Dear Dookie Dooks…

I’m sorry that whilst your insides were broken hearted and you cried internally, I made you pretend and suppress your feelings and it just rooted and grew with you. I’m sorry I didn’t protect you Dookie but you were and still are loved very much. Please forgive me.

It is because of this I guess why you froze and pretended when you went on holiday and and that person invited you to come and lay down in his bed for cuddles you thought…yes somebody likes me.

So you were happy to feel love and affection from your them whilst on holiday. They treated you like a real kid sister and I know you felt loved and accepted. There was a huge smile on your face to cuddle with him… 9years old you were I remember it like yesterday.

You thought nothing of it.

Again I silenced you, froze you as still as a Door-mouse, as his body started to move underneath you. At first you thought he was just repositioning himself to get comfortable I know, I was there. But his circular movement and the pressing against your body… not just any part of your body but down there, in the private area no one was allowed to see or touch. I know you felt uncomfortable and you were so happy being loved and accepted that I froze you, I sealed your lips and made you pretend you didn’t feel he was doing something rude. His movements reminded you of what you may have glimpsed on telly from time to time by accident… what married people do to have babies. Your innocence wondered if this meant that he loved you as a wife. Babygirl you were 9 years old and not old enough to be anyone’s wife.

I’m Sorry

So so sorry that I didn’t open your mouth so you could say ‘no thanks I like my own bed! Or speak out loud with your cheeky self and say ‘why do you keep moving it feels funny’… that would of alerted others that slept in the same room..

Sorry Dookie I should of given you your voice when it mattered most.

Now all I have done is make you think people show they really like you by touching you inappropriately, It wasn’t your fault, you didn’t know, you just wanted to be liked and loved and to be accepted.

Please forgive me,

Yours sincerely

Me xxx

You whisper gently by my ear

You tell me calmly, your touch I should not fear

But I cringe when you come so near

Being alone with you I will refrain

For I am much too young to have such stains

How can you, being older than me, not know what you do?

Yet you insist to bring spiritual pain

What does it profit; tell me what will you gain?

It’s a demonic sickness within your brain

Corrupting your innermost

Driven by an un-heavenly host

Whose plan for us all is utterly insane.

God also has a plan

If anyone can break this chain

I know in my heart He can

It’s decreed in His word and His word never fails

Jeremiah 29:11 I shall hold on to for it allows me to prevail

Whisper no more your egocentric lies

Pretending to love

And corrupt my innocence in an unlawful soul tie

My God my Father sees and has built a blood hedge to cover me

Yes I am His daughter

I did not know it back then

I choose to remember know more

You are defeated

For as I write this

I shut the door

Shut up!

Between the ages of 9-10 years old I saw quite a few ‘first times’ in my short life.

After Cam gave birth to my niece, my parents and I traveled to America the following year for a summer holiday. I took Chrissy with me and my hand luggage was all my nieces clothes aged 6 months. They were now Chrissys’ clothes and she would never grow out of them.

My first time…

It was strange, as I pictured the U.S to be in the same technicolor as what I saw in the movies! I didn’t expect it to look and feel like England, people like me etc.

The shops were different, everywhere there was a Deli. Singing accents flowing with upbeat excited conversations – everyone was always in a rush.

So much relatives and friends, there was no need to stay in a hotel, we just stayed here and there. Everyone took to my English accent and was told constantly ‘ Oh my garrsssh, she’s too cute’ so of course I felt great, I felt liked and nobody thought I was annoying!

Such a good feeling being accepted and liked, that I thought nothing of it when one night I complained that I couldn’t sleep and someone said “come and lay with me I’ll keep you company.” Well of course I got up from where I was and went in there bed.

It was a single bed and proved difficult to lay side by side so it was suggested I lay on top of them. He said to just stay quiet and sleep will come, so I did, the talking stopped. I could not sleep for a while though as he kept moving slowly all the time. I just thought he was trying to get comfortable but I started to feel uneasy by the feeling of where the movement was touching me and soft groans was coming from him. I decided to pretend I did not notice and began to move and go back to the other bed where I was, but he held me and whispered ‘shhhhhhhhhhhhhsh’ close to my ears. I froze, eyes wide shut and froze. I don’t remember anything else.

That was the first time…

I never thought much about what happened, only to think to myself ‘you made me feel safe then you used me.’

Inside I felt sick and angry, it was not a rage but a coldness that curdled on the inside but masked itself on the outside to the sweet cute smile they all adored. I trusted no one. I hated the way that person acted like it was nothing, he chatted and laughed and went on with his days as normal, was a child as small as me able to imagine this? was it all a dream? Hell no, it was real, it was nasty and I hated feeling that people were just pretending to like me so they can get close enough to hurt me. Did anyone like me? Anyone?

Lots of new found cousins seemed to. I met my Great Uncle who had 11 sons, they were so lovely. I met my dads sister and family in Washington D.C, we toured the Monument and The White House, we went to Connecticut, Baltimore, Queens, Brooklyn… just all over and it was great.

Lots of pleasant memorable first times.

So we’re out visiting again, have no idea who or where until I heard the word ‘sister!’

I got a sister? where? when? Then I get this crash course story that my dad had two daughters before he met my mum… I HAVE TWO EXTRA SISTERS!! A barrage of thoughts entered my mind, where have they been all my life? why was I not told about them before? why were they some big secret? but dad lived in England with us, he has not been on holiday to America, so has he not even seen them? how could he not look after them? Really?? I felt so sad for my new found sisters and bad as well because I felt it was our fault (my other sister and brothers) why dad may have not been there for them.

Wait, I have a niece?, not Cam’s daughter but there was another one, an older one from my eldest sister. I felt robbed! all this time I thought I was an aunt for the first time last year, when in fact I was an auntie a few years before and didn’t even know.

The first time I met my sister I kept staring , I guess still in shock and I had so many questions that I could not ask but desperately wanted to. My niece was hooked on Sesame Street and I remember my sister took us to the cinema to see the Muppet Movie. My niece called me’Aunt Ali’ and loved playing with me and my doll Chrissy, I had so much fun with her that I forgot about the other stuff that made me feel upset and weird. Now I felt the love I wanted, untarnished, unconditional, childlike love.

That was my first time…

I started to feel negatively about my dad, a layer of respect peeled away… For the first time.

So a beloved part of my childhood was definitely spent in our home in Greenford. Days of joy and innocence ( except from the episode with the two little boys in the park bushes!)

Memories of aunties, uncles and cousins coming over (majority not blood related) but nevertheless were family to us. Sounds of laughter and excited chatter from the sitting room and children playing or just hanging out in the dining room. No cares or fears, we went out to play with freedom.

I actually cannot remember winter months in this time of my life. I remember thick fog, I used to think it was the clouds that fell down from the sky as it was so thick and fluffy.

I remember Christmas Eve sleeping with one eye open waiting for that fat white bearded man to come and nibble on the mince pie and juice left out for him and wonder what he’d bring me. Well I was five years old and considered to be a good girl even though I was told I was cheeky!

My eyes were failing me, sleep beckoned, but just then at the corner of a half closed eye I saw a shadow.

I jumped sitting up on my bed rubbing my eyes so I could see properly. My feet felt something hard and I followed the gaze, there she was, the most beautiful black doll you could imagine. She was the size of a 6-8 month old baby with short black hair but in the middle of her head was a pony tail you could extend by pulling and retrieve by pulling on the string on her back. I was in glee as I remembered the shadow and ran out my room and downstairs, no one. I ran in my parents room panting “mum mum dad Father Christmas came I saw his shadow he gave me a doll a real baby seeee” as I held up the doll in excitement.

Mum rubbed her eyes trying hard to play dumb and half asleep (it worked!) she replied “oh that’s real nice, now go to sleep.” Sleep… sleep how could I sleep? I was overwhelmed, Father Christmas found me and brought me the best doll ever and I named her Chrissy. I was convinced at 5 years old; there IS a Father Christmas and he loved me enough to come all the way to my house to give me a present.

“I am a good girl.”

1976 The hottest summer recorded and I was 6 years old, dressed in a swimming costume, I played in the fountains of Trafalgar Square with my brothers. I do not recall my big sister there or my brother Angus, but they must’ve been there too.

In my mind I see myself running, giggling, laughing and wet.

“I sense happiness.”

1977 The Queens Silver Jubilee. There was red, white and blue everywhere, all over my school. I remember having to dress up like British kings & queens with large hats and having a garden party at school. Watching the parade on telly and thinking how lovely the world was with so many happy people. No one said anything about my hair or color, no one has ever answered my question, “why are we not called ‘Brown’ people and white people cream or colored??” Anyway it was a great year and I didn’t feel different outside of my home…

“I felt accepted.”

My big sister Cam use to take me with her to visit her friends. I really don’t know if she did it out of kindness or made to do it as she may have been in charge of looking after me. Regardless, I loved my outings with her. Her friends were always so nice to me and I loved the attention of being the ‘baby sister.’

I don’t even know when he came on the scene, but my sister had this boyfriend, then I remember mum not being happy about something. Later in years I realized it was because my sister got pregnant.

In all of this we moved house and next thing I know mum is busy sewing and my cousin and I have pretty dresses to wear. My other cousins are over from abroad and there’s pure excitement. Why? because there is a wedding, my sisters wedding and she was hugely pregnant. There was lots of people, the sun shone and there was loads of food at the reception. The one thing that stood out to me was the huge bread loaf shaped like ducks.

A lot of work and money went into this wedding, a lot of stress I imagine, but my mother (especially) did not want the ’embarrassment’ of a pregnancy outside of wedlock.

Anyway, I got to be a bridesmaid for the first time ever.

For my sister, it wasn’t the case of ‘I Do’ but rather ‘I have to’!

“I decided I wanted to get married for love.”

The wedding was June 1978 and it was the beginning of a wonderful summer. I became an auntie to a beautiful baby girl. I was 9 years old and automatically felt very grown up. I remember my mum came rushing in the house like a whirlwind to grab a dressing gown and slippers for my sister and rushed back out to head to the hospital. Somewhere between all that excitement was the information that Cam was in labor.

I sat on the stairs trying to imagine what that really meant, was the baby really going to come out down there and if so HOW??

‘I smile,’ “I want to be a mother.”