I never would have figured out that my father was the “artsy type” who would have posed for a statue. But here he is .
Richard Wayne Gill in his younger days.
Yeah, my father definitely wasn’t “dad” material.
As I’ve learnt in life, there actually aren’t too many men that fit the “ideal” model of a modern age “dad”.
Just as not every woman is fit to be a mother, not every man is fit to be a father.
Having sex and reproducing are simple enough that anyone can do it really.
No qualifications or experience required.
My paternal grandmother should never have reproduced.
My maternal grandmother should never have reproduced.
My mother and my father should have had a hysterectomy and vasectomy.
Sure, I wouldn’t have existed. But at the same token I would never have gone through any of the stuff that I went through.
Win-win I guess.
As I’ve said elsewhere, life isn’t a video game.
There’s no final stage boss to fight with the experience points you’ve gained in life.
You don’t win the game of life.
You don’t get bonus points for completing all of the missions and side quests in the game of life.
You don’t win a bonus life.
Two people have sex.
You gestate for 9 months.
You pop out into the world.
You then make a bee-line straight to your inevitable death.
What you life is like in between birth and death is pretty well determined by how well the two people who fucked to bring you into the world give a fuck after you’ve enter into the world.
I think someone forgot to flush the toilets at 101 Colonel By Drive…. the shit is overflowing at NDHQ.
Well David Pugliese had this article in the Ottawa Citizen today. The story involves the Minister of National Defence and the Canadian Armed Forces Chain of Command using the Canadian Forces National Investigation Service to harass and intimidate the Office of the Ombudsman of the Canadian Armed Forces.
The Federal court has rebuked the military and compensation has been paid to members of the Office of the Ombudsman of the Canadian Forces.
The Office of the Ombudsman for the Canadian Forces enjoys a rather unique position of independence from the Canadian Armed Forces.
Unlike the Military Police Complaints Commission which may only ‘ask’ for documents from the Canadian Forces Provost Marshal during investigations of complaints against the CFNIS. And unlike the Military Police Complaints Commission which may only ‘ask’ for persons to participate in their investigation. The National Defence Act makes mandatory the participation of military members in any Ombudsman investigation.
This is because criminal charges cannot result from any Ombudsman investigation or inquiry. The Ombudsman may only recommend changes and possibly compensation or other remedies.
The Office of the Ombudsman of the Canadian Armed Forces was the agency that recommended that while the Canadian Armed Forces were “technically correct” to deny benefits or compensation to any of the 12 to 18 year old cadets that were killed or injured in the 1974 grenade explosion at Canadian Forces Base Valcartier, it was absolutely the immoral thing to do considering that the regular force member whose negligence led to this disaster was allowed to receive benefits and compensation from the Canadian Armed Forces. The Ombudsman recommended that the Canadian Forces make amendments posthaste and offer the survivors compensation, counselling, and therapy.
There is one problem with the Office of the Ombudsman of the Canadian Forces. That problem is that the Ombudsman may only undertake investigations that the Minister of National Defence agrees to.
See, the Office of the Ombudsman of the Canadian Forces would have been the perfect agency to investigate the matter from Canadian Forces Base Namao. No criminal charges could ever flow from an Ombudsman investigation or findings.
P.S. could give all the information that he wished and he would never face criminal charges for what he said. Nor would P.S. be in violation of his Non-Disclosure agreement that he had to sign with the Government of Canada in November of 2008 in order to receive his settlement from the Government of Canada.
The Ombudsman could have called witnesses, including anyone who had been subject to the Code of Service Discipline during the events of the Captain Father Angus McRae affair.
Even though my father is dead now, had the Ombudsman conducted an inquiry while my father was still alive it would have been fun asking my father to explain just exactly who the hell was looking after his children from 1977 until 1981 if he was always away on training exercises and his wife had “abandoned the family” years prior. Was he letting his children run feral on a military base? Did he just drop his kids off at a random neighbour’s house for 6 weeks while he went and played soldier out in the woods?
The Ombudsman could have made recommendations to DND and the Canadian Forces so far as how to deal with the survivors of the Captain McRae fiasco.
But I can see why the Minister of National Defence would have declined the Ombudsman the permission to review the matter.
This would have been far too risky for DND.
If this matter had been reviewed by the Ombudsman, and news of this review made it to the media, how many other former military dependents would come forward with their allegations against DND and the CF?
Would the Ombudsman have made the formal recommendation that any and all child sexual abuse matters be formally handed over to the civilian police?
Would the Ombudsman make the recommendation that the Canadian Forces and the Department of National Defence hire an independent investigation firm to conduct a completely independent and arm’s length investigation looking at how many children were sexually abused on the bases from 1950 until the present day?
Would the Ombudsman make recommendations that Parliament pass the required legislation to nullify the effects of the pre-1998 3-year-time-bar flaw and the Summary-Investigation flaw for matters that could be considered to be child sexual abuse?
There’s just far too much risk for the Minister to allow the Ombudsman to go digging into the MIlitary’s copious dirty laundry.
And I know from speaking with various investigators with the Office of the Ombudsman that the Ombudsman has been fighting for even more independence from the Canadian Armed Forces and not having to rely on the permission of the Minister of National Defence to conduct investigations that look at historical matters which occurred prior to when the Office of the Ombudsman was created in the late ’90s.
And you should know I have another site that deals specifically with the Canadian Armed Forces. This site is mainly to do with me. But I feel that some of the topics that I post on the other site might me of interest to those following this site.
or how I realized that to be at peace with one’s self you have to realize that none of this matters.
It’s interesting how little people actually matter.
I could disappear tomorrow and to be honest not a single person would miss me. And that’s not being glib, it’s just being realistic.
Sure, there’s the pleasantries that would be exchanged. “Where’s Bobbie? Anybody seen Bobbie? No? Okay, who wants to go watch a hockey game next week?”
But me, like you, and like everyone else, are completely expendable.
As long as a person proves to be useful to someone else and we fill their requirements, then we matter.
But the instance you stop being useful, and the instant you stop fulfilling the needs of other, you’re dispensable.
In March of 2011 when I went to the Edmonton Police Service with my complaint against P.S., I honestly had no idea of just how putrid this was going to turn out to be.
The more that I uncovered, the more blown away I was that I was actually part and parcel of something much larger than I could ever have imagined. I was no longer the little homosexual faggot that made the babysitter molest my younger brother.
I was now one of at least 25 children, if not many more that Canadian Armed Forces officer Captain Father Angus McRae molested on the three Canadian Forces Bases and one Canadian Forces Station that he had been stationed at from 1973 until July of 1980.
I thought that with the uncovering of the Captain McRae court martial transcripts and the CFSIU investigation paperwork that this would get the ball rolling. That people would start asking “If this could happen to a schmuck like Bobbie, how many other kids were sexually abused by members of the Canadian Forces?” and “How many other kiddie diddling priests were in the Canadian Forces bouncing from base to base?”
I thought that with the Military Police Complaints Commission noting that the CFNIS in 2011 and 2015 to 2018 had in their possession the paperwork from the 1980 investigation of Captain Father Angus McRae and the 1980 court martial of Captain Father Angus McRae which indicated that the military police in 1980 were well aware of the antics of P.S. that this too would get the ball rolling.
Nope.
Outside of one story by David Pugliese, not a single bit of interest from the media or anyone else for that matter.
And with that I think that I’ve reached the final conclusion of my engagement with the Canadian Armed Forces.
Child sexual abuse obviously did not occur on the bases.
Children were obviously not sexually abused on base.
The Canadian Forces military police were obviously competent enough to protect the children living on base even though they couldn’t protect the adults.
My brother was not abused by P.S.
I was not abused by P.S. or Captain McRae.
P.S. didn’t have me provide oral sex to a much older man when I was 8 years old.
None of that happened.
And that’s okay.
I am not the person to expose this.
Not within my skillset.
So now I just have to concentrate on what’s going to happen in 2023.
We’ll have to see how my application for M.A.i.D. goes.
As I’ve said before, suicide isn’t for me.
Too much pain and too messy.
M.A.i.D. is ideal from the look of it.
Very painless, very quick, no mess, no fuss.
I don’t want to be the poster boy for M.A.i.D. for psychiatric issues.
But it is what it is.
I get to leave on my own terms.
I get to tie up all loose ends.
I get to fulfil my “bucket list” if you will.
And then I never have to worry about anything ever again.
And I promise you, no one will be the wiser when I’m gone.
Sure, you may say “but Bobbie, aren’t you letting the Canadian Forces off the hook too easy?”.
Nope.
Not my fight anymore.
Not my concern anymore.
I’m probably going to take some time off from work before I go through with M.A.i.D..
I found out that my pension will actually pay out early if I’m about to die, and yes M.A.i.D. is an acceptable cause of death for early payout.
Won’t be much, but it’ll be enough that I can do somethings.
Maybe travel.
Maybe just disappear right up until the day before the procedure.
But yeah, I’m not working to the end. And I have no intention of letting my pension go to waste.
My corpse can go to UBC medical school.
I’m hoping that my brain can go to the Montreal Brain Bank.
And in the end, when I’m gone I’ll be just as missed as I was prior to being conceived.
Once you realize just how truly insignificant you are you begin to realize that everything in the universe will carry on just fine without you.
Over the last ten years I’ve come to fully understand just how horrifically the kids from Canadian Forces Base Namao got fucked over by the leadership of the Canadian Armed Forces from May of 1980 until July of 1980.
And the one thing that the Canadian Armed Forces and the Canadian Forces National Investigation Service have made very fucking crystal clear to me is that under no circumstance is the Canadian Armed Forces or the Department of National Defence going to ever acknowledge that children were ever sexually abused on defence establishments by persons subject to the Code of Service Discipline.
In the 2020 final report of the Military Police Complaints Commission the MPCC remarked that the Canadian Forces National Investigation Service had in its possession the Court Martial transcripts of the 1980 court martial, as well as the 1980 Canadian Forces Special Investigations Unit paperwork for the 1980 investigation of Canadian Armed Forces officer Captain Father Angus McRae.
This is important for a few reasons.
On May 3rd, 2011 I told Mcpl Christian Cyr about the visits to the rectory at the chapel and the “sickly sweet grape juice” that P.S. would give to me. The next day Mcpl Cyr called me and told me he checked historical records and there never was a rectory at the chapel, the priest lived in other places.
Well, both the CFSIU paperwork and the court martial transcripts make it known that Captain McRae was known to have been taking children over to the RECTORY at the chapel and giving the children ALCOHOL.
The MPCC also indicate that it is very clear that the military police and the CFSIU knew that P.S. was molesting children as this is what initiated the investigation into Captain McRae in the first place and that Captain McRae’s defence counsel tried attacking the credibility of P.S. by raising the issue of P.S.’s habit of molesting children during the court martial hearings. McRae’s defence counsel also raised during the court martial hearings that P.S. had been sent for treatment with a psychologist due to his predilection of molesting children. The Court Martial transcripts describe one of the incidents where P.S., then 14, had forced anal intercourse with a ten year old boy behind the recreation centre in the “horseshoe forest”.
The MPCC also indicated that P.S. had a very lengthy criminal history for molesting children. One conviction in 1982, one conviction in 1984, two convictions in 1985. Three of these convictions were for molesting children while P.S. resided on Canadian Forces military bases in military family housing.
This is important as on November 4th, 2011 I was contacted by the CFNIS and told that they couldn’t find any thing to indicate that P.S. was capable of molesting children.
I don’t know who coaxed the statement out of my father, but his statement to the CFNIS in 2011 was easily disproved by readily available social service records. Was he coaxed into saying what he said, or did he say what he said to cover up for something in the past. Did he take a promotion in trade for keeping quiet about what happened to my brother and I. Or was it something else.
Anyways, back to the topic of this post, which is:
To “survivors” so long as they were not military dependents. Military dependents can go piss up a rope.
It looks as if the adult members of the Canadian Armed Forces are getting an apology.
I know that I’m going to probably sound crass and out of line, but these are people that CHOSE to join the Canadian Armed Forces. Yes, they shouldn’t have been sexually assaulted. But they had the choice to join the military.
Children living on Canadian Forces Base didn’t have that choice. The choice of where we lived was that of our serving parent. We we put on these bases into housing provided by and administered by the Canadian Armed Forces which was often located on secured Defence Establishments that the Canadian Forces supplied security for.
We were often sexually abused by members of the Canadian Forces. We were sexually abused by other military dependents. Our matters were investigated by the same defective military police that couldn’t protect the adult members of the Canadian Armed Forces.
I received two-and-a-half years of conversion therapy at the hands of military social worker Captain Terry Totzke due to the “homosexuality” that I had apparently exhibited when I had been abused by a boy twice my age and the base chaplain.
Military dependents are basically told be successive governments that we don’t matter and that we didn’t matter and that the abuse that we suffered didn’t matter because we weren’t serving members of the Canadian Armed Forces.
And people wonder why I’m depressed and why I’ve given up.
When that midazolam, and then the propofol, and then the rocuronium, and then the bupivacaine flow through my veins I will finally be free of this ‘life’, this shitty fucked up and rather meaningless existence that the Canadian Armed Forces sentenced me to for no other reason that I was a child living on a Canadian Armed Forces Base and I had the audacity to get molested by a 14 year old boy and a 45 year old member of the Canadian Armed Forces.
If I was half as smart as people think I am then I would have joined the Canadian Armed Forces when I was 20 and I would have retired this year.
So, I know that I’m not a genius by anyone’s standard.
But what gets me is people at work.
People in my department who have the same power engineering certificate and the exact same qualifications that I have.
I was hired by a man named Dave R. who was the chief engineer in 2005. He said that he saw something in me that would be beneficial to the dept.
Right off the bat this caused problems with my co-workers.
I’m not a trained mechanic.
I have no schooling as a mechanic.
I’m not a millwright, nor am I an electrician.
But as I said, I can analyze problems, and I am not afraid to read the fucking manual.
Maybe that’s my problem is that I realize how fucking stupid I actually am and therefore I know that I don’t know everything and therefore I’m not ashamed to read the fucking manual.
Maybe that’s my super power. Maybe realizing how fucking stupid I really am allows me to not over estimate my knowledge and therefore I’m open to listening to the ideas of others or just plain READING THE FUCKING MANUAL.
So anyways, one of the first incidents occurred while Dave was still the chief engineer. Dave had assigned one of the other power engineers to remove a pillow block bearing from one of the exhaust fans. Dave was getting frustrated with the amount of time it was taking this other engineer. Dave assigned me a work order to go assist this other engineer. This other engineer told me to stay away, he had everything under control.
This other engineer came down to the shop a few days later, still hadn’t gotten the bearing changed, and was now asking Dave to order a new pulley in for the fan as the old one just shattered as he tried to take it off. Turns out that this other engineer had never worked with a tapered bushing hub. He had used a 3-jaw puller on the pulley and when that wouldn’t work he got a 1/2″ impact gun and used that. The tapered bushing and the bore of the pulley were still on the shaft and he still couldn’t get it off. Dave was furious. Bob! Get up there and show him what to do. Now! So I grabbed my 3/8″ ratchet and my 7/16″ socket and headed up. The other engineer said that I was wasting my time and that I’d need the large prybar or a torch as the sleeve was obviously rusted to the shaft.
I removed the three bolts from the tapered sleeve. The other engineer said that he did the same thing but that the pulley still didn’t come off. I put the three bolts into the other holes that had been empty. These holes are threaded and allow the bolts to press the hub off the sleeve. The other engineer was beyond furious. I said “I offered to help you last week”. “Fuck you, you only think you’re smart”.
This is a tapered bushing sleeve. Three holes are threaded, three holes aren’t. The holes that aren’t threaded are used to draw the tapered sleeve into the hub using threaded holes in the pulley. The holes with the threads are used to push the sleeve out of the pulley hub.
A few days go by and this other engineer still hadn’t changed the bearing. Dave was talking to this other engineer after coffee, Dave motioned to me to come over. Bob, go up and show him how to take a pillow block bearing off. “But Dave, I just need the oxyacetylene torch to heat the bearing up and it will come right off”. “We’re a hospital, we can’t be lighting fires in the mechanical rooms”. “Bob, show him what to do”. So I grabbed the angle grinder, and ball and peen hammer, and a cold chisel. The other engineer was adamant that this was not going to work. I used the angle grinder to cut through the pillow block, the and the bearing. The housing and the bearing dropped off. The only thing left was to notch the inner race and then use the cold chisel to expand the race to get it off the shaft.
I’m holding the split inner race, the other engineer is holding the housing I cut with the grinder. The new bearing is just behind my shoulder.
We never really got along after that. The other engineer would do everything possible to stay away from me. And after Dave retired things got worse. An outside contractor was brought in to be the chief engineer. This guy had very little in the way of mechanical skills. He survived by hiding behind me and one other plant employee.
In 2011 this other engineer and I would collide again. He had been tasked with rebuilding the pitch mechanism for Supply Fan SF-54H. These are large 60 horsepower variable pitch fans. He had never done one of these before, and the new chief had no idea of what to do, so I had to go show this other engineer the different steps. When it came time to put the nose cone back over the hub I told him to get a box of q-tips, some degreaser, and use the q-tips and the degreaser to clean the oil and grease out of the threads for the cap screws that would hold the cover on. And that he was to use red loctite to lock the bolts in place so they wouldn’t come undone. I should have stayed, but he was getting agitated with my presence. Well, guess what he didn’t do? It cost around $15k to fix the damage.
The blades are not supposed to be bent and twisted like that. The fan ingested the cover that came loose because the bolts weren’t secured.
This other engineer and I had a few more instances like this before he left. He ended up climbing the corporate ladder and now he’s a manager someplace else. It’s funny how people end up in different places.
And no, this problem hasn’t gone away. Just after I became the chief engineer I was pulled into the manager’s office. “Bobbie, the guys are feeling intimidated by you and they’re afraid to ask you questions”.
I don’t get it. I’ll never understand this. We’re all 4th class power engineers. We should all have the same basic level of knowledge. Some of the guys that are my subordinates are 3rd class power engineers. I should be going to them for help. Most of the guys don’t understand basic refrigeration, which is a part of 4th class engineering. Most of the guys have very limited understanding of electrical and controls. Concepts of pneumatic controls and digital automation escape them.
Over the years I had taken on the responsibility of servicing the Honeywell building automation system. I could do power supply changes, CPU board changes, I/O board changes, flash RAM board changes, system backups, system restores. I could do actuator upgrades and replacements. The chief engineer that had replaced Dave kept promising me that he was going to get me into the DDC technician’s position and that this would come with a pay raise. As it turned out this was a lie. The union ended up taking this before human resources. H.R. determined that I was not qualified to service the automation system and that I was to cease doing so. The other guys in the department, who had become accustomed to dumping automation problems on my plate started getting pissed off when I would tell them that I’m not allowed to fix the building automation system. “Bobbie, you’re just being a fucking asshole. If you know how to fix the fucking thing, fix it!”.
I’m the grade 8 drop out with a grade 12 G.E.D.. I’m the loser that lived on the streets. I’m the joker that stayed in homeless shelters. I’m the homosexual that allowed the babysitter to molest his younger brother. As I’ve said, I’ve never gone to trade school. I never took an apprenticeship. I was never trained on electronics in a diploma program.
I’m the asshole who’s supposed to fix everything, but I’m also the asshole who is not qualified to fix anything. I’m Schrödinger‘s power engineer. Too stupid to be anything else, too fucking smart that others are uncomfortable.
Bobbie, be something else!
Do something that you like!
Go back to school and become an <something>!
Get realistic.
I’ve got a metric shit tonne of depressions, anxiety, CPTSD, self doubt, and self hatred.
I’m fifty years old. Contrary to what all of the helpful people have to say, there is no simple fix for my issues.
Mom! Dad! I need a place to stay while I go back to school / college / trade school / etc…… Yeah, that fucking ship sailed years ago. Grandpas, grandmas, aunts, uncles? Nope.
The time for trade school, for college, for university, for any of that was back in my teens or early 20s. This of course would have only been possible had I also received treatment for my major depression, my severe anxiety, my sexual and gender confusion gifted to me by Captain Terry Totzke.
Trying to go to school with 40 years of untreated major depression, severe anxiety, and all of the issues that go along with these issues would be utterly impossible.
And if you’re one of those people that say that I just have to smile and feel happy and that everything will be okay, you are part of the problem.
Wishing my issues away just to make yourself feel better isn’t going to make things better.
It was a fucking musical. This is not how things work in real life.
I saw this yesterday. And it really sums up Richard to a “T”.
Richard was a master manipulator.
Richard loved playing people against others.
Richard could “rage out” and beat the fuck out of you or spank you hard enough with his leather belt to leave bruises and scratches, but yet he never once remembered spanking me with the belt. He backhanded me one day and chipped my tooth and drew blood. The next day he claimed that he didn’t remember anything and that even if he did hit me that he wouldn’t have hit me in the mouth and that if I didn’t want to get hit that I shouldn’t talk back to him.
When I was about 10 years old, I fell off the roof of Tim’s camper that he had loaned to Richard for Richard and Sue’s 1982 honeymoon trip to Jasper. My brother had stuffed leaves into the air vent and I knew that Richard would have killed me if he came home and found the vent stuffed with leaves.
Richard was like that though. Richard couldn’t or wouldn’t accept responsibility for his family. He always blamed the problems of his family on others. Quite early on he had decided that it was my responsibility to raise my younger brother. He had even told Alberta Social Services that he considered it to be my responsibility to raise my younger brother. And once my younger brother noticed that I’d get the blame for anything he had done, it was game on.
So, I fell off the roof of the camper. It was one of those pickup truck mounted campers. And the pickup truck was a real 4X4 off-road truck, so it was quite the distance to the ground. I fractured both wrists. I also had the wind knocked out of me. One of the neighbours came over and helped me. Richard got called home from the squadron. When he got home he wanted to know what the fuck I was doing on top of the camper. I told him. His response was that it was my own damn fault for not keeping an eye on my brother. If I had watched my brother like I was supposed to then he would have never been able to get on top of the camper. And Richard said that I should consider myself lucky that my brother didn’t fall off the camper, because if he did Richard was going to beat me so hard that I’d wish that I had never been born.
I got sent to my room. I was told to stop my whining and just “get the fuck to bed” or he’d “give me something to cry about”.
I guess that Sue was finally able to convince Richard the next day that I needed to go to the hospital to get my wrists looked at.
My casts were supposed to stay on for six weeks.
They stayed on for longer than that.
Richard’s reasoning was that he wanted me to “learn my fucking lesson” and not be so “fucking stupid” the next time.
When we lived on CFB Griesbach in the time after grandma moved out of the house, Richard and Sue wouldn’t allow us into the house when they weren’t home. So that meant that after school my brother and I had to wait outside of the PMQ for them to get home from work. School was out at 15:00 Richard and Sue got off work around 16:30. In the summer and fall this wasn’t too bad. In the winter this was fucking stupid. We weren’t allowed to go anywhere, we had to stand on the porch and wait. Well, one cold day my brother decided that he wasn’t going to wait, so he kicked in one of the basement windows and got into the house that way. When Richard and Sue got home Richard was fucking furious. Again it was my fault for not watching my brother. If I had been watching my brother he never would have kicked the window in. Never mind that it could get down to -10 on a typical Edmonton winter day. No, the big problem was that someone kicked a window in to seek warmth.
It’s no wonder that by the time we moved to Canadian Forces Base Downsview in Toronto in April of 1983 my brother and I despised each other so much that the school board had to send us to separate schools due to intense sibling rivalry.
But that’s the way that gas-lighters work.
I worked for a man like this once. His way of keeping anyone from noticing that he didn’t have managerial skills was to keep everyone at each other’s throats. He had the admin assistants fighting amongst themselves. He had subordinate managers fighting with each other. He had the building operators distrusting each other. Even after the board of directors wised up and fired him and his assistant the damage was done.
And that’s the same with Richard. He was a fuckup. He knew he was a fuckup. Social services in three provinces knew that he was a fuckup. A psychologist hired by the Canadian Armed Forces knew that he was a fuckup. And what do fuckups do when they don’t want people knowing how much of a fuckup they are? They gaslight everyone around them. They have to. It’s the only way they can keep from having to admit that they’re fuckups.
My mother? Did she get kicked off the base? Nope, she “abandoned” her children.
Did she leave because she couldn’t take his drinking and his abuse? Nope, according to Richard she was a “slut” that would spread her legs for any man.
Was my brother getting into trouble because my father was a shitty parent? Nope, I wasn’t raising my brother correctly.
Did my brother start getting into trouble on CFB Downsview because my father was a neglectful parent. Fuck no, if only I had raised my brother right he wouldn’t be getting into trouble.
Was I having psychiatric problems due to sexual abuse, physical abuse, and neglect? Nope, I was just acting up to get attention.
Were my brother and I having issues because of Richard’s psychiatric issues? Hell no, it was his mother’s fault. She was the reason my brother and I were acting up.
There was one time that Richard had to pick me up after a weekend cadet camp out in a town near Kingston, Ontario. Richard pulled up in his Mustang. I put my dufflebag in the back of the car and I got into the passenger seat. As soon as I sat down Richard made a slapping motion towards me. I recoiled. But Richard stopped short of slapping me. He laughed and chuckled. Then he said that I was so fucking lucky. I asked what for. He said that he was so looking forward to slapping my fucking face when he came to pick me up. I asked again “for what?”. He said that earlier in the day he used his oscilloscope to work on something electronic and someone had poked holes in the anti-glare screen. I said “Wasn’t me”. He said “I know. I remember using the oscilloscope on Saturday morning and it was okay, so that means it was your fucking brother that did it”. He then continued on ” Why the fuck can’t you look after him. He’s your brother, you should be teaching him how to respect my equipment. Older brothers are supposed to look after their younger brothers. I guess that your just too fucking self-centred to give a shit about anyone else other than yourself”
This tendency for Richard to blame me for everything resulted in my younger brother remarking that he knew that all he had to do to get Richard to punish me was to take a screw out of something of Richard’s and to leave the screwdriver and the screw beside the equipment so that Richard couldn’t help but notice.
Sure, I can look back now at laugh. But it doesn’t really undo all of the psychiatric pain and suffering that was inflicted.
The damage that Richard did was fucking astounding. But the sad thing about gaslighters is that they do so much fucking damage that there often is no recovery.
The problem that a person like Richard causes for a person like me is that when you’re dealing with major depression and severe anxiety, the bullshit and the lies deliver a much more devastating blow. If I wasn’t suffering from CPTSD, major depression, and severe anxiety I probably could have weathered Richard’s gaslighting and victim blaming. But it wouldn’t be until I was 40 years old that I would learn the truth about Richard. By that time Richard’s gaslighting had a lot of time to cement itself and fix itself into my brain.
Even though I now know the truth, the damage can’t be undone. And even if it could be undone the problem is that the majority of my life was wasted away with Richard’s gaslighting being my only frame of reference.
I’m tired.
I’m broken.
I’m defeated.
I’m at peace with the way things were and the way things are.
I know that I can’t rewrite the past. The past will always be the past.
The future doesn’t really hold anything for me.
I know that my depression, my anxiety, my CPTSD, and my distrust of others, my crippling self doubt and my intense self hatred will plague me to the end of my days.
There is nothing that can be prescribed that will undo what was done.
ECT could erase some of the memories, but it also stands a good chance at obliterating the few good memories that I have.
The gaslighter made damn sure that if he couldn’t enjoy his life that no one else would enjoy theirs.
“in the end it isn’t the gods that cause us so much suffering, but those closest to us” – Hellblade: Senua’s Sacrifice.
I forget when I first hear this song, it was before I started working at the hospital, but I’ve loved it since first hearing it.
And yes, while the song is apparently about bipolar disorder, I think it can easily apply to good ol’ fashioned depression.
I’m fairly certain that I am not bipolar as I don’t get the manias.
I only get stomach turning brain spinning depression.
My father used to call me a “lazy ass” for not getting out of bed in the morning. But between waking up at least once a night with nightmares, and the crushing realization that I didn’t die in my sleep, it was so hard to muster the energy to get out of bed. I still have that to this day. Sure, the nightmares of my father, of P.S., and of all of the other shit from my childhood have faded over the years, but it’s still such a bear to get out of bed in the morning. So much so that I have to have two alarm clocks set for three alarms each as well as automated lights to come on.
Being that my depression is caused by trauma and genetics I don’t think that I will ever be free of this demon.
It’s “A Better Son/Daughter” by Rilo Kiley
Sometimes in the morning I am petrified and can’t move Awake but cannot open my eyes And the weight is crushing down on my lungs I know I can’t breathe And I hope someone will help me this time And your mother’s still calling you insane and high Swearing it’s different this time And you tell her you give in to the demons that possess her And that God never blessed her insides Then you hang up the phone And feel badly for upsetting things Crawl back into bed to dream of a time When your heart was open wide And you loved things just because Like the sick and the dying And sometimes when you’re on You’re really fucking on And your friends they sing along And they love you But the lows are so extreme That the good seems fucking cheap And it teases you for weeks in its absence But you’ll fight and you’ll make it through You’ll fake it if you have to And you’ll show up for work with a smile And you’ll be better And you’ll be smarter And more grown up And a better daughter or son And a real good friend And you’ll be awake You’ll be alert You’ll be positive though it hurts And you’ll laugh and embrace all your friends And you’ll be a real good listener You’ll be honest You’ll be brave You’ll be handsome and you’ll be beautiful You’ll be happy
Your ship may be coming in You’re weak but not giving in To the cries and the wails of the valley below And your ship may be coming in You’re weak but not giving in And you’ll fight it You’ll go out fighting all of them
Depression sucks.
Major depression is a killer.
Severe anxiety doesn’t help.
The pills kinda help though.
And I mean the legal pills.
I think that one of the things that has really hindered me so far as receiving treatment for my major depression and CPTDS is that I’ve never self medicated. No booze, no needles, no illegal pills, nothing.
And I think this is what’s kept me from being taken as serious.
As a kid, the doctors and the psychiatrists were telling my father and Captain Terry Totzke that I was having serious problems and that I should be institutionalized. My father didn’t care as he “knew” that it was all an act. Captain Totzke didn’t care as he had his orders.
And now as an adult no one takes me serious because I don’t push a shopping cart up and down the alleys and scream at telephone poles.
Not having anyone “on my team” i.e. friends (I don’t have any), family ( don’t have that either), there’s been no one there to alert my health care professionals or to vouch for what I’ve told my health care professionals.
So here I am at 50. Everyone who knows me and the issues that I am going through and the trauma that I’ve suffered are wandering around telling me to “Don’t worry, be happy”. As if I were to just smile then my life would be all fucking happiness and sunshine and rainbows.
All I can do is reflect upon what was taken from me, what was stolen from me, what was denied to me. This is shit that I’ve never getting back.
Everybody has an easy fix for my life…..
Bobbie, why don’t you find a boyfriend / girlfriend?
Bobbie, why don’t you just go out for drinks with the boys?
Bobbie, why don’t you go to a sportsball game?
Bobbie, why don’t you take trade training?
Bobbie, if you like electronics why don’t you take a course?
None of these things have ever been an interest to me before, and they’re sure not going to be an interest to me now. Especially the drinking. With the way that my father and my paternal grandmother were both raging alcoholics, drinking alcohol is the last thing I need.
One of the recurring issues that I’ve always had to deal with throughout my life is the incredible amount of self doubt and self hatred that I have inside.
“But Bobbie, you’re so smart”.
No, actually I’m not. Never have been. Never will be.
I’ve just managed to float along for most of my life.
Sure I can do things and fix things. So can anybody else.
Absolutely nothing special about what I can do.
People can sniff and smell my failings and inadequacies like a horrific stench that permeates everything around me.
I can weld. So can everyone else.
I can repair electronics. So can everyone else.
I’ve programmed in BASIC, Fortran, Cobol, C++, Python, Java. Again so can everyone else.
I can use Word, Excel, Open Office, Pages, etc. And so can everyone else.
I can use computers. So can everyone else.
I can find information. Big deal, did that change anything? Nope.
I discovered that my father actually legally kidnapped my brother and I.
Did anything come of that?
Nope.
I discovered that my father was actually a bigamist.
Did anything come of that?
Nope.
I discovered that the person who had molested my brother and I had criminal convictions in 1982, 1984, 1985, and 1986 for child molestation.
Did anything come of that?
Nope.
I discovered that Donald Joseph Sullivan was molesting children prior to joining the Canadian Armed Forces. He molested more children once he joined the Canadian Armed Forces.
Did anything come of that?
Nope.
I learnt that my family moved in April of 1983, not because my father wanted to “protect me” from the drugs that Pat and Wayne wanted to give me to make me stop trying to kiss boys. As it turned out it wasn’t Pat and Wayne that had concerns about my apparent homosexuality, that was my father and Captain Terry Totzke. We moved because my father was fleeing Alberta so that I wouldn’t be removed from his care and placed into foster care or residential care which would have exposed the fact that my father didn’t have legal custody of my brother and I.
Did anything come of this?
Nope.
I discovered that my father was known to lie and to bullshit and to kiss ass. To actually see in writing that my father “often told people in positions of authority what he thought the wanted to hear”,”or that Mr. Gill often told conflicting stories from on meeting to the next”,”or that Mr. Gill has a tendency to blame others for his problems and often expects others to solve his problems for him” was a beautiful fucking relief.
But did it change anything?
Nope.
I discovered that I had been diagnosed as suffering from major depression, severe anxiety, was terrified of men, was convinced that my father was going to kill me. I even discovered that I had been anorexic as a child. I also discovered that doctors at the IWK children’s hospital in Halifax, Nova Scotia had severe concerns about my father and my mother.
Did anything come of this?
Nope.
As my father once told me, “Be very fucking careful of sticking your fucking nose where it doesn’t fucking belong as you might not like what you find”.
Well, I stuck my nose where it didn’t fucking belong and just as Richard warned me, I didn’t really like what I found.
Sure, I’m not a fucking insane basket case, but I’ve realized that my life has been one very tragic fucking joke.
Left to suffer from untreated major depression, severe anxiety, and trauma from sexual abuse all because people people with political ambitions decided that it was politically expedient to sweep the full extent of the Captain McRae fiasco under the rug.
Nobody gave a single fucking shit about me my entire life. Not Richard Gill; Not Marie Dagenais; Not Al Dagenais; Not Susan Zwolle; Not Captain Terry Totzke; Not Colonel Dan Munro; Not Colonel J.D.Boan; Not Gilles Lamontagne; Not Jason Kenny; Not Jody Wilson-Raybould; Not Harjit Sajjan; Not Sgt. Robert Jon Hancock; Not Sgt. Christian Cyr; Not Glenn Stannard; Not Robert Howard; Not the Canadian Armed Forces; Not the Department of National Defence; Not the Royal Canadian Mounted Police; Not the Summerside Police; The fucking worthless media in this country that killed the idea of investigative journalism years ago. Not a single fucking one of these fuckers or worthless fucking entities gave a single flying fuck.
People who cared, but who couldn’t overcome the systematic bullshit. Pat M.; Wayne W; Aviva D; Richard Ford; Mrs. Donskov; Jonathan Bowles; Mr. Atkins; Mr. Richard Brown; The Casson family; Bob Becker; The Toronto Police Service; Constable Dustin Wilkins; David Pugliese; Nora Loreto; And many others.
Beeshive 