Episode 204: Long-Term Effects of Child Abuse (with Kate Russell)

Summary

Suffer the Little Children – Episode 204: Long-Term Effects of Child Abuse (with Kate Russell)

Date: September 23, 2025
Host: Laine
Guest: Kate Russell – author and survivor

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Overview

This episode spotlights the long-term effects of child abuse, featuring an in-depth conversation with memoirist and survivor Kate Russell. Drawing from her trilogy, Portrait of a Dysfunctional Family, Kate provides a raw and nuanced examination of how her abusive upbringing shaped every aspect of her adult life—including her career, relationships, self-concept, and emotional health. The discussion seeks to shed light on the generational, psychological, and systemic factors behind abuse, while offering hope, strategies for healing, and solidarity for other survivors.

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Episode Structure & Key Topics

• [02:00] Introduction — Setting the Stage

  • Laine introduces the topic: the well-documented, lasting impact of child abuse on physical, mental, and social health.
  • Kate Russell’s background: author, survivor, advocate.

• [03:42] Kate’s Family History and Trilogy

  • Outlines her three memoirs, each focusing on a different family member and dynamic.
  • Begins to recount her parents’ formative years and dysfunction.

• [04:53] Generational Dysfunction and Upbringing

  • The divergent childhoods of Kate’s parents: father (spoiled, self-centered, undisciplined) and mother (neglected, unloved, rebellious).
  • How their flaws magnified when combined, creating a dangerous environment for children.

• [06:44] Early Childhood—Childhood Parenting Role Reversal

  • Kate describes becoming a “mother” to her younger sister, chronicling specific stories of discipline and their psychological consequences.

• [08:23] Narrating Trauma Without Censorship

  • Discusses the importance of presenting abuse “without sugarcoating,” to honor truth and highlight the reality.

• [10:06] Dual Perspective: Inner Child and Adult Insight

  • Kate explains how, even as a child, she maintained a sense of purpose—believing her future self would write these stories to help others.

• [11:40] Difficult Memories and Shame

  • Kate on confronting taboo and uncomfortable truths (eg: her father’s inappropriate boundaries).
  • Call to end survivor shame and secrecy.

• [15:08] Re-examining Her Parents: Illness, Not Evil

  • Writing her memoirs deepened her understanding of her parents’ sickness, not “evilness.”
  • Distinguishing unresolved trauma, addiction, and mental illness as root causes.
  • Boundaries and the necessity of cutting off contact for healing.

• [17:43] Sister’s Mental Illness and Familial Denial

  • The compounded trauma of parental substance abuse during pregnancy.
  • Father’s denial and minimization of sister’s schizoaffective disorder.
  • Kate’s rationale for ending contact with both parents and her sister in her unmedicated state.

• [20:35] Realizing the Adult Consequences of Childhood Abuse

  • How her “fine” persona masked a total disconnect from her own emotions—an inability to feel in the moment, codependency, and people-pleasing behaviors.

• [27:01] Ongoing Patterns: People-Pleasing and Survival Instincts

  • Adult relationships shaped by the need to appease others and lack of healthy boundaries.
  • Self-awareness often comes only in hindsight.

• [29:28] Societal Denial and Validation

  • On the denial of abuse by bystanders and even close family friends.
  • Validation when others finally read her story and understand her as an adult.

• [32:43] Takeaways for Survivors

  • The healing power of connection; “the opposite of trauma is connection.”
  • You are not alone.

• [33:31] Takeaways for the Wider Audience

  • The necessity to cultivate empathy over judgment and to stop ostracizing survivors.
  • Abuse is not the survivor’s fault.

• [34:12] Advice to Her Younger Self

  • Reassurance it will get better; the importance of hope and perseverance.

• [37:28] Advice to Kids Currently Enduring Abuse

  • “It is temporary. Everything is going to be okay. You are going to be stronger for the pain you endure… Go towards good… If you’re putting one foot in front of the other and going in the right direction, then everything will be okay. Even if it doesn’t go exactly the way you plan, which it won’t. It will be okay.” (38:15, Kate Russell)

• [38:17] Advocacy, Child Welfare, and Systemic Failure

  • Kate’s efforts to educate at trauma and child welfare conferences.
  • Recounts failures of DCFS to intervene in her case, highlighting systemic blind spots based on race, class, and appearances: “Don’t judge a book by its cover.” (41:25, Kate Russell)

• [42:58] Normalization of Child Abuse and Its Societal Impact

  • Critique of the ‘80s normalization of child discipline as physical abuse—tracing links to adulthood addiction, homelessness, and trauma.
  • Call for continued research and storytelling.

• [44:20] Where to Find Kate’s Work

  • Kate’s trilogy (Down the Rabbit Hole, Voicemails from My Sister, Ironing Out My Life) is available on Amazon, Audible, and in Kindle format.

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Memorable Quotes & Key Moments

• On generational trauma:

  “If you could take the bad traits of two people and then add children to the mix—oh, this is a bad, bad, bad situation here. And don’t do that. Don’t add children to the mix.”
  —Kate Russell (05:28)

• On writing honestly about abuse:

  “I’m not here to Hollywoodize this story for you… That’s not going to help anybody.”
  —Kate Russell (08:50-08:57)

• On the effects of abuse:

  “Every act of discipline to me formed my thought patterns and went on to form who I became and how I relate to other people and to my career of choice… I want people to see how the thought pattern unfolds. It’s very important that we shine a light on how child abuse affects things for real and forever.”
  —Kate Russell (07:07)

• On survivor shame and speaking out:

  “There’s nothing to be ashamed of. Please, please speak out. If you think you’re alone, you’re definitely not. That’s really the bottom line here.”
  —Kate Russell (12:49)

• On emotional disconnect:

  “I don’t know my feelings at all… I’m used to having feelings when they won’t inconvenience someone—having them later. I don’t have feelings in the moment. My job is to keep everyone okay… so that I don’t get hit.”
  —Kate Russell (21:08, 22:31)

• On healing and connection:

  “They say in recovery, the opposite of addiction is connection. I think the opposite of trauma is connection... The more people in our boat, the stronger we are.”
  —Kate Russell (33:24)

• On advocating for better systems:

  “We don’t fit the profile … we are being beaten on a daily basis… You need to not judge a book by its cover. Listen to the kids. Nobody listened to us.”
  —Kate Russell (41:25-41:35)

• On empathy and judgment:

  “You’re not better than me because you weren’t abused. So deepen your empathy.”
  —Kate Russell (33:52)

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Notable Timestamps

• [02:00] Introduction, child abuse effects
• [03:42] Kate’s trilogy and framing her family’s dysfunction
• [04:53–09:06] Family history, cycles of trauma, impact on self-identity
• [10:06] Child-adult perspective; purpose in storytelling
• [11:51] Confronting damaging and taboo memories
• [15:08–16:50] Reframing abusers as sick, necessity of boundaries
• [17:43–20:06] Sister’s mental illness and family denial
• [20:59–25:05] Realizing and working through emotional dissociation as an adult
• [27:01] People-pleasing, boundary issues, and the struggle to change ingrained patterns
• [29:28] Societal denial, external validation
• [32:43 & 33:31] Major takeaways for survivors and non-survivors
• [34:12 & 37:28] Advice to her child self, to children experiencing abuse now
• [38:17–42:29] Advocacy, systemic failures, and the importance of listening to children
• [42:58] Societal consequences of abuse normalization

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Final Messages

• For Survivors:
  You are not alone, and connection is the root of healing. Speaking your truth, while hard, can lighten the shame and isolation.
• For the Public:
  Listen without judgment. Empathy and believing survivors are vital.
• For Professionals and Policymakers:
  Systemic failures often stem from bias, denial, and rigid profiling—listen to what children are actually saying and reassess intervention criteria.

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Kate Russell’s Memoirs

• Down the Rabbit Hole: A Memoir of Abuse, Addiction and Recovery
• Voicemails from My Sister: Stories of a Schizoaffective Sibling
• Ironing Out My Life: Child Abuse and How It Affected Everything Thereafter
  Available on Amazon, Audible, and Kindle.

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Closing

Host Laine thanks Kate for her candor and advocacy.
Links to Kate’s books are in the show notes.

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This episode is recommended for those seeking insight into the lasting impacts of abuse, the realities of survival and recovery, and the importance of both personal and societal awareness and empathy.

Transcript

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[Podcast Host Laine]

This podcast contains descriptions of violence against children in adult language and is not suitable for all audiences. Listener discretion is advised. Hi everyone and welcome to Suffer the Little Children, the podcast giving voices back to the victims of child abuse, murder and their families. I'm your host, Laine, and this is episode 204, long term effects of Child Abuse with Kate Russell. Research has long shown that child abuse and neglect can and often do lead to a wide range of negative effects on a person's life, including mental, physical and behavioral problems. This kind of treatment during childhood causes stress that alters the way the child's brain develops, affects gene expression and changes the body's stress response system. Kate Russell is the author of three memoirs about her life, describing her painful experiences in detail, from living with a schizoaffective sister to suffering addiction and subsequently recovering. Her most recent book, Ironing Out My Child Abuse and How It Affected Everything Thereafter, is the third in the series and tells the story of her parents upbringing, then hers, and the impact their abusive behavior had on her life. Kate is a strong, intelligent, highly resilient survivor and it was my honor to speak with her for this episode. Here is my recent conversation with survivor and author Kate Russell.

[Kate Russell]

Hi, I'm Kate Russell. I'm the author of three memoirs, down the Rabbit Hole, a memoir of abuse, addiction and recovery, Voicemails from My Sister, Stories of a Schizoaffective Sibling and my latest memoir, Ironing Out My Life, Child Abuse and How It Affected Everything Thereafter, which is mainly what I'm here to talk about. It's really a trilogy. I tried to package it all like a box set, if you will, titled A Portrait of a Dysfunctional Family.

[Podcast Host Laine]

That's interesting.

[Podcast Interviewer]

I love the way you did that.

[Kate Russell]

Yeah. The first book is about me, the second is about my sister and the third is about my parents, but really about my relationship with my parents and how their parenting went on to affect my relationship with everything and everyone.

[Podcast Interviewer]

Sure. Of course. It does sound like you've had a whole lot of experiences that a lot of people hopefully don't have. I always say these types of things kind of make you an expert in things you never wanted to be. You talked about your parents childhoods and how they were raised and how that sort of fed into everything. So do you want to kind of get into the story?

[Kate Russell]

Oh, we absolutely can. I In this latest book, I go chronologically and I do start with my parents upbringing because they were raised so differently. You know, my father was very spoiled. He was adopted, which he didn't find out until he was marrying my mother. But he was spoiled. He was a child actor. My grandparents spoiled him. I mean they, that was their baby Bo boy. And he to them he could do no wrong. So he didn't have consequences. He didn't. He was not disciplined. Anything he wanted he could have and he was told he was everything. And he just developed a very big ego, very Young and that just continued to grow. My mother was not really loved very much. My grandparents, my mom's parents, they weren't physically abusive, but they weren't very loving. My grandfather on my mom's side just, just was very hands off. It was pretty neglectful on his part. He just, I don't think he wanted children. My grandmother did, but she was a disciplinary and it wasn't, again, wasn't physically abusive, but it was very, just here is your list of things to do after school and you do them and, and so my mother just rebelled very young and got into drugs at 9 years old and she just rebelled very young and that grew very quickly. So they met when they were 20 and 22 years old and they just, their defects, it was like opposites attract and they just got together and everything magnified, everything took off. It's like if you could take the bad traits of two people and then add children to the mix and oh, this is, this is a bad, bad, bad situation here. And don't do that, don't add children to the mix.

[Podcast Interviewer]

Yeah, it can be a very bad idea sometimes. You can see the writing on the wall from a mile away.

[Kate Russell]

They were so self harming both of their traits. You know, this huge ego that can do no wrong and a drug addict who just wanted to do drugs and you know, live hard, die young and he just wanted to be right, not happy. Those two things just don't bring children into the mix because you're going to hurt them if you want to hurt yourself. Okay. But once you add children to the mix now you're an abusive parent. There's just no way around that unless you're willing to change. And they just were not. So here we go. So then I, so then I just go chronologically and then I was born and then my sister was born and I became the mother. And you can kind of just tell where this is going to go. And I just go year by year and you know, I go into specific stories and each act of discipline to me formed my thought patterns and went on to form who I became and how I went on to think about myself and how I went on to relate to other people and to my career of choice. You know, I knew I wanted to be an actress from a little girl. My dad's a stagehand and so I would watch his shows from the wings and go, oh, I want to do that, but how could I do that? I am no one, you know, and these little kids, they have everything they're told they can And I'm told there's no way. And so here I am coming from this place, and I'm still at it. I'm still going. So I show in the book, step by step, how it all developed, how it all unfolded, how it's still going, because I want people to see how the thought pattern unfolds. It's very important that we shine a light on how child abuse affects things for real and forever.

[Podcast Interviewer]

I mean, even if you are able to, quote, unquote, get better, it's still a huge hurdle.

[Kate Russell]

Yeah.

[Podcast Interviewer]

It changed the way your brain formed.

[Kate Russell]

Exactly.

[Podcast Interviewer]

It made you who you are, regardless of whether you want to admit that or not. So I appreciated how you didn't soften the events of the book for the reader. That's kind of how I tell stories as well. They're not mine, but I tell them with the family's permission. Yeah, but I think that the harsh reality is what people need to hear.

[Kate Russell]

Well, I think so, too. Yeah. I'm not here to Hollywoodize this story for you.

[Podcast Interviewer]

Right. Yeah. It happened and that's it.

[Kate Russell]

You know, I'm not going to do that. That's not going to help anybody.

[Podcast Interviewer]

Sugar coating just makes people think, oh, it's not as bad as it is. Well, guess what? It's worse.

[Kate Russell]

It works.

[Podcast Interviewer]

A lot of people, I would think, might be hesitant to tell their stories in such detail, such personal things, but, yeah, like I said, I appreciated the way you didn't do that.

[Kate Russell]

A lot of people have told me they can't read it.

[Podcast Interviewer]

Yep. I get a lot of people saying that about this show, too.

[Kate Russell]

I can't hear it, I can't listen. Yeah, I can't. And I get it. Well, then don't exactly. It's not for you then. I can't edit myself or I can't deliver this information any other way. I'm just gonna. I can only speak my truth, you know?

[Podcast Interviewer]

Yeah, and you deserve that. Honestly. I mean, everyone deserves to be heard to the degree they want to be. And you've put it all out there and it's. I think it's going to help people. It's definitely going to help people.

[Kate Russell]

Thank you. And that is the goal. And that is the goal.

[Podcast Interviewer]

I think you've done a marvelous job so far. So you went back and forth between the child's perspective and the adult perspective. And how did you balance telling that story through your child self's eyes while you kind of weaved in the insight you have now?

[Kate Russell]

Yeah, I. I think as a child, I. I Had, you know, a strong sense of God. And so I had this. This perspective, this almost adult perspective. But I. I like to call it God almost. I had this outside sort of being held feeling, this fatherly feeling that this was all happening for a reason. And I knew I was gonna write a book when I was a little girl. And I. And I was being abused. I knew this. You're being abused, but it's temporary. Don't give up. Keep going. And you're gonna write this down. And what you write down will help other people. So I almost had this, like, adult perspective as a little child because I knew this is going down on paper and this is going down in history. This is going to help people.

[Podcast Interviewer]

You were one of those old souls.

[Kate Russell]

That's the goal here. So I. I sort of was already planning as a little kid, okay, this is going to be told as a story, and it's going to help. And I know it's. The book isn't written for children, but, you know, if I was a little kid, it would have helped me. I. I know it's written rated R, but still, it was my truth.

[Podcast Interviewer]

And so many kids are going through it right now that we don't even see.

[Kate Russell]

So I already had kind of an adult perspective. I was going through all these adult situations as a little kid. So. So I had this, like, duality going on. I was this little kid, but with all these adult circumstances, you know, so it wasn't hard at all for me to tap to as an adult writing in a child's perspective, because I remember being a child thinking in an adult perspective.

[Podcast Interviewer]

Were there any scenes that you had to kind of avoid for the longest time, or were there specific things that helped you face some memories that you didn't necessarily want to put down? At first?

[Kate Russell]

I was. I was always anxious to get into that stuff. The harder it was to read, the more I wanted to tell it. I think some people are so ashamed. There's so much shame, and I think in when you're an abuse victim because you think you're alone and that no one else has ever been belittled and demoralized the way that you've been. Especially with sexual abuse, which my parents didn't sexually abuse me, but my father was always skirting the line of inappropriateness. Like, he let me, when I was very young, watch him pee so that I could see a penis because I was very curious. But he showed it off to me as it. So do you know what I mean? He didn't touch me, but he showed. So it was always stuff like that. Touching my friends a little too long, telling me that my, my young friends were very attractive. Always stuff like that. Skirting the line of like daring us to call him out on his inappropriate behavior.

[Podcast Interviewer]

Yeah. How far can I go?

[Kate Russell]

Yeah. Yeah. And so I wanted to call stuff like that out because it's like, no, guys, tell your truth. Because there's nothing to be ashamed of. Please, please speak out. If you think you're alone, you're definitely not. That's really, that's really the bottom line there. That's really a theme here. Nobody's alone. Nobody should be ashamed. Nobody should be ashamed into silence, you know?

[Podcast Interviewer]

Exactly. And I know a lot of kids tend to blame themselves for this kind of thing happening to them, but it is absolutely not their fault. No matter what they did to anger their parent or. I hate to say it, but you know, seduce. Whatever the parents are saying, whatever the child did, it's not on them.

[Kate Russell]

Of course not. No, no, no, no.

[Podcast Host Laine]

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[Podcast Host]

I've got Dan Morgan here on the pod. Say hi Dan.

[Dan Morgan]

Hey, how's it going today?

[Podcast Host]

It's going good, man. Tell us who you are and what you do.

[Dan Morgan]

I'm Dan Morgan. I'm an attorney and a managing partner at Morgan and Morgan, which is America's largest injury law firm.

[Podcast Host]

That's pretty awesome. I think I saw a billboard of yours recently. It said 20 billion one. 20 billion is an insane number.

[Dan Morgan]

Yeah, 20 billion recovered. It's actually, I think somewhere north. Probably closer to 22, 23 after this year. And each year we get bigger and badder and our army grows. So the number will hopefully keep getting bigger and bigger as time goes on.

[Podcast Host]

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[Kate Russell]

Wow.

[Podcast Host]

Dan Morgan from Morgan and Morgan, America's large injury law firm. Thanks for coming by the show.

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[Podcast Interviewer]

Did your perception of how your parents were, who they were, what they did, did any of that change while you were writing this book or all three of them?

[Kate Russell]

You know, I just saw them as sick, understood them more as sick than evil. Spiritually sick. You know, the brain is such a weird, misunderstood organ.

[Podcast Interviewer]

It really is.

[Kate Russell]

We don't know that much about it. It's constantly being studied and new things are being discovered. But it's really hard to diagnose things about the brain because, like, a certain amount of people have to have the same thing in order to make a diagnosis. Blah, blah, blah. And like, so there's. There's something wrong. Right. But we don't know exactly what because everybody's got a. A slight uniqueness. So I know there's some narcissism here, there's some addiction here, but I'm not quite sure what. I'm not quite sure, like, what. What my dad's addiction here is. And there's some trauma, but we don't exactly know what because he won't address his. Like, my dad won't go to a doctor. So we don't. We don't really know. And so we're guessing, but we know there is something. Something's wrong here. Right.

[Podcast Interviewer]

And.

[Kate Russell]

Yeah, and so there's all this guessing and this, this. But bottom line, I can't fix it.

[Podcast Interviewer]

Yeah, right.

[Kate Russell]

I. I didn't cause it. I can't fix it. I wish him well. I had to extricate myself from that relationship in order to heal. I'm just poisoning myself by staying in that relationship. So I got out of the relationship with my father, you know, oh, geez, 14 plus years ago, and my mother died in 2009, and I don't have relationships with my abusers. And I. That's what I had to do, so.

[Podcast Interviewer]

Oh, I'm sure a lot of people go. No contact for that same reason.

[Kate Russell]

Yeah. And there's no anger. I'm not angry at my father. I really see him as a sick person and I do wish him well. He's very spiritually sick. Spiritually sick. You know, he had an unhappy person, and that's too bad. But that's within his power to change if he wanted to.

[Podcast Interviewer]

True. Yeah. If he would first come to terms with the fact that there's a problem that Needs to be fixed. That's. Yeah, I think a lot of times the problem. Yeah, they don't. They don't want to admit that there's something wrong with them because.

[Kate Russell]

Yeah, but who knows? I mean, we could sit here and guess all day, right?

[Podcast Interviewer]

Oh, yeah.

[Kate Russell]

I don't know. I'm not in his head. I don't know.

[Podcast Interviewer]

The brain is so complicated. It's like the ocean of the body, where most of it's not understood. It really is the center of everything. Everything. And so the fact that people don't accept the fact that childhood experiences change who you are and how your brain develops, it just drives me insane. Figuratively, I guess.

[Kate Russell]

And that's another thing is. So my. My sister. My second book's all about her. She has bipolar schizoaffective disorder. She's five years younger than me. And when I was born, my parents drank and used cocaine while pregnant with me. But just a little, right? Just testing it. Just a little. And when I came out cute and not, as they so lovingly put it, literally, they decided, oh, great, drugs and alcohol don't harm fetuses. We can use drugs and alcohol while pregnant. Great. So they did that all the time while pregnant.

[Podcast Interviewer]

Never mind what the doctors say.

[Kate Russell]

Oh, well, they didn't tell the doctors. Why would they do that? What do they know? They're liberal quacks. So they did more drugs and drank more while pregnant with my sister, and she came out developmentally disabled. Well, my dad does not believe that that is a thing. He doesn't think mental illness is a thing. He thinks my sister's just lazy. He thinks my mother's just lazy. He doesn't believe alcoholism is a disease either. He just thinks they're lazy and they lack willpower and blah, blah, blah. So, you know, that was another thing with having to cut off contact with him, is that he's like your sister. There's nothing wrong with her. She could do anything. She could get a job if she wants. She has no life skills whatsoever. The poor thing. Like right now, I. I don't talk to her because she won't take medicine when she was properly medicated. We had a good relationship. When she was on Haldol, that was the only medication that got rid of her paranoid delusions. When she's on Abilify or when she's not on medication or on, it seems, any other weird cocktail of medications, she has delusions in which she accuses me or whoever's around her of things, just things she'll say, you Drugged my food. I'm in California. Like, she's in Connecticut. Like, you sent people out to kill me. You're. It's just part of her disease. And this all started in her early 20s, but it started with weird lies. Like, oh, I wrote a song for Britney Spears, but I didn't want the fame. And I talked to her caseworker and be like, she just lies all the time. She's like, no, no, this is her disease. This is what she believes. I was like, oh, okay. Well, they could never get the medication right. Finally they did. She didn't want to stay on it because it made her dull, so she got off it. Now she's on nothing. And so anytime I would call her, we could have like a one minute conversation of normalcy, then she would accuse me of something. So I can't. I can't have that.

[Podcast Interviewer]

No, you have to protect your mental health and everything else.

[Kate Russell]

Yeah. Anyway. But my father says there's nothing wrong with her. So even though she's in and out of institutions, even though she's a ward of the state of Connecticut and she's on Social Security disability and they pay her bills and they. Section 8 housing and they. But anyway, nope, nope. She's just mooching off the system and living off his dime. And she's just lazy. She's just lazy, just like her mother. So, yeah, I can't. None of this. This is all toxic. I can't have this. So.

[Podcast Interviewer]

So it is a lot. You definitely have learned a lot and seen a lot more than many people ever do, thank goodness. The book obviously shows how abuse influences the smallest of life choices. It affects everything into your future and who you become. Like we were saying, when did you kind of recognize that the abuse is what was feeding into your adult life or who you became into adulthood?

[Kate Russell]

I'm still realizing it. Recently I realized, you know what? I don't have feelings.

[Podcast Interviewer]

Oh, wow.

[Kate Russell]

I. I'm 46 years old. I just realized I don't know my feelings at all. And I realized this because my boyfriend and I of 14 years broke up. We're still friends. It's okay. But we were breaking up. He was crying, and I said, I really admire your ability to have feelings in the moment. I think I'll have mine later. I was frozen, like I couldn't access any feelings. I just was there. I'm used to having feelings when they won't inconvenience someone having them later. I don't have feelings in the moment. This is what happened. This is what I can tell you. So I went home, and I was like, I'm going to sit with my journal, and I'm going to think about how I feel. I'm going to write. Write out how I feel. And I was like, how do I feel? And I thought about how he felt, and I thought about him crying, and I felt guilty, and I felt bad, and I thought, I feel bad that I hurt him. And all of my thoughts were about him and how he felt and how I felt in relation to how he felt and how I felt that I made him feel. Do you know what I mean? Like a codependency kind of thing. None were about me. It wasn't at all how I felt. It was how he felt and how I thought, the guilt, that kind of thing. And I didn't realize I was doing that. And when I did realize I was doing that, I was like, wait a minute. No, no, no. How. How do I feel? And when I finally got to how. And I was like, no, no, Kate, how do you feel? Well, I'm. I'm sad. And when I identified that sadness, which was buried so deep, I started to cry. But it was buried so deep. And when I started to cry, thank God I started to cry, because then the floodgates opened and I really started to have those feelings. And I thank God because they needed to come out, but they were buried so deep. And I called a handful of friends that I wanted to cry to that I felt would hear me and would listen and be there for me. And I had a lovely day of crying on the phone with some beautiful, close friends that really just listened and were there for me. And it was. It was cathartic and exactly what I needed. But that feeling was so deep. And I did not know that I did that. I did not know that I didn't know my feelings, because my answer is always, well, I'm fine. I'm always fine. Because I'm a survivor. I'm fine. How are you? My job is to keep everyone okay. My job is to make sure that everyone's okay so that I don't get hit. My job is to make sure everybody's quiet so that mom and dad don't wake up and hit me.

[Podcast Interviewer]

Your job is to walk on eggshells?

[Kate Russell]

Yeah. And so I'm always fine. Don't worry about me. I'm always gonna be fine. I don't know how I feel. What do you mean, how do I feel? I'm fine. And that's still how I am. But to actually get to how I felt. That took so much unpeeling. It was so hard to identify. And even now that was one day of grief that I had. That's the only time I've, I've grieved. And that was, I would say seven weeks ago. I haven't felt that again. And I feel like I don't think that's enough grief for, you know, the ending of a 14 year relationship. I think there's more to be done but I can't just access that. I don't know. I. But I've been, been thinking that and feeling that. And I actually started going to Al Anon because I was like, I think I need to start working that. I've been sober myself. I've been in, you know, 12 step programs but not Al Anon for 14 years. And so I've done step work but never in an Al Anon fashion. Never regarding, you know, being a child of addicts. So I want to start doing step work like that. Recognizing growing up with addict parents and looking at things from that perspective, doing the steps from that perspective, from the.

[Podcast Interviewer]

Little kids perspective, you kind of learn to not evolve past it but sort of grow a shell around it.

[Kate Russell]

Oh yeah. Yeah.

[Podcast Host Laine]

Time for another quick sponsor break.

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[Podcast Host]

I've got Dan Morgan here on the pod. Say hi Dan.

[Dan Morgan]

Hey, how's it going today?

[Podcast Host]

It's going good, man. Tell us who you are and what you do.

[Dan Morgan]

I'm Dan Morgan. I'm an attorney and a managing partner at Morgan and Morgan, which is America's largest injury law firm.

[Podcast Host]

That's pretty awesome. I think I saw a billboard of yours recently that said 20 billion won. 20 billion is an insane number.

[Dan Morgan]

Yeah, 20 billion recovered. It's actually I think somewhere north, probably closer to 22, 23 after this year. And each year we get bigger and badder and our army grows. So the, the number will hopefully keep getting bigger and bigger as time goes on.

[Podcast Host]

Awesome. So how does someone get in contact with Morgan and Morgan. What would I do if I got into an accident?

[Dan Morgan]

Probably the easiest way is dialing pound law. That's £529 from your cell phone. We are always open. Our call center is always waiting to take your call. 247 365.

[Podcast Interviewer]

Wow.

[Podcast Host]

Dan Morgan from Morgan and Morgan, America's largest injury law firm. Thanks for coming by the show.

[Dan Morgan]

Thanks for having me. Visit forthepeople.com for an office near you.

[Podcast Interviewer]

How do you think that that performance of happiness shaped your adult relationships and even your career path?

[Kate Russell]

I am someone who never says no. I don't know how. I don't have boundaries. I don't know what they are. I will say yes to anyone. As long as you're happy, that's all that matters.

[Podcast Interviewer]

To your detriment or not.

[Kate Russell]

I'm a people pleaser and I don't know that I'm doing it until everything's clear in the rearview mirror. I don't know that I'm doing it when I'm doing it. I know it later. Because I can sit here and tell you that I do that. And I could currently be doing that and not know that I'm doing that.

[Podcast Interviewer]

Yeah, exactly.

[Kate Russell]

But I can tell you in the past when I've done it.

[Podcast Interviewer]

Yeah, you're self aware. It's just at the time, it's really hard to see past your survival instinct right there.

[Kate Russell]

Yeah. Because in the moment, I don't know I'm doing it. I know later on I can look back and go, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh.

[Podcast Interviewer]

Yeah, exactly.

[Kate Russell]

You know?

[Podcast Interviewer]

Yeah, write that down for next time.

[Kate Russell]

And then, and then next time comes and you're like, oh, I didn't. How did I, I didn't even know. I'm so smart. How did I do that? It's insidious, this silly brain and all these coping mechanisms. That's what I mean. Like the brain is smarter than me.

[Podcast Interviewer]

I, I feel that on a cellular level, I think. But yes. Yeah, you, you don't realize what your brain's doing until well after the fact. And, and if you can recognize it afterward, that's great. A lot of people don't. I think that's part of how you've grown and become a successful person where some people don't do that.

[Kate Russell]

Oh, thank you.

[Podcast Interviewer]

Yeah. I mean, you've done a lot. You've. Writing three books is nothing to laugh at. It's massive. That's a huge undertaking and putting so much of yourself into it and your background and the real events that happen to you? That's really impressive. So I really do hope that people will read it and give it a chance, even if it's, oh, this might be too hard for me to read. Well, I think they should try anyway. If they're listening to my show, it's not.

[Kate Russell]

Oh, yeah. If they let. If they're listening to your show. Nah. This will be fun for you.

[Podcast Interviewer]

Oh, my gosh, I hope not.

[Kate Russell]

It's weird to say fun, but what are we doing here, I think, on Earth, if not to get to the truth of things? I think we're here to grow. We're here on this earth to grow. And that does mean looking at the truth. That does mean looking at things that are hard to look at and working through them. So what? That it's difficult to look at. At. We're brave that we're looking at it and working through it and moving forward because we're going to be better for it. Our souls are going to be richer. And I just think that's our purpose on Earth.

[Podcast Interviewer]

And I think hearing things that are that difficult and, you know, the stories I tell. I always say that if the kids can endure that, then we can listen to it. Because if we don't, then we don't know those things are going on behind the scenes. We wouldn't know what was going on with you when you were a child. I can't imagine how many people surrounded you that had no idea what you were living with.

[Kate Russell]

People like to deny. Too true.

[Podcast Interviewer]

Especially people who are close to the abusers themselves.

[Kate Russell]

Oh, yeah.

[Podcast Interviewer]

Do you have any relationship with extended family or they kind of. Were they on your parents? I don't want to say side, but.

[Kate Russell]

I don't have a lot of extended family. My parents are both only children. But there's people that have been close to our family, friends of the family that I am still in touch with, that we've known for a long time and who have read my books, who know my family. And I'm glad. I'm glad they read my books because they were there to some degree during all this. And it's like I just am glad to still have a relationship with them, that they know the truth, that it's like they can now see me as an adult.

[Podcast Interviewer]

It's got to feel validating.

[Kate Russell]

Yeah. This might explain some things.

[Podcast Interviewer]

Right exactly now, you know.

[Kate Russell]

Yeah. If I seemed a little depressed around this time, this might explain that. Yeah.

[Podcast Interviewer]

How did they take it when they read it? Did they have a hard time processing it, do you think?

[Kate Russell]

My Yeesh. Yeah.

[Podcast Interviewer]

No hard questions.

[Kate Russell]

I said, yeah, I think that I. I got a lot of just sympathy.

[Podcast Interviewer]

At least we are living in that kind of a time where people are starting to understand more and deny less, which is good. You know, that's why I think a lot of people are able to come out with these stories now. I can't imagine if you had tried to tell anyone the story even 20 years ago.

[Kate Russell]

Yeah.

[Podcast Interviewer]

It would have been nearly impossible to get people to sit down and listen or even, you know, admit that. Okay. These things do happen.

[Kate Russell]

Yeah. It's not like I ever hid anything. I always was very vocal about, hi, things are bad over here. Take me out of my home. Like, I called dcf. People didn't listen. Denial was so big. But now as an adult, and now in this day and age, people do listen. And so it's nice to be heard. Because I wasn't heard as a little kid. It's like, no, you're fine. No, everything's fine now. It's like, oh, okay. Oh, geez, I'm sorry. I didn't listen.

[Podcast Interviewer]

You know, that's why children have to feel so powerless. Because even if they do open their mouth, half the time they're told, no, you're imagining it, or.

[Kate Russell]

Yeah, or it's not as bad as you're saying. You're just a kid. You don't know.

[Podcast Interviewer]

It's just discipline.

[Kate Russell]

Yeah. You have no idea.

[Podcast Interviewer]

No. And then you put it into such well written words and terms when you're an adult that no one can refute it. And it's almost like, well, it is. It's art. All art comes from pain, including books and memoirs. And so I think that's why it's so gripping, because of the way that you worded it and you made it feel very real for people who didn't experience it.

[Kate Russell]

Cool. Thank you.

[Podcast Interviewer]

Oh, you're welcome. What do you hope that other survivors, particularly will take away from the story?

[Kate Russell]

Just a sense of they're not alone. I. I always just want people to feel a little less alone. That's when I was a little kid and I was being abused, and I knew I was gonna write a book. I just knew if this is happening to me, this is happening to other people, and people need to know that they're not alone. And that's just. That's what healing is. You know, they say in recovery, the opposite of addiction is connection. I think the opposite of trauma is connection. I think healing is connection. If we're all standing in a circle holding hands, we're healing. The more we know somebody else is in our boat, the more we heal. Like for trauma survivors, the more people in our boat, the stronger we are.

[Podcast Interviewer]

Exactly. Yeah. What would you hope that then people who hadn't been through it would take from it?

[Kate Russell]

Well, I think there is a tendency to ostracize people and that needs to go away. That sense of like, gaslighting, like, oh, that, that's weird. Gross. That's horrible. I see that. A lot of judgment. You know, I didn't choose to be abused. You're not better than me because you weren't abused. So deepen your empathy.

[Podcast Interviewer]

Some people know the term, others don't.

[Kate Russell]

Yeah. So any sense of judgment needs to go away. If you, if, if you don't have empathy, you need to learn what it is. I don't know.

[Podcast Interviewer]

I think that's an excellent takeaway. It applies to so many areas of life these days, but. Yeah, that. Just try to understand what people have been through rather than judge them for it.

[Kate Russell]

Yeah.

[Podcast Interviewer]

If you could go back and, and talk to your child self, what would you tell her? I can only imagine. I mean, if we could all do such a thing, but you in particular, knowing what you know now, what would you say to her?

[Kate Russell]

Well, I would reassure her. I think I did such a good job of being a parent to myself when I was little because I had this very strong God sense, this very strong God voice. But I would, But I would reassure my little. Because I didn't know, you know, that it was, that it was all going to be okay. I had a sense that it was going to be okay. I did have this voice saying, this will pay off. It will be. But I would just reassure it. No, it really will be okay. And you, you will write a book about it. It will. It really is temporary. Everything is going to be okay. It is.

[Podcast Interviewer]

And it all feels so much more eternal and infinite when you're small and you have so few years behind you that each one feels like an eternity. So, yeah, that. I think that would be a huge help being able to hear when you're a child, it's okay. And you're going to get through it.

[Kate Russell]

When my sister was born, I'm five years old and she's an infant, and I'm, I'm, you know, like having to care for her. And it's like when you're 18, you can leave and I'm like 18, that's so many years from now. But it's like in the grand scheme of things, it isn't like it seems like a lot of time from now now but it's not. One day it'll seem so far behind you.

[Podcast Interviewer]

Yes, exactly. With the whole time being relative thing and each year failing faster as you get older. It's, it's really. I can't imagine how to explain that to someone who's young and really make them understand it. But yeah, that's it.

[Podcast Host Laine]

Now time for one last sponsor break.

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[Podcast Host]

I've got Dan Morgan here on the pod. Say hi Dan.

[Kate Russell]

Hey.

[Dan Morgan]

How's it going today?

[Podcast Host]

It's going good man. Tell us who you are and what you do.

[Dan Morgan]

I'm Dan Morgan. I'm an attorney and a managing partner at Morgan and Morgan which is America's largest and law firm.

[Podcast Host]

That's pretty awesome. I think I saw a billboard of yours recently that said 20 billion one 20 billion is an insane number.

[Dan Morgan]

Yeah, 20 billion recovered. It's actually I think somewhere north. Probably closer to 2223 after this year. And each year we get bigger and badder and our army grows. So the number will hopefully keep getting bigger and bigger as time goes on.

[Podcast Host]

Awesome. So how does someone get in contact with Morgan and Morgan, what would I do if I got into an accident?

[Dan Morgan]

Probably the easiest way is dialing pound law. That's £529 from your cell phone. We are always open. Our call center is always waiting to take your call. 247365 wow.

[Podcast Host]

Dan Morgan from Morgan and Morgan, America's large injury law firm. Thanks for coming by the show.

[Dan Morgan]

Thanks for having me. Visit forthepeople.com for an office near you.

[Podcast Interviewer]

What advice would you have for kids who are living through things like this?

[Kate Russell]

It is temporary. Everything is going to be okay. You are going to be stronger for the pain that you endure. God is real. Every little mountain that you overcome will make you stronger. Just know that and just I say go towards good because we can make. I could have made all these bad choices like my mother chose to go down the path. You know she chose drugs and I mean, I did too, I guess eventually. Well, temporarily, I guess I did too. But I did. But then I chose recovery and go down the path of good, go towards God and everything will be okay. If you're putting one foot in front of the other and going in the right direction, then everything will be okay. Even if it doesn't go exactly the way you plan, which it won't. It will be okay.

[Podcast Interviewer]

Yeah, it never does, but exactly.

[Kate Russell]

Yeah.

[Podcast Interviewer]

What do you plan on doing next? I mean, you've written your trilogy. Is that it for memoirs or what do you see next?

[Kate Russell]

I don't know. I'm just promoting these books right now. I'm going to a International Violence and Trauma summit next week in San Diego with these books. And then in the beginning of September, I'm going to a child welfare conference in Sacramento, which is people who are going to be working in child welfare. So, you know, DCFS and stuff like that. It's training conference, but I'll be there with my books and with other authors and their seminars and etc. So I'm really just like promoting these books. I don't know, writing wise, what's going to be next.

[Podcast Interviewer]

That's a great idea that someone like you and other authors would be there to talk to them so that they know what the examples are, what the experience is really like. So they can kind of see it from your perspective.

[Kate Russell]

Yeah, that's part of. You know, I called DCFS many times and said, come take me out of this house. And they came once and they decided everything was fine because we didn't fit the profile of who should be taken out of their homes. And so we weren't, we were just told everything was fine. And, you know, and I just want that looked at because don't judge a book by its cover. We were overlooked. So.

[Podcast Interviewer]

Yes, very. Yeah. Did they show up once and you called all of them?

[Kate Russell]

Oh, I called many times. Crying. Yeah, I was constantly, never in class in sixth grade. I was going to the principal's office because that's when it was like super, super bad. I mean, it was super bad all the time. But I was leaving class in sixth grade, constantly going to the principal's office, crying, being like, call dcfs. Call dcfs. And they. And they only showed up once and they said no. And my mother didn't even lie. My mother said, she was like, I do hit them. They deserve it. She didn't even lie.

[Podcast Interviewer]

Do you think the principal called?

[Kate Russell]

Yeah, no, she. No, they did. I was there. Wow.

[Podcast Interviewer]

It's Incredible. It's such a huge failure that. Well, I mean, I'm familiar with, unfortunately, the failures. You know, some of them are very, very bad. But that is. That's why these things happen. That's why I'm doing what I'm doing. Because DCYF or DCFS or whatever they're called in the state, they do. They fail. They just don't listen. And that's the problem.

[Kate Russell]

Yeah.

[Podcast Interviewer]

Unbelievable.

[Kate Russell]

I think I looked like a whiny little spoiled brat, because I'm. I'm a pretty little blonde white girl, and. And we live in a. In a big house. It's not a nice big house, but it's a big house. You know, it's my grandmother's house, and my dad rented it, so. So we don't even own the house. It's my. It's my grandmother's house, you know, like. But it has a big backyard. But it's my grandmother's backyard. You know, we don't fit the picture.

[Podcast Interviewer]

Yeah.

[Kate Russell]

We don't fit the. My dad has a job. Right. You know, we live literally down the street from one set of two projects. We live in a poorer town, but we're not the poorer people in the poorer town, you know, at least not on paper. So we're being looked over, but we are being beaten on a daily basis.

[Podcast Interviewer]

Yeah. And your mother admitted to it. I mean, that's just.

[Kate Russell]

And she admitted it, but we're. We're white, and my dad has a good job. And I'm sorry, but that's exactly what happened.

[Podcast Interviewer]

Yeah.

[Kate Russell]

So I'm just gonna go ahead and just tell you all that here at this child welfare conference. You need to not judge a book by its cover.

[Podcast Interviewer]

And listen to the kids. I mean, listen to what they are saying.

[Kate Russell]

Yeah. Nobody listened to us. I called the cops when my mom was beating me, and they came and they were just like, well, can you go somewhere for the night? And. And, like, my aunt. Well, she's not my aunt. She's my. Again, like, friends of the family kind of thing. She didn't want to take us. She was like, ugh. You know? And she finally came and got us, and, like, nothing happened. My mom didn't get arrested for hitting us. Nothing. My mom wrote a journal, this big diary that said that me and my dad were having a consensual sexual affair. And the cops just rolled their eyes. My mom was drunk off her ass. Nothing happened. Nothing. We were sent right back there the next night.

[Podcast Interviewer]

Wow. They treated it like a domestic situation.

[Kate Russell]

Just a Little tiff between a mother and. My mother's crazy. This is happening nightly. She's beating me. She's writing fake diaries. She's drunk off her ass every night. This is all the time. And this is just the one night I happen to get to the phone to dial 911 and nothing is happening.

[Podcast Interviewer]

It's just a field of red flags and no one is paying attention. It's crazy.

[Kate Russell]

Insane. So I'm here to shine lights on things that need illuminating.

[Podcast Interviewer]

And you do it so well. And thank you for letting me read it. I mean it, really.

[Kate Russell]

No, thank you for reading it.

[Podcast Interviewer]

Oh, of course. I think that your books, not just the one, all three, I think, could be life changing. And not just for people who have been through it, but for people who haven't. So I think that's very important.

[Kate Russell]

It's just one of those things that, like, I was raised in the 80s and it was normalized because, quote, unquote, everybody got hit.

[Podcast Interviewer]

Right.

[Kate Russell]

And so it was treated as normal, but it's not normal. It affects the brain, it affects our thinking, our thought patterns. And look around now. Who do we see on the streets, living in tent cities? People my age. Who's on meth?

[Podcast Interviewer]

Yeah.

[Kate Russell]

Who's homeless, jobless, and unmet? People in their 40s.

[Podcast Interviewer]

Yeah.

[Kate Russell]

Right. Okay, great. What do they have in common?

[Podcast Interviewer]

Yes.

[Kate Russell]

Can we just, like, think and talk a little bit? Okay.

[Podcast Interviewer]

So many studies have to be done. I mean, a lot more work, I think, has to go into a whole lot of area in this particular regard. But I think that this is a great way for you to contribute, and you've. You've done such a great job of it that I can't recommend enough that people read these books.

[Kate Russell]

Thank you. I think they're pretty good. Yeah.

[Podcast Interviewer]

Well, that's good. I'm glad you're happy with them. That's step one. Right.

[Kate Russell]

And they're. They're available in audiobook and in Kindle as well. Yeah. People tend to listen to books nowadays. They don't. They don't like to read so much, but.

[Podcast Interviewer]

So that's for sure. Yeah. I don't have time to read, but I do listen to podcasts and stuff.

[Kate Russell]

Like that, so we spend a lot of time in the car, so.

[Podcast Interviewer]

Oh, my gosh. Yes. Yep. Exactly. So where can they find your audiobooks and your print books?

[Kate Russell]

Amazon, Audible. And if you go to Amazon, you can get the Audible book, you can get the Kindle, you can get the paperback.

[Podcast Interviewer]

Okay, perfect. All right, well, I'll include the link so that they can get to it easily from the show notes in this episode. And thank you again for talking with me. I think this is a really valuable topic. Speaking to someone who's been through it all really gives you a lot of perspective on what happens and what's going on every single day that kids don't talk about or even if they do like you saw, no one listens. So thank you for telling your truth and sharing it with all of us.

[Kate Russell]

Oh thank you. Thank you so much for having me. I appreciate it so much.

[Podcast Host Laine]

Huge thanks to Kate for sharing her story with us in such a detailed, unfiltered way. I highly recommend checking out her three part memoir series Portrait of a Dysfunctional Family, which is available on Amazon in both print and audio formats. I'll include the links in the show notes for this episode. Shout outs to my newest patrons. Thank you to Jamie M. From South Lyon, Michigan and Rhea F. From Minden, Ontario, Canada. I appreciate your support and I appreciate all my patrons because I couldn't keep this show going without them. To help support the show, you can visit patreon.com stlcpod that's it for this episode. Join me next time for Another Child's Story.

[Podcast Interviewer]

If you like the show, please follow or subscribe to Suffer the Little Children on Apple podcasts, Google Podcasts, YouTube, Spotify, Spreaker, Pandora, iHeartRadio, Stitcher, or your favorite podcast listening app. And please leave me a five star rating and a positive review on your favorite podcast platform. Visit the website at sufferthelittlechildrenpod.com you can support the show by visiting patreon.com stlcpod where you can become a patron for rewards ranging from a shout out by name on the show to exclusive gifts. You can also support the show at ko-fi.com stlcpod Follow the podcast on Facebook and Instagram at Suffer the Little Children pod and on TikTok tlcpod. View photos Related to today's episode on Facebook. This podcast is researched, written, hosted, edited and produced by Lane Intro. Theme music is by Dream Note Music and all music for the show is licensed from audiojungle.net for more information about preventing or reporting Child Abuse, visit childhelp.org or call your area's Child Abuse Hotline. And remember, if you see something, say something.

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