Laura King - Iron Legacy: Childhood Trauma and Adult Transformation

Iron Legacy

Childhood Trauma

and Adult Transformation

Donna Bevan-Lee

Copyright 2019 by Donna Bevan-Lee

The ideas and exercises in this book are not meant to replace treatment by a mental health professional. The author will not be liable for any damage that allegedly issues from any information, activity, or suggestion offered.

Cover design: Laura King

Cover photos: Iron Folk Art Tree Sculpture by Huniford Design Studio; Gold Leaf by iStock/Getty Images

for Deb and James with love

Table of Contents

INTRODUCTION

I f I had to choose an emblem for my childhood, it would be a belt bucklenot just any buckle, but one my father won in a calf-roping competition. My dad was the ultimate American icon: a cowboy. When he could afford to, he raised cattle, and when he had to take other jobs to survive, he competed in small rodeos around Utah and Nevada, where he rode broncs and roped cattle for small prizes. For those unfamiliar with rodeo, a bronc was originally a wild horse, though most now are born in a barn, rather than captured. But theyre bred to buck and jump and kickand shocked into a terrified fury while theyre in the chuteso they ride as wild as wild horses. As with bull riding, a cowboy has to stay on the bronc for eight seconds while the horse does everything possible to throw him off. Not surprisingly, bronc riding is risky, exacting a heavy toll of head, neck, and spinal injuries, along with ordinary broken bones. In fact, most observers agree that roughstock riding, whether bronc or bull, is the most dangerous professional sport in the United States.

Roping is another rodeo staple. My father roped calves and steers, the first by himself and the second as part of a team. In calf-roping, a rider twirling a rope chases a two- or three-month-old calf, throws the rope around its neck, jumps off his horse, grabs the calf by its belly or leg, flips it over onto its back, and ties three of its legs together in less time than it took you to read that sentence. In team roping, two riders twirling ropes chase a steer. The first rider ropes the steers neck; the second circles around to rope its two back legs. The clock stops when the two riders face each other with their taut ropes fully controlling the steer. Both events involve a quick sequence of difficult skills for both the rider and the horse. My father was fast, precise, and as fine a horseman as I have ever known. He practiced constantly, both on the job and off. He didnt always win a buckle or a cash prize, but he won his share, as well as the adulation of the crowd, for he was handsome as well as skilled. He always had a bit more swagger when he brought home a new belt buckle.

While other sports trophies sit on a shelf, rodeo trophies have a practical purpose: they keep a mans pants up. My father wore one every day of his life. A fastidious dresser with a sharp crease down the front of his jeans, he nonetheless insisted that his clothing be utilitarian: Wrangler or Lee jeans, single-pattern western shirts, cowboy boots, spurs, cowboy hat. Anything impractical or unnecessary was for sissies. A bandana around the neck, for instance, was right only when airborne debris threatened to cause breathing problemswhile haying or after a dust storm, say. If a man might need to cover his mouth and nose quickly, then he should wear a bandana tied loosely around his neck. Otherwise, bandanas were for sissies, along with shorts, sandals, two-toned shirts, Levis jeans (because of the little red tag on the back pocket), and mens jewelry of any kind, even wedding rings. Rodeo belt buckles, though they might have more silver or filigree flowers than ten necklaces, were definitely not for sissies.

My father had more than a dozen buckles. One, for saddle bronc, was all pewter and showed a cowboy mid-ride, but the bronco appeared to be diving, rather than bucking, his legs flung out straight in front and behind, his body on a steep diagonal. Add a little water tank at the bottom, and he would look like one of those old diving horses in Atlantic City. Most of my dads buckles were brass with just the name of the rodeo protruding from an ornately carved background. But the one he loved most, the one I remember best, was much more elaborate. It was not as deeply carved as the lettered buckles but featured three different metals and a lot of fine detail. It showed a copper cowboy roping a copper calf on an ornately carved silver medallion. The rider, his horse, and the calf were beautifully executed; you could see the calf straining to get away while the cowboy strained to catch it. The cowboys rope, which was brass, stretched across the medallion and hung in mid-air, the loop right over the calfs head, ready to fall. The buckle captured the split-second before the rope clotheslined the calf and the cowboy jumped off his horse to flip it over and bind its legs. Frozen in that moment, the little calf ran as hard as its legs could carry it, unaware that there was no escaping the rope and the man wielding it. I didnt realize the fact until many years later, but looking at that belt buckle was like looking into a mirror.

There are two important facts in that last sentence. First, I was an abused child. Second, I didnt know it. Though my heart bled for the little calf on the rodeo buckleand for all the calves I saw my father bring down in the roping arenaI never made the connection between us. That I did not make the connection becomes even more startling when I tell you that my father honed his skill with a rope on me , not playfully, the way a loving adult might pretend to munch on a childs foot, but with calculated detachment, his only focus being how well I could help him lower his time in the next rodeo.

Run, he would shout. On two legs, I couldnt match the speed of a terrified calf or steer, but I was plenty fast, especially in a sprint, so Id launch myself across the gravel in front of our trailer while my father stood about ten yards behind me twirling his rope. Sometimes hed throw the rope from above so that the loop circled my torso. More often, hed go low and trap one of my feet. He liked the difficulty of delivering the heeler rope, the angle and the timing necessary to snag the moving legs of a steeror a child. He practiced a lot, so he was good at it. Though he missed some of the time, he usually connected, and, when he did, my momentum threw me forward onto the scattered gravel. When I was lucky, I landed on my hands and knees. When I wasnt luckyor when my father pulled back hard on the ropeI landed on my face. Though not as fast as calf- or steer-roping, child-roping is plenty fast and unpredictable. I couldnt see what was coming from behind, so I really couldnt control how I fell or how hard I landed. The only thing I could control was whether Id remove the rope from my foot or leg, stand up, and wait for my father to shout Run! again. I always did.

It has taken me many years to write that story. It may take you many years to write yours. All my stories began with overwhelming experience recollected in fragments like images projected onto a wall for a split-second. My father lunging toward me in daylight. My father creeping toward me in darkness. A belt lashing my back. A hand pushing me underwater. My mother cleaning grit from my bloody knees. My boy-uncle's high voice singing doodle oodle oodle do. A rope around my neck. A peach dress, filthy and torn. Random slides from a terrible vacation: was it mine or someone elses, someone I barely knew? I couldnt always tell, though, every so often, one of those slides would punch me in the stomach so hard I couldnt breathe.

The stories began to take shape when I realized I needed to look deeply into my past in order to understand my present. Guided by therapists and friends, I worked to fill in gaps. I figured out chronologies and relationships of cause and effect. My random slides began to look more like old home movies with titles like "The Day I Dropped the Cucumber Slice" and "The Day I Stopped Crying Forever." I began telling those stories to other survivors of childhood abuse. Many survivors told me that the stories helped them, maybe even more than the concepts they were supposed to illustrate. That made sense to me. There are reasons why a cultures most essential, sacred knowledge takes the form of stories. Stories make ideas vital, engaging, and easy to remember. One reason is that vivid description is processed in the same parts of the brain as data from your own senses. In other words, more of your brain is engaged in processing a story than is engaged in processing an explanation. Because theres a kind of seeing and hearing involved, you dont just get truth; you get embodied truth. If I tell you stories, you understand the journey from trauma to healing in a deeper, more complex way than if I simply explain it to you. For that reason, I begin each section of this book with a story that illustrates a crisis or challenge in my history as a survivor of childhood trauma. Some stories are quite long and involved, more like chapters in a novel than like the brief illustrations in most self-help books. I'll say more about why in Chapter Five, which focuses on storytelling; for now, please trust that their ultimate purpose is to help you understand and tell your own story.