pages 33-79

David began to see a drastic change in his mother. She stopped dressing up and putting make up on and just taking care of herself in general. Her displine with her kids, mainly Dave, got out of hand. She started hard core drinking and would just watch tv and shout orders. David's father began spending less and less time at home and making any excuse possible to get out of the "mad house." Dave's mother would beat him worse when his father was gone so he thought of his Dad as his only protector. His parents would drink together all night and when they fought, his mother would take it out on him. She began by beating him and making him stay in the cold basement for hours on end. When she thought that this routine was no longer working she stopped feeding Dave. She constantly told him that he was a "bad boy" and that he wasn't worth anything. She'd go days at a time excluding Dave from family meals until he'd barely starve. His only hope to get food was at school. When he was good and did all of mothers chores in the right amount of time he would get his brother's scraps left from the cereal from breakfast. Dave's mother's way of humiliating him was making him wear the same shirt and pants every day at school and kids were always making fun of the way he looked and smelled. His shirt looked like "swiss cheese" with all of the holes in it. Dave began to steal food from school any possible way he could so he'd run super quickly too school to steal some of his classmates packed lunches before class began. When he finally got caught the school called his mother and he paid for it when he returned home that night. He then came up with a new strategy that if he wanted to live he was going to have to try again. So he began stealing from the market up the street from his school during recess time and of course then got caught not long after. His mother would force his finger down his throat when he'd return home from school to see if he managed to steal any food that day. The day he stole a packaged lunch of frozen hot dogs from the school his mother made him throw it up and eat it. As his father sat and watched, and didn't do a thing about it Dave began to lose hope in his father. His father always promised him that he'd soon get Dave and himself out of the house but the drunker they got the more they fought. And the fought was usually based on Dave. Dave's last chance for life was to out smart his mother. Part of his daily chores as being the "family slave" he had to clear the dinner table and get rid of the trash. He began going through the trash and eating whatever scraps he could find. When his mother finally caught onto him she starved him even more after a beating. It's really hard for me to continue reading this book knowing that it's true and that these kind of disgusting things actually happen to kids. I feel bad for Dave and my antipication for him to be more brave or have a change in his life kills me as I read on. No one on earth, bad boy or not, should be treated the way Dave's mother treats him. His father being no better in my opinion for allowing the abuse to happen to his child.