I was hesitant today about writing a special post for my Mum... you see today is my Mum's Birthday and like every year since her passing I am feeling sad.
Sad that I will never get to see her as an old woman, that I will never again hear her constant laughter that filled my life, never again hear her voice as she gave me wonderful advice whenever I needed.
Never more will I see her hair blowing in the wind on our day trips in the car as I reached out with my tiny 6 year old fingers to touch it. Hearing her always singing along to songs on the radio. The times when we would both be singing at the tops of our voices as I drove us somewhere in my car, oblivious to anyone around us and having the time of our lives.
No, never more will I see her or hear her and that is what hurts more than anything today, all I have are the photos and the memories of our life together, from my birth until her death.
My Mum was one in a million and there wasn't one single second when she never supported me or gave me unconditional love. In very difficult times in my life (and there have been a few) she was always the one person I knew that I could go to, however embarrassing my problem, and she would be there ready to listen, to love and give her wonderful and unique advice.
Whatever the problem and however big it seemed she just kissed it all away and made me feel so very special.
She would often say to me "Son, there isn't any love greater than a Mother's love for her Son and I would fight my last breath for you, you're my world"
When I finally knew in my 20's that I was gay I was terrified. I felt I had nobody to talk to about any of it and I spent months hiding it all from my parents. I felt like a fraud, lying to the people who loved me more than anything and I think it was a very low point in my life.
I had met a guy who would become my first relationship, although I use that word very loosely as it only lasted six months and I regretted every minute of it, in fact I don't think of that experience as a relationship as there was no love involved. I don't even say "Boyfriend" as the monster doesn't deserve that title.
You see he turned out to be an extremely violent person, a paranoid shizophrenic who started controlling my life, stealing my money and blackmailing me because my family knew nothing about my sexuality. I was terrified, terrified of him and terrified of what could happen if he went to tell my family all about me.
I would go to work every day not knowing if that very day he would finally phone my parents and tell them everything, I was living on a knife's edge.
Jumping forward...
After my third and worst visit to the hospital with my face totally unrecognizable, my cheekbone fractured, cuts in my head and black bruises around my neck I knew that I had to get out... I had to be strong and I needed to save my life by breaking free.
I had just spent three hours inside my car, forced to drive him all across London while he talked nonsense and threatenly held a broken glass bottle in his hand.
Sometimes he would make me stop on the hard shoulder of the motorway and hold it against my throat, threatening me and using more violence against me, both physically and mentally.
At one point he made me stop the car, had a violent outburst, and finally grabbed me by the neck and started strangling me.
I struggled and kicked but he was extremely strong and I couldn't fight him off. In the end I just lost all control and gave in, I accepted the fact that I was going to die. My mind was going blank, my body limp and all I could hear was muffled sounds and everything went black and silent, I was passing out through lack of oxygen.
At that point he released his hands and I slowly started seeing and hearing things again, it felt like someone was playing an old vinyl record at slow speed. I started choking as I tried to get my breath back.
All I could think about was the fact that I had to find a way to make it through that nightmare journey and to find a way to somehow get him out of the car... I needed to survive this but had to stay very calm, I knew that was the only way.
I started talking to him, pretending that I could help him and that we could go to the hospital and get him help, when in truth it was me who needed the hospital as my face was all swollen up; black and blue, blood everywhere and by this time dark bruises on my neck...
I continued to keep calm and we arrived at a hospital... he got out of the car first and, with the fastest action I've ever done in my life, I drove off at full-speed and continued speeding all the way down the motorway to another hospital... I was free.
By this time it was the early hours of the morning and I arrived at my parents home knowing that I would have to tell them everything that had happened, and in turn everything about me.
My Mum came downstairs, as she had been worried, and then she saw me...
My face was double it's size, black and blue, stitches across my eyebrow, cuts in my head, dark black bruises on my neck and dried blood everywhere.
She was in a panic "My God! What has happened to you??!!" she said as she threw her arms around me crying and sobbing in a panic. I started crying too, tears that I had held back all night and for all the months before and we clung onto each other for what seemed like hours... I'll never, ever forget that embrace of love.
Dad was still asleep and I told Mum everything... about how the guy was blackmailing me, taking my money, beating me up, putting me in hospital three times and on that very night abducted me in my car and submitted me to torture, violence and other unspeakable things.
I told her how he had strangled me that night, up until the point of me losing conciousness, when all that I had in my mind was that I was dying there and then...
I told her how I had been terrified to tell her and Dad about my sexuality, being sure that it would be a terrible shock to them as I had been engaged to a girl for several years.
"Son, whatever made you think that you couldn't come to us and tell us all about this guy in the beginning?!" she said "You should know that no matter what choices you make in life and no matter who you choose to be with that we would be here for you through everything! Do you really think that we would think any different of you just because you're gay?!"
We held onto each other, cried so many tears and talked until the morning got light.
"You've got to go to the police! you know that don't you Son?!" "I know, I'm going to go there today..." I said
You see after all I had been through I refused to be a victim, refused to let that guy get away with everything he had done to me, and I refused to think that he could maybe do all that to someone else...
And aside from all of this I had my parents support and love to keep me strong through everything.
I had photos taken of my face, head and neck and went to the police station to give a full statement... all the facts that had happened to me over the last six months and especially on the night during the abduction.
My case got taken on by one of the top inspectors and they started looking for the guy to arrest him. The inspector said to me "You know that you should make yourself ready for all your family and friends to know about your sexuality as this case will definately go to court and could get reported in the local newspapers..." and I said "My family already know about me, they are all who really matter, all that stuff used to worry me but I just don't care anymore"
After two weeks the police finally caught the guy and arrested him.... those two weeks before were terrible as we would all go to sleep in one room in the house, knowing that he was out there somewhere and terrified that he would be coming after me during the night. We hardly slept at all, waking up with every sound with one of us going to check by looking out of the window.
The inspector told me that the guy was diagnosed as a paranoid schizophrenic and that his lawyers would more than likely plead insanity or something similar, and that he had a criminal record for something similar before my case.
Then this next part just shook me to the core:
The inspector told me that his intention that night was to kill me and that I only survived because I kept calm all the way and didn't react, trying to calm him down...
For the first time I saw the real seriousness of it all, of course I knew it was serious but I never imagined that my life was at risk.
All this gave me even more strength to get through the next few months, knowing that this guy needed to be punished.
I had the full support of the police and victim's support to help me through any problems.
The months went by as I was waiting for the case to get a court date. Day after day I was getting more and more scared of everything that I would have to go through in that courtroom. The inspector had already advised me that all the guy's family and friends would most likely be there in the public gallery, all staring at me, but that I shouldn't even look at them or feel intimidated by them. This would be very difficult, I had to remain strong and I knew that I would be standing there in the dock telling strangers and reporters and everyone about my sexuality and all that had happened to me.
The inspector told me that I would be asked very intimate questions about my sex life and from the night of the abduction from his lawyer and that he would want to make me feel very uncomfortable, but to just answer all his questions honestly and to try to keep calm. I had no worries about keeping calm, it's what I do... my worry was all the people watching and listening in the public gallery and making me feel like some kind of a freak.
I was under the Doctor for my nerves and was having nightmares, re-living out the ordeal every single night.
Through all of those months (sometimes when I would be feeling so low that I just felt like dropping the case) my Mum was there with me, giving me all of her 100% loving support and telling me "Son, you've been through all of that, you've come all this way and survived... now you have to be strong and see it all through right until the very end..."
And it was her love and support and strength that kept me strong.... right up until that terrible day in court...
I was shaking as I was putting on my suit, doing up my shirt buttons with sweat-filled fingers, not being able to eat anything for days, sweating and vomiting the whole morning.
We drove to the court, my Mum, Dad and Sister there with me to give me their continuing support and love. Some local newspapers had already heard about "the gay case" which had interested some reporters who were there at the doors with their notepads.
We ignored them and went in to meet my lawyer and the inspector, they told me it would be half an hour's wait until we would enter the courtroom.
I stood in the dock giving my evidence, my whole sex life being dissected by strangers, being asked the most intimate questions and going through the absolute hell of that night once more, whilst him and his family and friends looked on with looks of hatred. I was terrified but I didn't show it, only through my sweating palms.
I looked over at my Mum as his lawyer was asking me about my sexuality and making me look like a truly disgusting person. Mum smiled at me with tears in her eyes and nodded as if to say to me "Don't be afraid Son, just tell them what they want to know" and I completely sailed through that whole ordeal all because of her.
The time came for them to read the verdict for him: Guilty of assault and battery, Guilty of attempted murder, Guilty of abduction.
He went away to prison for three years and we left the court relieved. For the first time in almost a year I felt free.
That week my case was written about in the local papers and all my friends and work colleagues got to know the whole truth about me, including people I'd never spoken to, everyone silently judging me.
A year before I would have felt ashamed, afraid to go out and show myself to the neighbours who hid behind their twitching curtains, all gossiping about "the poof neighbour"
But I had found a new strength, I was alive... I had survived and I had brought justice upon my assailant. I had nothing to be afraid of anymore and more than this I had refused to be a victim.
What did affect me afterwards was the fact that I had been "outed" in a very public way. I hadn't chosen to come out to everyone and probably never would have, only to my family and close friends. I'm a very private and discreet person and would never have dreamed that all of that could have happened to me, let alone get written about in newspapers as something "shocking and dirty"
I had been forced out of the closet when I had only just begun to accept my sexuality and that was a very traumatic, painful and very difficult experience to go through.
But I had no choice but to prosecute the guy. It was either get outed publicly to everyone; friends, family, neighbours and strangers and ultimately put the guy in prison, or let the monster get away with everything he had done to me and for him to be free to torture someone else...
I chose to get outed.
I couldn't have wished for a better, more loving, understanding, supportive and adoring Mother than mine and without her I know that I would never have got through the bad things in my life, her love always saw me through everything.
At that point the court case and everything I went through on the the night of my abduction was the worst thing I had ever experienced in my whole life, but that worst life experience would be replaced five years later when my Mum would pass away at the young age of 56 years old to Cancer of the ovaries, which ultimately spread to her liver. It was very fast and she was gone within four months of being diagnosed with Cancer.
I still have my Mum's love, support and understanding all around me, I just don't have it in the physical sense... and some days when I feel sad or have some problem that I know I could share with her I feel her next to me, smiling and telling me it's all going to be alright, that I'm strong like her and that nobody could ever take me for granted ever again. The hairs stand up all over my body and I know that once more she is here with me and that I have her support, that even death cannot break that Mother-Son bond that we have. She's with me and watching over me always and I absolutely know that for sure.
On the morning of the court case I remember saying to Mum "It's going to be terrible Mum! everyone is going to be there knowing everything about me... strangers who I don't even know, what is everyone going to think?! I feel so ashamed"
And Mum said to me "Don't you for one minute think that any of those people there are better than you or that you have anything to be ashamed of! and if anyone says anything to you you just hold your head up high and walk on, not just today but at any time in your life... I love you more than anything in the whole wide world my darling! and love is all that matters in this life... If I ever hear anyone say anything bad about you I will kill them with my own bare hands!"
And my Dad said to me "You're a very brave boy! I couldn't go through a fraction of what you are going through!" and I replied "I'm not brave Dad... I'm scared shitless!!"
I love you Mum; yesterday, today, tomorrow, forever and with a life full of memories! I love you and miss you always.
Happy Birthday My Darling Mum xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
P.S:My abduction and court case is something I haven't spoken about for many years and none of my current friends know anything about it. The only people who know about all of this are my family and my Boyfriend, who has been the close witness to my screams, waking up from terrible nightmares seeing that monster's face...
I just felt it was time to write about it and maybe release some of the demons from within me.
Expat mum has interviewed me with 5 questions, so are you sitting comfortably?!....
