Born Into Prayer.

Born a middle child to a farming couple from a small town in Alberta, Canada . I arrived the fifth child of eight. Smack in the middle four years younger than an older sister and four years older than a brother. Yes, I did suffer from the middle child syndrome. I was brought up with a strict Roman Catholic dogma and learned at a very young age that there was a God somewhere up there. I also learned that I had a special Guardian Angle on my right shoulder that guided and protected me each and every day of my life. I was taught how to pray as soon as I could speak. I have once again started repeating it again on a daily basis. "Angel of God my guardian dear, to whom God's love commits me here. Every day be at my side, to light and guard, to rule and guide, Amen."

It had a lot of meaning to me as a child. I said it out loud to my Mother each night. I did talk to that guardian angel on my shoulder. Later with all the trauma that wound its way through my life, I forgot and looked right through the angel only living and focusing on the pain and dysfunction. Now I know with all the certainty and faith of a child in each moment, I really do have a spiritual guide I can call upon for each and every moment. It's only today that I realize how much true meaning and power that prayer really has.

I was lonely as a child and spent much of my time in the three acres of trees next to the house where I would run around exploring the beautiful trees and plants and just being me. I would pick Blue Bells and dandelion flowers and give my Mom a small bouquet almost every summer day. She would show much gratitude, put them in water and place the small vase next to a statue of the Virgin Mary. I would feel loved. Although Mom never said the words, "I love you."

When I would get bored, my older sister Gail would be delegated to entertain me. She would take me to the edge of the trees and with a gardening hoe, she would carve out rooms in the dirt telling me it was my palace and what were in the rooms. I loved this adventure. It was always a new surprise. Then off she would go leaving me to play with my imagination and I would do so very intently.

I have a great imagination today and I believe this experience played a large part in its development. I loved what Gail did for me and am now filled with gratitude for those days. The funny things about siblings is she has guilt feelings about how she treated me. The most important thing was that I loved it and I felt connected to her at these times.

Testing God

As I said I was often lonely. I would try to spend time with my too busy father who would go to the trees for a nap after lunch. I would go with him, lie down beside him, he would fall asleep and soon I would be up and running around again discovering nature.

My Dad would often leave home in the afternoon and go to the Hotel bars nearby and would drink. He would come home when the bars shut down for the supper hour. Of course, he would be drunk. The first thing he would do when he walked in the door was start verbally abusing my Mother.

I would watch the pain in her face as she did her best to try and hide her painful feelings. I noticed. I felt them all. I hated seeing her treated that way and I understood that my father was criticizing her wrongly.

I hated it and would pray to God for him to stop. My prayers went unanswered. I wondered if there truly was a God and if he was there, why did he not answer my requests.

When I was about eight or nine years of age I was allowed to play bingo in the church basement on some weekends. The winners would win a large farm chicken ready for the roasting pan and the funds raised would go to maintaining the church that my Father and other community members built. I was lucky and would frequently win. I didn't want the chickens but calling out bingo was very exciting and I would get praised for being lucky.

On one of these nights I was feeling very troubled, wondering if there really was a God or not, as the verbal abuse to my Mother continued. The caller started calling the numbers as I became excited and hopeful. The first three numbers called were all under the N, and I had all three. Including the free space I only had one number to go and I would get bingo. I gazed up, looking at a crucifix hanging on the front wall. I had to talk to God.

I said, "God, if you are really there and can hear me, then let me know by letting me get bingo on the next number called." I told Him that if he did, I promised I would never doubt him again. Sure enough the next number called was mine and I got bingo. I knew that beyond any doubt there truly was a God and my belief has never faltered since.

However Dad continued abusing my Mother and that I didn't understand.

Growing Up Fast

When I was thirteen, my Dad had a heart attack and was unable to take care of the farm. My three older sisters had left home to continue on with their lives, leaving my older brother and Mom to take care of all the animals and outside work, which was plenty. My two younger brothers eight and nine at the time were some help. My youngest sister at six was just too young. That left no one to cook and clean, work in the gardens etc,. I immediately took on the responsibility to do Mom's work.

An older neighbour,, whom I loved, taught me how to cook over the phone using my mind and sense of smell. She told me to line up the spices, to smell them and imagine which meat or vegetable to pair the spices with to yield the best tastes. I never used recipes and to this day they don't make sense to me so I inevitably change something, only to be disappointed with the result. I am now an awesome cook. When I wasn't cooking or cleaning I was helping outside with the chores, working in the garden, bailing hay or straw depending on the season. Winter came but the cooking and cleaning continued for my remainder of the time on the farm.

Sundays were always nice. Company would come, especially my older siblings with their children and many close friends. I could easily cook great meals for large groups and everyone appreciated my efforts. However, everything I did for my Mom and Dad seemed to me to be unappreciated by them.

Learning To Take Abuse

I was a little chubby as a child and as a teenager was about twenty pounds overweight. I don't really know why because we couldn't afford candy, deserts, and junk food was unheard of. Everyone said I looked and took after my Grandmother who died young and whom I never met. Pictures showed me a very robust woman. She was fat.

My older brother nicknamed me fatty which I hated. As a teenager he would tease me unmercifully and tell me I was fat and ugly and no man would ever look at me. I unfortunately believed him and became very self-conscious of my appearance all my life. He would especially tease at the supper table.

I would look at my Mom, my Dad, my older sister, all people who I thought in some way must love me but no one said anything. No one stopped him so I thought it must be true. I would leave the table without eating and go to the bathroom and cry feeling totally unloved by anyone. The feelings of loneliness and unworthiness were overwhelming.

I did not eat anything until the dishes were done and the floors swept and school lunches were made for myself and younger siblings. Then I would sneak some food and myself into the bathroom and eat out of sight of anyone. I didn't realize it but I was learning to take abuse from a man. A man that I loved. What I didn't know is that I was being set up for a life time of abuse. Was I fat because I believed I was fat? Later on in my story I will share the answer and how much power a belief can hold.

As I got older I couldn't bear so frequently seeing the pain in my mother's face as she was being abused by my drunken father. I'm sure he abused her to relieve himself for leaving home and getting drunk and having to come home and face her knowing how much she hated what he was doing.

After his heart attack Mom would be outside working when he came home. I would watch for his car coming down the road. When I would see him I would quickly have his supper ready in his place of eating and have everything just the way he liked it in hopes that he would appreciate it and just be quiet. He never was.

So I started to stand in my Mother's place and allowed him to verbally abuse me. He would say all kinds of things to me that were horrible and it would feel like a knife stabbing through my heart each time. He would say he could hear the hired man walking upstairs from his bedroom to mine and would accuse me of having sex with him. He would rant falsehoods till I would cry with my own pain. The tears, Mom's or mine, would always make him stop.

I would think that he was thinking, there, she feels as guilty as I do. The experience was horrible but at least I didn't have to see the pain in my Mother's face anymore. I stood strong in her place. Sometimes I would tell her about Dad abusing me but she was helpless to do anything about it.

I just wanted to be appreciated by her but felt I never was. Looking back I realize she just didn't know how to love me, for she really could do nothing. I made the choice to spare my mom. Again I was learning to take abuse from a man; another man that I loved.

Life went on at the farm. I rarely finished my work before nine pm which gave me no time to do homework. A school buddy would do my homework for me on the bus to and from school. I always passed my grades only because I realize now, I am smart.

Next Came Marriage

Being responsible and hard working my parents saw me as very mature and allowed me to get married at the too young age of seventeen. What a mistake! I had friends and many sleepovers, started a youth group with the church as a teenager but never really went out on dates till I started dating my future husband at the age of sixteen. For a date, we would we would frequently go to the nearest town, have something to eat and then go home to watch T.V. with Mom and Dad.

I didn't have much fun and missed out on what one would call a young life. I was brought up to be a virgin on my wedding night which I was so I had no sexual experience to offer my marriage. Actually I think he married me because he wanted to have sex as he was also brought up in a strict Catholic home.

One month before we were to be married we had a fight. With great relief I threw my engagement ring at him and called the wedding off. I know I didn't really want to get married. However he begged and cried and reminded me that wedding plans had been made, invitations had been sent out and I felt guilted into taking the ring back.

I think my wedding was the biggest wedding I have ever attended. It poured down rain all day. After the ceremony it seemed to take forever to meet all the people and receive envelopes of money from them.

My husband had reserved the wedding suite in the best hotel in Edmonton and paid them to have as much of my favourite colour yellow in the room. There were yellow towels, yellow sheets on the bed, a yellow bow on the champagne bottle, thirty-six long stemmed yellow roses; it was so beautiful. My husband was very tentative, gentle and my first sexual experience was wonderful. Every woman should have such an experience. We had done a lot of heavy petting on the weekends in the car and before we said goodnight after dates. I was definitely ready for all that it was.

Now I feel it was all a set up. I found married life hard. I worked as a bank teller for the Royal Bank and my husband was an electrician and helped his father on the farm when needed. He was gone from home a lot and I was once again lonely as he stayed at his parents overnight frequently during those times. I bought a budgie bird for company, trained him to ride around on my shoulder and it helped fill in an empty space.

Baby Fever

I played the role of the good wife. Went to church service on Sundays. I cooked good meals and kept a clean home. After a couple of years I wanted a baby more than anything. I got pregnant but had three miscarriages and thinking I could not carry a child, we filed for adoption. My husband went along with what I wanted but never really expressed any feelings on the subject. It went unnoticed by me because I wanted a baby to love so badly. We were going to adopt a boy as my husband wanted but I wanted a girl.

The adoption agency made an appointment to come see our home. All went well and I happily knew a baby would be coming to me. A month later I had been feeling unwell for quite some time. It was bothering me at work so off to the doctor I went. The next day I got a telephone call from my doctor informing me that I was pregnant and all looked like everything would be all right this time. I was ecstatic. I couldn't wait to tell my husband and cancel the adoption application! When I did tell him, he didn't seem to share my extreme joy, but I thought it was just his way.

During my last month of pregnancy, even though I had lost a lot of weight, my stomach was huge and it was difficult accomplishing my daily tasks. I was well liked by my boss and continued to work till the day before the birth. During that last month, we moved out of our apartment into an old farm house a few miles away from where I grew up. I didn't want to but I did what my husband wanted. I had become very good at going along with him. I couldn't understand why he made me work so hard with the move in my condition.

I had grown accustomed to his very controlling ways. I had difficulty with that because I was independent which he hated. That, I would not allow him to take away from me. The loneliness in my life continued.

The best day of my life, ever, arrived and I gave birth to a beautiful, healthy baby girl whom I named Mary. I had never felt so much love in all of my life. I always felt unloved by my family and husband but now I had this lovely, innocent baby to love and I knew she loved me too. When, with baby in arms I was wheeled out of the delivery room to see my husband, I looked into his eyes and was horrified.

Intuition Becomes Truth

I think at a time of just giving birth, women's intuitive senses are heightened. At least I know mine were. I looked into my husband's eyes and knew beyond any doubt that he didn't want us. Oh my God! What was I going to do now?

My daughter was born at five pm. Shortly after I was taken to a room and fell asleep. At one am I was awakened by a nurse holding my baby. I didn't know why she brought her to me but I was incredibly happy. I held my baby close to my heart and felt the unconditional love for her but I knew we would end up alone together. I clearly remember saying to her as I held her tightly, "It's going to be you and me little girlie," and it was. My husband didn't visit us in the hospital, no flowers and no celebration of her life. Inside my heart, I held my own celebration fuelled by the immense love I felt for her.

My husband never held her, bathed her, changed her, nothing. I knew I was right about him not wanting us but never said anything to him about it. I didn't feel love in my marriage. I wasn't allowed to work and meals had to be to his satisfaction. If I did something in the house or went out to buy clothes, anything not sanctioned by him, would lead to an argument about me being too independent.

I took a part-time job working Friday night and Saturdays but wasn't allowed to spend the money I earned so it all went into a savings account. We were acting like the perfect family. All for show. I didn't like it but did it. I had already learned to be quiet and let the man be boss. That's exactly what he wanted. As a sexual partner I did my duty but was never sexually satisfied. I was always left hanging and he didn't seem to care. Once again I learned to turn myself off to the pain of being under a man's control.

Leaving For New Beginnings

I waited for one year but no change in our relationship. I thought that he would come around but didn't. One month after Marys first birthday I packed up our personal things, including my dishwasher which was a gift, and left to start my life over with Mary. I took nothing else. I could not let my daughter grow up in a loveless home. I was happy with my decision and it felt good moving to Calgary, three hours drive away. Though I had no idea that my real hell would start there shortly after this "new" beginning.

Three years later walking in a park talking divorce things over with my ex-husband who was about to remarry I was compelled to ask him. Was I right about him not wanting us the day Mary was born? He admitted I was right. We both cried.

My new life in Calgary brought many surprises. When I was still with my husband he played the game of broomball in the winter as a pastime. His teammates became our friends. They were all nice people and we got to know each other well.

I grew closer to one couple, Kate and Bruce.. Kate worked and Bruce was a stay-at-home Dad. Kate and I became friends and spent time with each other at the get togethers.