School Bag

I always knew what I was fighting for – my family’s stability (my children for a long time are my only family). Now I’m not so sure, everything that was happiness once just bores me. Like some people who are addicted to work, I was high on my kids and it kind of makes me a social loner, but I was unable to give up my addiction.

Woke up pretty early today, partly because I have an appointment to keep, and mostly because hubby was singing his snoring song. When I looked out of the window I saw that it was raining, and decided to send an email to postpone the appointment to a later date, and I realized yet again that I am missing the kids. How can this be possible all the time, even when I am with the man that I cherish, respect, and love so much.

There are many reasons that make me love the kids so unconditionally, many things were related to my own upbringing, I need to talk about my real personal history often I guess, in order to become free of it. As a single parent I worked 3 times harder just to give them all that I was deprived of, not that I regret not having them. But along the way, there were terrible moments of my life that I still have nightmare about.

This incident that happened, oh so long ago, that still brings tears to my eyes. I have always been a good student, a smart one and I am someone who does everything to impress my parents, not so much my father but my mom. Once, one of my sisters was given a new school bag, and she is the most stupid one in the family, so naturally I also asked for the same and for whatever reason I was throwing tantrums for being always sidelined.
Mom was so angry that she started hitting me hard; I was doing my homework at that point of time, she even took my books and tore them. I think this was the moment that I cried the tears that I will never again. However, she was not done at that; she went to the kitchen and took a long `parang’ which my father often keeps sharp, as he used them in the garden.

When I saw this, I was stunned and ran, but where can I run, as all the doors are locked because it is already night time. So I run to the main hall (we have a big house, which consists of 3 halls) and my mom was looking so insane at that point of time, she chased after me and told me that I would be history once she laid her hands on me. I was running around the dining table (we had a big dining table of 12 chairs then); she even hit the table with the `parang’. I felt blinded with my own tears and suffocating from being so tired, things only calmed down when my father returned from the `surau’.

After this incident, I felt bitter all the time, I learned how to hate, learned how to be nasty, learned to recoil into myself so much that I don’t feel love for any of my siblings. To me they are just there, they don’t have any impact on me at all. Therefore, I pour all the love that I have on my kids, and I want to give them all that they want even if I have to suffer to get that for them, so much so that I became over-protective of them.

This scene of mom trying to kill me still haunts me, before I left, I had the same dream again and I have to talk to someone about it, so I call hubby and told him. He is the only person who can take me with all my baggage, he is so understanding and I hope with him I will heal. And the tears flow yet again……………..