Tumbling Down / Ch 5 / Pt. 6 / Hummmm

Paula

The doctor shook his head, asking. “And you say she keeps hearing voices? Hummm. I am sorry, but, I have done everything within my knowledge of medicine. I am recommending that she be seen by a psychiatrist."

"A psychiatrist!" gasped my mother. "Surely you don't mean that?"

"Yes, I feel that it is imperative." replied the sullen doctor.

In the fifties, a psychiatrist was not at all fashionable. This was a very serious matter and my mother could not bring herself to take further steps in that direction. What would people think? She felt petrified, and her nerves were raw. After months of my behavior, her reserve finally shattered.

It was about three o'clock in the morning when I began crawling in the hallway toward my mother's bedroom screeching. "Help me! Help me! I can’t see! I can’t feel! I can't hear anything!"

“I can’t take this anymore." My mother screamed. There is nothing wrong with you! Nothing! Do you hear me?"

"Buh, buh, barely!" I sobbed.....

That was it. She lost it right then and there. She began spanking me as hard as she could. "Well, can you hear this? Or, this, can you feel this? Or, how about this?” Out of control, Mom kept hitting at me, again and again.

I can recall that I didn't feel a thing, except the for the want of my mother to keep on hitting me. The shock contact was somehow keeping me connected to reality. Or, so it felt. Suddenly, my father was there, pulling my mother off of me and holding her back as she struggled to plunge at me again. Mom kept screaming. "I'm sick of this! Sick! I can't take it any more . . . she slid to the floor holding her head in her hands, her body racking with guttural sobs.

"I'm sorry, Mommy." I was crying from somewhere deep in my soul. My father silently carried my shaking body downstairs and put me on the couch away from the rest of the family; who, by this time, were watching in terror. He knew that this was far beyond just a case of cookies with marshmallows; and stayed next to me the entire night, until I finally fell to sleep.

The next morning my father made a suggestion to my mother. "What about this new young priest, Father Cherbuck? Paula is always talking about him. Maybe he could help."

My mother gave him a nasty look as if it were the stupidest suggestion of life, "What in the hell good, would that do?

“I don’t know, it was just a suggestion.” My father’s voice caught in his throat, and tears of frustration began streaming down his face.

Desperate, and unsettled by my father’s reaction, Mom, decided to follow his advice. So as it happened, a rather pleasant ultimatum fell upon me. Mom said that I needed to go and have a talk about my problem with “that priest that I liked.”

“Who, Father Cherbuck?” I asked, as my eyes bugged out.

“Yes, you can talk to him when you go to confession. It is either that or you have to go to a psychiatrist.” She said.

I really didn’t know what that all meant, but I did know that I had a mad crush on the new handsome priest. Needless to say, I was quite excited, and a lot scared. When the day came, I was thankful for the little drape over the window that separated us in the confessional booth. "Forgive me Father, for I have sinned. It has been one week since my last confession and these are my sins." I told him all that there was to tell.

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	MusicDiva Music Lover	Wow...that's raw. I guess we all have a breaking point, and it sounds like your mother reached hers. Perhaps out of pure frustration she turned to physical outlet for her emotions. So sad for you, who probably needed support more than ever then. But your father certainly gave you the love and protection your mom was unable to give at that point.... The brain (emotional) and the body (physical) are so intertwined that sometimes diagnosis of one depends on the other... Posted by MusicDiva on Thursday, January 14, 2010 - 12:18 AM [Reply to this] [Remove] [Block User]

	Paula Paula Servetti	I loved my mother very much. Strange as it seems, she was the rock in my life . . .Strong, and never backed down. She was a fighter. My mother was very complex. She was definitely not a nurturer, but she loved us all very much. She was raised with the rod and so were we. She missed out on the beauty of life in many ways, because of wanting and worrying and disappointment. We are very different women, but I understood her completely and learned to not expect more than she was able to give. I must say, she was very different, with my children, her grandchildren. They loved their Nana and thought of her as a sweet, lively, little woman. Thank-you, Anna for your always insiteful comments. They always make me ponder, upon points I might have missed, or not made clear. Posted by Paula on Thursday, January 14, 2010 - 11:38 AM [Reply to this] [Remove] [Block User]

	Jennie	You have me on pins and needles... Posted by Jennie on Thursday, January 14, 2010 - 5:58 AM [Reply to this] [Remove] [Block User]

	Paula Paula Servetti	Ha Ha, Thanks Jen. The things you say are so amusing. I really thank you for reading, and being there for this little journey back in time, of mine. Posted by Paula on Thursday, January 14, 2010 - 11:41 AM [Reply to this] [Remove] [Block User]

	wolfwitch Wolf Witch	Awww, it makes me want to reach out & hug poor baby Paula. What a mess! There's nothing run of the mill about you or this story. Posted by wolfwitch on Thursday, January 14, 2010 - 7:19 AM [Reply to this] [Remove] [Block User]

	Paula Paula Servetti	Thanks Wolfie. I guess I could have used a few hugs for sure. See my mom couldn't conceive of the mind's complexities. She was a reality woman, straight and forward. She was not of an artistic nature, nor did she lend herself to any imaginings. My father was different, so he understood me in a way, then, that my mother never could. (Strangely, their influences reversed later.) Thank you for reading and commenting. Posted by Paula on Thursday, January 14, 2010 - 11:49 AM [Reply to this] [Remove] [Block User]

	scott Kenneth s cornwall	I had an imaginary friend as a kid. His name was "Pal". One day I actually thought I saw him sitting in a tree, in the football field near Flower Hill school, on a branch of a pine tree in a little grove by the fence. The goodyear blimp was flying over the football field. I've never mentioned this to anyone, for fear of being called nuts. I was still in grade school when it happened. This sounds crazy as hell, I know...but there he was, looking like a chimp up in the tree. Sounds like I made it up, doesn't it? Thats why I never tell anyone...of course, I never went to confession. Nobody was wise to "Pal". I suppose if I told a shrink that it would be a garunteed stay in the nuthouse for awhile. Kids have imaginary friends, I know it's not that unusual. The thing that landed me in the nuthouse, years later, was when I told a shrink about a ufo I had seen. I was diagnosed as schizophrenic, within hours. Then mom and dad told them THEY SAW IT TOO. Kind of blew his mind, I think. The diagnosis was changed rather quickly. Parents have to put up with a lot, and the way the world changes so rapidly it's hard to understand sometimes. I wonder what a preist would have thought of the ufo...but what has that to do with confessing your sins? Had you sinned to cause the voices? The answer is obviously no...I have some strange ideas about consciousness and our awareness of it at times. I really think we are all connected to something that's outside of this timeframe and we can access it if we try. I also think that life's experiences have a tendancy to block the pathways to accessing it. Maybe that's why adults don't always understand young children. Posted by scott on Friday, January 15, 2010 - 8:46 PM [Reply to this] [Remove] [Block User]

	Paula Paula Servetti	Because of my imaginings, I've never doubted the reality of monsters and pretend playmates, in the lives of people young or old. My mother had long talks with many people before she died and her special and constant friend was an old black man with a funny hat and a dog that sat in the chair in her room. I know he was there. Posted by Paula on Monday, January 18, 2010 - 9:05 PM [Reply to this] [Remove] [Block User]

Paula Paula Servetti

Some writers have a certain person in mind who they create as their target audience. In many ways, you were that person, since I wrote about you, and the many things that led up to meeting you and subsequently, spun off of having known you. . . and I wondered if you would have liked what I wrote. Now, even more so you are that audience to me, and so, with this clarification, I thank-you. Posted by Paula on Friday, January 22, 2010 - 9:46 PM [Reply to this] [Remove] [Block User]