A Child Called It

A Child Called 'It'

A Child Called 'It' is the story of a young boy who, in order to survive, must triumph over the physical, emotional, and medical abuse created by his mother. The exploitation of alcohol plays an important role in the abuse by the mother and the neglect to see and the courage to intervene the problems by Dave's father. Dave considered the abuse he endured by his mother, 'games'. But he always tried to be one small step ahead of her.

Like Death From Child Abuse . . . And No One Heard, the outside world does nothing to help out a small child suffering from various forms of abuse. The few people who took notice were David's teachers and the school nurse. Yet it took them a considerable amount of time to finally build up suspicion and finally report Dave's problems to the proper authorities. I find the unreported instances observed by the public to be just as substantial a crime as the child abusers themselves.

One of the things I enjoyed and always found myself grinning about was the spunk that Dave had. He was crafty enough to stall his mother's efforts of physical and emotional cruelty just long enough for his dad to arrive, and he would not receive the most severe option of the abuse. When his mother attempted to make him eat his brother's stool, he held his head away just long enough to get it taken away at the last second as his father drove up from work.

The games that his mother would make him play would turn deadly. He had to fortunately thank God that she was a former nurse. For example, she told him that she was going to kill him, and played with a knife as if she was going to. The knife slipped out of her hands and struck him around the chest area. He bled profusely and she bandaged him up and nurtured him for a little while after until she saw he was able to support himself again. Soon after, Dave would have to take care of the wound by himself, like when it became infected, and he had to squeeze the puss from it.

Another game instance is he would be timed when it came to doing his chores, if not done quick enough (faster than an adult human could wash and dry the dishes) he would be subject to more, and more severe punishment. And even if he did accomplish his tasks in a reasonable amount of time, his only reward was to eat the left over food thrown in the garbage.

Emotionally,