Why I Don't Like Christmas

Trigger warnings: this is a story about the climax of years of abuse my mother and I suffered at the hands of my stepfather. This story includes details of the use of a gun as well. Please read with caution.

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Hey Cherubs. Today I'm not actually talking about why I don't like Christmas. I might do a History of Christmas piece at some point for you guys before Christmas gets here, but if not this is just what's on my heart.

Holidays in general are pretty hard for me. I don't really care for almost any of them. You could call me cynical, I don't think people should need a holiday for a lot of the behaviors they exhibit on holidays, such as love, family, gratefulness, those sorts of things. I also think it's a thing that happens when you get older. Holidays slowly become regular days. I don't hate holidays, I understand the point of them, but they just aren't really a thing I get excited about.

Christmas is a little different though. Christmas is hard for me for different reasons. It's been 6 years since the story I'm about to tell you happened and still, it haunts me to this day. I am often told that the internet isn't the place to "tell my business" or things like that. I'm cautioned about the topics I write so as not to upset the Christians I was raised around. This is my whole life. Censorship and "people don't need to know that." Social media may not be the place to tell your life story, but that's why I started this blog in the first place. So I could talk freely and tell my story, my stories, as freely as I want to. And that's what I intend to do. So, to all my family members who might see this, in advance: I'm not sorry. I know you probably would like for me to be, but I'm not and I won't be. People should not be afraid to speak their truths, because those who mind don't matter and those who matter don't mind.

Christmas 2013. This would be my third Christmas with that man. For years I refused to speak his name, but it was Eric Kinton. We called him Denell, his middle name. But for about 2 years by that point, I had been forced to call him 'dad'. Back then, I truly believed he was my dad, but that's a whole other story for a whole other time. We were living in a town outside of Boston called Randolph. Just down the street from the one and only high school in town. Holidays were always iffy days. Ever since his mother fell ill, Eric wasn't entirely sane. It got even worse after she died, so holidays were difficult for him.

It started out as a normal Christmas day. I woke up, pretended to believe in Santa, and opened my presents excitedly. I only remember a few of the gifts I got, and I know I don't have any of them anymore for one reason or another. I was less than a month away from 14 at this time, so some things are fuzzy. Like the smaller details throughout the day. At this time, my older sister was also living with us. She was 17 at this time, and she stayed in my younger step-sister's room when she wasn't visiting. For some reason, Eric didn't like her. I could talk about why, but it doesn't matter. He talked to us like adults when he was mad, but talked down to us when he was calm. I used to wake up shaking in the middle of the night because I could hear my mother screaming out in pain from the bedroom. They argued a lot too, especially about my siblings and I. Those screams still haunt my nightmares.

I remember the argument though. The usual, lots of cussing, lots of him slamming her around where I can hear but not see, and me pretending not to hear it because he always got angrier if I tried to defend my mother in anyway. It was always my fault or her fault or my sister's fault. It was never his. He could never be wrong. Now that I'm older I recognize a lot of his behavior as delusions and he had his own fair share of mental health issues. He'd spent most of the day in our furnished basement, which he had turned into a man cave and kept his dogs chained up when he wasn't beating on them either. My mother and I spent most of the day cooking a massive Christmas dinner. We were excited despite having to tiptoe around the house because Eric was in a mood. An understandable mood, but a mood nonetheless.

The plan was to have Christmas at the house, and then the next morning my mother, my two siblings, and I were going to drive down to North Carolina to visit family for the rest of the holiday vacation. Sometime around when the sun had started to go down, Eric got angry and started to argue with my mom about my brother coming over the house. To my knowledge, he had been at work most of the day and then went to do laundry for the trip and accidentally locked himself out of the house. So he called our mother. His laundry was done and so everything he needed was packed, we were leaving the next day anyway. So why not come over and spend the night?

For some reason I never discovered, that was a problem. I don't remember how it was brought up, but I remember how many hours they argued in between Momma and I cooking. She guided me through the food and let me watch it myself, and when I didn't need to stand over it I watched TV in the living room. I thought the arguing would be like any other time, I tried to block it out. And then at one point I heard my mother yell to Eric never to point a gun in her face again. She had gone into the bathroom, probably to smoke a cigarette and get away from him, but a few minutes later he stomped upstairs and barged into the bathroom. I remember hearing some knocking around, like banging on the wall. I knew what it was.

For most of the rest of the time the sun was up, that was the day. Cooking with my mother, playing with my presents, and watching TV all while they argued. It got really bad when we started making the cake, and eventually my mom just told my brother to come over anyway. She had already said many times, many ways, that she wasn't going to leave her son out in the cold in the wintertime in Boston, of all places. Especially not under the circumstances. Eventually the arguing died down and stopped. We finished cooking. There was fried barbecue chicken, greens, cornbread, mac & cheese, all kinds of black people holiday dishes. Just as we finished cooking, my brother arrived. It was dark outside by then, and freezing.

We started making plates and eating. For a few minutes there was talking, laughing, eating. For a moment, it seemed like the rest of the night could actually be fun and peaceful. It didn't take long to start hearing Eric downstairs banging things and slamming things and ranting. Then all of a sudden the lights were out and it was dark. And I don't mean just lights out. Every single thing in the house shut off, he had turned off the power in the house from the basement. Later on I learned my brother heard the click of the gun, but we all heard Eric charging up the stairs and my brother turned his phone flashlight on just in time for us to see him carrying a shotgun. I saw it clear as day. He was shouting at us to get out. My brother went into protective mode instantly, but most of what happened in that moment is a blur. After seeing the gun, I just remember hurrying behind my mother, stumbling in the dark with a plate of almost finished mac & cheese in hand. I was in just my pajamas, I didn't have a chance to get my coat or put on shoes so I wore only socks.

He locked us out and nailed the door shut so we couldn't get back in even with the key. We stood outside in the cold for awhile, in nothing but whatever we had on at that moment, I don't know for how long though. Scared and terrified, I started crying and my sister had been having a panic attack. Eventually, everyone was able to calm down and a friend of my brother's came and got us so we could figure out our next move. Figure out how to get our stuff. And so that we could be in a heated car in the meantime.

Eventually we just had to call the police. Thankfully at least one of them was former military. Eric was a former Force Recon Marine, and my mom told me that after talking to the police officer they were gonna have to handle the situation with care. We didn't tell them about the gun though. My mom said her fingerprints were also on it, but I was too young to understand why that mattered. He used it to force us out of the house was all I knew.

We did eventually get in and get our stuff, car keys, phones, everything we needed and we stayed in a hotel that night. Then, we left for North Carolina. My brother stayed back in North Carolina since he was planning on moving anyway, but my mother and sister and I went to stay in a hotel when winter break was over until we could find another place. It didn't take very long but things were tight for a long while. The police only gave us 5 minutes to get our stuff and so many things got left behind in that house. I made sure I grabbed the things I cared about most first. Material things that could be replaced mostly, but my mother lost a lot of photos and papers she'd held on to for various reasons. I lost all my journals that had my first short stories in them. None of it mattered though, because finally we were free. We had tried to leave before, but my mother refused to leave me there and Eric refused to let her take me. Had he not done what he did, we might not have been able to get out. We might have even died. Today, though, almost 6 years later, we're alive. And through all the ups and downs, we've survived.

But trauma is still trauma, and that day will haunt me for a very long time and throughout many future therapy sessions before I'm finally able to let it go. At least the nightmares are gone, y'know?

I don't hate holidays in general, I just don't care for them. And I don't hate Christmas either. The excuse to visit my family is always a good one, but the childlike excitement for Christmas has left me. And now I'm a young adult, figuring out how I fit into this world and how I feel about holidays and how I want to celebrate them. In the meantime, I refuse to spoil it for the children and I at least try not to be a downer about the holiday. I can be a bit cynical, but in terms of how I feel about Christmas? Indifferent.

I wasn't going to tell this story; however, I summed all of this up in one sentence on Twitter and it seemed to resonate with a few people. One person even reached out to me wanting to know my story. And I've been wanting to get back into writing. The last 10 months have been hectic, depressing, fun, exciting, and just a huge roller coaster, but this was what was on my spirit. This is just when everything came to a head. I have so much more story to tell, and as time goes on, maybe I'll tell you more of it. For now, I leave you with this:

More than 12 million men and women in the U.S. are victims of domestic abuse, rape, or

stalking by an intimate partner

over the course of a year, on average 24 people per minute.

Nearly half of all men and women in the U.S. have experienced "psychological aggression by an intimate partner."

It could be you or anyone you know. More than 1 in 4 and 1 in 7 women and men, respectively, over the age of 18 have been the victims of severe physical abuse at the hands of their significant other.

You are never alone. More than 1 in 3 and 1 in 4 women and men, respectfully, in the U.S. have been raped, stalked, and/or subjected to physical violence by their partners.

You matter. You deserve respect, love, affection, kindness. And domestic abuse is unacceptable, no matter who you are, under any and all circumstances.

And if you want to learn more, or you need help I've linked the National Domestic Violence Hotline in one of the quotes. If you or someone you know is being abused or stalked and need help but are afraid of your browsing history being monitored, you can call at 1−800−799−7233.

That's all for now Cherubs. Peace, love, and hugs.

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