by Nancy Sepulveda
His fat sausage fingers jabbed at my face, emphasizing insults in between flecks of spittle. Fear and shame intermingled with a bubbling, rising sense of rebellion, and I had to stop myself from taking a snapping bite. To do so would have incited a barrage of belittling, and I was simply too exhausted. I was also seven years old.
I didn’t know my biological father, so I was thrilled when my mom married 
just after my 5th birthday. I’d finally have someone to call “dad,” to take me bike riding and camping and to do all the other fatherly activities I envisioned daddy’s girls did. Unfortunately, she married a monster who delighted in verbally abusing us.
Years of drunken rages and sober insults ensued, and rather than “precious” or “sweetheart,” my monikers were “retard” and “stupid.” I was repeatedly told I was unlovable and unwanted, hence my “real” father’s abandonment. Or he’d play cruel tricks, like announcing that we were going to Disneyland and seeing the excitement fade from my face when I realized no such trip awaited me. Like all children, I learned to adapt in order to survive. I could recognize the warning signs of a tirade: the rise in vocal volume, the excessive questioning about mundane subjects in order to find some misstep or mistake to seize upon. I learned to be quiet, go unnoticed, to disappear into a book-world of make-believe and safety.
In between the curses and whacks with the belt were periods of excessive affection and joy, when impromptu trips to the toy store or pizza parlor were interspersed with hugs and compliments on my good grades and “obvious intelligence.” Looking back, the man (himself the victim of childhood abuse) was clearly grappling with bi-polarism. My insides were constantly in a knot, unconsciously flinching as I awaited either a high-five or an open-handed smack.
After five years and two children, my mother finally had the strength to 
leave. But the effects of his abuse during my formative years lingered on. My self-esteem suffers still, and even completing a college degree and becoming a mother myself has not silenced the critic in me whispering, “You’re not smart enough, you’re not good enough, you’re unworthy.” Therapy has helped, but it’s an ongoing battle to learn to love myself.
If you are being verbally abused, I implore you to seek help. Do not make excuses, do not shrug aside insults as “just his/her unique sense of humor” or “he/she doesn’t really mean it.” Men who are verbally abusive are at times overlooked as merely machistas (“Tio has always been gruff with Tia,”) but verbal abuse transcends cultural norms and affects all ethnicities and genders. It’s an abuse often swept under the rug, seen as “not as bad” as physical or sexual abuse. But the beating to your self-esteem and sense of self-worth, the festering wounds of self-hatred, can leave a scar as surely as a split lip.
It’s time to start the healing.
Contributor, Nancy Sepulveda.
______________________________________________________________
Disclaimer: The views and opinions expressed in this article are solely those
of the author and should not be understood to be shared by Being Latino, Inc.
______________________________________________________________
______________________________________________________________
Being Latino Online Magazine 