Oh I was lonely as a child, because I was an only child, and my mum didn’t want me because she was um raped and I’m what come out of the rape. And I was a sixties child, and in those days I don’t think they had anything like counselling, so I don’t think there was anywhere for my Mum to go to talk about what happened to her. And then these days as well, you had to be married before you had the baby, it was that sort of time where you get married, you have sex on, or making love, you don’t have sex outside marriage, so I suppose it was all taboo.

But what had happened was I remember it being my fourth birthday and I woke up thinking what’s the birthday bunny gonna bring me, is it gonna bring me joy? happiness at all. I was all I wanted and it brought me nothing but pain, anger, from my mum’s perspective, pain, neglect, loneliness. I was put in a coal bunker for up to 2 days and nights. And it was lonely because I’d nobody to talk to about it.  I saw visions in the bunker, heard all these voices, and I feel that if I hadn’t heard voices, especially from the ages of 4 to 7 years old, when they were positive and friendly, I’d be dead, because they gave me survival techniques. They told me how to keep warm, how to get food, stuff like that, where I’d hide food if I managed to get it.

And it was quite lonely because I’d no friends at school, because I used to wet myself a lot, because when I was in the bunker I wasn’t allowed to go out to the toilet. I wasn’t allowed to use the family toilet, I had to do the toilet there. So, I was also getting beaten up for that, for something that wasn’t my fault. So, children wouldn’t come near me unless they were going to bully me. Because I smelt of wee, and as I said only children that did, and the teachers never understood either. They just, you know it was, “You’ve got to do your work, you’ve got to get your schoolwork, your grades up.” But obviously my mind was elsewhere, with my voices and paranoia because when I was at school, I’d be thinking of ways of escape, oh how can I get out of school at 4 without so and so seeing me.

And then I was worried about when I went home because I was thinking well if my mum’s in a bad mood again, she’s gonna lock me up, you know or she’s gonna beat me and lock me up, or she’s just gonna beat me. So, there was always that constant fear of you know something’s gonna happen. And the fear and loneliness was in my eyes, and I got to thinking that if people could just look into my eyes, they would see that there was a frightened lost lonely child in there. But nobody ever sort of asked, or, and once they actually picked my mum up for the state of my appearance she liked to cut off all my hair and this day I can only describe, I was like a, a concentration camp victim, you know when their hairs all cut into the root, and the teachers actually said you know, “Could we ask you why your daughter’s hair is like that?” And just she said, “Oh she got nits.” And they said, “Oh what do you mean?” She says, “Well do you know what it is when you, you’ve got nit’s, you’ve got to go and comb the hair, well we, I tried to go and comb her hair, she wouldn’t let me, so I had no choice but to cut her hair. And as you know hairdressers won’t cut your hair if you’ve got nit’s. So, because I’m not a hairdresser, this is why her heads like this.”

And they believed it. You know so again I felt alone. So that was really you know  loneliness as a child, cos you’re in that bunker. But in a way although I was alone, I was safe if that makes sense, because nobody, the hurt and pain was outside, the only time the hurt was inside in the blackness, the darkness, was when she came into beat me up in the bunker. Oh, that’s, as I say, I was just alone.

I: Could you talk to me a little bit more about the relationship with your mother?

Yeah, it wasn’t very good, it was as I say, she just beat me up all the time and my Gran was just the same. My Gran didn’t live with us, but if we were up my Grans, or my Gran was here our house, but I don’t know if she knew about the beatings, cos she never locked me up, my Gran, but she did beat me up. So I think in a sense she knew about the beatings, but my mum and my Gran would say awful words to me, vile words that a four year old couldn’t understand, like you should be aborted, am I allowed to swear?

I: Oh absolutely.

Say things like you’re a bastard, and when you’re four years old you’re like what do these words mean? And you just want your Mum to hug you. But she never ever showed me affection at all. She showed me plenty of hate and anger, but never love.  To the extent when I had my first child, years later, when I held him and he, in my arms I was like, “How do I love this wee boy? What do, what do I do?”

Nobody came near me, I smelt of wee a lot. Nobody wanted to know. Nobody wanted to be my friend. And the only people that did come near was people to hit me, so they would constantly, and in these days I hope they don’t do it now, but in they days you’d have the victim which was always me, and the bully, and then you’d have other kids in a big circle, egging up the XXX, going you know, “Batter her,” that’s a Scottish word for getting beat up.

I was alone all my life really, it was only really when I had my children. But saying that although I had my children, I was alone, but I wasn’t alone. I wasn’t alone cos I had my children, but I was alone because I craved a different kind of love, I loved the love that my kids were giving me, don’t get me wrong, I loved being a mum, I loved the love that the kids were giving me but I craved love from elsewhere, because my partners that I had, you know, and the last two beat me up all, you know that’s my ex-husband so the, I just didn’t, I was lonely for that so I needed somebody my own age.

And it was only my health visitor that actually was my saviour, she was amazing, cos she’d say, “Kate your house isn’t dirty, it’s untidy.” She said, “But that’s to be  normalised,” she said, “Because think about it, you’ve got four children,” she said, “If I came out of your house and your house was spotless, then I’d be thinking Kate’s got four kids, why the hell is her house spotless? You know.”  And she always, she’d take a cup of tea, she’d look about, if she saw the house untidy, she’d be like okay, have they put you on anymore meds? How are you feeling with your meds? She wouldn’t presume and then she’d say, “Are you, can you make me a cup of tea, can I have?” And I’d be like, “What you want tea? You’re gonna accept tea?” And she’d XXX, and then she’d say, “If you’ve got any dishes Kate why don’t we get on with them while we’re waiting on the kettle boiling.” So, she would secretly do lovely things, but I didn’t think that she was helping me that way, until later on.

You know she was the only one that wasn’t, and she came to my youngest daughters christening, asked the other two, I said, “Oh you know she’s getting christened,” and they’d say, “Oh we’re not allowed, red tape, we’re not allowed.” So, I said to them, “well I don’t understand that, because if I died would you come to my funeral?” “Yeah, we’re allowed to come to your funeral Kate. But we’re not allowed to come to your wedding or a christening.” So, I couldn’t understand that, and I’d say, “Well why won’t you come to something happy.” So I asked the health visitor, and I said, “I suppose you,” and she went, “Yeah, I’ll be there Kate,” she said, “Obviously I’m, I can’t come to your house,” but she never made it that she wasn’t allowed to, she said, “I’ve got to go and visit my uncle,” she said, I’ll come to the church and I’ll see your daughter getting christened. And I was like, “Oh my goodness,” and she got her a wee bank, that she’s still got to this day. And it just, well I hope I didn’t go off the story,

I: No, no, no, no, no, no, no, no. So, so the people like that, people, people that are [er] take their profession to, to, to more humanely, view people

Yes

I: more human, those, those people [er] can help you with loneliness in a way?

Yeah. And she’d speak to me about things about her life, like she’d sometimes say, “Would you want to go to the shops? We can go to the café for a cup of tea, you and I, and brew, Kate,” and she’d say “I’d still, am I allowed?” And she, she’d had this mini that her uncle gave her and [er] it was an old-fashioned mini, the old ones, and it was lovely and she’d talk about the mini and how she got it. And I was thinking, oh my goodness, this woman is talking to me about, you know her life. Obviously she wasn’t going to right into her, you know, but she was talking to me, you know about how her uncle gave her the car, and how she loves it, and she was just being normal. She wasn’t all about, “Right, Kate, you’ve taken your meds?” Tick the box. “Are you, you know,” well if, cos the other two would be like, if I said, “oh my voices,” cos they’d say, “How’s your voices?” Oh that, right, are you taking your meds? That’s why, if you’re not taking your meds, you’re good at that Kate. You’ll not take your meds.” And it was just totally different you know where she would talk to me different, she’d say, “How does the meds make you feel Kate? Does it give you any side effects?” You know and, “How do you feel when that happens? Would you like me to come and talk to you with the psychiatrist?” And XXX, because I felt that I couldn’t get talking, they wouldn’t listen, he wouldn’t even take his head off the, the, you know, the only time he would take, cos he’d go, “Right, come in,” and then he’d go, “Right,” and he XXX, and then he’d say, “Right have you taken your meds?” And if I went, “No,” he’d go, “What?” You know, and that was the only time he would show me his face. You know cos he wouldn’t even have that face interaction.

I:        So, in, in that medicalised [er] medicalised [er] world, there were only a few people that viewed you as a person?

I would say that up to that point sweetheart, one person, and that was the health visitor. And she was there really for xxx, she wasn’t, you know I feel thankful that I had my last kid because if I didn’t, I’d probably be dead, because due to having her I got my health visitor, and she was the first ever and only professional at that time, showed me compassion, she was lovely, trust, she was really lovely. I would talk to her before I’d talk to the other two. You know she, as I say she’d scan the house and see that it was untidy, but she realised that it was the medication that I was on. You know she’d say things like, “Have they put your meds up Kate? And how are you coping with that.” You know she wasn’t just saying, “Right, you’ve got to take your meds,” and that was it. You know she’s just be like, “Well how do you feel when you’re taking your meds? How, do you know do you feel lethargic? Do you,” you know, and, and she was listening. You know and it was great.