LANGUAGE OF LOVE

Copyright: Janine Harrington

A small pebble is thrown into a still small pool. Ripples emanate from where the pebble entered, before it falls to the bottom and is lost to sight. For a while, the waters carry that sense of disturbance, remaining restless, uneasy, slow to return to the tranquil scene of which it was once a part. Finally, a seeming peace returns. The picture of light playing among the shadows makes it surreal as sunlight touches the waters making it glint and sparkle and shine. While the pebble lies on the bottom creating uneven ground, a lasting reminder of a disturbance in an otherwise unblemished, tranquil scene.

It can be like that in Life.

Every action has a consequence.

Something happens, and like the stone, it can lie heavy on our soul.

I was sexually abused as a young child. I know I survived because my body protected itself, withdrawing, pulling the event in deep ... hiding it so deep not even I could find it, or was even aware it was there. Like the stone, it sat on the seabed of my soul, weighing heavier through the years as abuse continued on. I was four years old when it began. A small disabled child. An innocent. Naive and vulnerable, I trusted the specialist I needed to see three times a week at hospital. He was the first man to betray my trust. Aged fourteen years old, I went on strike, vowing never to return to the hospital after five unsuccessful operations which I believed were punishment for trying to make my secret known. All I could say aged six was: 'The doctor hurts me ...' As a child, I didn't have the words to describe what was happening to me, especially the devious way it was done. All I carried were the feelings of which I could make no sense at all. Yet my fingers had to be prised from the dark green railings outside by orderlies instructed to bring me in. I was obviously afraid, haunted by nightmares which made me scream at night.

The ripple effect!

However, despite putting a stop to the specialist, the abuse continued through my teens courtesy of a music teacher both at home and at school. In much the same way as the specialist, he never spoke of his crime. I was left only with implied threats, and the belief that I was somehow bad, that this was happening to me because there was something about me which was different, distasteful, pliable, and despite all attempts to be a good girl, brought up in a quiet tranquil suburb of society with loving parents; there was nevertheless something very wrong with me.

I was a good girl. Yet I must be bad otherwise why did bad things happen to me?

I couldn't work it out. It was the riddle that haunted my life.

Again, my body kicked in, protecting me from the effects of pedophile action. I had a twenty-year amnesic block. I couldn't remember childhood. Everyone told me I'd had a happy childhood. I believed them. Why would I suspect anything was wrong? Except that deep within me, I felt the weight of something which caused me to be physically sick at the colour of darkest green, panic attacks, bulimia, phobias. I had nightmares as well as daymares, seeing shadows, faceless people who came out of thin air, transposing themselves onto others. I self-harmed. I wanted to end my life. But why? I had no memory then of anything being wrong, or of what had happened to me. 

I became a battered wife. By then, it was all I was worth. I believed I needed to be punished, I deserved to be punished for the feelings I carried with me. A second marriage failed ... yet, in the very act of giving birth to my miracle child, the child I was told I could never have ... came distorted pieces of a puzzle I couldn't put together or make sense of. I was having flashbacks. In years that followed, like a rabbit caught in the glare of a car's headlamps, I would suddenly be brought up short, stopped in my tracks by pictures entering my mind. They were triggered by everyday events, leaving me ill, deeply depressed, with feelings of dread, as if I had to do something I didn't want to do but must, something very confusing and bad, and which left me absolutely frazzled. Slowly, through the years, with the help of a clinical psychologist and years of therapy, I took back the life that was lost, tracking back through time, using a time-line to dredge the bed of memories, reclaiming what was mine, restoring sanity and reason, bringing balance back into my world. The gift of love ultimately came, I believed, in my marriage to Tony on 20 September 2013. I thought he accepted me just as I am. No more secrets. No more pretending or barriers or demons I had yet to face. I could talk and share about anything, and for the first time in my life I felt free of the past ... of pain. It therefore came as a greater shock when, in July last year, he sent me an email to say he was never coming home. He had been leading a double life, had a home in London with someone else. The years peeled back, like layers of sticking plasters coming away from a still raw open wound, and again I felt ... bad. My trust betrayed. I collapsed and had a breakdown. I couldn't look back because every memory I had of our time together was tainted with deceit and lies. I had no future because I dare not dream. I lived a moment-to-moment existence.

Now Tony is getting married again. He has moved on. My past year has been a nightmare, but never mind the consequences of his actions, or the trauma of what he left behind. He is not the man I thought I knew. I was merely a pawn in someone else's game of Life.

The effect of a childhood trauma never goes away. It remains a lifetime sentence. Yes, we can learn strategies to manage our lives. We can put on different faces, make it seem as if we are fitting in with everyone else, adapting to the world around us as they would have us be. But like a pebble entering a pool, the effects can be more far reaching than we can ever know. While on the surface it appears the waters are once more clear and clean, refreshed, tranquil, sublime, beneath them lurks a deep dark secret which, as more and more pebbles enter the pool, they form a small mountain on the ground below, more weighty, more liable to cause problems for the future.

I shared with my parents my past childhood abuse when I was forty years old. My mother did everything she could to understand, to know, to realise what it meant in terms of living everyday life. We became soulmates, and she went on to become a Counsellor working alongside me, taking calls from pedophiles after we discovered that, once they share their secret addiction, they can no longer carry it through. Their fantasy is spoiled in the act of that sharing, and through sharing, they can for the long term seek the help they need before another child is hurt. Prevention is the key on both sides of the coin ... protecting by listening to abusers, protecting by teaching our children that saying 'No' is okay when we're asked to do something which makes us uncomfortable or we believe is wrong. Fathers however, can find it difficult to accept their child's abuse experience when they feel safe enough to share. In discovering they did not protect their daughter, they can become angry ... more than anything at themselves, but then even at their child for somehow 'allowing it to happen', lacking knowledge and understanding ... rather than with the abuser.

In adulthood, mindful of the ripple effect, I felt I had dealt with past experiences to the best of my ability. I know my triggers. I understand my pain and what was done to me. There are no more secrets hidden from me. I can manage them ... or so I thought. But then, suddenly something happened unexpectedly, completely dragging away the careful wrapping I have put in place. No time to put barriers in place to preventing myself sliding back into the still disquieted waters of the deep. Without warning, I am back in that point of childhood when my life turned upside down, and abuse and pain entered my innocent world. The ripple effect kicked in BIG TIME! I slid back into the womb on automatic reflex, the only place left of safety in a once more fragile world.

I don't know how else to describe what happened to me recently.

It has meant reminding myself that I am A1 normal for my experience ... but still I feel judged!!

There are thousands upon thousands of child sexual abuse survivors who will identify with these words, and understand exactly what I am saying. It doesn't need words. You are already right there with me on my journey. But then there are others who can never understand, and yet at the same time, I believed would be right there for me in my moments of pain ... reaching out ... hugging, holding, loving me, letting me know that I am safe and they are there for me no matter what, and more than anything else, that they accept me JUST THE WAY I AM.

I have sat with teenagers in places of their choosing, where they felt safe to disclose what happened to them, there for them as they reached out to be enfolded in a hug. I have held adults affected by the searing pain of past abuse still scarring their souls. I have held the hands of and listened to an aging great grandmother in her late eighties as she shared for the first time what was done to her as a child. The greatest gift of all is to love and to be loved whoever and however we are. So why is that so hard? How can someone simply turn their back and walk away, shutting the door behind them, unable or unwilling to deal with the pain of another, judging their behaviour over which they have no control? Why leave someone hurting when all they need is a hug, comfort, compassion? It doesn't matter that you don't understand or know the experience. All that really matters is comforting them through the experience, just being there, listening, learning from them ... beside them as a friend.

It is the language of love.

When we've had a bad experience in life, it is the response we fear from other people, especially those we love, those within our family. It is the reason children don't tell. What will happen? What will people think of us? What words can we use for the tsunami of emotion we feel inside? How can they ever understand what it feels like to be us? Questions keep coming, while we hold the dreadful, awful burning secret inside us, frantically putting up barriers so that no-one will know, fencing it in, somehow believing people will see the 'bad' that we feel must be leaking from us, making us feel ashamed, guilty, confused, upset, disillusioned, disgraced ... even though we are the victims of what someone else did to us.

If only the language of love was universal, one which everyone could use and understand from the inside out.

It isn't hard. The language of love, more than anything else, isn't about words. It uses body language ... a smile, a helping hand, a hug, being held and comforted, being listened to and simply allowing us to share knowing that compassion is right there between us.

I remain grateful to all those people who accept me today just the way I am.

I value both your friendship and your love.

Copyright: Janine Harrington

 

TRUTH CAN BE STRANGER THAN FICTION

Foulsham Church, courtesy Stuart Borlase, May 2016

The air was still, settled, calm ... and yet held a ripple of discontent. Who were these strangers entering its hallowed hall? Why had they come? What did they want?

The building was old, heavy with memories. It also held a sadness. Tears streaked its walls, imprinting the stone, leaving droplets of shadows marking the passage of Time.

Gently, reverently, we entered, stopping at the glass case where beneath its cover, a register of names caught my eye on the page of an open book. My hands reached to turn the pages back ... back ... back to a name which caught in my throat. 

Flt/Lt Henry Victor Vinnell.  

Vic!

Stationed on the airfield just down the road at RAF Foulsham he probably wandered in through these same doors, walked the same way we had come. His eyes would have been drawn to the same stained glass window up ahead, and he might well have sat on one of the wooden pews to pause and reflect on what he hoped would be. Deep in the pocket of his heart where fear lurked, was a name that had become his world. With no family to call his own, already she was so much more than the young WAAF he had fallen in love with and was soon to marry ... please God! Silly really, that this WAAF could be jealous of the aircraft in which he flew and all because he spent so many more nights with it than she. 'N for Nina', a Mosquito IV, numbered DK292. It would be waiting for him now, being prepped for an op.  He knew where he would preferred to be right now, and yet serving in the lead 192 Squadron under RAF 100 Group, Bomber Command, he was under orders. Until the war was over he was not a free man. But then they were already planning the wedding. He had the ring. Nina was his fiancee. Already his home was hers where they spent every Leave with her widowed mother. Soon, they would become Family, and they would look after and take good care of one another. Her mother, bless her, need never live in fear again. Their life would be almost complete ... almost ... because in time there would come children. And one day, he would return to this place and talk about his time here with them, teaching a new generation about the dangers of conflict and war. There must never be another. It had killed too many friends, colleagues, strangers, aircrew unable to save themselves when the enemy struck their aircraft high in the sky. This world needed to find its peace.

A shiver rippled the air.

Sitting in the front pew of the little village church I sensed suddenly I was not alone. A family entered through the door behind me. The lady wore a soft smile on her face, and she was looking at me with the eyes of someone who already knew my thoughts. As she approached, I stood up, and she introduced herself and I to her. Names. What were they but vessels filled with life, experience, knowledge, truths as yet unspoken. Somewhere in the far corner, children were playing. Her grandchildren. Her daughter stood off to one side. An onlooker. While her husband talked quietly to my companion Stuart. A stone mason, the man had run his hands gently over the ancient stones of the building, feeling its sadness, the pain of neglect, wishing he could heal its emotions. It was in a bad state of disrepair. The village, made up of few people, did their best. But this icon of history needed so much more to restore and give it back life.

Time stilled. It was as if everything around me was happening in slow motion. I felt caught in a place between past and present. The lady sat beside me, and suddenly I was enveloped with a huge wave of love, drowning me in tears. It reached deep into my soul while she stroked my neck, my back, holding me to her, reassuring me, telling me that those of the past were gathering round me, telling me it wasn't yet time for me to cross over, I still had so much more work to do. Knowing nothing about me, the words made little sense to her. She was simply the portal through which this message came. But it was nonetheless real ... heart-stoppingly real as I realised what her words meant. She said they were thanking me for keeping their memory alive, ensuring they never be forgotten, and yet still, my work was not yet done. This then was the message of the moment, the one, in truth, she had come so many miles to deliver from some other place ... beyond where we were right now.

Jacqui lives in Australia, not far from where my companion lives. Strange ... yet true. She and her family had travelled to Essex because her brother was dying. They needed to be there for him at the end. Assured he had time, their plan was to spend their days with him over the next few weeks, until finally, after he was gone, they would return home. But then, he passed sooner rather than later. They were caught off guard. Death isn't an exact science. It can creep up on us unawares. Suddenly, he was gone.

But then Jacqui suddenly knew she needed to be, not in Essex, but in Norfolk. She couldn't explain why. They had never been here before, yet somehow, that morning, they had been drawn to the church in Foulsham. More than Happenstance, it was a Meant-to-Be. We met. Our paths crossed and intertwined. And together we sat on the pew, talking and sharing as if we had known one another all our lives. Soulmates. In the time we shared, she felt so close, so vibrant, so filled with secrets and messages of hope, and the un-explainable fact was that she had come to pass on messages meant for me.

Vic and Jack his Canadian friend and pilot were close. I could feel them even as we sat together on the pew. A shaft of sunlight fell across the floor, for moments blocking sight of the door. I knew we weren't alone. Not just because there were other people ... her family, my companion ... waiting beyond. But again came this tsunami of emotion, great waves of love cradled me, urging me to speak their names aloud, to tell their stories, to write as I never had before.

The veil lifted. We had shared all there was to say. Our meeting was not about words, but something more ... something beyond words which even now I struggle to explain. But I know the way it was, and it reassured me.

I gave her a copy of the book Nina, my mother, and I had written together: 'Nina & Vic - A World War II Love Story' ... the book Vic had promised he would write once war was done. It was his passion to become an author. To tell the stories as I am doing now, of people he had known and who also had been a part of RAF 100 Group so that they be remembered in the wider world. I also gave her a copy of the weighty tome: 'RAF 100 Group - Kindred Spirits' which brings voices of different Squadrons under the Group together under the one cover, just as they had served under the umbrella of RAF 100 Group, Bomber Command, during the war. Then, walking away, down the path between grave stones, each a marker in Time of a life that had been lived with a story all its own; I became aware I was shaking, crying inside and out, filled with emotions beyond words, knowing my own journey was not yet done.

As we sat quiet in a corner of the local Inn, sharing experiences of what had happened, again I wondered whether Vic and Jack had sat here during precious moments away from duty. Did he come here, to this local haunt, perhaps with paper and pen in hand to write to his precious Nina, my mother? Or did he save moments he shared with her for times when he was alone? And on 26 November 1944, did he enter the church to say a prayer for God to keep him safe on that night's special operation, not knowing then it would be his last ... and that over seventy years on, the secret of where they went, what they were doing, why they were killed would remain unknown?

I can think now only of a young man, old before his time, just twenty-one years; wanting to reserve that most precious of days when ultimately he and his sweetheart would say their wedding vows, united before God, to spend the rest of their days together.

The future was theirs.

War snatched it away in a heartbeat.

One thing I do know for certain. That final word on his lips had to be: 'Nina ...' He loved her so much!

Foulsham Church gravestones, courtesy: Stuart Borlase, May 2016,

Graves, like markers,

map lives snuffed out before their time.

Set out in random Regiments

Standing on parade,

A permanent reminder

Of a country saved.

Next to each a stranger

With a story all his own

Buried deep within a field

A long long way from Home.

In the air around them

I feel their Spirit near

‘Remember how and where we died

and why we’re lying here.

Please do not forget us,

We didn’t die in vain.

Let our Life and Death have meaning;

One day we’ll meet again.’

Men who died in battle,

Brave boys who went to war,

Each and every one a Hero

Left … on a foreign shore.

Copyright: Janine Harrington

A ROAD LESS TRAVELLED

Copyright: Janine Harrington

I am on a journey, taking the road less travelled.

It began as I left to attend the RAF 100 Group Association Reunion. It is the one weekend in the year when veterans of this secret wartime Group gather with family and friends in Norfolk, surrounded by airfields on which they served now achingly abandoned, empty, as if still holding their breath seventy years on for those who did not return.

We remember them. We speak their names aloud. Veterans become nineteen and twenty years old again as they recall some happening of which only they are aware. They laugh among themselves, following an operation through, their arms going through the motions, their bodies moving and swaying in time to the beat of a Merlin engine, taking their positions as they once did, back in the aircraft, soaring like birds through the skies. Then misty-eyed, they stop to stare off into a bygone age, recalling faces which remain forever young. It is an absolute joy and privilege to be among these people, to be accepted by them as one of their own, joining in the chatter, learning from them, catching glimpses of the young boys they were who grew up before their time to become men, experienced beyond their years.

This year, I stayed on to give a talk in Norwich at the 2nd Air Division Memorial Library. Stuart Borlase travelled all the way from Western Australia to share the Reunion weekend and accompanied me to film the event. He is working on a Documentary Film which complements my book: RAF 100 Group - Kindred Spirits, published by Austin Macauley, December 2015; using a different medium to portray veterans sharing wartime experiences, interspersed with past and present photographs of Norfolk and its airfields now turned back into fields of rape seed and corn, stretching like a patchwork quilt across the county, hiding forever the secrets of a war they brought to an early conclusion, and yet today remain 'forgotten heroes' with no recognition, no reward in the form of a medal to call their own, despite the dangerous work they undertook ... identifying and jamming enemy Radar deep in the heart of Germany, working alongside the Resistance, SOE, SOD, and Bletchley Park and so much more. Many of their secrets remain under a 100 Year Rule and will not be known in their lifetime.

Stan Forsyth, 192 Sqdn who received the DFC for identifying The Tirpitz
with fellow veteran John 'Paddy' Gilpin, 214 Squadron

Courtesy: Stuart Borlase

It was an honour to talk and share their stories and those of Americans who served with them on operations, enlightening people who knew nothing about them. Familiar images of my mother Nina as a WAAF, her wartime fiance Navigator/Special Operator Flt/Lt Vic Vinnell and Canadian Pilot Flt/Lt Jack Fisher who flew Mosquito DK292 ... believed to have landed on a mined beach on the coast of France ... flashed up on a large screen as if sharing these moments with me. I steered the Talk around the pictures, living Vic and Jack's last fateful journey, answering questions, plugging the emotion as best I could. And yet, those times when it leaked out it added something poignant and passionate which otherwise would have been missing. I felt the empathy, compassion and support of the audience as I drew them into past times.

Vic Vinnell (Mum's fiance), behind me, remains forever young,

Courtesy: Stuart Borlase

It was during the week that followed as Stuart and I stayed on in Norfolk to explore the various pathways leading back into the past that I became more and more aware that something was shifting ... altering ... changing within me. It is only now, back home, that I can begin to put feelings into words enough to make some kind of sense of what was happening to me and the unexpected journey on which I find myself.

There is an old Zen Parable about a boy sitting on the hillside, watching over his father's cattle. One strays from the rest, and the boy goes on foot in search of the one which is lost. He sees the surrounding countryside suddenly from a new perspective. His footsteps take him into new horizons shifting and shaping before him. When he finds the cow, he rides home on its back, and again, it is different, another view of his world he hasn't seen before. I feel like that boy today. For a year and more now my life has been on hold. I have plummeted the depths within, gone to places I thought I had left far behind in my abusive past. Memories have been stark. Nightmares real. Tablets nor Counsellor nor Mental Health Nurse can compensate or eliminate the pain, abandonment, betrayal I have been experiencing. It would be so easy to curl up like a baby in the womb, remain at home, never go out again, become a hermit, safe in the confines, and yet at the same time imprisoned. The boundaries of my world shrunk when Tony left me, not to mention being without transport after he wrote off my car.

Yet here I was, suddenly on a road less travelled.

Robert Frost (1874-1963) in 1920 put into words more eloquently than I ever could:

Two roads diverged in a wood, and I -

I took the one less traveled by,

And that has made all the difference.

Perhaps he had a similar experience, who knows. Yet it wasn't I who deliberately chose to divert away from the path I was already on. Somehow, something happened within me, rather than without. And I feel it shifted and changed a part of me deep down inside. It's difficult to explain, but I feel I need to share this moment which stretches into days, a week, and more. It's so much more than just a feeling because it goes deeper to the extent that other people are recognising that something extraordinary has happened and are openly asking and commenting on it to me.

On Mondays I attend a Lunch Club, the only 'home-cooked' hot meal of my week. It is an absolute pleasure to be among people on a table, and while we eat, we talk about everyday things. But this week, they suggested there was a glow around me as I entered. It was as if I had had the same experience as Paul on the road to Emaus ... some kind of life-changing event. But there was nothing to hang this on.  Neighbours have said the same. I guess I've looked ill and grey for so long, and yet they say they've never seen me looking so radiant and well! Even the Counsellor couldn't believe it was the same person she'd seen the week before. I was different 'inside out'. After the session, I actually went to a cafe overlooking the sea halfway down the cliff, sat in the sunshine soaking up its rays, musing on this strange phenomenon.

And I never go for coffee on my own ... never mind actually settle for lunch!!!!!

It is as if I have an 'altered state'. I believe it is about having had the opportunity to see beyond the hill which has for so long been blocking my horizons, giving me in turn the ability to create new dreams, to see the world through new and clearer eyes ... eyes wide open ... with the freedom to know somehow I am accepted just the way I am. I don't have to try to fit into anyone else's mould and become their jelly!! I'm good enough 'just the way I am'. 

It's a major leap forward for Womankind!

There was the Reunion, and yes, the Talk which followed which brought unexpected positive feedback. They wished there had been time to talk for longer, to understand RAF 100 Group's activities, to hear more stories. But then, I've written a definitive book which contains so many voices of veterans, like echoes from past times, sharing often for the first and only time. Then again, maybe it was the company, driving down an open road, the colour of the fields, the birdsong, just being away from what had become a 'step-by-step existence' as I enjoyed the views, the countryside, a different way of life, eating out, the wide open spaces ... and simply TO BE!

No one thing happened to bring about this very positive change. It came more from within. As if something shifted deep within me, altering my perception, my view of the world and the life I have lived. Like the boy returning to the hillside with his father's lost cow, I return home, yet I'm no longer in the same place at all. I feel so different, so filled with life ... so much so that I have to say all things are possible. Any experience on offer, including a ride in a small aircraft which may be feasible, will be welcomed with open arms. Nothing is out of reach. Yet previously I would have been the tortoise withdrawing rapidly back inside his shell. I used to read Jonathan Livingstone Seagull and other books written by Richard Bach ... now I feel like that seagull in the making, reaching for far horizons which before I didn't even realise were there.

Using a different analogy, it feels like a flower lying dormant beneath the ground in eternal hibernation, accustomed to that way, when suddenly, the rays of the sun reach in through the shadows, awakening something vital and extraordinary. The plant is now finding new life, new ways of growing, of living ... budding, blooming, beginning to blossom in a way like never before in a variety of colours so rich and fragranced it defies belief.

Yes, as a Wordsmith I could go on and on. The world is filled with a plethora of analogies which fit this scenario. Perhaps someone out there knows the experience. Perhaps they can explain it in other ways. But right now, I'm just enjoying the ride, wondering where it might take me, willing to follow the road less travelled, opening my mind to possibilities yet to be discovered. Already it is proving to be a most remarkable journey.

It truly is as if I am on a different path, a road leading me I know not where. I am different in myself in ways I can't even begin to describe. All I know is that it is a very positive place to be right now and I'm loathe for it to end any time soon. I don't know quite where this journey is taking me, but wherever it is, it is a journey meant to be ... and at this particular time.

Bring it on ...

Copyright: Janine Harrington

xx MOTHER'S DAY xx

My Guardian Angel

Her smile is in the rainbow

Face turned towards the sun.

Her kisses in the raindrops

Falling one by one

And I know she is there

On a wing, in a prayer

An Angel, My Guardian Angel

Always there.

She’s waiting in the sunrise

To greet a bright new day,

Listening to my fears,

Those things so hard to say;

And in the evening she beckons

Calling me to prayer –

An Angel, my Guardian Angel

Always there.

She’s the promise of tomorrow,

The Dream of yesterday;

In my heart I feel her calling

She’s never far away.

She’s the strength that keeps me going

The Love that holds me here –

An Angel, my Guardian Angel

I love you.

Written & Dedicated to my Soulmate, Mum,

Nina Harrington (nee Chessall); who passed away to Cancer:

9.4.1918 - 22.7.1996

 Mum taught me the true value of love -
accepting and supporting me just as I am.
I still feel her presence, her peace, her love,

in every moment of every day in my Life,

through the good times, and the bad.

 xxx

True Love is Eternal

xxx 


Copyright: Janine Harrington, 2016