What Lies Down the Rabbit Hole?

"I am not crazy; my reality is just different from yours."Alice in Wonderland Lewis Carroll 1865

I read Alice in Wonderland as a kid, it occurred to me that apart from Lewis Carroll’s phenomenal active imagination, like Alice I had stumbled down into a hole and met a whole bunch of characters that never seemed real.

My life was observing everything from early on, especially when I started school, and the reality of the outside world was way different than the one I was living in.

Now I consider fate and what meandering down a path will bring or if it's already chosen. A story that my adoptive mother liked to recite to me goes like this: “We chose you; your brother (adoptive brother no 2) picked you out.”

 He said, “you were the more beautiful, baby”.

My mind tries to twist that upside down and sideways, but I never really understood that choice. It makes me imagine the other child and what if they were “chosen” or the “better looking baby?” what life would I have had?

I have argued the point, that children never choose to be born or to whom or where, but I have heard this said by other adoptees. “You never feel complete or whole”.

I never did in my adoptive family and less so in my biological one. Both parents have been found, but like most adoptee’s the reunions are not what you imagine or see on TV. They inject the drama and you only see an edited version of events and it never follows the happy reunion beyond the cameras.

Fate is still a winner for me. It solves all the conundrums that I can swirl about in my brain and satisfies me enough to get through to the next day, week, or year.

I was chosen, by whatever means to the family that would break my heart and leave me with deep scarring tissue. But travelling that path has brought me here and I like where I am.

No longer can I look at the vignettes of “what if’s”, I have accepted that this is my life and there were lessons in each part. Most of the time I wouldn’t know if I had tripped on it and fallen over a cliff. It took me a long time to come to feeling this motivated and alive.

But I still need to share a piece from the “Mum files” because as much as I hated woman for so long, I also admired her and was fascinated by who she was. She alluded to many things, but lied or hid her inner being.

In our ordered life, Mum had ground rules. They were hard to live with, but you knew that breaking them was going to cost you. I liked to think I was a smart kid and circumvent them sometimes, it took a lot of courage to fly against Mum’s directives. My oldest brother, who lived at home would try to keep me in line, in his flying monkey role. I am sure there were a few times he dobbed me in. But that was Mum, she loved playing us against each other. To the outside world we were accomplished, hardworking children that boosted Mum’s ego. Behind closed doors we were belittled to each other so that none of us would form a strong bond and go against the war machine. My brother and I did share a cordial closeness, I believe he was very genuine, but Mum always held sway.

Dad was just along for the ride: I asked him once why he stayed and his answer was simple " I loved you all" ( meaning the children, even though none of us were biologically his). He also loved Mum and if you could say that made him a weak man, you are probably half right. For a time, I believed him to be a coward, he wouldn't stand up for himself, let alone any of us. If he did, he would get the silent treatment, one time that lasted more than six months. What I believe of him now is about having battered spouse syndrome, he was incapable of leaving and in that it gave him patience and a strength to carry on. I often wonder at how much potential his life had. He had talent galore, good with his hands and brains, his work ethic was straight out of a German efficiency handbook. But when I visit his grave in North Queensland I still weep at how he suffered in his later years.

Dad became ill in his late sixties and of course Mum wouldn't have it. She would often berate him for audacity to say he was tired. When they finally did go to a doctor he was wrongly diagnosed with Parkinsons. When the real culprit of his illness came to light he was already on borrowed time. Officially, he had Lewy Body Disease, the condition that Robin Williams was diagnosed with. It is a terrible disease that robs your body of functions we take for granted and eventually your mind.

In around 2001 I had to go to Sydney to assist with my oldest brother's breakdown (thats another story) and when I arrived at the house, Dad came from the garage, opening it to meet me. When I got out of the car, I couldn't believe the man that smiled like I was his saviour and ushered me in for a cuddle. He was gaunt, emaciated, stooped and in obvious pain.

I was shocked and brought to tears in his arms, holding tight and I didn't want to let go. No one had told me he was ill and certainly nothing about the condition he was enduring.

It was at that visit that I witnessed the worst I had ever seen of Mum. It was that visit that had me standing up to her like I never had and putting her bullshit where it belonged - in the trash!

The first night, I tried to get out of Dad what had been happening with him and his obvious ill health. He didn't have much to say about it, other than he was in pain and the medications he had were not working. I completely ignored Mum as I was seething underneath, one word from her and I think the exlosion would have been heard back in Perth. Instead, I busied myself with making dinner. There was barely any food, just jars or fermenting wild mushrooms in the fridge. On questioning Dad about the food situation, he shrugged and stated that Mum was no longer cooking. With that I took myself out to the shops and purchased some items for dinner and things I knew Mum liked to eat, like bananas, strawberries and yoghurt. Later I made a chicken stirfry that Dad ate like he was starved. I was worried!

Tucked up in my bedroom for the night, laying there wondering about the whole situation with Dad, I heard some whimpering and listened carefully. It was definately coming from other spare room, not the master bedroom. With a curiosity filled with dread, I searched out the source of the noise and found Dad in other room on a single bed, sitting up, his old worn leather jacket around his shoulders. He looked so pitiful and distraught.

I sat with him and asked him to tell me what was going on. Of course super max ears in the other room shot out to confront us.

" There is nothing wrong with him! " she declared and went on to further say he was making it up. When questioned about why he was relegated to a spare room, she simply said " he makes too much noise and I can't sleep."

She emphatically ordered me to bed and I just told her "to go to her bed, I was talking with Dad", a flash of that old jealousy was caught in her eyes as she slunk back down the corridor. I promptly closed the door and found out that Dad had been in pain for months now and all he could do was sit up to sleep. Lying down was more painful.

It was at that point I couldn't take it anymore, so I dialled 000 for an ambulance. I went and told Mum that Dad was going to hospital and she just turned over and said " Im not paying for it!"

Dad was ferried to the nearest hospital in Katoomba 20km's away. The next day I went straight up and went to speak to the staff. They had settled him in and found that he had a broken femur, most likely from a fall. They also discussed his condition after running numerous tests and finding out information from Dad's last appointment with a neuroligist. Further, they wanted me to speak to the social worker.

It came as little surprise that the social worker wanted Dad to remain in the hospital, she had secured a spot for him the rehabilitation wing and that she was sure he was being abused.

Mum was many things, she was cruel and nasty when she wanted her own way or she could stab you figuratively every which way finding your soft spots, but I never believed she would harm Dad in this way. As it unfolded he had numerous bruises along his legs and torso where he had been kicked, presumably when he had fallen. He had lived with broken femur for months, having to navigate stairs to get to bed and was kicked out of his own room so that the Queen could slumber peacefully.

Eventually, Dad went to live in far North Queensland, first with my sister and then in the nursing home, where he would pass away from his condition in 2003, three days before his seventy-third birthday and three days before my second brother committed suicide.