Why this matters now - What changed for me on the 40th anniversary of the 1982 ban
What changed for me on the 40th anniversary of the 1982 ban
It was 9th November 2022. I was sitting in our office canteen and the Joe Duffy show was on in the background.
The men at the heart of the successful case against the order running Blackrock College were on the show discussing their experiences.
Shortly before November classmates from the Saint Kieran’s College Leaving Cert class of 1983 had started planning our 40th Reunion, this led to contacts with lads that I hadn’t spoken with in decades.
Something about these two experiences coming close together clicked and changed something in me, a kind of ‘The Emperor has no Clothes’ experience in respect of my school experiences. Before the 40th Reunion came into view I had unconsciously adopted the view of many of my classmates, ‘ah sure it didn’t do us any harm’. I didn’t see the connection between the physical abuse I had experienced at Saint Kieran’s College and my triggers that affected my life in subtle, unpredictable ways.
However I found it hard to account for finding myself unaccountably drawn back to the institution over the years, not really understanding why I went into the school and walked the corridors in 2009 and again in 2017. Back in 1998 I had submitted a radio play to RTE entitled 'A Family Man', I uploaded it here a couple of years ago which includes scenes where the main character experiences beatings by the school headmaster. In the noughties I was on a spiritual retreat and I spent most of the time talking about beatings by the then headmaster of my school.
Some part of me felt unable to move on. Why?
The reason the impact of physical abuse at school can last a lifetime
As someone commented to me recently ‘it’s always there in the background, it doesn’t go away’. Once you have experienced a trauma, unless it’s treated, it echoes throughout your lifetime. It has for me. Physical abuse during school years can lead to mental pain that lasts a lifetime - psychologists say that from the age of 7 to 16 are the most formative for our brain, when patterns and pathways that are laid down in the brain take hold.
The period from age 7 to adolescence is characterised by intense brain remodeling, with unused connections being pruned away and other connections strengthened. Adolescence (12-18 years) is marked by the development of more complex thinking, including abstract reasoning and the ability to consider multiple perspectives. As identified by David Jordan’s research physical abuse during school years, particularly between ages 7 to 16, can have profound and lasting effects on mental health. This period is critical for brain development, with neural pathways being established and strengthened. Trauma during this time can alter these pathways, leading to long-term psychological consequences that persist into adulthood.
“I had suppressed it in my memory and it wasn’t until I had my first grandchild that I realised something was wrong”
The predominant coping mechanism by those that experienced physical abuse at school was to bury it away, partly from shame, partly because there was nothing else they could do. However this strategy shares parallels with how the oyster seeks to protect itself from damaging grain of dirt inside their shell, no matter how many layers the oyster buries the intruder under it is always there.
Throughout my life after Saint Kieran’s I had experienced disproportionate and unpredictable reactions to certain situations (termed triggers).
As part of my therapy work in 2023 I outlined in drawings how the child I was then, experienced each incident. I found this process healing. I shared these drawings in my public post about meeting Father McEvoy.
Unravelling my triggers
I wrote about my experiences here ‘Don’t Suffer in Silence’ in the hope of helping others realise that it's never too late to avail of the help that's available. In the year following the November 2022 airing of the Blackrock boys case I worked with my therapist to start picking apart the various triggers that had dogged my life. Again in the hope that it might help others recognise behaviours which they have but can’t explain I have outlined at a high level the list below.
Trigger - Jaw clicking in cold weather or at the dentist.
Situation - When my jaw clicked it brings back memories of school.
Origin - Punches in the face from Father McEvoy when I was 12 ½ in First Year
Trigger - Feelings of numbness when I wish I felt love or warmth for people or unexpected reactions (such as hostility) to people’s kindness.
Situation - I had often experienced what psychologists term 'disassociation', a coping mechanism of the mind arising from physical abuse.
Origin - The unwritten rule amongst us students when being beaten by Father McEvoy was to never show any emotion, no matter how severe the beatings. As boys, a studied indifference to it was our way of coping with random acts of violence that we had no control over. It took a lot of mental effort and involved separating the mind and body.
Trigger - Face looking in the window
Situation - I jump whenever I perceive someone looking in a window at me, it could be in an office, home or a shop.
Origin - Before one beating my sixth sense told me I was being observed in class and as I looked up to my left I saw Father McEvoy’s face peering in the window.
Trigger - Keys thrown on a table
Situation - I became unaccountably anxious when bunches of keys were near me on tables, office desks or the bar of a pub.
Origin - To enable him to have the full swing of his arms Father McEvoy threw his bunch of keys on my desk. After the beating, as he turned to march away I saw he had left his bunch of keys on my desk. I experienced deep anxiety in that moment as I knew he would have to return to retrieve them and may as a result might give me another beating. Therefore I had the humiliation of having to pick up his keys and say “Father, your keys.”
Trigger - Being squeezed in between people at a table in a restaurant
Situation - Hypervigilance - I can’t escape easily if I am wedged in between people.
Origin - In the assaults by Father McEvoy I had to sit waiting for the beating while he made his way from the window where he had been watching the classroom unobserved, to my desk, agonising moments where I had to neutralise the natural instinct to defend myself by running or blocking his blows.
Trigger - Shrieks and shouts of kids on a flight or a bus
Situation - Muffled sounds and shrieks in enclosed/confined places (it could be children playing and shrieking on a flight to our holidays) triggered anxiety in me, an irrational feeling of being trapped and a growing, impending threat followed by a need to escape.
Origin - We had a water bomb fight against the second years in the two storey changing room facilities in third year. Father McEvoy threw the door to the stairs of the changing rooms open and as boys ran down the stairs to escape he threw punches and hitting with his leather strap at each in turn with the sound reverberating in the enclosed space as he worked his way up the stairs through the oncoming students. The blows and shrieks of our classmates as they were assaulted by Father McEvoy reverberated and echoed up to those of us trapped upstairs.
Trigger - My name being called when I am in a queue like the waiting room in my GP’s clinic
Situation - It could be at a doctor’s or parent teacher meeting appointment etc, when my name is called a shot of anxiety always crosses my stomach.
Origin - To regularise the delivery of beatings with the leather strap Fr. Mc Evoy had a traffic light contraption erected on his office door frame, when he was occupied the light on the system outside his door flashed red, it then moved to amber and green when the door was to be knocked on. As each of us students in the queue went in the light turned red, those of us waiting outside heard the beating and the student's reaction. The light then went yellow, the beaten student would exit and the light would go green for the next student to go in, present their slip and receive their punishment.
Trigger - Someone leaning over me when I am seated
Situation - I had a meeting with my solicitor. As she stood leaning over my shoulder explaining some point of law to me, I started feeling very anxious, a reaction that was completely unconnected to the situation I was in.
Origin - As I unpicked this experience in therapy, it traced back to the trauma I had experienced as a school boy observing the unmerciful beating of a classmate Peter Burns. Father McEvoy then dragged Peter up off the ground and repeated the whacking around the head of Peter until Peter fell to the ground again. To this date the incident, the large figure, out of control, dragging and standing over and repeatedly hitting the much smaller figure, can be triggered by completely unrelated situations. My mind plays tricks on me, visualising authority figures suddenly climbing over their desk and making for me to assault me, I have to shake my head to bring myself back to the reality of where I am. Equally if a boss told me 'I need to see you in my office at 3:00 p.m.' I would spend the intervening time imagining the worst!
Trigger - Hostile faces
Situation - At job interviews I often found myself on edge due to perceived hostility of the faces on the interview panel facing me.
Origin - I found that my mind experienced job interviews like a visit to Father McEvoy’s office, the process of turning up, waiting, being asked to come into a room with a large table, being in a slightly adversarial situation.
Trigger - Something associated with me possibly causing a nuisance or attracting negative attention
Situation - If I tie my dog outside a cafe and she starts barking, I start getting very anxious in case somebody bursts in and starts shouting at me for the nuisance she is causing.
Origin - When messing or horse playing in St. Kieran’s, one had to watch over your shoulder in case Father McEvoy burst in and engaged in violence.
Trigger - A hug
Situation - A good friend could come into my close personal space, give me a hug and this would involuntarily trigger an alarm response in my brain with the unconscious message to my body that it is under attack!
Origin - Each time Father McEvoy assaulted me he was up close to me, right in my personal space. Part of the brain's response to perceived threats automatically triggers a cascade of reactions in the body (the fight or flight response), primarily through the activation of the sympathetic nervous system and the hypothalamic-pituitary-adrenal (HPA) axis leading to a release of adrenaline, increased heart rate, elevated blood pressure and rapid breathing preparing the body for immediate action.
At times of impending psychologically stressful encounters (such as attending a therapy session on PTSD) I get deep, acute muscle pain in the left of my neck reflecting historical situations where my body braced my neck and head for the coming impact of expected blows and not being able to protect myself. The overall outcome of the incidents with Father McEvoy was a lifelong impact, an irrational alertness in the most orderly of settings (work, a library, a hospital) in the most respected of institutions, that extreme violence could suddenly occur out of the blue on those present.
Many people who experienced the epidemic of physical abuse that took place in Irish school are only coming to terms with it now in the 2020’s
Why this matters now is that there are many, many Irish people struggling with their own triggers. As coping mechanisms that kept them going during busy lifetimes start to no longer work they are struggling with anxiety arising from violent abuse that they experienced at school.
As people approach the end of their careers, they often have more time for reflection. This period of transition can trigger memories and emotions that were previously suppressed or ignored. The stress of maintaining a career and family life may have served as a distraction from past trauma. As these responsibilities diminish, the psychological impact of childhood abuse may resurface. As noted by David Jordan’s research, the long-term effects of childhood abuse can accumulate over time, leading to increased vulnerability to mental health issues in later life. Some individuals may not fully recognise or acknowledge the impact of their childhood experiences until later in life, when they have the emotional distance and life experience to process these events
They need to be allowed to be heard for what they went through in their school days. Every year that goes by without a State Apology for the failure of the state to protect the children in the Irish Education system is another year of denial, another year of ‘ah shure’ shame.
It needs to be confronted now to give people the opportunity to heal and move on with their lives.
“When you start shining a light into a very dark place in your mind, overwhelming fear gradually makes space for healing.”
