Once Upon a Time

My daughter is currently binge watching the TV series Once Upon a Time. It’s an interesting spin on all the old fairy tales and the intertwining of good and evil, and what we think we know versus the actual truth. Obviously, taking liberties with fictional characters isn’t going to upset the apple cart too much. In the land of make believe, there’s no harm in weaving a different tale from what we are used to reading in the storybooks. In fact, that’s what makes the show so fun.

One of the running undercurrents is the notion that even the most despicable characters have a kernel of good; that their willingness to choose evil is still rooted in some warped sense of righteousness. They make wicked decisions out of a twisted desire to do right by a lost child or scorned lover. The fallacy of their logic is completely lost on them.

That was mom. Her brain would twist things around in all sorts of amazing ways in order to come to conclusions that were so far outside the realm of reality they might as well have included unicorns pooping rainbow sherbert.  Some of her rationalizing was really quite extraordinary, and the saddest part is that I think she eventually started believing her rewritten history. The reason she waterboarded me with gallons of dirty dishwater? Why, I was constipated, and she was merely trying to get things moving down there. Seriously, she told me that. Well, eventually she came around to that rationale. The first time I confronted her about that instance in particular, she denied the whole thing ever occurred. Eventually, she admitted it happened, but gave the aforementioned reason for it. I truly don’t think her brain was able to process and accept some of the atrocities she unleashed. Which I hope means there was that kernel of good left in her, the one that knew in her soul that she was wrong. The torment of admitting and accepting that was simply too much to bear.

Unless they’ve willingly embraced and been completely consumed by evil, which is an entirely different beast that manifests in truly horrific ways, then the abuser has the ability to see that their abuse for what it is. And that’s a problem on many levels.