Stepfamily Issues

Personal stories about stepfamilies, childhood and general family issues.

August 28, 2012

war damaged babies

Ida, 64, remains terrified by thunder, darkness and the smell of rubber as a result of being born in Europe during the second world war. She is very upset that wars continue despite hundreds of thousands of babies and small children being severely affected by the crimes and horrors of war.

"People of the same age as myself born in countries that were never touched by the war are so different from me," says Ida. "They have no idea what it was like to be born in the middle of a war."

"They also cannot understand how I can remember the war when I was just a baby," sighs Ida, "which just goes to show how ignorant people are about what children can and cannot remember."

"What the Jesuits say about children is true," says Ida. "What happens to a child in his or her first seven years of life does determine how the adult turns out - but I believe the first year is far more important than other years and I also believe it goes back to the womb."

"Also, I think a child is more likely to remember something that happens over a period of time rather than at one particular time," muses Ida, "but I am no child psychologist - I just go on what happened to me."

"My mother and I have never ever discussed my birth and the war years," says Ida, "so I am not repeating something she told me."

"I do concede though that the emotional state of my mother had a lot to do with my remembering so much of my baby years," says Ida.

"We lived twenty miles from the city and although my village was never a military target it was in the direct flight path of the bombers and stray bombs were dropped on us from time to time -- the craters still exist -- and my 16-year old cousin was one of seven innocent civilians killed in such a bombing."

"I would imagine that when the bombers came over my mother would go into a panic - no wonder I cringe with fear when the sky rumbles with thunder. The bombers must have sounded like thunder!"

"My fear of darkness has probably got something to do with the fact that my mother was most afraid during the air raid sirens when no light was permitted."

"I have a vague recollection of being put in a cupboard - maybe even the oven of an old iron stove - and being forced to endure hours or darkness when I was wide awake."

"My abhorrence of the smell of rubber comes directly from the gas mask that my mother placed on my face when the bombers went over us -- there was always a fear of mustard gas being used by the enemy."

"My mother kept a gas mask in my cot and I was terrified of the thing."

"The war was well and truly over before I learned to speak and - apart from the craters and several bombed out buildings - life was very normal after the war and very few people talked about it."

"My father went back to work in the city, my mother had two more children and we all lived together happily in a white picket fenced house."

"There were several children in my class at school who had 'nervous problems' similar to the ones I had," says Ida. "But my younger brother and sister had no problems -- they were born after the war and were not affected by it."

"For years at school several children and myself would dive under the desks or hide in a cupboard and go quite crazy when we heard thunder - and I still do to this day!"

"I always needed a night light for sleeping - and I still do," confesses Ida.

"And my fear of the smell of rubber has stopped me from enjoying water sports requiring a rubber suit," sighs Ida. "The smell truly makes me nauseous."

"That all of these fears emanated from my baby years is quite amazing, isn't it?" asks Ida.

"If I could be affected like this then just imagine the awful trauma that the babies and children experienced in the concentration camps - with starvation and disease thrown in for added terror."

"My children -- like my brother and sister -- are blessed for never having experienced any trauma in their childhood," says Ida. "And my husband -- being eight years old when the war broke out -- saw it as an adventure!"

"It's like a lottery isn't it?"

"I believe all adults with psychological problems suffered some sort of trauma in their childhood," says Ida, "and because so few of us ever resolve our fears it's possible that the damage is permanent -- something we just have to learn to live with."

"Traumas caused by war are not something we should have to bear over and above accidental childhood traumas," says Ida. "Most wars are avoidable. There are other ways of solving problems and as far as I can discern all the wars after the Second World War were fought for the wrong reasons and are therefore crimes of the highest magnitude."

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