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  ‘But childhood prolonged, cannot remain a fairyland. It becomes a

hell.’

Louise Bogan

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I have been very lucky; my childhood was perfect. I feel sorry for those who do not

have a supportive family, who suffer from neglect or physical or sexual abuse. I imagine that

it must be awful to go into the world alone, having been hurt from the people who should

protect you. I am painfully aware that a fairly high proportion of people with problems such

as mine have suffered such things, particularly, it would seem, sexual abuse.

But nothing like that has ever happened to me. A lot of people assumed that it had,

they asked me over and over what happened that was so bad to make me hurt myself on

purpose. Some asked me straight out: ‘Were you sexually abused?’

‘No’

‘Are you sure?’

‘um..yes’

Still, it is a good thing that they are so forceful, if it can at least possibly help people

who are abused and are frightened to tell because of the consequences or because they do

not think they will be believed.

I longed for my childhood innocence that I had lost to come back. I wanted to be free,

to go back to that age where I was blissfully unaware of the future. Then I could warn the

naive girl that I once was. I wanted to stop her from spending years of her life obsessed with

starvation and death. But I couldn’t; I could only watch as the young girl lost her way in a

dark forest where a murderer awaited. I would shout to her but my voice was always muted.

Thinking back to this time upset me, as I wondered what she would think if she could

have seen herself at age 14,15,16,17.... I wondered what her teachers would say if they knew

the bleak future in store for her. Although, I imagine that my teachers must have known

something of the perpetual torture bubbling away inside of me. I was a sad and withdrawn

child despite my young age. My parents were asked if I was okay, because I seemed so

unhappy in my primary school.

But I lived in the present. I couldn’t change the past but I could decide on the future. I

knew that I had to stop, before it became too late and the rollercoaster span out of control. I

just didn’t think that I knew how to do it.

I don’t remember having feelings in childhood, I am still unsure that anyone can

remember their feelings. I dont really remember my childhood at all really. I occasionally get snapshot in

 my mind, some kind of memory of times past and lost. I’m sure I must have been happy as a young girl- 

I certainly had nothing to be unhappy about. But my memory of events up to the age of 11 or 12 is very

vague, only in two dimensions, it doesn’t consider the mind, or capture emotion.

I remember smelling the sweet pink blossoms as I ran down the messy path and

through the overgrown sunflowers, almost as tall as me in their full summer glory. Then I’d

walk across the dewy grass to the rusty old swing at the bottom of the garden, wiping the

cold rainwater off the seat before sitting on it. I’d sit for hours, picking at the gold paint which

had already started to peel despite having only just been painted by my mum. The girl that I

imagine does not look happy. But perhaps that is something I have imposed onto a blank

face because I can’t see that she’d be unhappy. She would just swing lazily, staring at the

wiry rope, twisted and worn over the years of fun me and my brother had had, spinning each

other round until we reached a climax and the swing would whizz back round in the other

direction, the whole world flashing before our eyes until it eventually came back into focus. A

lot of the time she would sit alone on the bright blue seat and would wish to eat some of the

poison berries from the bush next to the swing, just to see what would happen if she did.

I can remember all the things that I did that I must have enjoyed as a child, but it is the

concept that I had feelings at that age is alien to me. I don’t know whether I did have them

and I have forgotten them, or if they weren’t there in the first place.

I have photographs of my childhood stuck to my wall: me and my brother and sisters

as children, safe in our family. I stuck them there in the hope that I would be able to retrieve

some emotion. But I still see that little girl as someone else, someone different to who I am

now. Then again, I don’t feel as if I am anyone right now. However much I stare into those

faraway eyes of hers, however much I force myself to think how much I’ve failed her, how ill

I am and how I really need to get my life on track for her sake; there’s nothing.

No feeling, not even a flicker of recognition. She is not me; I am not her. No wonder i cant remember 

being her!

I am nobody, just a robot; Freud’s iceberg which has lost its underwater mass and is

now just the surface, a melting lump of frozen water now separated from its anchor, its soul.

I must have had a great childhood because any reminders- the smell of freshly mown

grass in the summer for example- would evoke powerful emotions in me and I’d often get

quite upset. I loved the warmth and sun and happiness of the summer but it always held just

to many memories of innocence. The sunny days would remind me of when I was little, when

I could sit on my swing for hours. I wanted to run around on the freshly mown grass and go in

the paddling pool and make daisy chains and eat ice creams. Still, when I was younger I’m

not sure if I was particularly impressed with doing such things, I have forgotten.

I knew that I had to leave my childhood behind, let go. But such a thing is always

easier to say than it is to do. Everything changes when you leave childhood, when you have

to face the realities of this world. I wasn’t prepared to see it, I wanted to carry on in my

fantasy land for just too long. Unfortunately, I appeared to get trapped in there. I was safe

away from life, but then my mind turned against me too, and began to insult me until I was

banging on the doors, begging to live in the real world. But I would always go crawling back,

wanting to return to the fantasy world in my mind where I could play with the fairies behind

the rainbow.

When I was a child I would lie in bed at night, tired nut unable to sleep, staring at my

clock on the wall, trying to catch the minute hand moving. But, more fascinating than that,

were the numbers. To me the numbers were all people, they were my friends; warm and

accepting six, or the scary and condescending nine, they all had personalities and

appearances. I wonder where that childhood world went, did I grow out of it or did maths

desensitise me to the numbers, make me treat them as just digits, arbitrary measures on a

line with little or no meaning? Or did it disappear when the clock stopped and got put in a

box somewhere? All that remained was a passion for maths, but perhaps there’s no link,

because my favourite bit, the part of maths that literally excited me, that I would love and do

more and more of, was algebra, the use of letters! Whenever I caught my new digital clock

saying 11:11 (pm) I would stop and stare and stare at the numbers, enraptured, until it turned

11:12 and the spell was broken. On a drip when I overdosed on paracetemol the numbers

enthralled me again, all I could do was to stare at the little digital numbers, changing steadily

as more of the life-saving drug flowed into the vein in my hand. But, on the whole, I miss my

number friends, who kept me entertained for hours of sleepless nights.

I would watch the video of ‘Alice in Wonderland’ repeatedly, as it reinforced the

fantasy world in my head. And it had the added attraction of being able to sing the songs

loudly inside my head to block the real world out, or to block the derogatory thoughts in my

head out.

Even though I was desperately scrambling to return to the freedom and innocence of

childhood, I also wanted to grow up and leave home. I thought that when I lived on my own I

would be able to keep my cupboards empty and throw up straight away after eating anything,

so I would be thin. I could also cut myself whenever and wherever I wanted, or overdose or

anything.

Perhaps knowing this was what made me wish for a return to childhood