China in your hand

# Don't push too hard, your dreams are china in your hand...#

So back to the party. Me a student nurse, he was a friend of my best mates boyfriend.
Not my usual type, blonde, same height (Miss Jones has a penchant for tall, dark you understand..although its hard to generalise, I have to be honest here!)
He was I suppose the "bad boy", was in care as a youngster, skirmishes with the law, you get the idea. It wasn't the best chat up line of all time, "Can you show me where the bog is like?" That should have really told me something, but you know what young love is like, we've all been there?!
Anyway Cyndi Lauper always reminds me of that party, my mate and I loved her at the time, and I think that album was on repeat all weekend. We were quite unseparable that weekend, but I wasn't bowled over if I am honest, perhaps attracted to someone down to earth. It wasn't long before I was spending weekends at his flat, or he at mine. This was a whirlwind time of late nights, studying for nursing exams and partying.
It was a year later he was drunk in a pub and on Valentines Day said "Hows about thee and me getting engaged?" again, not smooth or that much of a compliment but I was taken in.
We moved into our own flat, got married and thats when the problems escalated.
To say he liked a drink was an understatement, I would come home from work to find the lounge piled high with empty cans, various "mates" in residence and a general free for all.
All to their own, but after a 12 hour shift, this was a little wearing!
One day I overheard a conversation I shouldn't have, when he told his mate "I only married her to have kids"  This sent me reeling emotionally, though I never told him I had overheard it. The drinking continued, but along with it a rage that would escalate in him putting holes in doors/cupboards etc. I knew this was bordering on something, but they say love is blind?! I knew there was something underlying this rage, but could not work out what. I had always told my mother as a teenager, "I will not tolerate a partner hitting me, thats it"
In time, I found out I was having my daughter. This time period was good, and he was supportive immediately after. However the drinking escalated to all time heights along with other substances.
My daughter in the midst of this mayhem, was growing up fast. However she seemed to be displaying worrying behaviour. I remember taking her for vaccinations and on the way home her screaming. Not just a toddler tantrum, this lasted half an hour. There was just no controlling her. Biting, scratching me, screaming. I can see the peoples faces on the bus now. One woman said to me "my child is handicapped, and she does not make a noise like that". This embarrassed me so much that the tears were pouring down my face. This behaviour however became a daily routine. Getting called away from work because she had hurt someone at playgroup/bitten them/punched them etc. My husband comatose on the sofa, my mum still suicidal. Madness around me, like a Dr Who credits tunnel I seemed trapped in. I had to wrap her in a blanket to stop her hurting me or herself, and got used to the stares and comments on a daily basis. The "experts" so called as I am afraid I have seen so many in so many places that I feel let us down so badly, told me it was my fault, I was a bad mother, there was nothing wrong with her. I was accused of wanting a label for her. This angered me. I was a professional, I knew this was not "normal behaviour" and was something of the ilk of autism/aspergers etc. The help and support however was nowhere to be found.
She tried to jump out of windows, would run off ahead without warning, in front of cars, was aggressive, screamed constantly and it was like Jeckyl and Hyde when she could be a little loving and was a very intelligent child.
My husband was so drunk one day that I flipped, I had had enough. I tried to reason with him, but when he said "You have too much to say for yourself" that was the final straw.
Still calmly, I stuck up for myself saying he needed to get himself sorted out. With that he put his hands around my throat and pushed me back so hard my head hit the wall.
Did I stick to what I always had said? Did I leave? Well its easy to tell someone what they should do. But with a small child and someone you love, in reality that is impossible.
One night he didn't come home. I knew where he was. Across the road on the estate with a girl half his age. Everyone knew.
The next day he rolled in, just as I was ready to go to work. He admitted what he'd done.
I did what I always do, coped with it on my own, went to work, pretended nothing had happened, never told a soul.
That night I came home from work. As I opened the door, the next few minutes were like a film still..
He was stood in the bathroom, blood pouring from his wrists. Timed exactly for when I would walk through the door. The one thing he knew my mother had repeatedly done to me as a teenager. The only person I had ever shared this hurt with. The one thing he knew would scar me yet again.

# But they're only dreams, and you shouldn't push too far #