Incest

By Carolyn Franklin M.A.

‘Way back in 1968 for a Psychology Class I decided to write a paper on teen age prostitutes thinking that I would find a reason for this social trend, this question-able choice of lifestyle. Why would young girls go to those dark, hostile streets and rent their body, mind and soul, to anyone?

Living on the street is a dangerous, haphazard life. One minute a girl has a “home” the next day she’s sleeping in doorways again. Do these girls, these “children”, not understand the danger they’re in?

In my naiveté I assumed there was a solution to the teen prostitution problem - I had a solution - so simple. Why didn’t anyone think of this before!

Gather up the girls, explain the danger, disgrace and futility of life on the streets. Of course they would understand, then return home to Mom and Dad and safety.

But, I didn’t know the real reason, lurking in the darkness, for their flight from home. After many years working with teen inmates, now I know their story. My heart aches for their loss of youth and innocence - not their choice of life.

Today, my enthusiasm for hope, for change, is buried in the Valley of the Shadow of Death. I do fear evil, - the evil is pervasive and insidious. But, it’s not the men who rent girls’ bodies, the evil is much closer to home - incest!

My initiation as a 4 years old girl: I looked up at the men surrounding the toilet, they were dead silent. Their eyes were focused on me in an unspoken agreement among themselves as to what I should learn. With my father tight holding my hand as they all urinated, I watched their stinking yellow liquid bubble and foam in the brown stained bowl.

I learned...what evil is. I learned...men are evil. But, I am fully aware, as I grit my teeth, men are not totally to blame. There’s Mommy’s implicit permission.

So, to protect myself, I killed myself. I died when I was 4 years old.

This book explains why incest will never be stopped or taken seriously - never.

Unless...

• Language: English
• Publisher: Carolyn Franklin M.A.
• Release date: Apr 13, 2020
• ISBN: 9780463008416

Carolyn Franklin M.A.

M. A. Communication StudiesM. A. EducationB. A. Psychology30 years voice training (San Francisco Opera)Voice/Speech improvement CoachContact Carolyn - [e-mail]

Book preview

Incest

Carolyn Franklin M.A.

[e-mail]

Copyright Carolyn Franklin M. A. 2020

All rights reserved

CONTENTS

INCEST

MY STORY

MOLEST, ABUSE, INCEST - Defined

CHILD SEXUAL ABUSE IS A WIDE-SPREAD PROBLEM

CONSEQUENCES & RISK FACTORS

IF IT DON’T WORK, TOSS IT OUT

UP-DATING THE OLD TESTAMENT

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

PUBLICATIONS BY CAROLYN FRANKLIN M. A.

INCEST

In the 1940’s, my teen-age years, the worst thing that I heard of girls doing was drinking beer. Then, later smoking was scandalous and, then, and then, absolutely unthinkable was, you know, they’d do that…that - you know…(unspeakable). We girls would look knowingly at each other and put our head down - oh, that…(gasp!) they would do that?!

Today, not only the word SEX is spoken, it is accepted, expected and flaunted.

My very early years, being raised in New England, in a Puritan environment, led me to view any indiscretion as inexcusable. We were on guard, alert, for any shadow of violation of social expectation. The word toilet was unspoken. If absolutely necessary you could murmur, I need to use the bahth room and we would know what you meant. Please and thank you were basic to our behavior.

The Pilgrims would have been pleased.

Therefore, yes, I thought, that teen-age sex - prostitution - was a chosen life style, easy money. I was disgusted with someone who had so little self respect that they’d have sex with anyone, that they had so little self regard and decency that a person would stoop to that level.

Don’t those girls know what they’re doing? Do they have any idea of how we - we - the good people - look down on them?

I had every right to judge them - we all did.

Then, I started college and decided I would major in Psychology, determined to set the world right. All the misunderstandings, the mis-guided, mis-understood actions of people would be fixed. We’d all be happy and get along - like Puritans should.

And, then… I learned about incest… the pervasive, evil that taints a child’s life - kills their spirit - forever, everywhere… oh, my God! How to stop that…?

MY STORY

My story started in 1931, before I was born. My mother didn't want children so she had several self-induced abortions.

Apparently the wire coat hanger missed its target in my case and, against all my mother’s prayers to the contrary, I was born.

Being born was bad enough, but the cutting insult was that I was a girl. Mother had the name, Anton chosen for her prized son and when she had a non-son she was indifferent as to what I was called.

My cousins were taking dance lessons from Marion Rice who they adored. Her daughter was Carolyn, so my cousins begged mother to name me Carolyn.

Sure, why not.

Mother often reminded me how disappointed she was that I was a girl - and intelligent! Truly, a mortal sin. She often said she wished she’d left me at the hospital. I often supposed they insisted she take me with her and I was relieved I wasn’t left there.

I was so wrong.

The Family

I was born into a family of Italians. Fresh off the boat in 1898, arriving from Napoli, they landed in Boston and immediately took up residence in Fitchburg, Massachusetts. They by-passed Ellis Island.

The town was a thriving center of shoe manufacturing, cotton mills and corner grocery stores. Ice, fish, meat and some vegetables were delivered by horse-drawn wagons.

Everyone knew everyone. You were either Italian or Irish. There were some Jews, but they stayed to themselves, a few Finns and some Frenchmen, but they didn’t count. The Irish and the Italians ran the town.

Consequently, the Irish and the Italians married outside of their class - they married each other. This caused a lot of hard feelings on both sides, but we were all Catholic so it wasn't like we were marrying a different race. Everyone loved the children.

My Aunt Giuseppina married Giuseppi in Italy. Maria, Rosa and Carmen married Irish people. Mother, (Lena) the different one, the Gypsy, married an American Indian, Osage tribe. She told me she loved him because he was 6’ tall.

As a red-skinned oddity, I was known as The Papoose.

After Mother was burdened with a non-son child, my father walked out into the sunrise. He left mother with the insurmountable problem of economic survival. In those days a woman could starve, beg - or marry.

She was actually a gypsy in all but the caravan. Both she and my grandmother, Pasqualina, had the gift of foresight, both could see the future clearly. As I reflect on the past, many of the events I found coincidental were a result of Mother’s power and I am truly impressed.

Now, alone, Mother resorted for income to her gypsy gift, fortune telling. She met and befriended sorted odd characters along that path.

At this time, when my father stepped into his sunrise, I fell into my darkness.

The Cloak of Darkness Falls

In Denver, we lived in an upstairs room in a two-story house. Before my father left we used to see him occasionally. He’d sit me on his foot, swing me up and down while he taught me songs in Spanish, La Cucaracha, German, Ach, Mein Leiber Augustine, and French, Frere Jacques. I absolutely delighted in those times!

But, one sunny morning I awoke to see a strange man in the room. He was ugly and ignorant - nothing like my father. I could see instantly this person couldn’t sing! Why was he there?

Mother was delighted with him, she smiled a lot and literally bounced around the room when he was there. She never addressed his presence, never said a word to me, just acted as though he always was a part of her life. I was confused. Who was he?

Later, in a hallway, I was standing, talking to a boy of my age who also lived in that house. I must have mentioned something about my father because the boy, annoyed, pointed at that man and said, That man there! That’s your father!

I stared at that man. My father? Since when? No, it couldn’t be.

I was more confused.

I walked, alone, into my mother’s and my room, dazed. If that man was my father, I thought, I’d rather die. Yes, that made sense.

I had nothing to lose. My mother didn’t want me. My father left me…

Yes! I’ll die - I’ll kill myself! The thought was a revelation - I had a choice in the matter! I could easily solve my confusion.

But, how to die?

Poison, I knew, was out of the question. I’d seen people die of poison in the moving pictures and I didn’t