Think back to when you were a kid, just age six or seven. You probably have memories of playing at the park, or riding in the car with your parents. Some children, however, have memories of their parents physically abusing them. Whether it's hitting them with a magazine, or kicking them in the face, their parents hurt them. For Lily in The Secret Life of Bees, a fictional novel, she was used to the more minor pain from her dad T-Ray; however David from A Child Called It was abused with unimaginable things for over 11 years by his mother Catherine. Whether it's a fiction novel, or accounts of real life events, all abuse stories connect with each other.
What does a parent feel, as they are in the middle of punching their child in the arm? Do they feel happy? Sad? Maybe they think that because they're the adult, they have the right to do this to their kid…when in all actuality they don't. Neither parent has a reason to abuse their child. They blame it on minor things, like they got a bad grade or didn't finish one of their chores. A normal parent would ground their child or talk to them about it, where T-Ray would make Lily kneel on grits and Catherine would make David eat ammonia. They think that because their child makes a mistake, it's okay to hurt them. They have no reason to hit their kids -- they just do.
Besides having no reason to neglect their children, also, both parents ignore their children. They act like they never gave birth to them, like they never were part of the family, like they never were born. T-Ray acts as if he didn't have another family member, as if he were on his own. He didn't ask if Lily ever wanted to hang out with friends or go see a movie. He pretended that she wasn't there -- however she was. As for Catherine, she was the same way. She treated her other sons like royalty, bought them candy, let them play with toys, took them to the park…all while David was in the basement. She made him sleep on a cot and wear the same clothes. David was ignored in his house. He wasn't treated right. Both parents were unfair to their kids…if you could even call them parents.
Aside from abusing their children, or ignoring them and not including them in the family, both parents suffer with problems. T-ray's wife was killed, and Catherine deals with alcohol. Not saying that these things potentially give the parents reasons to abuse, but they may believe that because they have pain -- others should feel it, too. Drinking and death aren't the same thing, but they both cause pain…pain which needs to be let out, and these parents choose abusing their kids.
Both parents have no reason to hit, both parents ignore their abused kids, both parents have problems they're trying to cope with…but there is a difference. One is real, and one if fake. In the Secret Life of Bees, we read about a girl who gets abused, yeah it's sad, but we know it's not real. We know it's just words on a page describing an action. Where in A Child Called It, each page we turn holds real emotion, real experiences, real pain. It's not so sad to think that T-Ray is an imaginary character. He's like Cruella de Ville, Ursula, or even Captain Hook; all made up. Nothing they do really happens in the world. However, Catherine is a real person. She holds a real heart, a real soul, a real life. She is real. Every time we read about a punch, she really laid a hand on her son. Every time we read about Dave not eating, he was literally being starved. Everything in that book is real, which has a huge impact on the emotion you feel while reading it.
When we were kids, we would all get upset about things that happened. It was the end of the world when we couldn't eat a snack, or play a game. Little problems consumed us, as we were ignorant to the larger ones there are. Children everyday are being hurt by their parents. The ones who are supposed to love them the most, the ones who are supposed to care about them, the ones who are supposed to protect them. Whether a real life story, or a fiction tale of one being abused, abuse is a serious problem.
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