A Child Called "It"
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A Child Called "It": One Child's Courage to Survive is David J. Pelzer's 1995 autobiographical account of his maltreatment as a child by his alcoholic mother, Catherine Roerva, who singled him out much more so from among her other children as an object of abuse.
Everyone who met the Pelzer family in the "early days" had noted them as "The Brady Bunch" for being such a perfect family. In those days, Dave Pelzer was the second of 3 boys, until later the story is followed by the birth of two more boys. His Dad was a fireman and according to him one of the biggest men he's ever seen. His mother was a loving, kind, caring, and certainly exceptional mother that anyone has ever met. She did her absolute best to keep the house clean, the boys well behaved, and even during dinners when she cooked meals from different countries she would set the table up as that culture.
Dave often described his affection for his mom. However when Dave turned 5, things slowly began to change. While his father was away at work often, his mother became an alcoholic. Dave has said that "...you could tell what mood she was in in the morning by her appearance." Although Dave was the "bad boy" of the family at some times, his mother claims that Dave was so bad behind her back it required punishments, despite Dave being good. The symbolic point when abuse became consistant seemed to be when his mother thrashed him the summer before he began Kindergarten and dislocated his shoulder. Still the good and bad times seemed mixed for the next couple years. A bigger turning point occurred when he was 7 years old and had to repeat first grade. It was not made clear if his mother initiated this or the school. At this point he was banished from the family most of the time. He was banned from watching television and playing outside. Just before turning 8, he was given virtually no toys for Christmas.
The more his mother began to drink, the more Dave began to get abused. When he was 8 years old his mother tried to burn him on the stove. That fall, he was no longer part of the family, so he could not eat with them at the family table. By then he was being punished without dinner most nights. When he was given dinner, it was scraps. At some points the only food he got was lunch at school, which consisted daily of 2 peanut butter and jelly sandwiches and carrot sticks. He received a pair of pants, long sleeves, shoes, and socks for the year. Catherine also said that he was not allowed to interact with "her family". He was banished from his bedroom and forced to live in the basement on an army cot. When he didn't have the tedious chores, he was forced to sit in the Prisoner of War position (sitting with head bent backwards facing sky and sitting on hands). Dave lost his name and was replaced with "The Boy" and finally "It".
Slowly the punishments turned into sick games the mother enjoyed using to watch her son suffer. The stove burning incident was the first. Other incidents included making him drink ammonia, making him clean the bathroom with ammonia mixed with chlorox nearly killing him, rollerskating outside in 40 degree temperatures, making him throw up and having to eat it, smashing his face against the mirror while screaming "I'm a bad boy", lying in the bathtub naked with freezing water for hours, getting stabbed, rubbing his face in his brother's dirty diaper, making him eat dog's feces, starving him for a few days at a time and even for 10 days once, and just plain thrashing from his mother to name a few.
His father distanced himself from the house. At first he tried to stop the abuse but as time went on he was unable to do anything. When he tried to intervene, his mother would just become even more adamant on abusing "The Boy". His father gradually spent less time at home as a result. Two months before Dave's rescue he separated from his mother and moved out.
Dave learned how to survive his mother's grueling games of torture, and vowed that he would defy the odds. He often prays to God, angry for him ignoring him and not responding to his prayers. During this abusive period, his mom gives birth twice more so Dave became the middle child. Finally on March 5, 1973 after nearly 8 years of extreme abuse, David, 12, is finally rescued by his teachers, some of which were new and therefore risked their jobs for the life of a young boy. With only pure will and determination, Dave got through the extremities of his life.
A 1997 sequel, The Lost Boy, details Pelzer's experience in the foster care system. In 1999, the third book, A Man Named Dave was published, detailing his life as an adult. The three were compiled into a single book called My Story in 2002.
