intervention
I wonder what it says about me that growing up, I wished I could sit people down intervention-style and show hidden camera footage of all the things they hurt me with and the things they swore they didn’t say. I guess it says a lot about helplessness, about not being believed, being gaslit, about wanting proof to stay sane. I wanted them to be surrounded by an audience and forcing them to watch, so they’d also feel ganged up on, and were forced to confront their behavior and lies. I wanted them to feel guilt and shame, the way I felt guilt and shame constantly because of them.
I never had the feeling the people that hurt me in that way felt guilt and shame about it towards me. In front of me, they could just DARVO (Deny, Attack, Reverse Victim and Offender) and do the narcissists prayer (“That didn't happen. And if it did, it wasn't that bad. And if it was, that's not a big deal. And if it is, that's not my fault. And if it was, I didn't mean it. And if I did, you deserved it.”).
They only feared the reaction by third parties. Onlookers, teachers, other parents, their friends. So I wished they could be there as an audience. Look at how your darling treats other people! Look at what’s going on in my family! Look how your child treats me!
I think I learned that outsiders are powerful and ready to stop the abuse temporarily when I got yelled at so hard over math homework by my mother in elementary school that one of our neighbors went to the local school to get my school teacher to intervene. She literally rang the doorbell, asked to be let in and see me mid-abuse. I suddenly saw my usually towering, loud, red-faced, teeth-exposed and scary looking mum cowering. Small. Afraid. Embarrassed. Apologetic. Not towards me, but towards my teacher.
But there were never any hidden cameras, no interventions, no audience. No one came to rescue me permanently (not because it was their fault, but because no one could, and many people did the best they could for me, like my teacher and neighbor). My mother pretends it all didn’t happen.