A Child Called It: One Child's Courage to Survive

I have put off reading this book for years. I just knew that it would be a book that just completely guts you and leaves you heartbroken. I wasn't wrong.

This is a story about David, a little boy who endured the worst kind of abuse throughout his childhood at the hands of his mother. She starved him, beat him, burned him, made him drink chemicals, tried to make him eat literal shit...this bitch was majorly fucked up. He was 1 of 5 children and while his other brothers were treated like kings, he was, in the words of this book, treated as the family slave.

This was a very short book that I read within just a couple of hours. To say that I enjoyed it would be a lie, but it did open my eyes to how bad abuse can be. I do wish that he would have included more of the story. It left me with a few unanswered questions. I want to know why his mother turned on him so quickly and violently. I believe that she may have some sort of mental disability that worsened with her alcoholism. In the beginning, she seemed like the best mother that any child could want, why did she single him out and hate him so much? Since I very much intend on reading the next book, hopefully my questions will be answered.

After doing a bit of research on the author, I realized that this book has gotten a lot of hate. I see that some people believe that he lied about his childhood, or exaggerated the truth. Well, I refuse to be a part of that. In a certain part of this story, his mother called him an It. (Hence the name of the book.) She didn't even see her son as a human being, just a worthless thing. So, forgive me but I WILL NOT take his story away from him. If I did, I would be a part of the problem. Even if he did fabricate some of the story, at least it brought child abuse into a new light. So many people live their day to day lives not knowing how fucking horrible someone else's life has been. Or, they think that child abuse is just a child being beaten, when in reality it can get so much worse.

I recommend this book not because it's good, it's a truly heartbreaking story. But, I recommend this book because I feel that everyone should know what can happen behind closed doors and some of the signs to look for with an abused child.