Professional Social Work • February 2010

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The secret middleclass abuse

Nicola Barry tells the story of how her mother’s alcoholismblighted her childhood. She believes that her middle class background insulated her family from the scrutiny of socialservices and that examples of this are likely to persist today.

nobody could see in. It wasn’t long before wechildren stopped trying to see out. We were tooashamed to ask for help. I soon learned frommy three older brothers that I had to grow upquickly. But it was OK for them. Theydisappeared to a posh boarding school inYorkshire, leaving me to cope with the chaos.

I often stayed off school to collect mymother’s prescriptions, do the shopping, buyher drink, shop, cook and clean the house. Istole money from her, ostensibly to buy food,but also as recompense for her lack of care andaffection. I turned into a child detective,hunting down her vodka and pouring it downthe sink, hoping to curb her drinking. I was incharge - a parent at ten. My mother and fathernever spoke, other than to fight, usually overher drinking. To say it ruined my life would be acop-out. ‘Ruled’ my life is more like it. I wasborn drunk. My parents used to argue about

whether her drinking during pregnancy hadcaused the condition in my hips – bilateralslipped epytheses. I was confined to awheelchair for several years as a child.Whenever she leaned over me, to give me abedpan or help me wash, I could smell drink.Occasionally, she’d swig from a bottle in thepantry, saying she couldn’t face any nursingtasks without her ‘wee cocktail’.

ShameMy father, a consultant anaesthetist and a cold,ill-tempered man, saw my disability as areflection on his professional ability. His wife’sdrinking caused him shame enough without mebeing abnormal as well. He’d go out to his car,slamming the front door until the glass cracked,shouting to himself “bloody” this, “bloody”that, “bloody crippled fool” and “bloodydrunken imbecile”. He was downright scary.

I watched my mother drink from the bottleuntil, one day, the bottle began to drink her –all of her. She went from being a strikinglybeautiful woman into a pickled old prune, heryouth sucked utterly dry. The familiar motherhad died and a new one – older, more uncertain– had taken her place.

The neglect started almost as soon as I wasborn. When I was six months old, my motherlost me after one of her many benders. Myfather returned from an overnight trip to newsof my disappearance. My mother told him she’dbeen helping my three brothers prepare for acamping holiday with the Scouts, had a fewvodkas, probably a bottle, and everything afterthat was a blank. When she woke up, I was

MY MOTHER’SFATHER HAD BEENTHE PSYCHIATRISTTO THE ROYALFAMILY. MY MOTHERWAS A DEBUTANTEPRESENTED TO THEQUEEN

or most children, strangers in theworld outside represent the mostdanger. For my family, the dangerwas right there under our feet.For all that we were middle class,

when we ventured out of our house peoplesoon realised how deeply dysfunctional wewere. We lived in Murrayfield, one ofEdinburgh’s leafy suburbs, close to the rugbyground, in a three-storey Georgian house. Ourstreet’s houses had Jaguars at the front andsprinklers at the back.

But we stuck out like sore thumbs – mainlybecause our house was falling to bits. Slates fellfrom the roof and lay in the back garden, neverto be replaced. Taps dripped and paint peeled.

We were well off. My mother’s father hadbeen the psychiatrist to the Royal Family. Mymother and her sisters came out as debutantesand were presented to the Queen. He leftmoney for the sisters in trust when he died, andmother drank away every penny.

Our neighbours didn’t say anything when mymother staggered out in the mornings, herblack leather shopping bag full of rattlingempties. Nor when she hurried home, a look offixed concentration on her face, clutching thesame shopping bag, this time containing fullbottles. That was our life. As long as nobodyknew what was going on, or at least pretendedthey didn’t, she could drink herself to death.That was the penalty of being so-calledrespectable, of being middle class.

We lived in a bubble, cut off from the worldby our own strangeness and unpredictability.Our white net curtains were now so filthy

F

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gone. My father phoned the Scoutmaster’s wife,who confirmed that her husband had collectedthe boys from our back garden. He also said mymother had “looked tired” – an Edinburgh-ismfor being out of one’s face. My parents ran outto the garden and found me, crying. I’d beenout there all night.

The police came to the house that time,summoned by a vigilant neighbour. My father,for whom the police were servants, notauthorities, explained that they were bothdoctors, that everything was fine, and that no,we didn’t need social workers, for God’s sake.Some of their best friends were social workers.

This was the way my parents operated. Theyknew how to fend off the authorities. We hidthe truth from each other as well as the worldoutside. We lived separately but together,sneaking around, sniffing my mother’s breathfor clues. Instead of living, we existed, in amausoleum of our own making. I rememberone occasion when my mother fell downstairsand lay at the front door for hours. When I got

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home from school, I thought she was dead. Butshe was just drunk. We lived like that for years,never knowing what would happen next. Ibelieve the real reason no one intervened was apervading sense of shame – a far bigger diseasein the world then than alcoholism itself.

We couldn’t tackle my mother’s drinkingbecause society insisted we kept it hidden.

Our relatives, my parents’ friends and ourneighbours were ashamed of us. As a family, itwas as if we were buried alive, kept out of theway like lepers. I just wanted my mother to benormal like the others, to bake scones and makeus meals when we came home. I could neverunderstand why my father didn’t stop herdrinking. I understood years later that nobodystops anyone drinking. Alcohol respects neitherincome, address nor profession.

My parents both drank. He drank beer andwine, but his drinking was the acceptable sort: abeer before dinner, a few glasses of wine withhis meal, a whisky afterwards. My motherordered her stash from a local shop and hid it

wherever there was space – in the wardrobe, inlaundry baskets, behind the cistern, in bootsand shoes. Her drinking was snatched, furtive.

I almost succumbed to my mother’s disease.I feel sure intervention could have preventedthat as well. I started drinking really young,heading exactly the same way as my mother. Iwas drinking and stealing her tranquillisersbecause there was so much I couldn’t face. By17, I couldn’t dry my hair without a glass ofsomething in my hand. But, in a sense, I wasprivileged. For years I’d had the opportunity towatch as alcohol stripped my mother ofeverything – her looks, friends, all her selfrespect. So I knew, first-hand, that drink was ahorrible way to live and an even more miserableway to die. Nevertheless, I ended up in a comawith acute pancreatitis at 26. That was my wakeup call.

Nothing went right when it involved home –not even my chance to get married and escape.Bringing my fiancé Colin home terrified me.My mother promised she wouldn’t drink if Ibrought him round. Stupidly, I agreed. Colinknew I carried baggage but not how much andhow heavy. Shortly after the dreadful meeting,we split up.

Taken into careProfessionals often ask me whether I wouldrather have been taken into care. It is a verydifficult question because the answer I’d havegiven as a child is different from the one Iwould give now. Back then, I was desperate forthe agony to end. I honestly do not think I’dhave had any qualms about being taken awayfrom home. There was no love in our house.Everything was done either out of guilt or asense of duty. Even at ten, I knew my efforts tomake things better at home weren’t working.Nothing worked.

In fact, I had a very close friend at schoolwhose family kept asking me to stay. It wouldhave been a very middle class, silent, solution.But now I look back and realise that I loved mymother, and that going into care would havemeant being separated from her. Perhaps beingthere – not abandoning her – was the rightdecision.

Are middle class child abusers still gettingaway with it? Early in 2009, the chief executiveof Barnardo’s divided opinion when he saidmore children need to be taken into care atbirth – to stop them being damaged beyondrepair by inadequate parents. Martin Nareycalled for social workers to be braver aboutremoving children at risk. He said: “If you cantake a baby very young and place them in apermanent adoptive home, we know that iswhere we have success. But that view is seen asheresy among social services, where the

A typical street in Edinburgh, where NicolaBarry spent her troubled childhood

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thinking is that parents deserve another chance.“My own view is that we need to take more

children into care if we really want to put theinterests of the child first. We can’t keep tryingto fix families that are completely broken.”

I could not agree more. Ruth Stark, theBritish Association of Social Workers (BASW)professional officer for Scotland, says spottingchild abuse or neglect in any family is extremelydifficult – unless it is immediately obvious fromphysical signs like bruising or poor dental care.“There may be frequent absences from school,”Ms Stark says. “But so much abuse and neglectof children happens behind closed doors. I havehad to take middle class children into care. Iknow that parents who are not coping usevarious methods to avoid being discovered.

What works“To uncover child abuse, you need to knowwhat works with parents who have abusedsubstances, have mental health difficulties orbeen involved in the criminal justice system.Equally, you have to know how to work withparents in successful careers who may havedealt with childhood abuse and neglect byworking hard to go to university and do well intheir chosen careers. They still often fail todevelop emotionally.”

Ruth says her two most challenging casesincluded an adult survivor of childhood sexualabuse, where the perpetrator was apaediatrician, and helping the emotionallyneglected child of an MP. Ruth says: “Thebackground or social standing of the parent issomething you have to look beyond in order toreach behind those closed doors and discoverwhat people are doing to each other. Only thencan you aim to turn their lives around, helpthem find a better quality of life.”

Ms Stark says uncovering abuse can behindered by systemic impediments, pointing athow other countries employ social services indifferent ways, potentially allowingpractitioners to focus more on the problemthan in investigating for evidence. In France,Spain and Portugal, for example, theinvestigation of child abuse and neglect is doneby the police – then the courts intervene. Starkexplains: “It is not an adversarial approach, butan investigative approach. In the UK, we use anadversarial court system and this processinvolves social workers undertakinginvestigation and intervention post-courtsanction. “Scotland has a halfway model – theChildren’s Hearing system. The reporter takeson the investigative role based on reports fromagencies, but the parents can still face acriminal prosecution.

So, could my story still happen today? WhenI was younger, the only person I confided in

and my heart thumped loudly.The room went quiet. It was a study in total

incomprehension, but everyone in the roomknew something wasn’t right. Some of thegirls continued to scribble while others staredat the teacher for guidance. When my motherspied me, she demanded I take off my skirtand give it to her. She said she needed it to goon holiday. I had to do it in front of the wholeclass. Not one teacher, nor one nun, said ordid anything.

Could that happen now? I would find thatsurprising. Teachers seem far more astute atspotting vulnerable children now than theywere back then. People seem to understandalcoholism better now, and are braver aboutconfronting it. But since my book Mother’sRuin was published, a lot of adults withsimilar stories have written to me. Many ofthem suffered similar neglect without help aslate as the 1980s. That fills me with worry.

As for what happened to us, in September1978 I found my mother lying on herbedroom floor. The bedside lamp had fallenbeside her, and had burned a hole in thecarpet before it burned out. She lay on herright side, facing the door. Her head looked asif it had been screwed on her body back tofront. She was wearing her old blue dressinggown, which gaped in the middle displayingbruised thighs and bony knees. Her arms wereoutstretched, her mouth was wide open andsaliva was running down her chin. She hadvomited on the carpet.

The moment I had always dreaded hadarrived. My mother had choked to death onher own vomit at the age of 63. I was 38.

What happened to me? In my late forties Imet my husband Alastair, a wonderful manwho has made me very happy. Before him, Iwas just existing. Now I feel I have escapedthe past and have become my own person. Mymother will always be with me, exerting herinfluence. Her voice lives on, but not herinfluence. I have left that behind.

Just the voice is always there in thebackground, like a dull but persistentecho. PSW

was my family’s doctor, but he just gave metranquillisers. He didn’t tell a social worker. Itwould be convenient to explain the lack ofintervention by noting that the Social WorkScotland Act was not yet in place at the time.But a lot of people whose job it was to helpfailed us.

Had they been around, social workers mighthave succeeded with my mother where I failedso abysmally. But there were many missedopportunities for intervention, with all theprofessions. Like the time my mother turnedup at my Sussex school. I was in an Englishlesson when one of the nuns came in,followed by my mother. I knew immediately,by the fraught look on her face, that she wasraving, paranoid drunk. As she stood in theclassroom – her hair dishevelled, wild eyesdarting, strain etched between the lines onher forehead – my classmates stared in horror

Nicola Barry is the author of Mother’s Ruin,published by Headline. She also works as asocial work feature writer and columnist,currently with the Sunday Express and Pressand Journal. She was formerly editor of theBig Issue.

This article is an abridged version of a featurefirst run in Every Child Journal in January2010. For more details or to subscribe, visithttp://library.teachingtimes.com/home.htm

A LOT OF ADULTSWITH SIMILARSTORIES HAVESUFFERED SIMILARNEGLECT WITHOUTHELP AS LATE AS THE1980S. THAT FILLS MEWITH WORRY

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