Mum's The Word

This post is totally unrelated to my concerns over my daughter (as if that wasn’t enough!) but I feel this is probably the only place I can get things off my chest.

The term “Mum’s the Word” is still very appropriate but from another perspective. I have still to fully “get my head round” this one.

On the last day of my recent visit to my Mum, who is in her eighties, she dropped a few bombshells right into my unsuspecting lap. I’m not sure how the conversation came about but she began to tell me that my Dad, who’s been dead for twenty years, was a serial womaniser. She went on to mention various instances including the fact that he’d even slept with her own sister. As if this wasn’t enough of a shock she went on to add that my Dad had hit her on more than one occasion and that she was basically afraid of him.

I asked her why she’d never spoken out before she said that it wasn’t the done thing in her generation and that she simply had to put up with the situation. She started to go on to say that she’d had a dreadfully unhappy life but our conversation had to come to an abrupt end when another family member appeared.

This conversation will have to be continued at some other time and I need to discuss it with my other siblings who are oblivious to what went on within what I thought was a close (and large) household. I also feel that my Mum needs to “unload” so much more and I want to be there for her. I know that nothing can change the past and my own memories of my Dad are still precious to me but the knowledge raises so many questions.

Well they say troubles come in threes – whatever next?

I hope this will, in part, explain my mind set at the present time – thank you for listening.