Peppermint things

Please note: post contains reference to sexual assault

I’m getting a handle on the basics, a bit.

I’m catching the reflex to please in the moment, a bit.

I’m doing well enough to unlock a new level, as it were.

And that comes in the form of a seemingly benign question that drifts lazily across my mind, like an inoffensive summer cloud:

I wonder why I need to people please?

And then, boom. It turns out this question was the portal to a world of darkness.

And I really, really don’t want to tell you any of this.

But there is no other way to tell the story of people pleasing than to include it. If pleasing is the tip of the iceberg, then the shit show that I’m about to tell you makes up a pretty hefty whack of the iceberg itself.

So. Where to begin?

Let’s begin with my lovely primary school teacher called Mrs. Farmelow. She had a tight bun on her head and a neck of rippling jowls. When there were thunderstorms, she would gather the class around the piano and bash out songs as loudly as she could demanding that we sang along, our little chins trembling with fear.

One of my earliest memories is of Mrs Farmelow signing me a song:

Peppermint ice cream.

Peppermint tea.

Peppermint things are good for me.

She would then spoon a great dollop of medicine into my mouth.

It’s just a fragment of memory, a moment flagged as important that I would roll over in mind’s eye from time to time, like a treasured keepsake. I remembered it long before I worked out why I had kept it to hand.

And the why is linked to my people pleasing in a way I have only recently worked out.

Peppermint things are good for me.

Turns out, peppermint medicine is good for 5 year olds girls who are so traumatised by life that their digestive tract is already shot to pieces.

Little girls who can’t fight or flee so freeze and fawn, as if their lives depend on it. Because, at times, it feels as though they do.

The medicine is balm for the rage and fear and panic and horror that a 5 year old tummy simply can’t digest.

Peppermint things are good for me.

But no amount of peppermint ice cream or peppermint tea can stop a body from turning against itself when the fight/flight response is jammed on and left running for years. So, as the years go by…and this is so hard to write so say it quickly…there are accidents.

By 7 years old, I had already learned that this was to be my problem, my dirty little secret. I had an accident waiting to go on stage to sing ‘Matchstick Men’ at the school concert, so took myself off to the loo and did what I could to sort it out. Do not ask for help. Disgusting, smelly, nasty little girl.

I got my first job at 13, working in the local shop at the weekends. It was an old-fashioned counter service shop which meant I was constantly on show. I couldn’t simply go to the loo as I needed. Which caused me to panic. Which caused me to need the loo even more. I would not – could not – explain or ask for help. So I wheedled, connived, pretended. “I’ll go and get some more paper bags from the stock room,” I’d say, crippled, in pain, humiliated by my pathetic, disgusting self.

As I became more independent, going out into the world as a teenager, fear would travel with me. And anywhere my body let me down – a bad smell, an uncontrollable need to dash to the loo – an association would be created. I still struggle to buy cards in a card shop. And flea markets, which I absolutely love, are a nightmare for me. It’s like my body was putting pins in a map, creating no-go zones. The world was becoming a war zone.

Things then got worse, much worse, after surviving rape. And still, I said nothing. Shoved all of that down, too, into the silent belly…but the belly refused to be silent.

I remember once arriving into Gare du Nord train station from the sleeper train from Venice, a romantic birthday treat. But I couldn’t exit the station. I could see the glorious sunshine of Paris reflecting off the pavement outside…but I couldn’t move. If I moved, I would have an accident. I felt trapped. Pinned like an insect. Disgusting, useless, wretched piece of shit.

On and on and on, over years. Miles of ticker tape of horrendous moments. Exposing. Humiliating. Stinking. Drenched with sweat and panic. Alone, alone, alone. And learning to hate myself a bit more each time.

No amount of peppermint things could stop me becoming disabled by a body that confounded me.

But something I could control? To ensure that no one ever ever ever knew. And to be extra sweet and nice and smiley so they’d never guess.

To please, so things were safe.

To appease, when things felt risky.

To fawn, when things were risky.

But no amount of saccharine could hide the real truth: I was a shitty, stinky, disgusting, nasty girl.

So, why do I people please?

Yup. To keep that from coming out.

But, it’s here now. And, I as I exhale, I have a feeling that all of this is going to turn into real medicine; the power of the Bog Woman archetype. An archetype that has abundant gifts in her ragged pockets. But that…that’s for another day.

I am happy you are here. I am working this out in real time and using this diary as a way to sense-make as I go. Too many thoughts swirling does no one good, so this diary is a butterfly net, swooping ideas into order on the page. I am sharing in the hopes that, if people pleasing is loud or quiet in your life, you might find some solace in the companionship as you travel alongside me.