You can read my post on general about the kid, but here's the basic story.

There is this little kid, 2 or 3 years old, who lives downstairs from me. Pretty much every night, for hours (seriously), I can hear her dad talking loudly to her, though I can't quite make out what he's saying, and the poor kid is just sobbing hysterically. It's not little, "waah, I'm tired/hungry/cold" cries -- the best way I can describe it is that at my former job, a coworker got a call that her brother-in-law had shot himself in the head. Imagine THAT kind of crying -- out of control, basically.

I have no way of knowing what's going on down there. I don't want to go down there and barge in, because I have to live in the same building with these people, after all. I don't know what the managers could do. I'm afraid to call the police because I don't want these people knowing who called them. But with the crying comes noises like thuds, like something hitting a wall, and I'm scared to death this poor kid is being abused. Even if she's not,it's f'ing ANNOYING to be kept up at night by a screaming kid who isn't even yours!

Not to mention, it's horribly triggery and makes bad things come up. I am too afraid to tell you the pictures playing in my head, but all the Klonopin in the world won't make them go away. And, I'm feeling guilty as hell, because I'm standing by doing nothing when something might be going on. The world doesn't need another abused kid. I'm thinking I'm triggery because nobody rescued me, either. The kid's mom came upstairs and apologized to me once for all the crying, but she didn't offer an explanation for it and I assured her it wasn't a bother....right....like, what are you going to say? I thought of the last episode of MASH, where Hawkeye tells the Korean mom on the bus to shut up her baby and she smothers it.

If I were feeling better, I would be pretty f'ing pissed right about now that nobody rescued me. I'm not willing to say I didn't deserve it quite yet, although I know the little girl downstairs doesn't deserve any of it, if it's happening to her. But I'm pissed that it was all made to look absolutely fine to everyone else. Nobody had a clue what the hell went on INSIDE my house. From the outside, everything was just fine. I remember bits and pieces of people occasionally bringing things up, but I don't know if it was because they knew something, or what.

In third grade, I had this green fake fur coat that had a left-hand zipper. I could not zip that jacket to save my life. (I also couldn't tie my shoes till first grade and couldn't tell time till late third grade.) I remember being the last kid in the classroom one day, trying to zip the f'ing jacket, and my teacher finally doing it for me "because you know your mom will be mad if you don't have it zipped." I don't know if "mad" is the right word, but I'm pretty sure I would have heard about how stupid and useless I was for not being able to zip my own jacket.

In eighth grade, after I had been seeing the same math tutor since 2nd grade, we were discussing something--no clue what--and she said she was never sure she would see me from week to week, because she didn't know if I would live that long. WTF kind of thing is that to say to a kid?! I remember the comment, but I don't know what caused her to make it. A lot is a blur prior to 13, or it used to be, but right now it's all very clear and I need to cry but I can't, and I'm desperate to cut but I can't, and I feel like I am losing my f'ing mind, or what's left of it, and I just want it all to go away. Or at the very least I want to scream, "WHY ME?" What could I have done that was so rotten and horrible? Why didn't any of the rest of them get it? Why did they doom me to a f'ing LIFETIME of mental illness because of this crap? And, the question I most want answered: WHAT THE $#@! IS WRONG WITH ME?!

I'm having the breathing problems of a panic attack, but the VCR in my head is still going and trumping everything else. There is no f'ing way I could have earned this...right? Why did all THEIR crap get taken out on ME? What kind of psychopath would do that to a little kid?

I feel like I should keep typing till the tape in my head fully unwinds, but I might be up all night. I think I'm going to go curl up with a bear and a blanket and soothe my inner 3-year-old.

I'm too "out of it" to cut, so I should be fine in a bit. Thanks for letting me rant. And the next time I hear that kid scream, I'm calling the cops. It's got to stop somewhere.....

Candy