RESPONSES AS POSTS
All I Could Do Was Stand There and Watch
When child abuse happens in public. What would you have done in my situation?
Writing about things like this always unsettles me. But I know that if I don’t bring myself to get this message out there, I’ll regret it and make myself feel a lot worse.
Sometime in May, I was leisurely entering my local park when I was passed by a young parent and their daughter, or even an older and younger sibling, together with a woman pushing a buggy. As we crossed paths, I heard the young woman say something foul to the younger child, who looked confused as they remained walking quietly beside them. The worst thing about it was the mum/older sibling seemed to be treating the child so poorly to show off to the other woman.
The tragic audacity of it all. It made me so sad and full of pent-up anger.
All I could manage to do about it then was make a generic Facebook post to express my disliking for people who choose to treat children that way, and even do so in public. To my surprise, I was pulled up by a young mum I just so happened to be friends with for being judgemental, even going as far as saying I wasn’t allowed to comment because I wasn’t a parent myself…
But that’s a whole other story. One which turned a whole lotta ugly very quickly. It caused a lot of mental distress and I even ended up losing a few friends over how they treated me throughout the ordeal.
I’d like to say this experience of witnessing public forms of abuse was a one-off and I no longer need to worry about it happening again…
But it happened again. And this time it was a lot worse.
And the bizarre thing about it was it was in the exact same spot as the last.
Before explaining the dreadful scene, I’d like to preface this by saying I know traumatic experiences from my past have caused me to develop certain conflict phobias. My need for certainty caused me to look up exactly what these fears meant and how they usually come about.
As someone who believes much credibility is lost when people self-diagnose major conditions, it felt comforting knowing phobias aren’t usually formally diagnosed. If anything, people living with certain fears who are fully aware of problems enough to identify them as a phobia should be encouraged to think this way. It could help motivate them to seek professional treatment.
Welcome to my phobia: Allodoxaphobia: the fear of hearing others’ opinions. Chiefly, their opinions of me.
I realise this fear is based on a lot of assumptions. I’m sensitive and oftentimes care far too much about what other people (may or may not) think of me. This sometimes causes me to retreat back into my shell (confining myself to my tiny flat) for weeks so as not to confront those and say something/do something wrong.
I like singing. But I remember as a 13-year-old on holiday in Spain, running flat out alone in the middle of the night back to the hotel rather than staying and singing karaoke in a little bar with some friends I’d just made. The fear of judgement is real.
I know it was caused by making an absolute embarrassment of myself a few years before singing in front of my family and an entire swimming pool full of people, and a few kids laughing at how much my voice cracked…
It all really escalated when I turned 16 and had my first boyfriend. He was so intelligent, creative, and book-smart beyond his years, having also been 16 like me. We loved each other (or whatever idea of love that was) but I couldn’t help feeling inferior to him, as I was so inexperienced and poorly educated in comparison.
This feeling was fully realised whilst playing a game of Trivial Pursuit with his parents. It was clear where he had gotten his admirable qualities from. Their mids were scalpels. And they cut through mine like butter.
I didn’t get one question right. Not one. And I have been living with this perplexing fear of being judged and critiqued for my lack of knowledge ever since.
My reactions to these fears may come across as selective but that’s simply because sometimes I feel more able to handle situations than others. Not sure how likely they will persist, but I know I have them and I know why.
Now, back to our regularly scheduled programme. And rewind to a few days ago.
A nearing middle-aged (not that it really matters) mother was pushing a buggy with a baby/small child inside. Two others I’d say under 8 years old were beside her. We crossed paths at the mouth of my local park’s corner, just as I had with the others beforehand.
This woman…
It honestly sounded like they were talking to someone who had just threatened her children’s lives, not the children themselves! The amount of hatred that came out of her mouth as she spoke with the little girl trailing to the left of her was heartbreaking. My eyes couldn’t help but dart in her general direction as she loudly shouted “That’s because you’re a little selfish f**king b**ch!”
How in the world could that be an acceptable thing to say to what looked like a 6-year-old girl who was merely talking to their mother? She continued snapping at her in the same tone as we walked further apart from one another. When they had reached the small island between the road, I could still hear her, although the yelling had turned indistinguishable. And this time, her focus was on the even younger child strapped in the buggy.
She was yelling even louder. Sticking her head right up close to the child inside as she did. Her arms grasped onto the handlebars and slightly shook them with each inflexion of her voice. No child deserves that sort of verbal abuse from their mother.
By this point, I had shut down in the mouth of the park. My heart beat with such force, that it felt like my ribcage was being bashed open from the inside. Swallowing masses of sadness as I watched them embark on the other side of the road.
I couldn’t handle what was going on in front of me. It’s almost like my brain flat-out refused to compute the input. And the output was a frozen, silent screen.
This time my fear of confrontation held me captive and bound my mouth closed with its hands.
I wanted desperately to be an everyday hero in some way and speak out against what was happening. Maybe the more people did, the less this display of verbal abuse would go on.
I’m writing this here as a confession, a way of getting this off my chest, and as a mini cry for help. I am at a loss as to what to do when situations like this occur.
I live in the UK and I’m sure there are certain things I am legally in my rights to do along with numbers I could call for advice on what to do. But what could I do, really? I didn’t know these people. They didn’t have a number plate on their backs to report. And I couldn’t exactly follow them in public whilst on the phone with child services…
Wait… could I have?
As much as I strive to know solutions, “knowing” and “doing” are two entirely different skills to master.
So I ask, dear reader, what would you have done in my situation?
Genuinely asking… for a friend.
This was a Responses as Posts story to Gracia Kleijnen. How introversion oftentimes prevents them from dealing with social conflict:
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