I Am Carmen's Daughter
Just when I think I have it all figured out, I'm taken back by a memory, a flashback, a moment that will never happen again. I am stopped in my tracks while I am trying to find my way, I remember my mom trying to find hers.
Journeys and paths and a story that have to be shared. An Induced environment that makes us who we are. Pardon, my indulgence... If we haven't met before, let me introduce myself... I Am Carmen's Daughter. I am Kitryn Marie.( I am her oldest) Who I am is really not all that important... but my mom, Carmen ... she was! And her life mattered...
May 19th of 1968 at the age of 31, my mom died, leaving behind a 6-year-old and a 3-year-old. A family grieving that dared to keep a secret. My grandma,(a saint) and grandpa doing everything in their possible Italian ways to protect us (My sister and myself). Not ever letting us know what had happened...
My mother was a victim of domestic abuse and although it is not what took her life it was what played a grave part in her life ending.
It is hard enough to explain death in general but how do you explain to a child who has witnessed domestic abuse, really what domestic abuse is. When everyday violent occurrences take place in the home, it just becomes part of the scenery and a child knows no difference. It becomes part of their environment and it is what the child who finally grows up is all too familiar with. (At some point in all our lives we become the product of our environments.)
Her meager beginning began in the back of a shoe shop. My grandfather, Vince, a shoe cobbler (by day). An accomplished guitar player, (by night) and my grandmother, Dorothy an accomplished seamstress. Not having any money, they lived in the back of his shoe shop raising 3 small girls. Mom being the eldest, then 18 mos. apart, Sara and years later to follow, Phyllis. Mom had shown signs of singing at the age of 3. It just had happened that one of grandpa's customers was a singing teacher and was more than happy to have mom become one of her students. By the age of 5, my mother started performing.
My mom, a product of talent that thrived on singing. A 1955 graduate from NotreDame highschool. She was dubbed "The Song Bird." Having lead roles in all of their musicals. Landing her first real job at our local news affiliate. When TV was really glamorous and special, mom found her way on a stage singing before live audiences and cameras. Grandma and Grandpa could not have been prouder.
She continued with her career up until she met my dad. Before I go any farther, let me say I loved my dad. He too was quite the product of his environment. Born into a dirt-poor alcoholic family that did not want him, he witnessed abuse as he was subject to it also. He worked hard for every dollar he ever made but sometimes that money became the lesser of the two evils.
Meeting my mother by chance. Dad had a paper route on the corner where they were then living. (Grand and Bates)buying his own route after returning from being in the service. The year was somewhere around 1954... by the time he had met my mom she had just graduated from high school and was working at the news station. I don't know if it was love at first sight... all I know was dad was flashy and mom wanted out of her south city life... and I don't think Grandma and Grandpa were all too thrilled about it.
Mom had been asked to participate in the veiled prophets coronation November of 1957, which my father accompanied her. He very well by then knew of her talent and was proud of her but later down the line her life in the public was too much for him. Jealousy and rage became part of his alcoholic behavior. Trying to control her and manage her life..
By November of 1958, they were married and he took her from her south St. Louis home to a brand new home with the state of the art lifestyle in Florissant(when Florissant was nothing but farmland) isolating her, where she would be removed from family, friends and her singing career. He had even had a pool put in for her. Dad a truck driver, driving for AG (Associated Grocers) was gone away on long shifts at a time. Although he drove in town his days long leaving my mom to herself until I came along in July of 1961.
From my earliest childhood memories, I would hear my mom singing up and down the halls of our home. She would be in the best of moods until my dad would come home most often inebriated and then I don't know what would happen. At times, it was turbulent. My flashbacks are just fleeting moments of me running down that same hall to my room and hiding listening to her screams. I wish I could remember more. These flashbacks come and go from the age span of 3 to 6 when she died...
Finally moving my mom back to South St. Louis, they bought a house on Bates. My sister then born, 1964. We lived upstairs and grandma and grandpa lived downstairs. I can tell you my mom still sang and sang but her health was declining and her spirit just not the same... It was if we lived in a beautifully decorated closet. What went on behind doors was so different than when those doors were opened.
Dad could not or would not take mom to the Dr. The story is muted... I remember though mom was sick and had this horrible type rash on her legs. Grandpa had taken off work and to take her. I was playing in the back yard watching my mom come through the gate, she was pale. She had dark circles under eyes... she was tired, so tired. The next day they were admitting her to the hospital.
Now if I back up ... somewhere before all that had happened. I do remember a horrific fight. Dad had come home from work agitated. We had just sat down to dinner. Mom always cooked. ...always a real meal. Dad would not have it any other way. My sister in her highchair to my left, my dad to my right and mom seated across from him. We were having T-bone steak... I vividly remember they would give me the bone with meat on it... knowing I would pick it up and eat it with no fight. I had made a comment. I don't remember the comment but within a matter of seconds, my dad flipped the table on my mom. I grabbed my sister out of her highchair. She was a baby!!!! I picked her up and followed my mom and dad in their room. I saw my dad beating her with the table cloth and then... I ran down the 2 story flight of steps. I was screaming ... I could hear my mom screaming. It was the same screams the same cries... it was all the same.
The day after mom went into the hospital, dad sneaked me and my sister in. Coming up a service elevator big heavy metal doors opened, slowly we walked down a smelly medicinal odor permeated corridor til we found mom's room. There she was... pale, her nose bleeding. Running towards her bed I hugged her. She was clammy so clammy... she had a smell. (to this day I try to remember that smell.It wasn't bad. It wasn't good... it was what I think sickness smells like... ) She told me and my sister to be good, to listen to grandma and she said, hugging me so tight, " I love you." She then looked at my dad and with the most evil voice spoke, " So help me God, if you do not do right by these girls, I will come back and haunt you!"
My mom died that night... and I never saw her again. We were not allowed to go to her funeral.
The morning following her death, dad had sat each of us on his knee saying the angels had came and got her. Can a child go into shock? I think I went into shock... I know my mind went somewhere... the same place my mind has gone several times over the last years. Where is that place? When the mind just can not handle anymore...
When I was about 14, my grandma gave me my mother's autopsy report. A child should not have to decipher an autopsy... anybody for that matter should NOT have to decipher a fucking autopsy!!! but gram knew that I would study it...decipher it and get to the truth at some point in my life! Lucky me... always the super sleuth! all those years we were protected from the truth. It was never talked about... NEVER! My mom was here one day and gone the next... We (my sister and I) orphans... ABANDONED!!!!
In 1968, there were no domestic violence laws. What a man did to his woman behind doors stayed behind doors. The police did come to our home many times over the course of the years but nothing was ever done. No one ever protected her. No one knew how... One time I do though remember dad was drinking something terrible... and driving with us. (which he did often) Hell he even drove us to California all drunked up and on speed (come to find out later in life) and the police did come to the house and arrest him for something... only to be released a few hours later.
Where am I going with all this...???
Well, it was only when I was diagnosed with having this Chronic Leukemia thing that all the puzzle pieces started to fall into place. What we were told growing up was that mom had "a leukemia" because of the fact that she was anemic due to the blood loss from blunt traumatic force. All those years I read and read that autopsy and tried to decipher what in the hell it all meant... it meant she was bleeding internally. The autopsy showed she was bleeding from her spleen, stomach, and colon. She had 7 blood clots... blood was pooling where it could. The hospital that she was in knew she was bleeding but technology from that day could not show it so what they did was give her a blood transfusion. And the issue with that was that was what killed her. They did not cross match blood back in those days and my mother being RH Negative... What they gave her did not match! therefore, she went into anaphylactic shock. Nowhere did the Dr or the hospital take responsibility and my grieving grandparents did not have it in them to pursue it or push an issue. In those days, the Dr's words were like God speaking!
So where does this leave me now???? ...
Funny you ask? As a woman the things I have learned to tolerate because of that abuse that occurred in my home. Common sense would tell anyone... (so you'd think?) if someone is emotionally, physically and mentally abusive leave! Get out!!!! RUN THE FUCK AWAY... but it does not work like that.
An abused woman wants to believe her man is going to change. They make excuses and even take blame for the abuse. *** He didn't mean it. He loves me. He was just angry. I said something and he took it wrong. Oh he just had too much too drink... etc etc etc...
An abused woman will stand by her man and allow him to continue the abuse because there are children. She has nowhere to go. She truly does love him...and does believe he can change. (often with that, the man has come from a domestic abusive childhood and he has witnessed seeing his father abuse his mother. Gaining no respect for woman or himself... because he too was blamed for the bad behavior) It is a horrible vicious cycle.
I can only speak from the situation I was in. We had just gotten engaged! It was my mothers ring. I was so proud to have that ring remade. It was Christmas time... I had bought a tree for him and his children. I took it to his house, he was nowhere to be found. The girls having attitudes... (because if the man has issues with the woman he too is having domestic issues with his children... the lack of respect and no ability to emotionally connect therefore not knowing how to converse with ...) Anyway, I fell on ice injuring my hand to the point where my finger had swelled so bad the ring was cutting off circulation. Still not being able to locate him finally when I did talk to him, he was mad I brought a tree over and he was mad, I fell.
Having a Christmas party to go to... he did not want me to go nor did he want to attend with me. I went without him and he showed up furious. His behavior was rude, disrespectable and the scene he was causing embarrassing... I tried to play it off so no one would notice... We left.
To wrap this up, after coming home and his horrific barrage of accusations, my finger had swelled so bad, we ended up cutting my engagement ring off. I never cried so hard in my life. That was my mothers ring and I was so proud of it...as he yelled, "that is the fakest cry I have ever heard! What's wrong with you... it doesn't mean anything anyway!" We fought all night long... he insisted on sex. Throwing someone else name at me... by morning he had me cornered in the bathroom, threatening ...
Well come to find out, he had been cheating on me. It had just so happened it was the other woman's Christmas party too... he was pissed he couldn't go with her and the night of the tree delivery ... and I fell. He was with her that night too...
Yes!! I know better... unfortunately, as my mom it was the same thing... and it has taken years to come to terms with everything making the connections and the correlations... domestic abuse has a trickle down effect. We all become a product of our environment if we do not recognize the corrupt behavior. It does not change until you yourself change the situation and become aware of actions!
My mother's life was taken down too short! Her vibrant career and talents taken away from her children, her family and everybody that knew her and loved her!
I proudly say I AM CARMEN'S DAUGHTER! I speak for her and all the women that are out there afraid to do something about the abuse that is taking place. 1 in 3 women are abused every 9 seconds a woman is assaulted and or beaten. http://www.ncadv.org/learn/statistics
The lingering effects a child lives with is traumatic and haunting and its memories linger well into adulthood. Trust issues are formed and if not recognized they pick abusive partners... mimicking the life they knew!!!
This is MY story and this is why I am who I am...
If you know anyone or you are in a situation... I encourage you to reach out GET HELP! If not for you, your children! Do not leave them orphans.
Meet Me In St. Louis,
Kitryn Marie
Journeys and paths and a story that have to be shared. An Induced environment that makes us who we are. Pardon, my indulgence... If we haven't met before, let me introduce myself... I Am Carmen's Daughter. I am Kitryn Marie.( I am her oldest) Who I am is really not all that important... but my mom, Carmen ... she was! And her life mattered...
May 19th of 1968 at the age of 31, my mom died, leaving behind a 6-year-old and a 3-year-old. A family grieving that dared to keep a secret. My grandma,(a saint) and grandpa doing everything in their possible Italian ways to protect us (My sister and myself). Not ever letting us know what had happened...
My mother was a victim of domestic abuse and although it is not what took her life it was what played a grave part in her life ending.
It is hard enough to explain death in general but how do you explain to a child who has witnessed domestic abuse, really what domestic abuse is. When everyday violent occurrences take place in the home, it just becomes part of the scenery and a child knows no difference. It becomes part of their environment and it is what the child who finally grows up is all too familiar with. (At some point in all our lives we become the product of our environments.)
Her meager beginning began in the back of a shoe shop. My grandfather, Vince, a shoe cobbler (by day). An accomplished guitar player, (by night) and my grandmother, Dorothy an accomplished seamstress. Not having any money, they lived in the back of his shoe shop raising 3 small girls. Mom being the eldest, then 18 mos. apart, Sara and years later to follow, Phyllis. Mom had shown signs of singing at the age of 3. It just had happened that one of grandpa's customers was a singing teacher and was more than happy to have mom become one of her students. By the age of 5, my mother started performing.
My mom, a product of talent that thrived on singing. A 1955 graduate from NotreDame highschool. She was dubbed "The Song Bird." Having lead roles in all of their musicals. Landing her first real job at our local news affiliate. When TV was really glamorous and special, mom found her way on a stage singing before live audiences and cameras. Grandma and Grandpa could not have been prouder.
She continued with her career up until she met my dad. Before I go any farther, let me say I loved my dad. He too was quite the product of his environment. Born into a dirt-poor alcoholic family that did not want him, he witnessed abuse as he was subject to it also. He worked hard for every dollar he ever made but sometimes that money became the lesser of the two evils.
Meeting my mother by chance. Dad had a paper route on the corner where they were then living. (Grand and Bates)buying his own route after returning from being in the service. The year was somewhere around 1954... by the time he had met my mom she had just graduated from high school and was working at the news station. I don't know if it was love at first sight... all I know was dad was flashy and mom wanted out of her south city life... and I don't think Grandma and Grandpa were all too thrilled about it.
Mom had been asked to participate in the veiled prophets coronation November of 1957, which my father accompanied her. He very well by then knew of her talent and was proud of her but later down the line her life in the public was too much for him. Jealousy and rage became part of his alcoholic behavior. Trying to control her and manage her life..
By November of 1958, they were married and he took her from her south St. Louis home to a brand new home with the state of the art lifestyle in Florissant(when Florissant was nothing but farmland) isolating her, where she would be removed from family, friends and her singing career. He had even had a pool put in for her. Dad a truck driver, driving for AG (Associated Grocers) was gone away on long shifts at a time. Although he drove in town his days long leaving my mom to herself until I came along in July of 1961.
From my earliest childhood memories, I would hear my mom singing up and down the halls of our home. She would be in the best of moods until my dad would come home most often inebriated and then I don't know what would happen. At times, it was turbulent. My flashbacks are just fleeting moments of me running down that same hall to my room and hiding listening to her screams. I wish I could remember more. These flashbacks come and go from the age span of 3 to 6 when she died...
Finally moving my mom back to South St. Louis, they bought a house on Bates. My sister then born, 1964. We lived upstairs and grandma and grandpa lived downstairs. I can tell you my mom still sang and sang but her health was declining and her spirit just not the same... It was if we lived in a beautifully decorated closet. What went on behind doors was so different than when those doors were opened.
Dad could not or would not take mom to the Dr. The story is muted... I remember though mom was sick and had this horrible type rash on her legs. Grandpa had taken off work and to take her. I was playing in the back yard watching my mom come through the gate, she was pale. She had dark circles under eyes... she was tired, so tired. The next day they were admitting her to the hospital.
Now if I back up ... somewhere before all that had happened. I do remember a horrific fight. Dad had come home from work agitated. We had just sat down to dinner. Mom always cooked. ...always a real meal. Dad would not have it any other way. My sister in her highchair to my left, my dad to my right and mom seated across from him. We were having T-bone steak... I vividly remember they would give me the bone with meat on it... knowing I would pick it up and eat it with no fight. I had made a comment. I don't remember the comment but within a matter of seconds, my dad flipped the table on my mom. I grabbed my sister out of her highchair. She was a baby!!!! I picked her up and followed my mom and dad in their room. I saw my dad beating her with the table cloth and then... I ran down the 2 story flight of steps. I was screaming ... I could hear my mom screaming. It was the same screams the same cries... it was all the same.
The day after mom went into the hospital, dad sneaked me and my sister in. Coming up a service elevator big heavy metal doors opened, slowly we walked down a smelly medicinal odor permeated corridor til we found mom's room. There she was... pale, her nose bleeding. Running towards her bed I hugged her. She was clammy so clammy... she had a smell. (to this day I try to remember that smell.It wasn't bad. It wasn't good... it was what I think sickness smells like... ) She told me and my sister to be good, to listen to grandma and she said, hugging me so tight, " I love you." She then looked at my dad and with the most evil voice spoke, " So help me God, if you do not do right by these girls, I will come back and haunt you!"
My mom died that night... and I never saw her again. We were not allowed to go to her funeral.
The morning following her death, dad had sat each of us on his knee saying the angels had came and got her. Can a child go into shock? I think I went into shock... I know my mind went somewhere... the same place my mind has gone several times over the last years. Where is that place? When the mind just can not handle anymore...
When I was about 14, my grandma gave me my mother's autopsy report. A child should not have to decipher an autopsy... anybody for that matter should NOT have to decipher a fucking autopsy!!! but gram knew that I would study it...decipher it and get to the truth at some point in my life! Lucky me... always the super sleuth! all those years we were protected from the truth. It was never talked about... NEVER! My mom was here one day and gone the next... We (my sister and I) orphans... ABANDONED!!!!
In 1968, there were no domestic violence laws. What a man did to his woman behind doors stayed behind doors. The police did come to our home many times over the course of the years but nothing was ever done. No one ever protected her. No one knew how... One time I do though remember dad was drinking something terrible... and driving with us. (which he did often) Hell he even drove us to California all drunked up and on speed (come to find out later in life) and the police did come to the house and arrest him for something... only to be released a few hours later.
Where am I going with all this...???
Well, it was only when I was diagnosed with having this Chronic Leukemia thing that all the puzzle pieces started to fall into place. What we were told growing up was that mom had "a leukemia" because of the fact that she was anemic due to the blood loss from blunt traumatic force. All those years I read and read that autopsy and tried to decipher what in the hell it all meant... it meant she was bleeding internally. The autopsy showed she was bleeding from her spleen, stomach, and colon. She had 7 blood clots... blood was pooling where it could. The hospital that she was in knew she was bleeding but technology from that day could not show it so what they did was give her a blood transfusion. And the issue with that was that was what killed her. They did not cross match blood back in those days and my mother being RH Negative... What they gave her did not match! therefore, she went into anaphylactic shock. Nowhere did the Dr or the hospital take responsibility and my grieving grandparents did not have it in them to pursue it or push an issue. In those days, the Dr's words were like God speaking!
So where does this leave me now???? ...
Funny you ask? As a woman the things I have learned to tolerate because of that abuse that occurred in my home. Common sense would tell anyone... (so you'd think?) if someone is emotionally, physically and mentally abusive leave! Get out!!!! RUN THE FUCK AWAY... but it does not work like that.
An abused woman wants to believe her man is going to change. They make excuses and even take blame for the abuse. *** He didn't mean it. He loves me. He was just angry. I said something and he took it wrong. Oh he just had too much too drink... etc etc etc...
An abused woman will stand by her man and allow him to continue the abuse because there are children. She has nowhere to go. She truly does love him...and does believe he can change. (often with that, the man has come from a domestic abusive childhood and he has witnessed seeing his father abuse his mother. Gaining no respect for woman or himself... because he too was blamed for the bad behavior) It is a horrible vicious cycle.
I can only speak from the situation I was in. We had just gotten engaged! It was my mothers ring. I was so proud to have that ring remade. It was Christmas time... I had bought a tree for him and his children. I took it to his house, he was nowhere to be found. The girls having attitudes... (because if the man has issues with the woman he too is having domestic issues with his children... the lack of respect and no ability to emotionally connect therefore not knowing how to converse with ...) Anyway, I fell on ice injuring my hand to the point where my finger had swelled so bad the ring was cutting off circulation. Still not being able to locate him finally when I did talk to him, he was mad I brought a tree over and he was mad, I fell.
Having a Christmas party to go to... he did not want me to go nor did he want to attend with me. I went without him and he showed up furious. His behavior was rude, disrespectable and the scene he was causing embarrassing... I tried to play it off so no one would notice... We left.
To wrap this up, after coming home and his horrific barrage of accusations, my finger had swelled so bad, we ended up cutting my engagement ring off. I never cried so hard in my life. That was my mothers ring and I was so proud of it...as he yelled, "that is the fakest cry I have ever heard! What's wrong with you... it doesn't mean anything anyway!" We fought all night long... he insisted on sex. Throwing someone else name at me... by morning he had me cornered in the bathroom, threatening ...
Well come to find out, he had been cheating on me. It had just so happened it was the other woman's Christmas party too... he was pissed he couldn't go with her and the night of the tree delivery ... and I fell. He was with her that night too...
Yes!! I know better... unfortunately, as my mom it was the same thing... and it has taken years to come to terms with everything making the connections and the correlations... domestic abuse has a trickle down effect. We all become a product of our environment if we do not recognize the corrupt behavior. It does not change until you yourself change the situation and become aware of actions!
My mother's life was taken down too short! Her vibrant career and talents taken away from her children, her family and everybody that knew her and loved her!
I proudly say I AM CARMEN'S DAUGHTER! I speak for her and all the women that are out there afraid to do something about the abuse that is taking place. 1 in 3 women are abused every 9 seconds a woman is assaulted and or beaten. http://www.ncadv.org/learn/statistics
The lingering effects a child lives with is traumatic and haunting and its memories linger well into adulthood. Trust issues are formed and if not recognized they pick abusive partners... mimicking the life they knew!!!
This is MY story and this is why I am who I am...
If you know anyone or you are in a situation... I encourage you to reach out GET HELP! If not for you, your children! Do not leave them orphans.
Meet Me In St. Louis,
Kitryn Marie
