Another pointer to, and one of the main causes of my beginning to wake up to my own past: my brother, the family discovered, had been abused at St Joseph's by another teacher who, for the time being shall remain nameless. But that's his own story to tell, not mine. Hearing about my brother caused me to ask the question, "Did something happen to me as well then?" The more I tried to ignore it, the more things I'd never understood about some of my own behaviours began to make sense.
My sister and I got chatting about St. Joseph's when we found this out about our brother. She knew I'd had issues with __ but then she said something that shook me. She said, "I remember when you started refusing to go to school and missing the bus. That's when __ started giving you lifts into school, to help Mum and Dad out."
I felt as though I'd been punched in the guts. Oh, my, God. He actually did, I remember it clearly now! I remember leaning away from him as close to the door as I could get. I remember feeling sick. Possibly even having to stop to be sick, and I think he came over all 'caring and concerned for me'. That bit might just be my imagination filling in the blanks but I would put money on it being a case of him playing the chummy role in private and belittler in the classroom. I can still hear him posing some question to the whole class before saying, "Oh don't ask him (me), he's stupid".
And guess what; those journeys with him were never my favourite car rides ever because guess what, he would rarely drive me into school by the most direct and obvious route. It was always the most convoluted route. Out of interest, I took the time to drive both recently. The route he took would always be through some of that lovely, quiet Suffolk countryside. Now why would that have been I wonder, from a "professional" obsessed with punctuality and all things ordered? Oh the power and control.
I've since discovered I've quite a keen interest in some of the subjects he managed to put me off completely. I know you can't live your life on 'what ifs' but I do catch myself wondering how much easier growing up and just living well every day might have been were it not for this teacher. I think I can count on one hand the times I've woken refreshed by sleep since puberty. Normally I wake feeling as though I've just run a marathon. I suspect I've always had incredibly vivid dreams just to keep my mind distracted enough from remembering the truth in what sleep there has been. I remember what it used to feel like to sleep well and for decades I've rationalised the disturbances as being normal hormonal changes sparked by puberty. Now I begin to think that it was around the age of 12 or 13 that sleeplessness began for another, much darker reason.
Was it the case that this guy who watched and chivvied us all in the communal showers was busy forming a plan and selecting his easiest target? Again, I'd put money on it. I think there was a network of teachers like him too, given accounts from other former pupils, and I know there are more stories to come out.
A couple of years ago I looked at the St Joseph's governors list and noticed a former classmate among them so I've not been too encouraged to contact them directly about abuse as it's a bit re-traumatising. Frankly they should be dealing with their ugly history before being asked to. I was speaking to one former pupil, a few years older than myself recently. He told me, "they're terrified there's something in the pipeline". Well there is. It's deeply unpleasant and it's coming out now. But you know what, it needs to, and denial is not an option any more. We're not going away and our blogging is here as our legacy if you're waiting for us all to die off. Personally, I have zero interest in tarnishing any reputations or revenge, but the more silent any organisation stays on a problematic past , the more complicit they appear to me. Acknowledging your failings and learning from them is not weakness, it's strength. And if you're not teaching that to your kids they're still being ripped off.
You never forget a good teacher, they say. Yeah well, just one might have been helpful.
