"There's a fine line"

The subject of my book covers more than one issue; it’s a true story that ranges over a period of many years. It covers the first married years of my mother’s life, and the abuse she received from my now deceased father. The hardship she found within her life in so many ways, no one should have ever had to go through, but sadly it just seemed to follow her around. Some years later she remarried, but unfortunately this union would tear her once more into tiny pieces. She would see everything slipping away from her. Was her husband really having an affair with her daughter? It seemed to her that was the case, why would he lie? It would see the breakdown of her complete family unit, scattered to the wind without care.

I would find myself in a situation that I had no control over, and in the grip of a complete madman. To follow there would be self mutilation, and the bartering of shot guns as if it were an everyday occurrence. The threat to life was very real, my own included.

I would spend many years within the mental health care system; in fact I am still under their care umbrella. I would move from a heterosexual relationship and into a lesbian relationship. Totally at a loss of understanding anything controlled by anyone male.

After an accident I was ill health retired, and most of my days are now spend in considerable pain. This of course gave me a lot of me time, which if I am honest I never really wanted. I was made to stare into the face, of so many things I had tried so very hard to bury. But I guess that was a little naive of me, muck will always rise to the surface at some point. The lid on Pandora’s Box was opening an inch at a time, and no matter how hard I pushed, I was never able to close it again. People would be hurt both physically and mentally. No one was safe if they stood in the way of my stepfather and what he claimed was his.

Years later I would sit and watch my mum die, when if dealt with properly it should never have happened. They say the good die young, or that they were too good for this world. Well both proverbs to my mind sit well whenever I think of her. To this day I stand in awe of the person I was so proud to call my mum. It’s a story that needs to be told for that fact alone.

It’s a story that resembles hell and it was my life for many years, as such I am equipped with everything I need, to help you relate to the madness which ensued. Although this has been extremely difficult for me to write, my hope is that someone out there may take some strength from it, if finding themselves in a similar situation. There is always a light at the end of the tunnel; all we have to do is reach out for it.

I understand that this book/memoir is just a little different to most other memoirs i.e. most are written by ghost writers. This was something I never even considered. To my mind I had to be the one to write this. I hoped and needed to be able to express my feelings within its pages, as no other person could. With the best outcome being, that you would feel like you were taking this journey with me. Strangely I feel an amount of support, at being able to think that you are out there. There is a fine line between sanity and insanity; I know this personally, through the experiences I have had to go through involving my stepfather. I also have a personal insight of my own, of a mind battling to stay on the right side of that line, because in truth, I came so very close to crossing over myself.