But it was my parents I longed for mostly. I wanted to be a little girl again and cuddle into them, wriggling in between them like I'd done in their bed when I was three or four, snug and warm in the safest place in the world.

Instead I had Hell.

It was the world-without-adults daydream. In my dream I'd never quite figured out where the adults went but we kids were free to roam, to help ourselves to anything we wanted. We'd pick up a Merc from a showroom when we wanted wheels, and when it ran out of petrol we'd get another one. We'd change cars the way I change socks. We'd sleep in different mansions every night, going to new houses instead of putting new sheets on the beds. Life would be one long party.

Yes, that had been the dream.

I was taught as a young child by my parents and family to love myself.

My parents told me in the very beginning as a young child when I raised the question about segregation and racial discrimination, they told me not to get in the way, not to get in trouble, not to make any noise.

What cannot be communicated to the [m]other cannot be communicated to the self.

There is no safe blow to the head, especially for a child.