Innocence Revisited

by Cathy Kezelman

  ‘This book is a sensitive and detailed account of one woman’s struggle to overcome the effects of severe childhood trauma. As a professor of child development I am all too aware of the importance of nurture and care in the early years and the long-term disastrous effects of abuse. Cathy’s book highlights some of the creative ways in which child victims cope with horrendous experiences. It shows the typical refusal of the mother to believe and protect her child and stop the abuse. It shows how hard it can be for adult survivors to live comfortably in loving sexual relationships and the strain this imposes on partners and family members. When children are not supported, they may push their traumatic experiences to a corner of the memory where they remain until a trigger leads to their return.

  Cathy’s capacity to dissociate as a child helped to save her and her ability to repress all memory of her abuse allowed her to function to some extent. But still, she knew that something was wrong. Her survival as a child and again as an adult coming to terms with her trauma is a testament to human resilience. Child sex abuse is known to be one of the greatest contributors to later mental illness, substance abuse, self harm and suicide. I hope her story will encourage others to create a safer and more caring world for children.’

  Emeritus Professor Freda Briggs AO - Emeritus Professor of Child Development - University of South Australia, child protection expert, recipient of the inaugural Australian Humanitarian Award, Senior Australian of the Year in 2001.

  Emeritus Professor Freda Briggs is perhaps Australia’s best-known expert on child protection. Through her roles as child protection professional, educator, author, scholar and ambassador she has worked ceaselessly and passionately towards her vision to provide a safer and more caring world for children. Freda spent 9 years as a consultant to Save the Children’ s international programs, 6 years as consultant to DVA on veterans’ children’s issues and has been an adviser to the New Zealand Police and Ministry of Education, and the Government of Fiji, Hong Kong and South Africa on child protection issues.

  She is Foundation Dean of the De Lissa Institute of Early Childhood and Family Studies, Professor of Childhood Development at the University of South Australia, recipient of the inaugural Australian Humanitarian Award, ANZAC Fellowship Award, the Jean Denton Memorial Fellowship, the Creswick Fellowship Award, two university Chancellors’ community service awards, an Hon PhD from the University of Sheffield (UK 2008) and was Senior Australian of the Year in 2001. In the 2005 Queens Birthday Honours, Professor Freda Briggs received an Officer (AO) in the General Division Award for service to raising community and professional awareness of child abuse and neglect, and as advocate for effective child safety education programs. Freda is the author of 16 books and since the age of 60, has published a book a year and continues to publish extensively in international journals.

  ‘This book, about the search for rebuilding from the ashes of abuse, is written with integrity and honesty. I found many sections confronting and wanted to reach out to that little trapped girl. Cathy’s strength in recreating a life, family and finding herself is remarkable and courageous.

  This is an important testament to survivors of child abuse. Irrespective of background, a child’s world is only safe, when the adult carer cares, loves and protects. It shows that we need to protect our children, so they don’t carry the burdens into adult years and life.’

  Susanne Gervay - M.Ed (UNSW), Dip Ed, M.A. (UTS), BA (UniSyd)

  A specialist in child growth & development and an award winning children’s and young adult author. Awarded Lady Cutter Award for Services to Children’s Literature and Professional Achievement Award (UTS) for Writing. Her books are widely endorsed by organisations that protect children such as the Alannah & Madeline Foundation, Room to Read, Life Education Australia, The Children’s Hospital Westmead.

  innocence revisited

  To a family of hope, special friends,

  and the therapist who helped me reclaim my life.

  A note from the author

  All names in this book have been changed, with the exception of

  my husband’s (Dan), my niece’s (Angela), and my own (Cathy).

  Innocence Revisited: A Tale in Parts.

  By Dr Cathy Kezelman

  Published by JoJo Publishing

  ‘Yarra’s Edge’

  2203/80 Lorimer Street

  Docklands VIC 3008

  Australia

  Email: jo-media@bigpond.net.au or visit www.jojopublishing.com

  © 2010 JoJo Publishing

  No part of this printed or video publication may be reproduced, stored in or introduced into a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form, or by any means (electrical, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise) without the prior written permission of the publisher and copyright owner:

  JoJo Publishing

  National Library of Australia

  Cataloguing-in-Publication data

  Kezelman, Cathy.

  Innocence revisited : a tale in parts / Dr Cathy Kezelman.

  1st ed.

  9780987192776 (ePub)

  Kezelman, Cathy.

  Depressed persons-Biography.

  Depression, Mental-Patients-Biography.

  Physicians-Biography.

  Anxiety disorders-Patients-Biography.

  616.85270092

  Editor: Riima Daher

  Designer / typesetter: Adam Laszczuk

  Digital Conversion by Winking Billy

  winkingbilly@optusnet.com.au

  Digital edition distributed by

  Port Campbell Press

  www.portcampbellpress.com.au ISBN 9780987192776 (ePub)

  contents

  Departing

  Ripped apart

  Daddy’s part

  Many parts

  Parting thoughts

  Acknowledgments

  chapter 1

  The Gap and the cliffs around it are picturesque. Copses of regenerated bush and a vast ocean cut a breathtaking vista to the east while, across the road, a park falls gently down to the harbour foreshores. Some days I’d claim my patch of grass in the park on the Western side, a patch removed from the main drag of strolling crowds.

  I would position myself alone with my thoughts, roll onto my back and stare into the majestic canopy of the century old Moreton Bay Figs above. Rosellas and parakeets would flitter overhead, flashing rainbows of hope against evolving skies. Sometimes I would venture to the water’s edge and sit on a bench watching children frolicking in the sand - pictures of innocence - with molten chocolate ice cream dripping onto their bellies.

  On bad days, I would mount the steps on the ocean side, clamber onto the platform overlooking the cliff and linger there, pondering my demise. Although there is one spot known as The Gap, the surrounding area boasts several contenders, all of which I considered with great interest. I eventually chose one. Mine was on top of the hill, off the path and hidden away from twittering tourists sporting cameras and expressions of delight. I would disappear into the tangle of shrubs and salt-encrusted bushes that cowed from the prevailing winds, and stop dead next to the flimsy wooden fence with its wire lifting off; my spot.

  I would spend hours pressed against the fence, studying the moods of the sea and the rocks below, the trajectory of my fall, visualising my end. When the ocean glistened on a still sunny day, the waves would tumble over one another, like young children at play. But as clouds of steel collected in the sky above ‘my spot’ they would transform my sea into a cesspool of despair. The wind would force the breakers to crash against the rocks below, pounding and exploding them, shooting spray and foam high into the air, soaking the path and the people lining it hundreds of metres above.

  I imagined climbing through the
fence, teetering on the edge and pushing off. A little soil would come loose, perhaps a few stones. Then I would plummet three, maybe four hundred metres and land with a thud onto the rocks below. Shattered senseless, the sea would gather me up and embrace my pain - an aquatic mother tending my wounds at long last.

  One desolate Wednesday evening at dusk I strode to my spot, resolute. Trembling, with my knees pressed hard against the rusty wire of the white painted fence, images of my family paraded before my eyes. I reached inside my handbag and rummaged through tissues, biros and the clink of keys for my wallet. Sequestered behind a flimsy plastic flap inside my wallet was a set of pint-sized photos; one of each of the children I had cared for, including one of my niece Angie, taken a year before she died. I slid Angie’s photo out first and remembered.

  I had seen Angie lying in the bottom of her rosewood coffin on the night before she was cremated. I’d bent forward to kiss her; I always kissed Angie when I saw her, but this time as soon as my lips touched her cheek I shuddered and recoiled. The icy chill of death had crept in and snatched my Angie away when I wasn’t watching.

  Standing on my spot I envisaged my body laid out in a dank wooden box as my children bent forward for their farewell kiss. ‘Stop, don’t touch me!’ I screamed as a seagull screeched in the buffeting sky above, swooped down, then back up and away.

  After Angie died I flew to the country town where my brother, Simon, and his partner lived. It was a horrid week; my brother had lost his only child. There was no consolation in her having enjoyed a long and successful life, nor had she even had a short joyful one. Just eighteen months before she’d died, Angie had lost her mother to cancer and soon after that had been ostracised by her mother’s family. Ironically, the trip which killed Angie was the first occasion on which she was to see her mother’s family for over a year.

  Angie had indeed experienced more than her fair share of pain. An only child, she’d suffered alone; her parent’s devotion to ‘The Orange People’ and after that her parents’ separation, divorce and their bitter custody battles that ensued. The tragedy of Angie’s life made losing her even more painful. My brother had adored and cared for her as best he knew how and was distraught. There was no consoling him. During the week a few of his friends dropped in. Some of those visits brought temporary relief but the moment they left, we were confronted by a loss too cruel to comprehend.

  It took several days for the coroner to release Angie’s body; she had died in an accident, but he had to be sure nothing suspicious had taken place. Unlike most eighteen year olds Angie had thought about her death. In fact she had visited a clairvoyant in the weeks before she died and the clairvoyant had predicted that Angie would die young and that she’d die in a car accident. Angie had left instructions; she wanted to be cremated.

  We’d gone to see her body the night before the funeral. She’d looked weird nestled in a tangle of white silk, dressed up in her ‘formal’ dress; a brown velvet gown, with a white crocheted vest over the bodice. A lively, vibrant Angie had shown off the dress in her year ten formal photos only a year earlier. Angie was not glowing in her coffin. Her face was drained of colour and her cheeks were collapsed, like deflated balloons. It was the lifelessness of her eyes that had shocked me the most. The bright eyes of youth had glazed over and retreated into their sockets; their work on earth was finished. I remember the bruise on Angie’s forehead, a little raised and slightly discoloured. It hadn’t seemed nasty enough to have made her die.

  How do you say goodbye to one so young and make it ‘okay’? Or make sense of a funeral full of youngsters who best belong at the beach? Or of a wake at which a series of surrogate mothers mourned a child whose biological mother had passed away?

  And so we trudged through the sand dunes of a windswept beach in Northern NSW, a curious procession of silent mourners, each carrying a few flowers with which to make our personal farewells. I ventured up to the water’s edge and stood watching the waves lapping at my feet, pondered and cried, kissed each flower and sent it on its way to find Angie. Then I looked up to see my brother had swum way too far out, so far out that I feared that he might never return. I watched anxiously until he had launched his flowers and waited until he emerged, sodden and spent, from a sea awash with colour.

  It was a week during which each night was black, sleepless and silent. And each day black, aimless and silent. Save the ticking clock, the wretched grandfather clock that marked every second of the week of Angie’s passing.

  After a week of bitter sweet rituals, I returned to my daily existence in Sydney. Put my head down and tried to move on with my life. But the emptiness I felt when Angie died continued to grow; that emptiness had awakened a feeling within me. Seeing her body had left me with a sense that there was something which I needed to remember. I had no idea what it was; I simply knew that there was something more, something which I needed to explore.

  chapter 2

  Before Angie died I lived a hectic but successful life. My husband and I had four kids of our own. We’d also cared for a cousin of my husband’s for a number of years, but at that time our kids were aged between eight and sixteen and our extra child was already living independently. Our kids kept us busy with their hobbies and a range of extra-curricular and school activities. I’d rip around all week squeezing their needs in between the other demands on my time and on weekends my husband would pitch in with the ferrying as well.

  I also worked in a group general practice in Sydney’s eastern suburbs. I worked part-time, or so it was called, but most weeks I put in at least forty hours. I loved the challenges of medical practice though, collecting and analysing the facts so I could apply my knowledge and skills to diagnosing and treating my patients. At work I felt confident and capable much of the time and it didn’t matter that there was little time left for my needs. Manic activity suited me. The more I did, the more I felt I could do and besides, I didn’t have any needs of my own - none that I knew about. But then I knew precious little about myself at all.

  I returned to work the week after Angie died. I suspected it was a bit early to go back, but never doubted that I could handle it. I wasn’t one to let my emotions get the better of me. Besides I was a doctor, a professional and professionals can keep their feelings under wraps; so I used to believe.

  At 8:10 Monday morning I strode into my office, swept the heaped pile of doctor correspondence to one side, and placed a freshly framed photo of Angie on the desk in front of me. When I smiled at Angie on my desk, she smiled back at me and that felt strangely reassuring.

  ‘Sorry to disturb you, Cathy, but you have three patients waiting.’ I looked at my watch. It was 9:15. My secretary’s voice had shaken me out of my reverie.

  I took the top file from the pile and called Mrs Harris in. I didn’t really want to see Mrs Harris, but I had no choice. I don’t remember who else I saw that day, but I know that I didn’t want to see any of them. It was a crazy day as it always was following a week away. Many of my regulars had waited for me to come back. I wish they hadn’t; I just wanted to be left alone. At least the time passed quickly. In fact ten hours evaporated in what seemed like no time.

  It was 7.15 pm when I showed my last patient out.

  ‘Cathy, are you all right?’ my secretary Pamela barked. I lifted my head off the desk, wiped my eyes dry and checked the time on my watch: 7:35 pm No wonder Pamela was annoyed. She usually left the office at 7 pm on the dot, if not a little before.

  ‘Just finishing off!’ I shouted in my best doctor’s voice. I straightened my collar, grabbed my things and marched outside.

  ‘Good night Pamela!’

  ‘Good night Cathy!’

  I hadn’t even taken the keys out of the ignition before all four kids burst into the garage. It was late and they were keen to see me. They too had lost Angie. When I saw their faces peering expectantly through the car window, I panicked. I knew I couldn’t give them the attention they needed. I was spent.

  Thank goodness my h
usband popped his head around the corner a minute later.

  ‘Hi honey, I’m stuffed.’ I called. ‘Could you do the honours tonight?’

  ‘Sure, darling. Is there anything-?’

  Before he’d finished the sentence I’d thrown everyone a goodnight kiss and headed off.

  ‘GOOD NIGHT, ALL!’ I shouted as I disappeared into my bedroom, shutting the world out behind me.

  I started crying the moment I found myself alone and didn’t stop even when I forced myself into my pyjamas. I snuggled into bed and pulled the covers up over my head, the tears still pouring. I was completely exhausted and yet my exhaustion didn’t help me fall asleep. How could I fall asleep when Angie had died? I couldn’t. I wasn’t nearly ready to let her go. When I was awake I could keep her alive in my mind’s eye. And so I did, all night long.

  The next morning, I toppled out of bed and wandered bleary-eyed into the kitchen. A giant-sized photo of a relaxed and tanned Angie smiled at me from the mini-shrine I’d created on the kitchen bench. Angie looked a picture, surrounded by her favourite flowers; red roses and baby’s breath and a circle of beeswax candles. I couldn’t smile back. Her photo didn’t reassure me anymore.

  Thoughts of Angie filled my head in the weeks that followed and I spoke to her whenever I could. We chatted about all sorts of things; about her dreams for the future and her plans for the here and now. Each time the light shone off her golden hair in my mind’s eye, the tragedy of her loss felt a little less real. And when she vanished, as she inevitably did, I would turn to her photo and will her to arise from within the image. She never did. And then I would hear another knock at my door.

  ‘Why can’t they leave me alone? Is that too much to ask? That shitty damn secretary, I’ve never liked her. Doesn’t she understand how lousy I feel? I don’t want to see any more patients today! Enough! They stream in here, one after another wanting things, demanding things. Angie’s dead, damn it! Who cares about some piddley little sniffle? Buy some tissues sniffle and snort if you must, but leave me alone! Doesn’t anyone understand? Angie is dead, damn it!’