The German thing might be one explanation. The Germans have a history of being abusively strict with their children. I know I have posted before about my husband's grandmother, she was German from Germany, spoke no English. Chris' mother was a war-bride, his dad met her while was in the Army, radio announcer at AFN-Munich after the war, she was a secretary. Chris' uncle was killed at the Battle of Stalingrad, he was Luftwaffe.
Chris' parents were very strict, but his grandmother was stricter. She threatened him that the Strewelpeter would cut off his thumbs if he did not behave.
My mother's mother was part German, too. When I was a kid, my mother beat me with a hairbrush, metal coathangers, one time with a garbage can lid, and scratched me with her fingernails until I bled. I've still got scars on my arm and my face. Then she got really psycho, and did bizarre stuff, like made us steal, and break into empty houses. She would go look at places, that were for rent and vacant, and then scope the place out to see if there was anything worth stealing, and then leave a window unlocked, come back late at night and make one of us go in the window and then unlock the door and let the rest in and we would steal stuff that she had identified. One time she made me sit on a birdbath pedestal while she shot suction cup darts at me from a dart gun, because I wouldn't co-operate. And another time she made me go in the shower and she poured cupfulls of ice water on me. One time she made me act as lookout while she stole a painting from the bathroom in a business. This was all after my father left my mother.
And there were the beatings that my father gave me, one time he punched me in the jaw and knocked me down. One time he pushed my mother down on a box of kittens and killed one. He ripped her clothes off her one time because dinner wasn't ready, and then she ran out into the street and I called the cops. And there was another time I had to call the cops. And my father's lawyer's wife told me that if I called the cops again, we'd be put into foster care, so not to do that anymore. And then when my father left my mother I blamed myself, and felt bad. Still do.
So, can you top that? Sorry, I am joking. Not funny.
But I think I understand. |
