A Review of A Child Called It

By

Nathaniel B. Broyles

Prof. Gloria Mitola, LMSW SOC 241 Violence in the Family May 10, 2011

A Child Called It is one of the most emotionally provoking books that I have ever read. It was also, for just that reason, one of the most difficult books that I have ever read. It was not the subject matter that affected me so much when reading the first of Dave Pelzers autobiographical trilogy as most Americans of my age have been exposed to such subject matter, at least in the abstract, to such an extent that we are a little desensitized to the topic. It was, instead, the knowledge that the author was writing about his own personal experiences in the first-person and speaking directly and with brutal honesty to his audience that made it difficult to read and impossible for me not to read in a single sitting.

Pelzer begins his story by describing in detail the day, March 3, 1973, that he was freed. That was the day that school administrators and police risked their jobs in order to protect a young boy who they knew was a victim of intolerable abuse. It was not until 1988 that the National Center on Child Abuse and Neglect introduced the harm standard, which helped to define child as abused if they had injuries that were still visible more than 48-hours later. More than a decade before that definition was made, it was far more difficult to prove child abuse rather than parental discipline was taking place and even more difficult to actually remove a child from their home. That day was a day of jubilation, redemption, fear, hope, and victory for a child who had beaten his tormentor by simple surviving against overwhelming odds.

David Pelzer had a normal childhood during the first few years of his life. His father was a firefighter and his mother was a stay-at-home mother and full-time homemaker. David thought his father was a hero and he loved his mother for all of the wonderful things that she did for the family. His mother was a gifted cook and homemaker and, by Davids own account, in his early years she was a wonderful mother who subtly taught her children respect, values, and life lessons without them knowing that they were actually being taught something valuable at the time. It was also during the early years, the good years, that David describes his favorite place in the world, the place that embodies those good times for him, a little cabin on the Russian River.

It was not long after that last summer happy summer vacation, however, when something seemed to chance with Davids mother. She was no longer the happy and vibrant homemaker and mother that she was previously. She took to spending the day in her night clothes on the couch where

she was previously almost religiously dedicated to keeping a clean house and cooking amazing meals every night for her family. Her behavior became extremely erratic, something which his father never noticed in the beginning because he was at work when the most extreme behavior occurred. It was also during this time that David and his brothers began to actually fear their mother as punishments began to change from discipline to ever escalating levels of draconian abuse.

Davids mother, Catherine, began to focus more and more of her negative attentions on David. All of a sudden, he went from being a good and loved child to being a bad boy who needed to be punished harshly for all wrongs, real or imagined. It became inevitable that David was going to be punished since he was unable to keep up with the rapidly changing moods of his mother and do whatever it was that would please her. She gave him impossible chores to finish and then punished him for not doing as he was told. That began a cycle of chores and increasing punishment since he was a bad boy that couldnt do what he was told. In an effort to discipline him, Davids mother would become more and more inventive in ways to cause him pain, moving from simple hitting, kicking, and punching to things straight out of a horror movie. The love that he felt for his mother soon turned into hate as he couldnt understand why his loving mother would treat him in such a way. He eventually internalized the knowledge that his mother would eventually kill him if things continued as they were going and he determined that he would beat his mother by doing whatever it took to disappoint her and to survive.

Davids strong firefighter father, his hero, turned out to be the weakest member of Davids family. His brothers saw what was happening to David and, while they loved him as their sibling, they were more afraid of their mother visiting the same treatment on them and so went along with the path of least resistance and pain. As children, they could not be blamed for not helping him and they happily included him just like old times whenever it was possible for them to do so without getting into trouble. Russell, the new baby brother, was raised from the start knowing that David was a bad boy and grew up doing his best to get David into trouble because it pleased his mother when he reported some infraction of Davids. Even though he did not want to, and was able to recognize that it was not Russells fault for not knowing any better, those initial feelings of love that David felt for his baby brother devolved into a keen hate.

Stephen, the brave firefighter, eventually saw what was happening to his family but was unwilling to deal with it. His weakness led him to ignore what he knew his wife was doing to David and telling him to do whatever it took to not make her angry. He solved his problems by a cycle of drinking and working, leaving his family to deal with his wife on their own because he was unable to face what was once a happy family. There were many occasions that David was told that his father was going to leave his mother and take David away with him and that hope allowed David to survive on more than one occasion. The disappointment when David realizes that his father is too cowardly to ever actually leave is overwhelming, even when simply reading Davids description of that realization.

I will not detail all of the abuse that David suffered during his hellish home life in his early years as there was far too much of it to write about. The abuse was, at times, so bad that it sounds like something one would hear about a prisoner-of-war experiencing. The most disturbing incident that I read about occurred during the summer after Davids second-grade year while on a family vacation. It was the summer after Miss Mosss unsuccessful attempt to help David by reporting his situation to social services and Davids mother, secure in her projection of normality to the world, felt comfortable in escalating the level of abuse she could inflict. She always saved the worst for when the rest of the family wasnt around to witness it.

One afternoon she manufactured an excuse to keep David home while the rest of the family went off to play on the super slide. She kept him sitting on a chair in the corner before bringing over a dirty diaper and smearing it in his face. She then ordered him to eat it. When he refused to open his mouth, his mother repeatedly struck him in the face, rocking his head from side to side to get him to do what she was ordering him to do. David adopted his mantra and rode things out with the belief that time would eventually save him. He was saved by the sound of the baby crying and had the brief thought that he might win this confrontation by denying his mother her attempt to get her own way in this instance. Those hopes were dashed when she brought him into the kitchen a few minutes later and confronted him with another full diaper. She smashed his face down repeatedly onto the counter and rubbed his face in the diaper while trying to get him to eat the contents. She only stopped when she realized that the rest of the family had returned and she yelled at David to clean himself up while she got rid of the rest of the evidence.

The idea that someone, especially a mother, would try to force their child to do something so abhorrent is something inconceivable to me. Intellectually, I know that there are people out there in the world that have scat fetishes but those are adults who, for some unfathomable reason to me, have made a conscious choice with regard to their behavior. Emotionally, the idea of someone eating feces makes me sick to my stomach. Like most people my age, I have changed a few diapers and remembering the sights and smells associated with such an act and then trying to put myself in Davids position makes me queasy. It was this incident that caused me to lose all notion of sympathy for a mentally and emotionally sick woman. She knows that what she is doing is unacceptable behavior as she is afraid of being caught in the commission of her acts. She does not fear the family seeing the after effects of her attentions to David but she is afraid to actually have them witness her at her most creative efforts.

This realization leads me to believe that there are no biological reasons for Catherines behavior. In my opinion, the explanation that fits most aptly for me is Wolfes (1999) three-stage process theory. For some reason, Catherines behavior as a model homemaker, wife, and mother deteriorated to the point that she became despondent and exhibited displays of paranoid fantasy. She became less and less tolerant of her children as her own life spiraled out of her control. David eventually came to be the focus of more and more of her attention as she perceived that he was being a bad boy and causing her the most trouble. This lead to ever escalating levels of violent and creative levels of discipline in an effort to make him good again. There is never any escalating child behavior problems displayed by David during this process as he recognizes that he has not doing anything deserving of his treatment and so does his level best to remain unnoticed as much as possible. He does this by never complaining of his treatment, since complaining leads to increased discipline, and by completing whatever tasks his mother sets him to the best of his ability despite knowing that she will never be pleased with his efforts. Perhaps, in hindsight, Davids mother experienced bouts of manic depression and the problems began when she entered into a prolonged state of depression that was incompatible with the responsibility for taking care of three young boys. Her inability to cope lead to the unending cycle of abuse heaped upon David in an apparent effort to relieve the pressures that she herself felt.

There is no question that A Child Called It should be required reading for every aspiring social

worker and teacher. Reading a first-hand account of how bad thing can be for a child at risk like David illustrates in a way like no other the importance of recognizing danger signs and knowing that smoke and fire most often are found together. Our schools are the first line of defense in

combating child abuse as they are usually the first place that a child at risk of abuse will exhibit recognizable signs of such abuse. The violence that David experienced from the person who should have cared for him the most should have broken him and would have done so to most people.
Amazingly, he has been able to recount his experiences to others in an effort to help those who have gone through similar experiences know that they are not alone. In the completion of a long circle, David himself is now a father and he describes the incredible feeling of satisfaction that he gets from knowing that he survived and is able to give his own child the gift of his most favorite place in the world, the Russian River.