07/10/2026
When abusive parents say, “We didn’t know any better. We did the best we could,” I think about all the times you waited.
You waited until we got home.
You waited until the door closed.
You waited until nobody else was around.
You waited until there were no teachers, neighbours, relatives, friends, or witnesses.
You waited until your public face was no longer needed.
So no, I do not believe you had no idea what you were doing.
You knew enough to hide it.
You knew enough to say, “Wait until we get home.”
You knew enough to make the car ride silent and terrifying before anything had even happened.
You knew enough to change your tone in public, then change it back the second we were alone.
You knew enough not to say those things where other people could hear.
You knew enough not to hit, scream, threaten, shame, mock, or humiliate me in front of people whose opinion you cared about.
You knew enough to protect your image.
You just did not care enough to protect me.
That is the part I am done softening.
Because “we did the best we could” does not explain why your best had witnesses and your worst had privacy.
It does not explain why I had to act normal around other people, then brace myself when we got into the house.
It does not explain why I learned to read your mood from the back seat.
It does not explain why I knew the difference between the parent everyone else saw and the parent I had to survive behind closed doors.
That was not ignorance….
That was control.
That was knowing exactly where you could get away with it.
That was making sure the world saw one version of you and I paid the price for the other.
And then you wonder why I do not accept the excuse.
Because the prequel told me everything.
The warning.
The silence.
The tension.
The look.
The “wait until we get home.”
And the sequel told me everything too.
The denial.
The minimising.
The “that never happened.”
The “you’re remembering it wrong.”
The “we did our best.”
No.
You did not “do your best.”
You did what you thought you could get away with when nobody else was watching.
And if you knew enough to hide it, you knew enough to know it was wrong.
