Beth

Where do I start?

First time I remember it happening I was around five. My Mom and Grandma and older sister went Christmas shopping and left me with him. I was laying in my mom’s bed watching tv when I heard him coming. I know that it had to have happened before because I remember thinking, “If I can just curl up in a ball he can’t touch me and he’ll go away.” Well it didn’t work. He came in and started touching me through my clothes, then made me take my clothes off.

Sometimes he would just touch me. Other times he would perform oral sex on me or make me do oral sex on him. Once I got older, he would rape me.

I lived with the shame and fear for eight years that I can think of. I never said anything to my mom because I didn’t think she would believe me. How many grandfathers molest and rape their granddaughters? There were times when I didn’t think I could take anymore of it and I just wanted to run away. I didn’t want anyone to ever find out. What if they thought I didn’t say anything because I liked it? I didn’t want any of my friends or family to label me as a sick freak and blame me.

Finally when I was 13 I had a friend that I could tell anything to. And I had a boyfriend that I knew would stand beside me no matter what. So I told my best friend and told my boyfriend in a letter. I asked them not to tell anyone else. But neither of them listened. I thank them everyday for not listening.

I was called into the office at school where they asked me about what I had told them. I broke down in tears and told them everything. It was such a relief. No one thought I was sick. No one blamed me at all. The police took my statement and he was arrested that night. My family didn’t believe me until four years later when he was critcally ill and thought he was dying. Then he confessed.

Now I’m 24 years old. I still struggle with the feelings that I have over the whole situation. I hope that one day I will be able to accept what happened and move on, but I won’t know until that day comes.

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33 Comments | January 4, 2012 | Filed Under rape, sexual abuse, survivor story

Charlotte

Maybe it was being the youngest? Maybe it was growing up with a workaholic father and a narcissistic mother? Maybe it was having siblings who didn’t want to spend time with me? Are these the aspects of my childhood that painted a target on my head? I will never know who or what planted the needy seed within my six-year-old heart, but it was there. My aunt saw the tiny seedling desperate for love and attention, and she decided to help tend my garden.

Of course, I am painting the picture as bright and happy because that is how it began for me. My heart sang songs of joy that an adult would take so much interest in me. We chatted about crafts because I was a creator. My mother tells stories about the piles of artwork and crafts that she tossed into the garbage because I made so much it caused a storage problem. Before I knew it, my aunt was making pom-pom bears and potholders with me. She showered my plant with the attention is so desperately craved. This is how she slowing began to poison my soul.

The moment she realized my defenses were down and the trust bond was strong enough. She pounced. It was a family gathering. The floor was covered in children playing surrounded by chairs of adults jabbering on about the world. My aunt was not talking to anyone. She sat alone watching the children. I felt so special when she asked me to sit in her lap. It was like Charlie finding the golden ticket. Only my golden ticket came with a price. I remember thinking how cool it was to be sitting in the circle of adults. As I watched my siblings and cousins playing, it happened. Her hand slowing snaked into my flowered panties to find a cavern I didn’t even know I had. My heart stopped as I felt her fingers probing me. She must have felt my response because she whispered into my ear that it was okay. When she was finished with me, she patted me on the bottom and sent me back to the floor, but somehow I no longer belonged there.

I would love to say that this is where it all stopped, and she had her fill. Unfortunately, I can’t. My aunt lured me into her room many times with crafts and the promise to fulfill my yearning for attention. The crafts would not last long before my aunt would begin to explore my caverns further with her own body and/or foreign objects. When she forced me to explore her body, the “ick” feeling that I had been ignoring was screaming. There was no ignoring it anymore.

My new mission became slipping out of her grip that felt like a vice. My aunt knew that something had changed. I would jump through childhood hoops to avoid any moment that might mean I would find myself alone with her. Eventually, she stopped trying, but she continued to call me her “special girl” and give me inappropriately tight hugs whenever possible.

Was it puberty? Was it my exploration with masturbation? Was it my blooming interest in both sexes? Who knows what aspects of my life illuminated the past, but when I was 13 years old, the memories of what happened that I had brushed off for so long surfaced. I said to myself for the first time that I was sexually abused.

I told a few of my closest friends. Some of them shared their own stories with me, but no one really “got me”. I was the ignored statistic. The female sexually abused by a female. The media likes to pretend that men are the only perpetrators, but that is such a lie. As I was blossoming into a woman, I struggled with defining what womanhood meant because the woman I had been closest to in my life was a monster. How could I hate her and not hate myself? I felt so alone. It took years for me to realize that womanhood is defined by your heart.

My soul moves me to share my story today, so other girls, women, boys and men are not the forgotten statistic. You are not alone! I also want parents to read this and know that women can be abusers, too.

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23 Comments | December 27, 2011 | Filed Under sexual abuse, survivor story

Anonymous

I can’t remember a time when he was nice to me. It was always more than a big brother picking on a little sister. I had that with my oldest brother. I knew what that felt like. It didn’t hurt and leave physical and emotional reminders.

He would look at me with pure hatred in his eyes. You’re so ugly. You’re so fat. You are stupid, why do you even do that?

I was told these things on a daily basis. Told how stupid I was, ugly, fat, how no one would ever love me. Told that the only thing I would be good for is my big mouth pleasing one of his friends. It scared me.

I am 13 and on the phone with a friend. We are giggling and making plans for meeting up with boys later in the day. He storms in and tells me to get off the phone, he needs it. I tell him to wait a minute. The mere act of me telling him to wait sets him off. Before I know it, the phone is ripped from the wall and thrown at my face.

We are driving home from school. His license has been suspended (again) so I am driving. He is mad that I am driving. He sees my Led Zepplin tape and asks where I got it. I sense I am on thin ice here, he is going to blow at any moment. I tell him my friend gave it to me. He sneers at me, throws the tape out the window of the moving car and tells me to stop being such a Poser.

Our parents are out of town for a week and it is just the two of us in the house. Our youngest brother has been sent to stay with some friends. I wish I had been too. Or that my parents would have taken me with them.

He throws a party and I lock myself in my bedroom. The doorknob rattles and a couple tries to come in. They are drunk and most likely high. I tell them to leave and they do. I breathe a sigh of relief and turn my music up higher. I need to go to the bathroom but don’t want to leave. I go to my parent’s room to use theirs. I walk in and there he is, on top of his girlfriend, having sex. It is the first time I see it and is an image burned into my 15 year old brain. I stumble over my words and run to my room in fear. I know that I will pay for that innocent mistake.

My brother was the worst thing that ever happened to me. Telling me daily I was worthless, ugly, dumb, not worth the air I breathe. I lived in fear of him. For as long as I can remember, I have lived in fear of the repercussions of telling my story.

My Mother knew. Her guilt did not allow her to do anything about it. She turned her eye so as not to see what he was doing to me. It was the family secret and still is. No one but he and I knew the abuse he doled out on a daily basis.

I am 34 and am still ashamed that I let it happen. Ashamed that I let it continue. Ashamed that I have let it have such an impact on my life.

He is now married with three daughters. My heart aches for those girls. I fear what he is doing to them. I fear that he is tearing them down the way he did me. I fear that they will never know how wonderful and special they are. I fear that he will destroy them the way he tried to destroy me.

I fear that no one will be there to tell those girls that they are wonderful, special, perfect, sweet, smart, and worth so much more than they will ever know.

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20 Comments | December 23, 2011 | Filed Under domestic violence, survivor story

Anonymous

Paper
Can you take the lava
Carried in my stomach for years
I don’t want it anymore
Lava that I swallowed in his truck
because I didn’t know what else to do
Lava I tasted after he threw up
and came back to kiss me again
I didn’t know I could say no

Daddy’s enemas in the living room
Uncle playing licky licky
Daddy playing licky licky
Big coffee cow tongue on my face and laughter
Me screaming stop I hate you
Mommy’s pathetic stop…
300lb husband holding down little girl
in living room floor blocking tv

No daddy I don’t want to show you
how I kiss my boyfriend
I don’t want to kiss you
how I kiss my boyfriend
Don’t talk about me with a boyfriend
Mommy’s pathetic stop don’t tease her

Did you know that uncle’s in prison now?
He played licky licky with
one too many little girls
huh?
Wonder if the other inmates know he’s
in for child molestation
& that he used to be
a prison guard
Wonder if he’s getting his own
licky licky

Mommy eyes closed
Fingers in ears
Head shaking
la la la la
la la la la
I can’t hear you…

But that was past
I don’t carry it now
Paper does
And when it burns
again the paper listens

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39 Comments | December 21, 2011 | Filed Under sexual abuse, survivor story

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