The chickens we own have become very dear to us, particular my son. He adores the chickens and one morning we are treated to something horrendous. One of the chickens throat has been mauled open. To make this more of a freaky morning when the chicken eats or drinks it just drops out from the bottom of its throat. My son is deeply disturbed by this, as am I. My husband has left for work and I usher them off into the house to get ready for school. I know I can’t afford the vets bills, my husband earns a professional wage but my unbalanced share of the bills are as such that I am mostly always overdrawn, as his wage is his, my wage is ours. As my son may read this I am going to state the chicken died of natural causes and went into a deep sleep.
When he arrived at school, he was deeply upset about Milly - the chicken. His teacher has a farming background and asks when I’m taking him to the vet. I freeze as I cannot fund the vet at all. All I can stutter is I can’t afford the vets, and I blurt out my monies not my own. On reflection I am so grateful to the chicken, she actually made the difference to our lives. My son’s teacher reported this to the headteacher as she felt it seemed odd. The headteacher who, is an angel and phoned me and asked for a meeting following the chicken vet money disclosure. This headteacher had an unintentional knack of making me cry. When I dropped the children off, she was frequently there to chat to parents. When I thought I was fine, and said hello, she would give me such a look, with such perception, like she understood completely (she did), and ask ‘how are you?’ and I felt she knew how deeply difficult I was finding living (I was) that I had moments of feeling that safe space and get teary. If one of the children mentioned it at dinner time, my husband would be cross and scornful, 'why would you do that? That women's not your friend, what will she think of you?' It simply never occurred to him to ask why I was crying.
At the meeting she told me how my boy was withdrawn and had been so sad this school year. She told me the school had flagged my boy two years previously as he was very apologetic and lacked confidence - traits of being in an abusive household. I knew and trusted this amazing women and opened up about the whole situation I was in. She listened, didn’t think I was over reacting, far from it. She felt strongly all was not well when I hired a ‘secret cleaner’. I hadn’t told my husband as he would have been annoyed that I was wasting money. I simply couldn’t get everything done housework/childcare wise to his standard. I joked to the head I had a secret cleaner when my toddler was a baby, and that I had to undo some of the tidying after the cleaner left so it was realistic. I hadn’t realised it wasn’t so funny to her, and it wasn’t normal.
It was pivotal, that meeting with her. I thought at that time I was managing the situation. I thought over compensating for him would be enough, and that I could intervene enough to make sure my children were happy. With the greatest will in the world I couldn’t, and I wasn’t and realistically we were treading on egg shells. As soon as I heard that my boy was so sad from someone unbiased I knew I needed a plan, I knew I had to get away. It was like a switch, a non negotiable. The fog starts to lift and I am beginning to have some clarity about the situation I am in.
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