Dedicated to everyone who has been through hell.
Based on real-life events.
One
I was only a young, maturing woman when I started to really understand what was going on in my life. If I am honest, I was never naive about my circumstances, as it was clear to me from a very early age that my childhood differed drastically from what was considered the norm.
When I blossomed into my adolescence at the age of thirteen, the struggle of hairy legs and period blood began. However, this phase in my life turned out to be a rather trivial problem in comparison to the reality that surrounded me. My birth into womanhood forced me to open my eyes and realize with crushing finality that I was destined for a life of misfortune.
My parents were die-hard addicts, who had corrupted personalities and were bound together by an unholy communion. They didn't truly love each other, nor did they love this world; they only loved one thing and that was heroin. This was the passion which kept them satisfied with existing and it truly was all that they cared about.
•••
They both were the reason I grew up lacking confidence and self-respect. Their comments and actions burnt me like the infernal flames of hell as they abused me day after day.
My earliest childhood memories rest abandoned in my mind, as they consist of me playing with toys among empty bloodstained syringes and waiting impatiently in long lines for soup bowls in the community park.
My parents screamed at me and called me nasty names; they hugged me and told me that they loved me. The constant hatred and the occasional praise were fueled by drugs. If the drugs made them happy, they were good to me. If they didn’t have any drugs to use they were frustrated and angry, so they took it out on me. I didn’t have a reason to believe they cared about me. Their occasional bursts of affection were regularly interrupted by events that proved that they both despised my existence. I was an unbearable burden to them and they made sure I was aware of the irritation my life bought into theirs.
They could barely take care of themselves, not to mention raising a daughter and luckily for them, I was an only child. I spent many gloomy days perched on the cigarette-stained window sill of our lounge room, hoping that one day a sibling would come into my life to share the burden of my adverse circumstances—but there was nobody. I had to fend for myself.
I was a miserable mishap and I believed my life was worthless.
There is no way they would have wished to have had someone to worry about other than themselves, so I concluded early on in my life that I must have been an accident.
•••
The suburb we lived in was as exploited as my parents’ veins. These destructive streets nurtured children into drug use and violence, fostering a community full of crime. It was definitely not a suitable place for a young and delicate girl like me.
During my youth, I was a vulnerable, innocent teen, but by the time I turned seventeen, I had lost my sense of innocence.
I slept with the man who lived two houses down from me.
I felt like this mindless action was a rite of passage for a girl my age who was trapped in this deprived environment. I truly believed that having sex was a necessary and essential stage in my life, so I willingly did slutty things that I didn’t regret…at the time.
He was a drug dealer and knew my parents very well—he profited from their addictions and took their money daily. Their bodies and minds decayed from his poppy seed product and they were always willing to go to extreme lengths to ensure they got their fix.
I never felt influenced to use drugs when I was with him and he never tried to force me to do them either. He was borderline insane, but I highly doubt he was aiming to turn the girl he fancied into a walking corpse like the rest of his clientele.
Deep down, I found being with him truly exhilarating. He was a heroin dealer and had a macho personality, which was fueled by an arrogant attitude. It was attractive in a way; he wasn't just a bad boy, he was a bad man.
This made me extremely intoxicated by him, which birthed a thirsty hormonal lust that was hardly ever quenched.
My actions in this saga of my adolescence were highly destructive because I was simply careless for my own well-being. I had become a product of my terrible environment and with useless parents, there wasn't anyone who'd shown me that life could be lived differently. I followed the patterns I noticed all around me and since everyone approved of them, I didn't have second thoughts. I had to become like my environment to survive in it.
•••
We rarely had money but when there was some, it went straight into my parents' veins. The only time they would give me money was when they were high. However, when they came back to reality and I had gone grocery shopping, they would become enraged that I had spent their precious money on food.
They were always agitated and anxiously cautious with their money, since everything that they couldn't inject wasn't worth their time - including me.
There is no doubt in my mind that they would have honestly sold me off for drugs if human trafficking was legal in our country. Not only would they have been given a generous payout for a young and pretty girl, but also they would have got rid of my unwanted hungry mouth.
The public school I attended was not sufficient for a serious education. I attended a co-ed high school and hated it with all my heart. My clothes, my books, even my bag were donated by the school’s second-hand services. I was teased and scolded for having holes in my stockings and a bag which was nearly falling apart.
I was bullied because I had nothing and suffocated emotionally in class. I wanted to escape, but there was no way out—I felt claustrophobic. As the years went on I became accustomed to daily abuse and therefore I showed little interest in the bullies at my high school. By the conclusion of my third year in high school I was immune even to the nastiest girls in the whole school, who spent their entire summer holidays plotting a way to destroy my reputation and life.
Slowly, everyone began to understand I didn’t give a single fuck about what they thought. Pathetic name-calling and even physical abuse were the norm in my life long before I attended this high school. I had practically graduated with a bachelor’s degree in never-ending violence and a master’s degree in dealing with maniac parents, well before I even knew the basics of algebra.
•••
To cope with this disheartening situation, I did what any other person with even a breadcrumb of hope would have done: I attempted to suppress all the negativity around me and look for the positive.
Unfortunately, there was never anything good that I could appreciate in my life. Each morning, I stood in front of my dirty mirror and told myself I was better than this. I desperately hoped that one day, somehow, my circumstances would change and I would be out of this hell.
•••
The worst part about my childhood was that I never even had one in the first place. The only present I ever got was on my eleventh birthday. My parents bought or stole me a princess costume, which I loved so much. I used to put it on and escape into a fantasy world, where my parents and their hatred couldn’t
