Stanley's Coat

When people called my father crazy, they weren’t joking. Were a psychiatrist to assess him now, I think they would diagnose my father with a personality disorder, an illness that went untreated all his life. The result of this for me was a childhood dominated with physical violence, ridicule, tears, and a life of misery. I was born in Orkney, Scotland, in 1956, the eldest of seven children. I was brought up suffering physical and mental abuse by a violent father who never acknowledged me as a son. A childhood lived in fear and humiliation at the hands of a man who was capable of vile and sadistic acts. This is the true story of a childhood lost, and the struggles to overcome the mental anguish inflicted on me throughout my young life.