My cross to bear

Zandile Nxumalo others

Chapter 1The beginning of my story, growing up in a difficult environment. My story began like many others, born to my biological mother, but given up for adoption at three months old. A kind relative who couldn't have children chose to take me in as her own legally. She worked hard as a domestic worker, and since there was no one to watch me at home, I often went with her to work. She became my whole world. Then when I was five, that world shattered. My adoptive mother passed away, her older sister came to live with me, bringing along her grown daughter and young grandchild, I called her cousin. Though the house was now full of people, I felt more alone than ever before. The loneliness was worse than the hunger, but the hunger was always there. We were just four and five years old, sometimes left alone for days with no food, no care. It was understandable with my adoptive mothers sister, she had hectic working shifts but with her daughter older than us, I would never understand why she would leave us alone.When we got sick, nobody noticed. At night we would look out the window at men drinking outside our gate, and I would wonder if they knew we were alone in the house. What would happen if they tried to come inside? I thank God they never did. At home they use to be pornography magazines under the couch and pornography DVDs hidden under the mattress, things children should never see. We would look at them sometimes, and one day we watched one of those DVDs. By the time I was five, I knew what a naked man looked like. And then something else happened, my cousin and I started kissing at night, touching each other’s private parts. She was five, I was six. We were just little girls who didn’t understand what we were doing,but the whole influence came from those magazines and DVDS. Thank God it didn’t last long, and thank God it didn’t mark us forever. But I still wonder,Why were those things in our house? Why did no one protect us?People called us naughty, but how could we be good? Exposed to such content?Nobody was there to teach us, to comfort us, to protect us. We shouldn’t have had to go through that. No child should.Now when I look back, I want to tell that little girl,”It wasn’t your fault”, “you deserved better”, but back then, there was nobody to say those words. So I will say them now for her, and for every child who still waits alone in the dark.Just when I was starting to adjust to this new life, another loss shook my world. The following year, my adoptive mother's sister,the woman who had taken us in passed away too.That same year, they moved us from the home my adoptive mother left for me. We didn't go far, just to another house in the same area, but it might as well have been another world. That move marked the beginning of what I call "the movie" because suddenly my life became a story I didn't recognize, with twists I never saw coming. What shocked me most? The house they moved us to was beautiful,spacious, with polished floors and rooms to spare. A home that spoke of money, of comfort. Yet for our first week, they gave us a toilet to sleep in. We didn’t question it. We slept where the toilet stood, changed clothes in the garage where our belongings were stored. At the time, it felt normal,children adapt to anything. After some time we got a room but still we were sleeping on the floor. I call that house a House of Fire because that’s what it was,a place that burned away pieces of me, one day at a time. Every morning began the same way,shouting, name calling, words that chipped at me until I started believing them. Useless.Stupid. Worthless.By the time I grew up, I carried a fear of everything ,not because the world was scary, but because I had been taught I couldn’t do anything right. Some believe shouting molds a child into obedience. Maybe it does. But what it also does is destroy. A child’s confidence is built at home long before they face the world, but mine was crushed there instead. Yes, discipline has its place,a child who disobeys should be corrected. But what I endured was not correction. It was breaking. I was not a defiant child; I was a learning child. A child’s mistakes should have been met with guidance, not fists or fury. I learned early what it meant to carry a weight too heavy for small shoulders. At the age of 12 other children played after school, my work began. I became teacher to four grandchildren, helping with homework they often didn't want to do. I turned into the family cook, preparing meals for mouths that never thanked me. The house never stayed clean, no matter how hard I scrubbed, and the little ones always needed feeding and attention.Nighttime brought no rest. A simple mistake could mean being thrown out of the house, the door locked behind me. Some nights I curled up in the car garage, the concrete cold beneath me, only to wake before dawn to get the children ready for school. A woman who was supposed to be my mother would watch as I worked never ever help

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