Saturday, October 27, 2018

Scarred For Life

Recently someone brought up a story about how they were scarred for life by the lies their parents told them, and it got me thinking about the odd things my mom convinced me were true. To be fair, my perspective has changed in recent years, and I am glad my mom taught me how to have a healthy sense of humour growing up. My  mom did a lot of awesome things when I was a kid too, but that doesn't change the minor trauma my mom inflicted in those impressionable early years. (Author's note: I may still be irrationally afraid of earwigs, tapioca and shower curtains, but otherwise I turned out alright.)

The look of innocence.
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First, a little perspective: I was not a particularly squeamish kid in most instances. I was definitely a tomboy, climbing trees and unafraid to get dirty. In elementary school, the boys would catch garden snakes and try to freak out the girls. Most of them would shriek and run away, while I would say "cool! Can I hold it?" The boys always looked a little disappointed that I hadn't reacted the way they wanted me to.

When I was about 4 years old, my mom told me that Tapioca Pudding was made from fish eyes. It has been 35 years, and I still cannot eat tapioca unless it is ground up as a powder. This became a particular problem when I attended UBC as there was a Bubble Tea kiosk in the Student Union Building. Bubble Tea was all the rage and the mere thought of it made me gag.

When I was 5 I asked why earwigs were called earwigs, which lead my mom to spin a tale for me that earwigs would crawl into a person's hair and then into their ear, where they would eat their brains from the inside out. She quickly refuted her own story, but I still can't see an earwig without wigging out to this day. I can relocate other bugs, spiders, frogs, lizards... but I feel that earwigs deserve to die a horrible fiery death, regardless of their innocence.

There was the incident when I decided to run away: I don't remember why I was upset, but I went up to my mom and said "fine, I'm running away!" Instead of arguing, she helped me pack. Really, this was ingenious of her, and she knew my propensity for devouring books would not let me get far, but at the time I was convinced that she was going to let me run away.

      "Well, you can't go anywhere without your books! You need something to read, take these."
      "You should definitely take your roller skates. You might need them."
      "Don't forget your stuffed animals, which ones should you take?"
      "You'll need a change of clothes of course."
      "You'll need your LEGO."

By the time she finished helping me pack, the clunky old pinkish suitcase was full, and to my young standards, very heavy. I got to the end of the driveway dragging the suitcase behind me, and needed to stop and take a break. I pulled out one of the books and got transported into another world. When I finished the books I decided that this wasn't the right day to run away, and I should really go home and try again some other time... besides, I really needed to pick a new set of books to take with me.

Picture this jumping out at you!
When I was a kid I would sneak through the house into the kitchen where I could see the TV in the living room, and would watch TV and movies "with" my dad late at night. At four years old, I somehow managed to watch Psycho without being caught. At some point I must have fessed up, because a few years later my mom hid behind the shower curtain and scared me half to death. You would think that would be the end of it, but no. Every time my mom cleans the house &/or expects company one of her automatic moves is to close the shower curtain to "hide the mess" (there almost never is a mess - this is just one of her quirks). Every time I enter her bathroom and the shower curtain is closed I have to pull it back suddenly to make sure nothing is hiding behind it waiting to murder me. Every time I see a closed shower curtain there is a brief sense of panic and my heart speeds up. EVERY TIME! (In hindsight, Dad is probably equally to blame for this fear as he was the one watching Psycho with a 4-year old at home. Also, I may have hidden behind a shower curtain or two as a child to try to get her back, so all's fair in love and war.)

Mom, you can expect a bill when I find a therapist willing to deal with this deep-seeded childhood trauma. Or, perhaps I could just pay them in zucchini?


3 comments:

  1. Jeanie,

    Wow! I'd be scarred too, even though I kind of like your mom's wicked sense of humor -- not to scare her kids, of course -- maybe for when you were in your teens and for adults who can handle it! Except the jumping out from behind the shower curtain part. She's lucky she never got hurt, cuz someone did that to me and I'd just lose it and go all psycho on them aka someone's gonna get hurt! Yeah, enjoy therapy. Hugs, Mona

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    1. To be fair, I was probably a pre-teen/teen when she jumped out at me, and she may not have known about my earlier trauma of seeing Psycho when I was waaaaaay too young to understand it.

      I've updated the post to reflect things in a slightly less harsh light. Yes, I'm still afraid of Tapioca, Shower Curtains and Earwigs, but otherwise I turned out alright.

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  2. My mom would like the following comments to go on the record:

    "All things considered, you turned out well, in spite of your mom’s warped sense of humour. 💖

    By the way, did this happen after you snuffed me out with a bucket of ice cold water, immediately before the Brownie’s parents came to collect them from camp?"

    For the water story check out my post about the Wicked Witch of the West.

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