this is my intro

I have some specific topics that I want to create threads about at some point, but I want to throw out my story first. I guess I'm curious to hear what others have to say about it. Only a few people have heard the whole story--T's, only I think.

I'm 44. I'm 5'4"

As a kid I was even shorter in proportional terms for males my age. Much shorter but not a "little person." My whole identity seemed to revolve around my height; random comments from people who met me or even who knew me, esp. when describing me to other people. Somehow "short" seemed to be part of every paragraph spoken about me.

My mom--severe bi-polar and alcoholic--who knows what else--made a major issue of my height. She herself was short +/- 5'2". She had a really bad childhood; she had major problems. I came to understand as an adult that she was sick and not a bad person.

She took me to the doctor frequently--regular appointments. They were monitoring my growth. They were considering doing something if I didn't grow or seem to approach some sort of "normal" height. It was the 70s and I figure HGH was being tested and that they'd put me on that; or perhaps other things were being tested, too, that were considered. It's all sketchy in my mind; I was never sat down and told all about it--as a kid or an adult.

They’d give me a basic physical. Measure my height and take my weight. My mom would then meet with the pediatrician and he’d fill her in (I wasn’t in those meetings).

She ridiculed me about my height/weight (I was extremely thin--from 15 to 32 I weighed 105 pounds; it wasn't until I started anti-d's and other meds that I gained weight). She’d make negative comments about me and about height (incl. positive comments about males being tall). She’d get mad at me about being so short. She would sort of yell at me, say things like (esp. after a Dr.’s appointment) “You don’t even want to grow.” “You’re not even trying to grow.” She really laid into me after one appointment where I either hadn’t grown at all or not much and had actually lost weight. Varios times she put me on vitamins, only to get mad that they didn’t do anything to make me grow. Same thing with drinking milk.

She had a habit of comparing me to other boys, esp. my best friend, for how great they/he were: Good-looking, smart, Tall, and popular (esp. with girls, which I wasn’t—“Mrs. B says girls from school keep calling Johnny. Why don’t girls ever call here for you? ) and then it got to 11-2-3-14 where people really start saying to kids “You’re getting so big/tall now!”

One particularly bad comment she made was asking me if I was the “big man on campus” – in preschool. She kept saying it or asking it oblivious to the fact that a 5 year old wouldn’t understand what that meant other than literally, and of course literally I was the shortest.

My T talked about some of what went on—with some other behavior going on-- as being covert sexual abuse. There was one overt episode.

At 9-10-11 (8?) she took me into a bedroom and made me take my pants down. She looked and said something like, “This is bad. We need to do something about you because you’re going to have problems with women when you grow up because your penis is too small.”

I found what I consider to be a partial validation of that episode happening in my pediatrician’s records, which I got as an adult to try and see if my memories about the whole monitoring my height drama were accurate. For one report—9 or 10 or 11 I think—the Dr. wrote “small genitals.” I figure he made note of it and mentioned it to her leading her to check me out herself. Or she got the idea in her head that I might be small down there, too, checked me out, and then told the Dr. Then he checked it out and made a note of it in his records. At about 14 was his only other reference to genital size and he wrote something like “Normal genitals.”

I can’t even begin to explain the effect that that stuff has had on my life, still at 44.

That’s the introduction. From a male perspective, what are your thoughts? I've only told ALL of it to a F therapist.

It's not your fault. It's too bad your mom had to put you through all that. I don't do it much but I'll reference the bible here. Jesus said "forgive them for they know not what they do" when they were taking his life. so, in this case, work with your T to look at ways you can forgive your mom. She learned that behavior somewhere else ... best thing you can do is not repeat it so you can end the chain.

Height is not a big deal for some entire-cultures. I have known a lot of guys and their kids of Mexican descent and they all are about 5'6" or smaller. Great people, friendly, loving of their families, hard workers, loyal folks. So, your T can help you with the PTSD, pain and forgiveness issues and then hopefully you can see yourself as the beautiful spirit you are rather than your physical body. A good reference is to look at Danny Divito and his wife Rhea Pearlman - both short but great people, very successful and a loving couple.

Your mother was a mean person, and there's nothing you could have done any differently to change things or "make it right" by your mother. Your mother had her own hangups and treated you like an object whose sole purpose in life was to conform to her standards and wishes so that you could please her ridiculous standards.

My father is a severe (and active) alcoholic. They are never rational, and tend to say the first insensitive thing that pops into their brain (only to usually forget about it later or minimize it because of their distorted memories).

The doctors visits were completely excessive, and no doubt he had to deal with a mother he just couldn't please. Probably NOTHING could please her, so don't feel so bad about that. You could be the "tall, handsome, athletic" build person with a great, high paying, prestigious career and it still wouldn't be good enough I bet.

It sounds pretty likely that your mother freaked out in her demented alcoholic/bipolar state and had the doctor check out your genitals to validate/invalidate her claims of abnormality. I don't think the doctor checked and then that lead to her looking herself, but rather the other way around. Just my impression. I'm positive that it's emotional abuse, whether it's sexual abuse or not it seems likely to be classified as such. All different types of sexual abuse, and it's not all pedophilia either.

When people are growing, we don't always grow all of our limbs and body in proportion. I remember being quite a skinny and gangly kid who was called a clutz a lot (way out of proportion to my actual "clutz" behavior FYI). Your mother was irrational (as active severe alcoholics tend to be).

Do you have brothers?

Is your mother still alive?

Big people have the disadvantage in some situations that they require more food than smaller people. So evolution would select for smaller people in situations where food resources are more limited. Variability in size and other qualities is good, because that means adaptability of a population to different conditions. So just think of the advantages of being smaller: you can more easily survive in conditions where bigger people would not fit!

Not really kidding, either, though you might not see the advantages...

Your "Mommie Dearest" sounds like quite a trip. My own mother could be cold as ice and belittling, but doesn't really compare to yours in the "mean" department.

I'm short, too, but not as short as you. Basically the only nice thing about being a short guy is that I'm attracted to tall women (not an unusual dynamic, I've found out) and so I can get turned on pretty easily around any pretty girl 5'7" or taller. Fun times.

Life can be full of nasty tricks, and you've had more than your share. I look forward to hearing more from you in the future.