Tressa, the 12-Year-Old Mum by Tressa Middleton

Author:Tressa Middleton [Tressa Middleton and Katy Weitz]
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 9781784186197
Publisher: John Blake Publishing
Published: 2015-09-15T04:00:00+00:00

I was trying my hardest, I really was, but now Mum’s health was really bad and every time I went there, I got sucked into her world and her problems. There was always a drama kicking off at her place and she was drinking so much by then that I couldn’t remember the last time I’d seen her without a can in her hand. My head was a mess and I felt like a failure. Nobody believed in me; nobody had faith in me. One night, I was listening to the Leona Lewis song ‘Bleeding Love’ on my CD player and the feelings just took over me. I started to sob. I couldn’t take it any more. My life felt like it wasn’t my own and I didn’t know how to keep everybody happy. If I tried to help my mum, Barbara and the social workers complained, and if I didn’t help her, she went into free fall. She was still my mother and I cared about her so much. I wanted to be a good mum, too, but the pressure on me was immense. Suddenly, something occurred to me. I wandered through to the bathroom and found a razor. I took it to my room and broke it out of its plastic case. It was so thin – so sharp and thin. I turned it over in my hand, marvelling at how light it was. Then I held it to my forearm and pressed down hard.

The pain was sharp and intense, and it made me catch my breath – but it was also the best feeling I’d had all day. The bright red blood appeared immediately and started to drip down onto my bed sheet, but I hardly noticed. I held the razor against another place in my arm and slashed at it again. And again. And again.

A wave of relief flooded through me – I watched as the blood dribbled down onto my covers and made crimson smears on my sheets. Then I looked at my arm, at the gashes I’d just made, and with my thumb and forefinger, I tried to pull each wound apart to increase the pain and summon up the sharp release that freed me from my worries and my fears. Afterwards, I felt light and happy; I slept better that night than I had in weeks.

The next morning Barbara took one look at the scabby red lines on my arm and asked me what I’d done. I told her. I didn’t see the point of hiding it – she’d find out eventually. Of course, it went straight into the reports but by that point I didn’t care. I couldn’t please everyone. I couldn’t even try – they had their agenda and they were just waiting for me to slip up. Just a few weeks later it all came to a head, and Barbara and I had a massive falling out.

‘I don’t want to live here anymore,’ I shouted at her. ‘You don’t think I can be a good mum to Annie.

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