell her about any of this. 

​When I was twenty, my mother announced, "If your stepfather ever touched you, sexually, I would've done something."

​Before I responded, my brain flipped through our history.

​I briefly considered explaining all this to her. 

​Instead, I said, “What did you ever do that would’ve made me believe that?”

Mary Beth’s award-winning memoir, From Junkie to Judge: One Woman’s Triumph Over Trauma and Addiction, describes the child abuse that led to teenage methamphetamine addiction, the chaos of that addiction, and her early recovery. Plus, how she became a judge! She also publishes op-eds, such as in the Wall Street Journal, Los Angeles Times, Philadelphia Inquirer, and Recovery Today. Mary Beth’s memoir writings have appeared in Memoir Magazine, Awakenings, The Noyo River Review, Fault Zone, Carry the Light, and Ravens Perch. She speaks about addiction and recovery, such as on television, radio, and podcasts, and at conferences and other events.