See this bottle of Hydrogen Peroxide? How could this bottle hold so many memories for me??
I bet my mama must have bought gallons of hydrogen peroxide over the years. I can remember her pouring it over the gashes that my mother had slashed into her arms. She would make her hold her arms over the sink while she poured the hydrogen peroxide over her self-inflicted wounds. How that stuff bubbles and hisses! Then she would squeeze the flesh together and then wind the bandages tight around her arms. A lot of time Mother would be screaming and crying and trying to pull away. Thinking back the cuts, even though they bled a lot, couldn't have been too deep because how did she get the bleeding to stop without stitches? Mama knew if she took Mother to the hospital they would put her away in the state mental hospital so she always patched her up herself.
When I was two, so I was told, I fell and split my head open on a sharp edge of a step on my mother's mobile home. Mama doused me with hydrogen peroxide and pinched the flesh together and slapped a bandage on me. I still have a scar across the front of my forehead.
One of the most vivid memories though was when I was much older and my stepfather wanted my mother to ride with him to Statesville, NC. She didn't want to go, so instead of just telling him no, she sliced her butt several times with a razor blade, knowing that there was no way she could sit down for the long drive. Again, out came the hydrogen peroxide to cleanse and disinfect.
Just seeing a bottle of hydrogen peroxide on a shelf makes me feel unconfortable, anxious.
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