Elizabeth
I always wanted to be invisible after that first time it happened. I wanted to watch you, but I didn’t want you to see what I was up to.
I remember sitting in my parents’ living room with my eyes shut down, while my breathing became rather shallow. I didn’t want you to hear me either.
I was always in my Sunday best – patent leather shoes with shiny buckles, poppy necklaces and frilly silly girly dresses that were held up by skinny little legs that sprung to life at the drop of a Broadway tune coming from my father’s HiFi. But now I wanted to dissolve into one of those Tom Collins drinks that made their way around at my parents’ shindigs. In between all the merriment and my father’s wit that rivaled Oscar Wilde, there he was. Some one had let the devil incarnate in.
Everybody loved him. What was not to like? His laughter was contagious, his dance moves were legendary and he could hold his liquor. But he gave up his soul a long time ago. Maybe he left it at home? What the hell did a 5-year-old know?
I did not have a shy bone in my body. I could entertain anyone at anytime. Even if they didn’t ask. I was your girl. I wish the little me could have hung out a little longer. But I understand. You had to go. You had to join the underground. Changed your name and burned your dance card. But he kept coming back and searched you out. Who let him in?
This was when adults knew everything. But they never knew this. I think my father would have killed him if he knew. But instead they shared cigarettes and war stories.
Your lap was like a portal into Hell, and I wonder how many other little girls felt pain when you pushed them down on your lap. Our big tulle and taffeta skirts hid what you did to us. Such a clever man you were.
But I had no one to tell and had no words to describe what had happened. I just knew that it hurt.
I realized if I stopped dancing, if I stayed with the other kids downstairs, if I never went near him again, then I could be safe. Funny how my 5-year-old self became the mother/father figure who saved my own life.
I stuffed that pain down inside just like I used to stuff green peas into my mashed potatoes. Thinking that this crime against my innocence would never resurface. But these memories always do. It’s all a matter of time. For the longest time I did real well in the stuff-it-and-snuff-it department.
Until I was 25.
I was living in San Francisco at the time when I was slammed against the wall with my memory, my hidden truth. My own personal earthquake had disturbed the sleeping beast and its black eye winked and welcomed me back home. It was that subtle.
I remembered what he had done to me.
I am so grateful that this sickening truth came back to me after my very anguished teen years. I can almost guarantee that I would have not survived those years.
I tried to find out if he was dead. I wanted to be afforded the opportunity to sit with him.
I was always told that I could give looks that could kill. And I would have taken a really long hard look at him.
I did find out recently that this man died in 2005. I have to say that I did not think about him that much over the years and for one very good reason – if I succumbed to what he did to me then I would have given up my power. There was no way I would allow him to take anything else from me. When I grasped that belief, I knew that although he violated my small little body, he did not get to my soul. He may have messed up some issues I had with trust, but when the right people showed up, I was able to let me defenses down. I won. He lost.
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Elizabeth writes at My View From the Edge.
Caitlyn
I was 15 when I first met him (I am 18 now). He was my boyfriend’s 45-year-old father. He seemed kind and nice and different. When my boyfriend and I broke up I was devastated. I tried to get back with my boyfriend, texted him as much as I could. I found out during the summer that he had started cutting himself. I texted his father.
Then it started. We texted day after day after day. I started to hope for a relationship, stupid as I was. One night he texted me saying all the things he wanted to do to me. I should have known it was wrong; he had a wife. I was a fool. I believed him when he told me he loved me and we agreed to meet.
I couldn’t drive yet so he had to pick me up. He gave me looks in the car ride, remarking, “God you’re beautiful.” I blushed, and he ran his hand up my neck and through my hair. I got shivers and smiled. We walked around an art exhibit and held hands. When we got back to the car I kissed his neck. He kissed me back, roughly. He pulled my hair too, to “get me to focus.” I should have stopped there. But I didn’t. Later that night he drove me to a place I didn’t know. He pulled down my pants and pulled up my shirt and just looked at me. I think I wanted it.
We met every weekend, him picking me up and me going along with it. One of the drives was different than the others. We had started talking about having sex. I was a virgin. I remember we were planning it. We drove to a construction site. He began to take my clothes off. I was naked, then I began to have second thoughts. He began to push me down on him. I said “No, wait, stop,” because it hurt. I pushed away from him and he forced me down on top of him, stop, please. When we were done I was bleeding pretty badly. He took a white handkerchief and wiped up my blood and his penis. He handed it to me; it was my virgin blood.
I felt nothing on the drive home and even asked him afterwards if it was rape. He told me it wasn’t, and that I would have regretted it if I didn’t do it.
From then on it was every weekend, having sex. At the end of every time I would cry and he would lick the tears from my eyes. I tried to tell people, because no one else knew. He told me I had to tell them I was lying. My friends stopped believing me. He gave me pot and alcohol most times to calm me down.
He would slap me around, pull my hair and tie me up. He called me beautiful. He watched me puke up all my food while he touched himself.
Six months later I left. I guess part of the reason I write this is to try to convince myself that it wasn’t my fault. I never went to the police because he has a wife and children. I didn’t want to ruin their lives. I cannot help but be mad at myself for what I did. I thought I was in love. I ask myself if it was rape, if it was my fault, if I deserved it. I still don’t know if I should hate myself for what I did.
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Jourdan
December 1 2007, I am in eighth grade. It was a hard year, I was mad at the world, cutting myself, had an eating disorder and was doing any drug I could get my hand on.
My speech and debate team was doing a tournament at the local high school and my ex-boyfriend who was a freshman in high school was helping out at the tournament. He said he wanted to catch up with me, but he wanted to do it in private so he took me to the band hallway of the high school and we sat down against the wall and started talking. It was like old times when we were dating, he made me feel safe. He put one of his headphones in my ears and we started listening to his dark depressing music. We started making out but some kid saw us so we went to find somewhere more private….this place was the handicapped stall of the girls bathroom. We started giving each other oral sex, but I had never done it before so I wasn’t aware at the time that what I was doing was actually oral sex.
He pulled my leggings down and pulled my dress up over my head. He pulled his pants and boxers down and got on top of me. I started screaming NO NO NO I don’t want to do this! He didn’t listen, I tried to fight and kick him and hit him and bite him, but I’m 4’10 and 90 pounds and he is 6’2 and 230 pounds. I screamed but we were in a pretty secluded part of the building. The rape lasted about thirty minutes and when he was done, he got up pulled his pants up and walked out. I put my clothes on and walked out to go to the award ceremony for the speech tournament. When I got to where my classmates where the teacher asked me if I was alright all I said was he took something from me, and I can’t get it back. Then I went to sit down. After the speech tournament I went to babysit for a family for four hours, then I went home and took a shower and another shower and another shower.
At school two days later the teacher had figured out what happened or what she thought had happened because Spencer ( my rapist) had bragged about having sex with me to her son. She reported it to the counselor who reported it to the police, but they didn’t report a rape….they reported unlawful sex on school property at a school sponsored event, meaning I was just as much as fault as Spencer. They called me into the office to talk to me about my punishment, but the counselor who I was very close with knew something else was up. She took me out of the room and asked me for the whole story…I looked away…She asked me if I was raped…and I just started crying. They then reported the rape to the police who made me go get a rape kit even though I washed away all the evidence and shredded the clothes I had been wearing. All they found from the rape kit was bruising and a torn hymen. I didn’t want to press charges cause I knew that Spencer was bi-polar and often went off his medicine, plus the cops said there wasn’t enough evidence for a case anyway. Spencer got suspended for six weeks .
I got pregnant because Spencer didn’t use a condom and I didn’t tell anyone in time to get the morning after pill. I miscarried at four months. I wasn’t ready for a baby, I was only fourteen and I hadn’t told my parents. After the rape they weren’t very supportive they denied it ever happened and avoided the topic at all costs. When I miscarried the school counselor took me to the emergency room not my parents. I was such a mess then any kid I had would have turned out totally screwed up, but part of me was upset when I lost my baby, I still can’t walk through the baby clothes section without crying.
I still wake up in the middle of the night from flashbacks of the rape. I miss Spencer. Not the Spencer who raped me but the Spencer I used to know who wrote me poems and gave me roses. I still feel like the rape was my fault , if only I hadn’t gone into that bathroom stall with him. I feel dirty and ashamed. When does the shame go away. When can I go a week without thinking about that day. When is December 1 going to be just another day.
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Jeni AKA Lucky Star
Let me start of by saying that there are many who think that I am brave for posting this blog. I am not brave. I am just no longer afraid. I am not that victim that I was in the past. i am not the confused, lost and shamed person that I was back then. I KNOW it was not my fault. I KNOW that I did not bring it on myself or make it happen. I did not ask for it. I did not cause it. I did not play hard to get or give them a reason to hurt me. I did nothing wrong.
I was raped when I was 15 by my boyfriend. I was raped when I was 18 by my boyfriend. I was raped when I was 21 by a man that I was on a date with. I was raped when I was 22 by my neighbor. I was raped again when I was 22 by my live in boyfriend. I was raped when I was 23 by my husband. I was raped when I was 29 by a guy I met on a dating site. It is easy to think that it can never happen to you…until it does. I was always a hopeless romantic. I always thought that I would find that happily ever after and that I would have my 2.5 kids and my house in the suburbs and my dog and my cat and my nice car and that life would be great. I never asked for any of this. I never asked to be raped.
What really gets to me is the fact that so many young and old out there, male and female, let others convince them that it IS their fault. That they DID ask for it. That they DID something to cause it. My heart breaks for those who are still victims. Those who still let these horrible events that have happened to them rule and sometimes ruin their lives.
I made a vow to myself. I will not be silent. I will not let someone who hurt me kill my voice. I will not let someone who hurt me take away my pride in who and what I am. I will not let someone else have that power over me. I hope that others will find their way to this place within themselves. To this peace that KNOWS that I am worthy of love and I am worthy of acceptance and that I love myself and accept myself. To the place inside that knows that I am a good and kind and beautiful person and I am deserving of happiness and love and light. To the place where they can say “I am a victim NO MORE!”and they can know that “I am a SURVIVOR!”.
This is my wish for anyone who has ever been sexually or otherwise assaulted, physically, verbally,mentally or emotionally abused. Get help and get out. Be a survivor. Do not let them make you a victim any longer.
If you feel that you are alone, know that you are not. I am here and I may not know you, but I love you. I love your heart and your spirit and your determination and I will be your friend. I will be your friend and I will give you my support and my help even if it is only in encouraging words.
Jeni AKA Lucky Star writes at Victim No More.
