I was in Class 4 when I first understood what fear really felt like.
That day, I saw my father hit my mother—so badly that my small heart couldn't understand what was happening. I wanted to stop him. I wanted to scream. But I was just a child, frozen in my place. My tears didn't wait for permission; they burst out of my eyes, one after another, until I felt empty inside. That was the first day I felt truly lonely in my life.
The next day, it happened again.
And then again.
Every day felt the same—like I was waking up into a nightmare that never ended. Slowly, I stopped feeling like a child. I started staying quiet. I started keeping everything inside. I hated my father for what he did, and at the same time, I felt helpless because he was still my father. The trauma didn't come all at once; it grew inside me, silently, like a shadow that followed me everywhere.
I couldn't share my pain with anyone. I didn't know how to. I felt deep pity for my mother—she was suffering physically, while I was breaking mentally. I was too small to protect her, too weak to change anything. All I could do was stand beside her and cry. Sometimes we cried together, sometimes alone—but the pain was always there.
Life felt cursed. Every day was just a repeat of the last.
Then one day, everything changed.
My father left the house. We thought he had gone to work, like always. Hours passed. Then the phone rang. My mother answered it, and I watched her face change as she listened. His words were cold and final: "I won't come back. I'm leaving you."
The world stopped.
My mother collapsed into tears. I felt numb. We cried, we begged him to return, to think about us, to come home—but he refused. His decision was already made.
That was the day my childhood truly ended.
What remained was a broken home, a wounded mother, and a child who learned too early what abandonment feels like.