Remedial Math

Mother insisted on dressing me like a doll - well into my pre-teens. Every day was a battle for what I was allowed to wear. The day she made me wear this particularly fucking ugly shirt was memorable. The battle I clearly lost was comparable to the “no wire hangers” scene from Mommy Dearest. I was from so much chaos, drama and had early trauma from when I was a toddler that I had a memory block from my earlier years by this age.

I do remember crying at the dinner table often - if I was asked about my day. My older siblings (by a different father) were there at that time, but not for long at that point. At the time I was crying because I was unpopular at school. At least that was what I thought the reason was.

One night mother was ranting but not directly at me. It was probably at her disgusting fat, drunk, Lawrence Welk (high decibel) watching third husband who she made me call “daddy”. The phrase “cop-out” was used in mother’s rant one evening.

Regrettably, I asked what that meant. She stood up from her seat at the dinner table and gave me an example with her full plate of spaghetti and salad. She picked it up to her shoulder height and turned it upside down so all her food hit the floor and did a number of the mirror-squared wall. She announced “This is a cop-out”. Not the best example for that term, but ok.

At school I was shy, and I hated team sports. I especially hated being told I “had to” do anything. I was really good at rope climbing in PE. I’d be at the top when most girl wouldn’t make it far off the ground and the boys had to push themselves to keep up.

One day was kickball. I told the teacher I didn’t want to play. This teacher wouldn’t let up and seriously tried to make me play. He put me up to be the kicker anyway. I kicked a fowl ball on purpose, and calmly walked off the field. The kids were pissed and they were yelling at me, calling me names. I just kept on walking.

I was also withdrawn in class and my grades were slipping. Another part of my home life then included witnessing Mother go after my brother with a HUGE kitchen knife.

I shared a room with my sister, who I thought hated me for being a pain in the ass and always in the way. Mother had removed the entire bedroom door-knob so we couldn’t lock her out.

Nobody at the school asked about my home life. They just threw me in remedial math.

Now, ‘remedial’ comes with a stigma. It’s embarrassing.

The teachers tried convincing me that it was normal that some kids need a little more help.

I was not happy about that. In my teen years, I got pissed enough to not just learn math, I got good at it. I maintained an A or high B average by high school and ended up getting a special honors award when I took to architecture.

Just think if I was encouraged to do any of this from the start. I was already painfully shy. In later years, my brother told me he’d cut class for a week and the school gave up calling Mother because she was always incoherent during the day. That may be an exaggeration. It’s a completely believable story to start with.

In all likelihood- worthy of being exaggerated, or flat-out-true.