Suicide Train

CHAPTER ONE - INFANCY

At fourteen months old there is nothing I can recall, about the day my only sibling Tracey was born. But for many years during my early childhood I heard and felt so much. I was absorbed by it. Little did I know, my sister's pain and suffering, as well as my own, would consume me mentally and emotionally for the best part of my adult life. My sibling Tracey-Anne was born in September 1970. I was just five months old at the time of Tracey's conception.

I was born in the July of 1969, Mum was a slip of a girl herself, just nineteen. She wore a low self esteem that dictated to and controlled her; needyness poured from her albeit in an unobvious way. She was 'baulchy' as Dad has put it. She had had her wedding, a rushed affair by all accounts and seemingly perfectly, nine months later, I entered the world. At the time my parent's lived in Reading, Witley Wood. Dad once confided how he was rolled along into it. I recognise now that these offerings are seldom; yet I witness glimpses of guilt ridden honesty. It rambled from him, now and then. But hey! on paper, all was well with the young couple, now married, so therefore in the eyes of nosey onlookers, there was no sin. Well, it was the late sixties, times have changed.

By the time I was eighteen months old, I mothered and adored Tracey. I've been told how I would love to help and often was involved in her early care. Some kind of maternal thing had kicked in. I look back at our childhood and can see that the adoration between us was mutual, but during much of our childhood, it never felt that way. Like all kids we would fight and get on each other's nerves... you know how it goes with siblings. My earliest visual memory of her I must have been 4 years old, I remember clearly giving her some of my pocket money to get sweets from our local sweet shop, Oakridge Towers, Oakridge. We were standing in the hall of our home in Normanton Road. We lived on an urban social housing estate 50 miles from SW London. I remember how we wiled the days away in Oakridge, much like other kids.

Dad was 17 when he met Mum, she was just 15. They plunged into adulthood head first; Husband and Wife with a child by the age of 21 and 19. Not uncommon, tho' many had warned they were too young. My Mother often recalls how the local folk gossiped and speculated that they could never 'make it work', they were too young. Opinions were ignored, a typical young adult tale. I often wonder if they would have drifted apart naturally if Mum hadn't been so hell bent on proving the 'gossips' wrong. Mum would often tell us they had 'proved them all wrong'. I don't know who the gossips were, but Mum would often say it was members of family and the adults where they lived in the mid 60's. Who knows?, the point I am making here is that I found it 'inspiring' how my Mother would 'defend' her 'Love' for my Father and justify their choice to do what they wanted to do. And in fairness, they were adults, and were free to make their own mistakes right?

During the early 1970's, graft, homebuilding, and establishing their family routines were the focus for my parents, just like everyone else I guess, but for us it was not that simple. By the time I was 3, that bastard illness depression had already it's grip on Mother. We children didn't know. We didn't understand, how could we? She was advised to get back to work and stay on the valium. And that was just the way it was. Meanwhile, us kids were developing. Dad grafted on, sweated his days out and he sadly had no idea about 'depression' or such matters, but he was in my eyes, Mum's best friend and My Daddy.

I can recall the rethoric now, that which to this day still haunts me at times. 'All she did was scream, from the minute she was born, she was so angry and uncontrollable!' Mother would complain matter of factly. It was common knowledge that Tracey was often left alone at the bottom of a garden to scream and scream until she was exhausted. Mum, like any mother would, would wonder what she was doing differently, or even wrong. After all the other one didn't give her all this trouble. As time evolved, There was a daily sermon of stress related worrying, fretting, anger and disappointment and all I wanted to do was please my Mum. I would help her and chat away to her, she was struggling with her health and I could see it. I definitely didn't understand it tho, I just knew I had to be 'good' and knew she wasn't very happy.

Life in the 70's progressed. Every day there seemed to be a 'drama' where Tracey would have been up to something or had done 'wrong' and a pattern of naughty behaviour developed and Tracey had their attention. She did have attention, but needed a lot and preferred to be learning one on one with teachers. Today, I wonder if she had Autism, there are various reasons why I think this and it is in our family, seemingly common. It would explain a lot. That will be addressed in another chapter. But there it was established, A label for each of us. The 'naughty' one and the 'good' one. I understand the damage this caused and continues to cause me, indeed it would define most of our childhood, until my teens kicked in, by then I had stopped the labelling in its tracks as I rebelled, to onlookers - seemingly without cause.

Mother was right in the respect that her children were different. Aren't they all? What has become apparant to me in my adult hood is that Tracey and I didn't realise that we both felt the same. We just acted out differently. I didn't want to get into trouble, Tracey didn't seem to care. Everyday soon became a battlefield for Mum. A war zone between Mother and Child. The battle of wills was extraordinary. Tracey's behaviour was stressful for Mum, and so the stories would unfold, in front of us all, and so it became my 'norm'. I, at this point an onlooker within my family. Quietly being affected by it all. The early signs were there, yet as time would unfold, these little girls were going to be let down by everyone who claimed to 'love' them and both would be failed by the 'system'. The consequences of these let downs have meant years of my needing pills and I dread to think how much therapy and hours of self-help tools.

Tracey's light blond whispy hair was styled into a smooth 1970's peanut cut. Her fragile whispy locks fell beside her ears. The biggest roundest brown 'cow' eyes would sparkle with mischief, her plump little legs would stomp around, bruised and grazed by clumsy adventurous play. She was pretty and she was cute. But she was definately not 'ordinary' compared to many of her peer group. That didn't matter. It was fun, she was a child and all children love muddy puddles!. She would stain all that was meant to stay clean, she would find mischeif and mess wherever she went, she was a lovely handful. She was different.

Mum would make dresses for us both, her two little girls. The stories and messages would flow daily 'Tracey looks like she's been dragged through hedge backwards within five minutes!' she would fuss angrily. Ten minutes after having been dressed for the day, she would look like the boys on the 'persil' adverts.' Dad had wanted sons, I am sure of it, he seemed to have missed out on a son and as time's gone by, he has almost admitted it. So to him, Tracey was the next best thing. She was for sure, a tomboy. He seemed bemused by her adventures and behaviour, providing him with good talkling points for family gatherings. The mischief that went on would be the next 'story told' amongst the family and within no time at all 'a charactor' was born. Tracey never seemed to speak much, she seemed to do. When questioned about her anticks, she rarely explained, she couldn't. It seemed she wouldn't. She would make us laugh too with her way's, we had to joke about a lot of her antics, but my Mum was often worried and stressed out by her behaviour.

One example, perhaps an early sign was her first day at infant school. Within 10 minutes of being introduced to her first teacher, aptly named Miss Yell, a chunk was almost taken from said teachers leg. Story time was not 'entertaining' Tracey. When asked why she had bitten her teacher, she replied 'I wanted to see if I could make her yell, her name is Miss Yell!' That is one of my earliest child hood memories. I enjoyed being at school, tho' I can see now how withdrawn I was, I realise that I wasn't happy. Daily life continued and incidents were plenty. It was not uncommon to see Tracey alone in the school hall, taken out of a class due to 'behaviour issues'. She would be left in the hall and would occupy herself with the musical instruments hidden behind the heavy purple curtain which concealed an off-shoot music room. She seemed happy enough, alone, contented and making a lot of noise.

Musical mayhem could be heard throughout the school as Tracey would be 'punished'. Tracey was discovering the joys of the xylaphone and drums. Discipline was never easy. Mum wanted her little girls to be polite and well behaved, of course. Tracey didn't seem to respond to any measures taken to stop her challenging behaviour. If sent to her room, she didn't care, she would happily play, loudly and disruptively.... chanting that she didn't care. If praised on a drawing or painting, she would rip it up. When grounded she would jump a window to escape. If denied pocket money she would steal it, or steal confectionary. Shopping trips were mayhem, she always went 'missing' and would be 'retreived' at the local police station. These happenings were not a one off, they became a regular occurence. 'A Stunt' my parents called it. And throughout my childhood, stunt after stunt unfolded. Child-minders couldn't or wouldn't manage her behaviour (according to our Mother), and the family all had their individual 'parenting advice' for our parents and so it went on. Nine years of 'naughtiness' and nine years of negative attention as a result. Beatings would take place. Dad was desperate to assert control. He had had it beaten out of him, so he would do the same. Even now I shudder when I recall what I could hear coming from my siblings mouth. Screams of "I will never hit my kids"....pleading " NO Daddy, I'm sorry! I'm sorry! I didn't mean to....." I remember feeling sick inside and being thankful I didn't get into so much trouble. I felt sorry for Tracey, but I was a child and I believed my Parents were right..... I believed their rhetoric.

One morning, I clearly remember wandering out of my classroom, to the toilet. I must have been 6 years old as it was my last year in Infant school. There she was, wandering along the corridor, appearing unphased. I can see her in my mindseye, strutting along the huge starchy clinical corridor, beaming with her 'TRACEY' labelled tray in hand. 'What are you doing?' I quizzed. 'I am in your class now' she explained, 'with you!' And that was it, I was faced with my darling sibling 'wanting' to be with me, her big sis. It was a move made by the school to see if it would settle her down. Of course at that time I had no clue what was going on, but what is now apparant is that my babby sis would not settle with anyone at that time, she needed me. I realise now, that I was possibly all she felt she really had at school. So that is the way Tracey settled into infancy. But it could never have lasted, I had junior school to go to.

Daily Mother would continue to bitch, stress and worry, her frustration fuelling her depression. She would work hard and I now realise, drink often to escape her worries. The dream was not quite how she had imagined. She was depressed and relied on my good behaviour to stop her and Dad needing to address their parenting attitude. We grew up with a dictionary of anti-social and cliche remarks that still make me cringe; For example 'like me or lump me' was a phrase I often heard Mum say. She would say it to re-enforce her belief that it was ok to treat people badly and that if they didn't like her way of being, they could get lost. She would mimic us as children in an attempt to shame us, rather than treating us with kindness. She would often behave as badly as us, in order to parent us? One song I recall her singing spitefully was "Nobody likes me, everybody hates me..... I think I'll go and eat worms", she would sing this is a micky taking childish way. Tracey would be struggling with friendships and her complaints would be met with either a backhanded comment or a childish mimic of Tracey! Thus resulting in both Tracey and I learning from our Mother how not to care. I understand she was trying to cope, but she was also seeking professional opinions and openly ignoring the advice given - that to me makes complete sense!

By the time we had left Oakridge and moved to Popley, we were both possibly suffering with PTSD following being rescued from our house burning down, both of us were very unsettled. And the emotional, mental and physical abuse was to follow us. I recall very clearly a conversation at our dining table where our father would scoff "Praise HER? Praise!!!!??? Why on earth am I gonna praise her for doing what she is meant to be doing!" I hear this words to this day, over and over again. I weep because I realise that my parents were being told how to improve their parenting in order to benefit their daughter, and they took the advice with a pinch of salt!

There were things they were doing which were not helping, they were making it all worse, and they didn't know that and they seemingly had nowhere to turn. The circle of life is real, they were merely responding the way they had been taught. I see that, I know that. We are all a product of our environment and experience to a point. Sadly, I as a youngster could see trauma for the future, I was somewhat aware of the sad predicament they were eventually going to have to face. There was no way I was ever going to make things better for Tracey, by the time she was 7, we were typical siblings! At war often yet comrades when there was trouble ahead. I could not have helped, I was merely a kid myself, at that point I tried to keep my head down and got on with the day to day routine of school and chores. I would play out alone, and wander from house to house to see if there was anybody 'in' who could come out and play. I needed company and would go and find it.