When You Live With a Perpetual Sense of Impending Doom
When I was young, part of the reason I wanted to grow up fast was the belief that adulthood would take away most of my fears. As a child, I didn’t realize that I suffered from anxiety and trauma, so, I naively thought that much of my stress would melt away as I grew older and gained more agency over my life.

I mostly thought this because I was raised in a very strict evangelical household. Things were so intense at home that I had frequent nightmares that my mother was angry with me or simply didn’t believe me about random, even mundane things.

By the time I was 12, no matter how hard I tried to be “perfect,” I felt as if my life was constantly on the brink of falling apart and that I was constantly about to get into trouble. My mother declared that I was rebellious, so, she’d go through my backpack when I was in the shower, read my diary, read the notes my friend sent me, and leave me angry Bible verses on pastel index cards while accusing me of things like “witchcraft” and “sexual immorality.”

It was horrible. To be honest, I have very few happy memories of my childhood. Instead, I recall a lot of pain.

Ironically, I was a “good” kid and super sheltered, but with my mom so convinced that I was up to no good, I worried that she was somehow right about me. I got into trouble at home for the most basic teenage behavior and struggles — if I did poorly in a class or inadvertently revealed any sort of romantic crush, I could wind up grounded at home for months.

Yes, months.

Eventually, I was so frightened about what might happen at home that I sometimes did try to hide or delay the truth. There was no room for grace in our household. As long as my mom thought I could or should do better in any area of life, she expected it to instantly happen. Every time I failed her, the punishment was swift and heavy with ridicule.

Compared to other homes, it wasn’t especially violent. On some occasions, there were plastic hangers or hairbrushes involved in the spankings. As my sister and I got older, there was no more spanking but plenty of pushing, shoving, and slapped faces.

If we yelled or cried in upset, our mom would accuse us of faking abuse and actually trying to get the neighbors to call the cops and take her away to jail.

“You would just love that, wouldn’t you,” she once sneered. I can still recall the feeling of her angry breath on my face. “You’re not going to lie about me!”
['Shannon Ashley']
['Life Lessons', 'Depression', 'Mental Health', 'Self', 'Disability']