That time I kind of tried to kill myself

I can't remember the exact year, but somewhere between the third and fifth grade I rode my bike into traffic.

I know. I know. What an droll way to start a story, but what I did isn't nearly as important as why I did it.

As I have stated before at the age of eight, my mother kidnapped me, stole my brother away from our father and our lives like the whole world revolved around her and her desires. Once she got me here her promises of a better life and no more violence proved devoid of any semblance of truth. The abuse started soon after we arrived and didn't stop, even after I was put in foster care at the age of 15. The only thing that stopped it was for me to completely cut off all contact with her.

I had a paper route, anything to get me away from her for a little bit. I woke up late and rushed out the door to deliver papers on my bike. I was tired and a bit out of sorts, we had been fighting that day, as usual. I could say I wasn't thinking clearly and blame it on that, but it is probably more honest to admit that it was probably just dumb kid shit. I didn't really want to die, just prove a point maybe. I rode up the rode to the main street that passed through my small town, and rode out in front of a car. I still remember thinking "Goddammit" right before the car hit me. Then it was lights out.

I woke up in an ambulance, I wasn't scared, hell I didn't even hurt that much. I feel bad for the guy that hit me, I was obviously at fault and he didn't get in trouble, but still to hit a kid with your car probably was very unsettling. I tried to sit up, and they wouldn't let me. I asked if anything was broken and they said we don't know. I think I was really calm through the whole thing. A state trooper gave me a teddy bear. I didn't really want a teddy bear, but I took it, that event marked the only positive interaction I ever had with an officer in that town, every other time they were helping my mother get away with abusing me or falsely charging me with domestic violence.

I made it out without any major injuries, some road rash on my face and leg, a nice knot on my forehead and a jaw that was pretty swollen but could still open enough to eat. I was stupid, and I was very lucky.

My mom's reaction. I don't know what to say, people told me she was worried but she didn't seem concerned with my health. She was however pretty jubilant that I had to get a cat scan, or MRI because she had asked my psychiatrist to order one for me to find the brain tumor that I definitely had because nothing else could explain my muted emotions and angry behavior. Well, I guess child abuse could have explained it but...... I went home, and a few days later she started a fight with me and I got pretty upset I yelled at her, she ended up crying saying I thought this would change you. She did that a lot, an I was always the problem. Sometimes, despite the constant abuse I could manage to keep my cool but as a child abused from an early age I couldn't do it forever and I would eventually inevitably break. It was never me when I was good though, she'd say it was the vitamins I was taking. I never got credit for the good but I got all the credit for her inappropriate actions as well as my own.

I lied and told people it was an accident. I told them there had been a semi going the other way and I didn't see the car. I lied because I was scared of having to go to even more counseling. If you are curious as to why I was so dead set against more involvement with mental health "Professionals" , they just didn't help. The counselor that I had the longest Michelle Pruess (I hope for the sake of abused children that she no longer practices) would either blatantly ignore my claims of abuse or completely buy any pathetic excuse she gave them for what she did. Once, in a fit of rage, my mother ran after me screaming that she was going to "knock my fucking teeth down my throat". I was probably ten at the time. She tackled me and began slamming my head into the floor. I still remember the banging sound inside my head and how my ears rang for days after. She told my counselor that she simply thought I was hysterical and she was trying to shake me out of it. My counselor just accepted that, not even a suggestion of how she could handle it better just "ok" , because as everyone knows the pediatrician approved response to hysterical children is to tackle them and shake them so violently that their head bounces off the floor about ten times.

So to me, all that counselors and psychiatrists amounted to, were people that would tell my mom what she was doing was fine when I knew it wasn't and tell me that I was the problem. On top of the fact that not one counselor would help me escape the abuse, nobody wants to be seen as mentally ill. My mother assured me that I was constantly. Most arguments that we had ended up in her telling me I was sick in the head. She would tell me this over and over trying to drive the idea home. Not in the sense that she did it every day though that was nearly the case, but she would repeat the phrases "you're sick in the head" or "you're one sick puppy" over and over like DiCaprio channeling Howard Hughes in "The Aviator" . His performance in the "show me the blueprints" scene is an almost perfect semblance one need only change his confused demeanor to one of aggression and add a tinge of saccharine sociopathy to the tone.

In hind sight this was a mistake. I shouldn't have hidden the truth. I should have told everyone I should have told every counselor and family member and teacher till someone took it seriously enough to do something. If I had she probably would have lost custody of me and after talking to my dads lawyer, which i'm sure would have happened in short order she probably would have lost custody of my brother as well. She wasn't bad to him like she was to me, but she didn't parent him, he recently died of a drug overdose. I didn't know all this of course and the only real evidence I had to go on was how I was constantly dismissed by every "professional" that she took me to. I could possibly have saved my brother, that's what hurts the most, and I know it tears my father up as well. I also could have avoided ever been falsely, arrested, prosecuted, and convicted, at her hands at least, there are no guarantees in life though.