this happened when i was 7 years old and was a very trusting child and thought the world was nice and kind, boy was i wrong this is my story of my experience with domestic violence as a child
this occurred about 3 years after my dad died.
my mother got involved with a guy that happened to be a police officer
all my young life i had been taught that police officers were there to protect and keep kids safe and i believed it whole heartedly and thought nothing of it until i started seeing odd things going on with my mum .
like when i would go to give her a big hug she jumped at the slightest tough, at first i put it down to she may not want a hug right now or i had disgusted he in some way so i would go off to my room and cry thinking i had done something to make my mummy not like me.
then not long after this me me and my five sibling started doing swimming lessons and i noticed this big brown and blue marks on my mummys neck , back ,legs and even ears so i went up to mum and said "did you paint yourself mummy because you miss some spots" and she stated crying and again i thought i did something wrong
why did i keep making my mummy cry whenever i went near her i couldnt understand at the time
then things began happening at home and i would constantly hear screaming and yelling coming from my mums room and then hear stuff smashing and being thrown around the room . then mum would come running into us grab all of us and bring us into a room only she had a key for the lock to keep us in there with her
she would make us laugh and just talk to us while we all could still hear smashing noises outside of that room
then over the next couple of months the screaming and bruises got bigger and louder and then i noticed it died down a bit which confused me so much because what had changed
then i noticed the poilice officer started on me
i was terrified
he would try and choke me , he tried raping me and even began bashing me i didnt know what i had done to make him so angry at me and if i asked i would cop a punch to the face or because he knew about me being able to dislocate easlily he would purposly dislocate my joints and then for an hour or two,
while he bashed me he also bashed my mum
at seven i ended up having toliet training problems. he noticed i had a bed wetting accident and when i tried to quietly change me sheets without him noticing he came in and noticed what i had done
and boy did i cop it for that he came in threw me around the room and went to go for my 4 year old and 2 year old sisters so instead i told him to take it all out on me leave them alone
i said to him "if you want kill me just dont hurt my sisters"
this just enraged him more and he demanded all my brothers and sisters and mum get into my room and he made me rub my own face in what i had done i was so ashamed
my family members wanted to help me i could tell by the look on their faces. but by then he had a knife to my mums throat and my family was so important to me so i did it to make him Leave my mummy alone
the next day when he went to work i went into mum and said to her after getting as much guts up as possible and i said to my mum
MUM I CANT HANDLE THIS ANYMORE WE NEED TO GO PLEASE MUM I WANT TO GET AWAY PLEASE PLEASE PLEASE MUMMY CAN WE GO
my mum was in tears hearing me begging but she said go play for a little bit and i will come and talk in a minute and again i thought we are going to get so hurt when he comes home. but my mum shocked the daylights out of me and my siblings when she came in our room and said " grab whatever clothes and a toy each you can and lets go and never come back i said to my mummy i dont need clothes i need you and my brothers and sisters and lets go and we left with the clothes on our back
we got a new place and my mum ended up having to get him charged and locked up for what he did to us imy family and i are still recieving counselling to this day to do with this very thing i hope this opens up peoples views to what happens to a child that may be going through this situation. if you are please leave now dont stay they will not change
also here are some sites that may help if you are in this type of situation :
http://www.healthinsite.gov.au/topics/Domestic_Violence
http://www.clarkprosecutor.org/html/domviol/domvic.htm
http://www.legalaid.qld.gov.au/Publications/Factsheets+and+guides/Factsheets/How+do+I+get+a+domestic+violence+protection+order.htm
http://www.lawlink.nsw.gov.au/lawlink/victimsservices/ll_vs.nsf/pages/VS_compensationdv
http://raisingchildren.net.au/articles/more_than_arguments_domestic_violence_-_cyh.html
(November 18th) (
