'You are the heroes. You are heroes everyday. For what you do, for standing up, for speaking out.'
-Brooke Souder
Sunday, September 12, 2010
Post 24
When I Dream
When I dream,
I see horrifying things.
Things you can’t imagine,
Things that make me scream.
When I dream,
I remember what was lost.
My innocence, my life.
They took from me what I can’t get back.
When I dream,
I see things that haunt me
And things that cause me to cry.
When I dream,
I remember what he took.
He took my trust
He crushed everything I had inside.
When I dream,
The things I see
Make me want to crawl out of my flesh.
I want to scream!
When I wish,
I wish it was all one bad dream.
-Kerry
When I dream,
I see horrifying things.
Things you can’t imagine,
Things that make me scream.
When I dream,
I remember what was lost.
My innocence, my life.
They took from me what I can’t get back.
When I dream,
I see things that haunt me
And things that cause me to cry.
When I dream,
I remember what he took.
He took my trust
He crushed everything I had inside.
When I dream,
The things I see
Make me want to crawl out of my flesh.
I want to scream!
When I wish,
I wish it was all one bad dream.
-Kerry
Post 23
Dating/relationships are hard due to what I've been through. There was an incident when I first went away to college and a lot of things happened to me when I was a kid as well. I've never been able to talk about what I went through as a child so I'm going to start what happened in college. Here goes...
I didn't grow up in the easiest family situation. My Dad's an alcoholic and he and Mom were always fighting. He also threw us around from time to time. When I graduated from high school, I just wanted to get away. I began college the fall of 2000 and everything started off great. I loved my dorm, my classes, my professors, went through recruitment and got into the best sorority on campus, it was just perfect. I felt happy and accepted for the first time in my life. Looking back I think: "Fucking idiot, you should have known it was too good to be true. How could you let your guard down like that?".
A few days after I accepted my sorority bid, I went to a fraternity party with some of my new "sisters". At some point, something was slipped into my drink. When the drug took effect, I was taken to a field and was raped for several hours by numerous people. I wasn't conscious the entire time but was during a lot of it. What I remember is pretty fucked up and I'm not getting into that at this point.
I actually did go to the police and went through with the rape investigation. It was a big mistake and another fucking nightmare. I went through that hell for nothing. In the end, the guys who drugged and raped me got away with it. I wound up transferring to another college.
-Anonymous
I didn't grow up in the easiest family situation. My Dad's an alcoholic and he and Mom were always fighting. He also threw us around from time to time. When I graduated from high school, I just wanted to get away. I began college the fall of 2000 and everything started off great. I loved my dorm, my classes, my professors, went through recruitment and got into the best sorority on campus, it was just perfect. I felt happy and accepted for the first time in my life. Looking back I think: "Fucking idiot, you should have known it was too good to be true. How could you let your guard down like that?".
A few days after I accepted my sorority bid, I went to a fraternity party with some of my new "sisters". At some point, something was slipped into my drink. When the drug took effect, I was taken to a field and was raped for several hours by numerous people. I wasn't conscious the entire time but was during a lot of it. What I remember is pretty fucked up and I'm not getting into that at this point.
I actually did go to the police and went through with the rape investigation. It was a big mistake and another fucking nightmare. I went through that hell for nothing. In the end, the guys who drugged and raped me got away with it. I wound up transferring to another college.
-Anonymous
Post 22
So Cold (triggering)
In the exam room
So cold…
Damn paper gown does
Not cover anything…
I wish they would
Have told me what
Was gonna happen…
Old man in white
Snapping latex gloves
He muttered and scowled
To the nurse (like I wasn’t in the room)
“not a damn thing.”
(God damn her, lying neurotic weirdo, for wasting my precious administrators and time)
“Excuse me mister? Have you found it yet?”
I asked.
“Found what?” he asked.
(My dignity of course. You seem to have forgotten that I am a real person laying here on this bed.)
“What you’re looking for.” I answer.
Standing abruptly, he dismissed me for a worthier trauma.
I am so cold…
-Kerry
In the exam room
So cold…
Damn paper gown does
Not cover anything…
I wish they would
Have told me what
Was gonna happen…
Old man in white
Snapping latex gloves
He muttered and scowled
To the nurse (like I wasn’t in the room)
“not a damn thing.”
(God damn her, lying neurotic weirdo, for wasting my precious administrators and time)
“Excuse me mister? Have you found it yet?”
I asked.
“Found what?” he asked.
(My dignity of course. You seem to have forgotten that I am a real person laying here on this bed.)
“What you’re looking for.” I answer.
Standing abruptly, he dismissed me for a worthier trauma.
I am so cold…
-Kerry
Post 21
I AM WORTHY
I no longer feel like a second class citizen or that I don't exist. It's my right to feel deserving of spiritual fulfillment, tranquility, happiness, creativity, the freedom to make choices, and, love. It is my responsibility to myself. I am a good person with faults. I am doing my personal homework. By homework I mean I've taken inventory of myself and to my surprise discovered that I'm strong, patient, intelligent and fully capable of doing things I was terrified of doing before.
I have been through more than my fair share of grief and trauma. Some of it, I brought on myself. My inability to see the truth about myself caused me to make impulsive, self defeating decisions. My actions haven't always been healthy ones, even if they started out with the best of intentions.
I am a kind person. I see nothing wrong with helping people or caring deeply. But, I have learned where to draw the line and when to realize that I am hurting myself or ignoring my own needs.
I'm learning more every day. I am becoming more aware every day. I now know that nobody has the right to tell me that I am "not worthy" or deserving, or treat me in a way as to imply that my self worth is not important.
It is.
It is necessary for my survival.
it is necessary to being a woman of strength, character and moral convictions. To be courageous enough to act on feelings you know to be true to you.
And wise enough to know when to walk away and let go.
I'm a work in progress. we all are.There is no such thing as perfection.
But, I am turning into the kind of woman and mother I was always in awe of.
I am a role model for my daughter. She will raised with these strengths and grow up to be a woman of substance.
From what I've seen so far, I am on the right path.
Nobody can block my way.
Nobody can stop me from moving forward. Only I can do that and I will not let myself.
My Spirit. My Voice. My Heart tells me, "Lisa! You are worthy.GO!!!"
Go with strength women. Love, Lisa
I no longer feel like a second class citizen or that I don't exist. It's my right to feel deserving of spiritual fulfillment, tranquility, happiness, creativity, the freedom to make choices, and, love. It is my responsibility to myself. I am a good person with faults. I am doing my personal homework. By homework I mean I've taken inventory of myself and to my surprise discovered that I'm strong, patient, intelligent and fully capable of doing things I was terrified of doing before.
I have been through more than my fair share of grief and trauma. Some of it, I brought on myself. My inability to see the truth about myself caused me to make impulsive, self defeating decisions. My actions haven't always been healthy ones, even if they started out with the best of intentions.
I am a kind person. I see nothing wrong with helping people or caring deeply. But, I have learned where to draw the line and when to realize that I am hurting myself or ignoring my own needs.
I'm learning more every day. I am becoming more aware every day. I now know that nobody has the right to tell me that I am "not worthy" or deserving, or treat me in a way as to imply that my self worth is not important.
It is.
It is necessary for my survival.
it is necessary to being a woman of strength, character and moral convictions. To be courageous enough to act on feelings you know to be true to you.
And wise enough to know when to walk away and let go.
I'm a work in progress. we all are.There is no such thing as perfection.
But, I am turning into the kind of woman and mother I was always in awe of.
I am a role model for my daughter. She will raised with these strengths and grow up to be a woman of substance.
From what I've seen so far, I am on the right path.
Nobody can block my way.
Nobody can stop me from moving forward. Only I can do that and I will not let myself.
My Spirit. My Voice. My Heart tells me, "Lisa! You are worthy.GO!!!"
Go with strength women. Love, Lisa
Post 20
I really can’t say when I started being abused; it was really as though I was born into abuse. My mom told me that my dad had admitted to molesting me when I was 18 months old. He was an alcoholic and he used this as one of his reasons to act out violently towards me. I thought the way he treated me was the way all fathers acted towards their daughters. When I was 5 years old, he told me I was pregnant, and after I bled heavily after he penetrated me with some kind of tool, he told me I killed the baby. I carried a lot of guilt for many years. I didn’t understand that physically, it was impossible for me to be pregnant. I have been in denial for many years about what he did to me. He loved me. He was my father, he would never do anything to hurt me. That was what I always told myself. It has only been recently that I have realized that what he did was wrong. A few weeks ago I found a tape that he made of the abuse. A lot of what I saw, were things that I didn’t remember, other parts of it brought a flood of memories back. A father that pours hot wax on her child’s genitals is not doing this out of love. With the help of therapy, I am beginning to see the reality to my situation. I realize that when I tried to commit suicide at the age of 5, because I was afraid of my father, clearly shows that he failed to make me feel safe and protected; a duty that all parents have. I’m moving on from what happened to me. I’m beginning to realize that I am truly a beautiful person, and I deserve to be happy. What he did does not define me. I’m currently attending University, with the goal of getting my doctorate in psychology. I truly want to help people. I believe that the experiences that I have had as a child have helped me have to have a different outlook on people around me. I am more compassionate and understanding towards people who seem just plain grumpy. Everyone has their own story, and to keep this in mind, makes it easier to love the people around you who seem angry and unhappy.
-Lindsey
-Lindsey
Post 19
All this started several months ago when I added the documentary Searching for Angela Shelton to my Netflix watch instantly queue. I work 3p-11p, my schedule sucks because I'm not ready to go to bed when I get home and the rest of the world is. So during my shift I often look for a movie to watch when I get home and somehow unintentionally I must have added this one (and obviously watched it). To say it "changed my life" or was "fate" sounds pretty melodramatic especially for me; however, I guess it kinda did or was.
It took me several days to watch the entire film, the best analogy I can give is that it was like hitting a brick wall. My first thought was: "I'm doing great now, I graduated college, have a stable job, bought my own condo, have great friends, and am basically a stable and functional person. So why bring this shit up now? It's over!" This thought still continuously crosses my mind on a daily basis. However, when being completely honest with myself, I know things are not all OK. Sure, I have great friends and a best friend who knows everything about my past and would do ANYTHING for me in an instant. The thing is that none of my close friends have been through what I have (which is a good thing, I wouldn't wish this on anyone); therefore, they can't relate to me. In fact, I haven't even talked to my best friend about this stuff in over six years because it upsets her so much. I'm not saying that she makes it about herself or anything but I can imagine it's hard to hear this stuff. You know what I mean?...
For the first time in my life I have connected with people who understand what I’ve been through. Being raised under the “suffer in silence” and “get over it and move on” philosophies, talking about what I’ve been through is a work in process. However, I know it’s a move in the right direction. My new friends totally rock. I really appreciate you all and Squish!
-Anonymous
It took me several days to watch the entire film, the best analogy I can give is that it was like hitting a brick wall. My first thought was: "I'm doing great now, I graduated college, have a stable job, bought my own condo, have great friends, and am basically a stable and functional person. So why bring this shit up now? It's over!" This thought still continuously crosses my mind on a daily basis. However, when being completely honest with myself, I know things are not all OK. Sure, I have great friends and a best friend who knows everything about my past and would do ANYTHING for me in an instant. The thing is that none of my close friends have been through what I have (which is a good thing, I wouldn't wish this on anyone); therefore, they can't relate to me. In fact, I haven't even talked to my best friend about this stuff in over six years because it upsets her so much. I'm not saying that she makes it about herself or anything but I can imagine it's hard to hear this stuff. You know what I mean?...
For the first time in my life I have connected with people who understand what I’ve been through. Being raised under the “suffer in silence” and “get over it and move on” philosophies, talking about what I’ve been through is a work in process. However, I know it’s a move in the right direction. My new friends totally rock. I really appreciate you all and Squish!
-Anonymous
Post 18
Not
Have you ever wondered what it would be like to:
not feel their breath, not feel their touch, not hear the door creep open, not hear the belt buckles, not hear the zippers, not smell their cologne, not smell their sweat, not sense fear, not sense anger, not sense loathing, not see their smiles, not see their eyes, not see them, not taste disappointment, not taste shame, not taste them. Ever wonder what innocence would be like.
-Anonymous
Have you ever wondered what it would be like to:
not feel their breath, not feel their touch, not hear the door creep open, not hear the belt buckles, not hear the zippers, not smell their cologne, not smell their sweat, not sense fear, not sense anger, not sense loathing, not see their smiles, not see their eyes, not see them, not taste disappointment, not taste shame, not taste them. Ever wonder what innocence would be like.
-Anonymous
Post 17
Evil vs. Child: The Game Less Played
Evil had come and stole me just a child,
A child that I wasn’t allowed to be.
I was no longer a child,
I was bound by secrecy,
You taught me how to play the game
I lost before I knew to participate.
I don’t wanna play.
You win.
You won.
I never played.
I hid my pain so no one knew,
A child I was not to be,
An adult I’d become before my time,
Loneliness was all I’d see
You know how to play the game, I lost before I knew how to participate
I don’t wanna play.
You win.
You won.
I never played.
Because Evil had come and stole me just a child,
A child that I wasn’t allowed to be.
Evil had come and stole me just a child,
A child that I wasn’t allowed to be.
I was no longer a child,
I was bound by secrecy,
You taught me how to play the game
I lost before I knew to participate.
I don’t wanna play.
You win.
You won.
I never played.
I hid my pain so no one knew,
A child I was not to be,
An adult I’d become before my time,
Loneliness was all I’d see
You know how to play the game, I lost before I knew how to participate
I don’t wanna play.
You win.
You won.
I never played.
Because Evil had come and stole me just a child,
A child that I wasn’t allowed to be.
Saturday, September 11, 2010
Post 16
TAKE BACK THE NIGHT
By
Suzanne E. Morse
(This poem is part of the Survivor Mural Project that will travel around the world. It is included in my Poetry Chapbook called “A Woman’s Journey From Darkness to Light.”)
Flickering light dances upon our faces.
Shadows conceal our wet tears.
Our candles burn steadily.
Hope peeks through the darkness.
Flowers – blood red, yellow, white – each a victim – fill a field.
Too numerous to count.
Words on signs tell the story of how violent and callous we are.
Faceless names etched onto golden plates disposed onto a wooden plaque.
The only reminder of the silent victims in the Night.
Who were these names that once breathed as I do?
What did they know? How did they live?
Roses embrace a glass vase. Another glimpse at the faceless names.
Purple balloons of hope drift slowly upward.
Will it matter that we “take back this night?”
I shiver in the gentle, warm air, soaking in the hideous numbers.
We chant. We march. We defy the night.
We utter the names of those we lost and lay the rose in its vase.
Noisy cars zoom past. Restaurants serve hot food on plates.
Lights gleam from distant buildings. The world evolves in its routine.
But we choose to seize this night -- to relive their Hell as if it were our own.
Then, it is done.
We release our balloons. The candlelight goes out.
We slip quietly back into the darkness.
Oh God, will it matter that we “take back this night?”
By
Suzanne E. Morse
(This poem is part of the Survivor Mural Project that will travel around the world. It is included in my Poetry Chapbook called “A Woman’s Journey From Darkness to Light.”)
Flickering light dances upon our faces.
Shadows conceal our wet tears.
Our candles burn steadily.
Hope peeks through the darkness.
Flowers – blood red, yellow, white – each a victim – fill a field.
Too numerous to count.
Words on signs tell the story of how violent and callous we are.
Faceless names etched onto golden plates disposed onto a wooden plaque.
The only reminder of the silent victims in the Night.
Who were these names that once breathed as I do?
What did they know? How did they live?
Roses embrace a glass vase. Another glimpse at the faceless names.
Purple balloons of hope drift slowly upward.
Will it matter that we “take back this night?”
I shiver in the gentle, warm air, soaking in the hideous numbers.
We chant. We march. We defy the night.
We utter the names of those we lost and lay the rose in its vase.
Noisy cars zoom past. Restaurants serve hot food on plates.
Lights gleam from distant buildings. The world evolves in its routine.
But we choose to seize this night -- to relive their Hell as if it were our own.
Then, it is done.
We release our balloons. The candlelight goes out.
We slip quietly back into the darkness.
Oh God, will it matter that we “take back this night?”
Post 15
SOUNDS
It was easy to lure the uncertain child who strives for affection and had not learned the extent of her own beauty. I was just a child.
I have never known a world without pain existing around my mind. I can feel the tenderness of my heartstrings being pulled from within. Someone else is plucking them without my permission.
The strings are silent now. I make a sanctuary out of the silence.
My nerves stand toned waiting to be plucked again.
There are knots where too many people have tried to play and the broken strings have twisted around my dreams. I am drawn down. Sinking down in the blackness of my memories.
Pain found me empty inside.
The shell that once was me is now filled with a constant pitch of pain.
I fear movement. I do not want to set the sirens off for they may draw attention.
Seeking for memories of a better place. The smell of home, of calmness, of peace escapes me.
A fragile mind crashed like a violent wave. Rushing in on itself. Silent until it was through destroying anything in its path.
There are many ways to die. There are many black holes that can suck the soul deep within.
The predators spin lies that seem like truth. They pluck at my strings until sound in inaudible.
I am vomiting memories. The darkness escapes without permission forcing me to face what happened. It is as if the entire world can see what I have worked for an eternity to hide.
Sleep without pain seems unreal. Falling asleep without thought and being able to merely exist is a dream.
I stuff everything; my pain, my sorrow, my truth as far down as I can.
With one last pluck of my strings, the enemy retreats to the far side of my heart where we cannot reach one another.
Everything is silent now. I have buried the sounds. Does anyone understand why even in silence I can hear the child scream?
-Anonymous
It was easy to lure the uncertain child who strives for affection and had not learned the extent of her own beauty. I was just a child.
I have never known a world without pain existing around my mind. I can feel the tenderness of my heartstrings being pulled from within. Someone else is plucking them without my permission.
The strings are silent now. I make a sanctuary out of the silence.
My nerves stand toned waiting to be plucked again.
There are knots where too many people have tried to play and the broken strings have twisted around my dreams. I am drawn down. Sinking down in the blackness of my memories.
Pain found me empty inside.
The shell that once was me is now filled with a constant pitch of pain.
I fear movement. I do not want to set the sirens off for they may draw attention.
Seeking for memories of a better place. The smell of home, of calmness, of peace escapes me.
A fragile mind crashed like a violent wave. Rushing in on itself. Silent until it was through destroying anything in its path.
There are many ways to die. There are many black holes that can suck the soul deep within.
The predators spin lies that seem like truth. They pluck at my strings until sound in inaudible.
I am vomiting memories. The darkness escapes without permission forcing me to face what happened. It is as if the entire world can see what I have worked for an eternity to hide.
Sleep without pain seems unreal. Falling asleep without thought and being able to merely exist is a dream.
I stuff everything; my pain, my sorrow, my truth as far down as I can.
With one last pluck of my strings, the enemy retreats to the far side of my heart where we cannot reach one another.
Everything is silent now. I have buried the sounds. Does anyone understand why even in silence I can hear the child scream?
-Anonymous
Post 14
I looked like a regular girl. My family looked like a normal family. Or, maybe it didn't. People didn't come to our house very much. And whenever I was fortunate enough to have a friend, I most always went to Her house. Friends didn't come to my house. My house was an odd and frightening place for me. I didn't understand it. I was just "there". Rolling with the punches.
I don't have much memory at all until around the age of 5 or 6. And at around this time I began my life of Survival Mode. Three choices; Confused and numb, Frightened and numb, or just plain Numb.
I experienced multiple-incest, other sexual abuse, domestic violence, psychological manipulation and control, and neglect. I learned to wear deceitful masks to hide the pain and secrets. After all, my family appeared “normal”, and they Demanded it appear 'normal'.
Controlled by fear by both parents, I pushed it all back, or down, as best I could, but I was a very sensitive child. My childhood experience was that of knowing sadness and loneliness, and of feeling “paralyzed” (emotionally and mentally). Dead in my head and heart. I was confused, couldn’t pay attention, and I struggle still, with lost time.. memory retention issues, and memory blocks.
I have struggled with low self esteem, major depressive disorders, acute social anxiety, PTSD, panic attacks, eating disorders, addiction, alcoholism, promiscuity, prostitution, and suicidal tendencies. School and work performance suffered, and relationships suffered.
For many years, I didn't understand What was happening to me, or Why I felt so sad and “crazy”. I couldn't put it all together. Couldn't make the connection that it stemmed from childhood abuses and teachings. Both parents continued to manipulate me with psychological control, even up until about this time last year! I was 50 years old by this time. I didn't know that's what they were doing. I was lost in this fog since very young, and it would be decades before tiny bits of understanding would come to me, like tiny puzzle pieces, but they came too few and too far between.
At about age 35, I found myself on a spiritual path. I didn't know that's where I was, I didn't even know What it was, or meant. Kinder souls started showing up in my “environment”, and I began to know and understand spiritual connection. A whole different world from what I had always known.
I have been learning to peel away the layers of the hardened ill-fated shell of existence, reacquainting myself with who and what I really am, and was within all along. I worked on learning healthier ways of living, learning coping techniques to try and bring things into balance. I got sober. I had to leave a relationship of 18 years where I realized I was not understood, or supported. I resolved to simplify my life. There was just way too much anxiety, pain, depression, and craziness. I couldn’t keep even the simplest things straight. It has not been easy. The world doesn’t wait, and I’m not good at catching curve-balls. My mental capacity had been diminished.
It has taken me a long time to get where I am. I am what some people refer to as a Shut-In, and have spent much of the last few years connecting with loving, caring, people across the world through the internet, and I now enjoy long time cherished relationships with people I not only call my friends, but - my Family. Then came Facebook, and last October of '09.
Mackenzie Phillips disclosed her story, a friend told me, and I began a search online. And, through Facebook, I found and joined several support groups, and have met many amazing people, and enjoy the online company of some pretty wonderful friends who lift me up with their love, strength, bravery, and encouragement, and I am now able to stand as they stand with me.
Some of it is still painful as I work through the issues, but speaking out and telling the truth is So Liberating!! And, if I can help someone else know that they are not alone just as I have been helped, well.. then I'll feel like I have accomplished something Real.
To my family of friends - Thank You! - I Am So Blessed.. And, I am Forever, So Grateful!
Namaste’
Angela
I don't have much memory at all until around the age of 5 or 6. And at around this time I began my life of Survival Mode. Three choices; Confused and numb, Frightened and numb, or just plain Numb.
I experienced multiple-incest, other sexual abuse, domestic violence, psychological manipulation and control, and neglect. I learned to wear deceitful masks to hide the pain and secrets. After all, my family appeared “normal”, and they Demanded it appear 'normal'.
Controlled by fear by both parents, I pushed it all back, or down, as best I could, but I was a very sensitive child. My childhood experience was that of knowing sadness and loneliness, and of feeling “paralyzed” (emotionally and mentally). Dead in my head and heart. I was confused, couldn’t pay attention, and I struggle still, with lost time.. memory retention issues, and memory blocks.
I have struggled with low self esteem, major depressive disorders, acute social anxiety, PTSD, panic attacks, eating disorders, addiction, alcoholism, promiscuity, prostitution, and suicidal tendencies. School and work performance suffered, and relationships suffered.
For many years, I didn't understand What was happening to me, or Why I felt so sad and “crazy”. I couldn't put it all together. Couldn't make the connection that it stemmed from childhood abuses and teachings. Both parents continued to manipulate me with psychological control, even up until about this time last year! I was 50 years old by this time. I didn't know that's what they were doing. I was lost in this fog since very young, and it would be decades before tiny bits of understanding would come to me, like tiny puzzle pieces, but they came too few and too far between.
At about age 35, I found myself on a spiritual path. I didn't know that's where I was, I didn't even know What it was, or meant. Kinder souls started showing up in my “environment”, and I began to know and understand spiritual connection. A whole different world from what I had always known.
I have been learning to peel away the layers of the hardened ill-fated shell of existence, reacquainting myself with who and what I really am, and was within all along. I worked on learning healthier ways of living, learning coping techniques to try and bring things into balance. I got sober. I had to leave a relationship of 18 years where I realized I was not understood, or supported. I resolved to simplify my life. There was just way too much anxiety, pain, depression, and craziness. I couldn’t keep even the simplest things straight. It has not been easy. The world doesn’t wait, and I’m not good at catching curve-balls. My mental capacity had been diminished.
It has taken me a long time to get where I am. I am what some people refer to as a Shut-In, and have spent much of the last few years connecting with loving, caring, people across the world through the internet, and I now enjoy long time cherished relationships with people I not only call my friends, but - my Family. Then came Facebook, and last October of '09.
Mackenzie Phillips disclosed her story, a friend told me, and I began a search online. And, through Facebook, I found and joined several support groups, and have met many amazing people, and enjoy the online company of some pretty wonderful friends who lift me up with their love, strength, bravery, and encouragement, and I am now able to stand as they stand with me.
Some of it is still painful as I work through the issues, but speaking out and telling the truth is So Liberating!! And, if I can help someone else know that they are not alone just as I have been helped, well.. then I'll feel like I have accomplished something Real.
To my family of friends - Thank You! - I Am So Blessed.. And, I am Forever, So Grateful!
Namaste’
Angela
Post 13
As a little girl I always wished my life could be like my friend Jill’s, with a mother that cooked dinner and helped her with her homework.
That wasn’t my life though. Everyday my mother and her dope friends would shoot up Heroin in the living room. I remember bringing my little sisters into my bedroom and turning the T.V. up real loud so that they couldn’t hear mom and her friends partying. When I had gotten to high school mom decided she was going to try and quit doping it up and ended up at Hall Street where the Methadone clinic is. It didn’t help though, she just ended up even more addicted to the Methadone than she was to the Heroin. She drinks it, you know, the Meth. She once said the addiction to Methadone was like liquid handcuffs, the Meth made it so that she couldn’t get high if she shot up and it shackled her back to Hall Street pulling her there every day as soon as she woke. I used to try really hard at school and when I would come home I’d clean the house and cook for my sisters, thinking if I was a good daughter it would be easier for her to stay clean. I really believed my love would be enough for her to be happy.
Mom didn’t stay clean long. Since it was harder for the Heroin to make my mother high, she’d combine alcohol and Benzos such as Xanax or Klonopin, then she’d get high just like as if she were on Heroin again.
One day I came home and opened the door. I walked into my kitchen. The trash was knocked over and all the cabinets were open. A bag of flour was busted open and thrown around the kitchen like a dusting of freshly fallen snow. I walked into my room, it was in shambles. All the contents of my dresser were thrown onto the floor and there my mother was going through my closet. I said “Mom, are you ok? What’s going on?” I was shocked and scared at the same time. I have never seen her in such a frenzy before. She was sweating and angry. She took me and shook me and pushed me up against the wall and said “where are my fucking pills, you took them, didn’t you? You wanted to know what it felt like to be high, just like Mommy.”
Then she went to the window and started throwing my stuff out. I was so scared. I just stood there and watched as my pictures and awards crashed down and splintered against the cold concrete sidewalk. Then she turned to me and said “Get the fuck outta here and never come back.” I begged her, I said “Mom, I love you and I want to help. You can’t live like this anymore.” She shoved me to the ground and stood over and said “leave before you end up like me.”
Crying, I turned around and walked away, not knowing where I was going or even if I was going to be safe. I was fifteen when I left home to go live with my friend Jill. The sad thing is I really believed I could do it. I believed that love could change an addict.
That wasn’t my life though. Everyday my mother and her dope friends would shoot up Heroin in the living room. I remember bringing my little sisters into my bedroom and turning the T.V. up real loud so that they couldn’t hear mom and her friends partying. When I had gotten to high school mom decided she was going to try and quit doping it up and ended up at Hall Street where the Methadone clinic is. It didn’t help though, she just ended up even more addicted to the Methadone than she was to the Heroin. She drinks it, you know, the Meth. She once said the addiction to Methadone was like liquid handcuffs, the Meth made it so that she couldn’t get high if she shot up and it shackled her back to Hall Street pulling her there every day as soon as she woke. I used to try really hard at school and when I would come home I’d clean the house and cook for my sisters, thinking if I was a good daughter it would be easier for her to stay clean. I really believed my love would be enough for her to be happy.
Mom didn’t stay clean long. Since it was harder for the Heroin to make my mother high, she’d combine alcohol and Benzos such as Xanax or Klonopin, then she’d get high just like as if she were on Heroin again.
One day I came home and opened the door. I walked into my kitchen. The trash was knocked over and all the cabinets were open. A bag of flour was busted open and thrown around the kitchen like a dusting of freshly fallen snow. I walked into my room, it was in shambles. All the contents of my dresser were thrown onto the floor and there my mother was going through my closet. I said “Mom, are you ok? What’s going on?” I was shocked and scared at the same time. I have never seen her in such a frenzy before. She was sweating and angry. She took me and shook me and pushed me up against the wall and said “where are my fucking pills, you took them, didn’t you? You wanted to know what it felt like to be high, just like Mommy.”
Then she went to the window and started throwing my stuff out. I was so scared. I just stood there and watched as my pictures and awards crashed down and splintered against the cold concrete sidewalk. Then she turned to me and said “Get the fuck outta here and never come back.” I begged her, I said “Mom, I love you and I want to help. You can’t live like this anymore.” She shoved me to the ground and stood over and said “leave before you end up like me.”
Crying, I turned around and walked away, not knowing where I was going or even if I was going to be safe. I was fifteen when I left home to go live with my friend Jill. The sad thing is I really believed I could do it. I believed that love could change an addict.
Post 12
There is a shadow that follows me wherever I go. She is the girl who has survived so much more than anybody should ever have to survive. It’s so hard to love her, when all I want to do is blame her; blame myself for what happened. I can’t go into detail, see, I did once and it was reported. I have to talk to social workers, detectives, and counselors.
That little girl always seems to get in the way. She covers my eyes with blindness when I least expect and jumps into my heart when I least need it. The shadow follows me everywhere, to school, to work, and home. Sometimes the sun is beaming down in the right spot and I cannot see her, but I know she’s there. That little shadow, her name is Boo. She got that name when she was 3 years old. Almost all of her family calls her that. She doesn’t really like it. It reminds her of very bad things.
When bad things would happen, Boo blamed herself. As she grew older she continued to do so. Not only was she blaming herself for her past, but things that happened in the present. Sometimes Boo really was at fault, but more often than not, she was the last person who should be blamed. Boo would beat herself up for everything. All of her thoughts were negative ones, always swearing at herself and hurting herself. Boo even tried to kill herself when things got too hard to handle. She just wanted to be happy, but couldn’t get past the pain.
Boo is Beth when I can’t stay in the present. Boo is the little girl who saved my life when bad things would happen. Boo never did anything wrong, she was just a little girl trying to survive when times got tough. It’s not Boo’s fault, and It’s not my fault. It's not your fault, I promise. You can survive, and you will. We are strong.
That little girl always seems to get in the way. She covers my eyes with blindness when I least expect and jumps into my heart when I least need it. The shadow follows me everywhere, to school, to work, and home. Sometimes the sun is beaming down in the right spot and I cannot see her, but I know she’s there. That little shadow, her name is Boo. She got that name when she was 3 years old. Almost all of her family calls her that. She doesn’t really like it. It reminds her of very bad things.
When bad things would happen, Boo blamed herself. As she grew older she continued to do so. Not only was she blaming herself for her past, but things that happened in the present. Sometimes Boo really was at fault, but more often than not, she was the last person who should be blamed. Boo would beat herself up for everything. All of her thoughts were negative ones, always swearing at herself and hurting herself. Boo even tried to kill herself when things got too hard to handle. She just wanted to be happy, but couldn’t get past the pain.
Boo is Beth when I can’t stay in the present. Boo is the little girl who saved my life when bad things would happen. Boo never did anything wrong, she was just a little girl trying to survive when times got tough. It’s not Boo’s fault, and It’s not my fault. It's not your fault, I promise. You can survive, and you will. We are strong.
Post 11
Born: August 1, female, 7 lbs 2 ozs, brown eyes
Distinctive marks: Leo, born on mother's birthday
Place in family: 5th child
On my Duffys Website page background for this I choose the picture of two people standing on the river bank because the remarkable thing is that under the tree branches from a distance it forms the outline of a baby. How fitting was that for me. Though I had been exploring and learning on my own for years, this is where I place my book mark.
This journey truly began on October 23, 1989 at the Wellness Center in Vestal, New York. There I began to see the light. It was perhaps the first time in my life that I let the world come in.
These are some notes from that day's class. The doctor who was in charged began with telling us that we where all predispose to ending up in a clinic like this if we had 2 or 3 of the following
Demographics in our lifetime.
Came from a large family I had 11 children in mine
Middle to later born I was the fifth
Less then a high school education I was out at sixteen
Parented early I had first child at nineteen
Never allowed to be a kid I have few happy memories
Model for chronic pain I have my mother
Married early I married first time at nineteen
Had kids quickly I was pregnant with first child
Abuse history I had physical and sexual
Multiple marriages I had been married three times
When he was done speaking my whole table broke out in laughter as I asked him "what happens if you have all 10"? He just looked at me and jokingly said "you get to come back for another thirty days". As he left the room that day he placed his hand knowingly on my shoulder. I had laughed when I should have cried. That was when I had the first real look at my condition and accept the first in a long list of diagnoses.
It seemed rather simple back then. It was called Posttraumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD). They could help with Cognitive Behavior Management (CBM). How simple it was. Just follow this simple plan and I'd be cured. Well, as any of us who are dissociate and had this label back then, found out that it only worked for a little while. Then the world would come crashing in again.
I have survived my childhood and my adulthood this far. My diagnoses are the only thing that seems to change. I've told the same story to each doctor who has treated me and each one claims to have the answer. I've been through all the Bi-Polar medication, the Boarder line Personality, the depression and manic stage medications of my life yet seem to be the only one willing at some point to accept myself for who I am. A great person with a dissociate tendency. If I could just get a handle on that one part of me my life might be complete. OK maybe not.
Where my life goes from here, I may not be sure. The one thing that I do know is that I have to keep going. In my life there has been set backs or stops along the way. some of them where not all that I had hoped they would be.
I've been in many relationships during my years and even though some where full of pain and sorrow, I can't really say that I would ever want my life to have been different. As a dissociate my memories have been kept in files. My bad experiences where handled by one and my happy/good memories in another. As you read my stories they may seem all doom and gloom. Remember that the happy memories remained in another story. That's how we deal with life.
Good memories we carry with us on the other side every day. It is the bad memories that we fight with every night. Many years ago I would pray for a better life. Now as I look around and listen to all the people I have met, I have come to believe that my life, though hard and sad, was so much better then other's.
I've heard from people all over the world that are dissociate and who have survived unbelievable lives compared to mine. My heart continues to go out to these people. When they write me their stories and share some of their pain with me, I can only pray that their healing come quickly for them.
Each of us is blessed who have begun this healing process. We can now share our heartaches and know that it is understood by many. I hope that some, when they come across these pages truly know that they are not alone. My stories in my sites are the first things that I was able to write about. They are just thebeginning of the stories. Slowly I hope that I will be able to write more into them. I've yet to remember the feelings of terror and hurt that I only have pictures of now.
Know that it is a process and for some of us we can never find it all. That is because as dissociate we weren't there. If that means that I never know or feel all the details then I'm ok with that. Just remember to believe in your self and know that if you find yourself crossing these pages then you are where you need to be.
Writing these stories has been a relief in it's own way. Trauma and abuse no matter what any one else will call it, causes this to happen to us. Being born with the tendency as they say or chemical imbalance (and I do believe this) causes us to experience our lives differently then others.
I come from a large family and none of them seem to have been affected by living in this unit as I was. So there must be something to that theory. Years ago they thought you had to relive these traumas in order to move on with your life. Don't let anyone make you believe that. We are who and what we are.
If you are truly a dissociate person then your disorder may never be able to take you there. That's the blessing in it all. For some things WE weren't there. (note: I will put a page up with some of the ways I sorted through memories to decide which where real and which were imagined as such. A very good tool for me.)
I need to say a few more things before you go on with this journey. I have seen in my life and the lives of others, that being dissociation was a gift. I have known people who weren't able to block out the pain and have suffered most of their lives because of it. We truly are the lucky ones who can say "I never felt" and "I cant remember". Those are truly the words and the ones who were saved. Many who could not dissociate did not survive and make it as far as those of us who can. That may not be much to say and understand now; yet I do hope that some day along this path you will understand that.
Live your life now and make peace with your past. That's what I have found to be the best advice to remember. On my web sites I have links to friends who have joined me and experienced much of life as I have. We all traveled different paths yet the same in so many ways. Each of my stories started out small and I added to them as the need arose. Once you read some of them please come back and email me if you want.
This was my first writing in many years. It started to flow one night and has never stopped even now as I begin these pages here and in my real world. Lady J
this was my mess that I actually got to stand up in front of the first group of women and teach this to. I still have that original set of papers typed out on the elementry school type writer the kids teacher let me use.
When lady j found her voice. I used word symbols for many things in my life. Much like acronyms to make a sentence, my word symbols tell a story.
Instead of reading the letters across, I write, then and you read them down.
"This Is MY MESS" ©1990LadyJtalks
M E S S
E M P E
N O I X
T T R U
A I I A
L O T L
N U
A A
L L
______________
L L L L
A O I I
B V F E
E E E S
L
__________
L E E S
When all was said and done, I got to the time for change in my recovery.
It brought me to a point where life could start again for me.
This is where my "word symbol" landed on a piece of paper.
It was the word MESS.
I knew it meant something by the way it made me feel inside as I looked at it.
It finally made sense.
How to clean up all the mess of my life.
It no longer mattered how it got there, who put it there, or how long it's been there.
It was now my responsibility to clean it up.
I had somehow gained the "ability to respond".
First I laid the MESS out where I could see it.
Then I separated each part and dealt with each letter separately.
M stood for mental. The mind blocked for more than twenty years.
Unable to let ideas flow evenly.
E stood for emotional. A agitation of the passions,
a strong feeling of a subject. How we are on the inside.
The first S stood for spiritual. Our very being, our soul, the God like part of us.
Neither tangible or material. The essence of our being.
The last S stood for sexual.
It pertains to the sexes and how life all comes together to make new life.
______________________________________________________
I drew a line and began adding things up.
At first the bottom line looks like all L's to me.
But I have come to know that life isn't always
what it appears to be.
When I look closer then passed it, I saw more.
Are they L's or are they perhaps the angles.
This piece I dedicate to the Candy Man from whom I found my mess
I was in when I learned his angle.
Life at this point is not right or wrong, it just is.
As I turn the angles around I make them the right angle or right direction.
What was done is done.
Now We take these angle to any degree to start the approach of our new life.
Under the mental the L (or angle) now stands for label.
A functioning means of identification attached to some thing to
designate it's origin, owner and contents.
The L (or angle) under emotional is for love.
The intangible, elusive part of our world.
You can't buy it, touch it, hold it, give it away or receive it for a present.
You can only feel it in your being.
When one stops waiting for it to arrive or trying to give it away you can begin to understand it.
It's the part of you always with you.
Having it gives you the ability to show love and except the gifts of
feeling love others give you in showing their love for you.
The next L (or angle) is life. A living growing being. That's what we are now.
Life is the interval between birth and death.
The process of living not just physically,
but mentally, emotionally, spiritually and sexually.
The last and most important L (or angle) is for the lies.
It is plural because it has two parts in it to make one whole being.
It takes two parts to create life, influence life, and change life.
The first part of the lie keeps us remaining in a specific condition.
We occupy this place and that becomes all to us.
The second part is the deliberate falsehoods we where taught as children.
Since we never knew to give them back we passed them on.
Not knowing we convey the false image that this is how life is.
"It's time to give it back or get rid of it"
______________________________________________________
As I drew the line and added things up again,
what was left was the letters L E E S.
I knew it must mean some thing, and there was this feeling again inside.
It had to be a word. It had to be a tangible part, and there had to be a purpose for it.
I looked for it's meaning.
I looked under the L's in the dictionary.
There I first found the word lee:
the side or quarter away from the wind 2. cover, shelter.
(it did shelter us all those years. We never felt exposed till the cover came off)
But I had LEES ? plural? It took two
lees: pl.n. Dregs; sediment
Wondering what dregs is? So did I. If that was my answer what did it mean.
dregs: pl. n. the sediment of a liquid. lees 2. the basest or least desirable portion.
Sediment is the material that settle to the bottom.
Dregs is all the junk we either don't want or don't need any more.
When all is settle and the "lees" has been given back, washed away with our tears,
drained out of us or enough time passes to distance us from our past.
What is left?
A foundation to start to build on in this process that has begun now and continues.
Distinctive marks: Leo, born on mother's birthday
Place in family: 5th child
On my Duffys Website page background for this I choose the picture of two people standing on the river bank because the remarkable thing is that under the tree branches from a distance it forms the outline of a baby. How fitting was that for me. Though I had been exploring and learning on my own for years, this is where I place my book mark.
This journey truly began on October 23, 1989 at the Wellness Center in Vestal, New York. There I began to see the light. It was perhaps the first time in my life that I let the world come in.
These are some notes from that day's class. The doctor who was in charged began with telling us that we where all predispose to ending up in a clinic like this if we had 2 or 3 of the following
Demographics in our lifetime.
Came from a large family I had 11 children in mine
Middle to later born I was the fifth
Less then a high school education I was out at sixteen
Parented early I had first child at nineteen
Never allowed to be a kid I have few happy memories
Model for chronic pain I have my mother
Married early I married first time at nineteen
Had kids quickly I was pregnant with first child
Abuse history I had physical and sexual
Multiple marriages I had been married three times
When he was done speaking my whole table broke out in laughter as I asked him "what happens if you have all 10"? He just looked at me and jokingly said "you get to come back for another thirty days". As he left the room that day he placed his hand knowingly on my shoulder. I had laughed when I should have cried. That was when I had the first real look at my condition and accept the first in a long list of diagnoses.
It seemed rather simple back then. It was called Posttraumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD). They could help with Cognitive Behavior Management (CBM). How simple it was. Just follow this simple plan and I'd be cured. Well, as any of us who are dissociate and had this label back then, found out that it only worked for a little while. Then the world would come crashing in again.
I have survived my childhood and my adulthood this far. My diagnoses are the only thing that seems to change. I've told the same story to each doctor who has treated me and each one claims to have the answer. I've been through all the Bi-Polar medication, the Boarder line Personality, the depression and manic stage medications of my life yet seem to be the only one willing at some point to accept myself for who I am. A great person with a dissociate tendency. If I could just get a handle on that one part of me my life might be complete. OK maybe not.
Where my life goes from here, I may not be sure. The one thing that I do know is that I have to keep going. In my life there has been set backs or stops along the way. some of them where not all that I had hoped they would be.
I've been in many relationships during my years and even though some where full of pain and sorrow, I can't really say that I would ever want my life to have been different. As a dissociate my memories have been kept in files. My bad experiences where handled by one and my happy/good memories in another. As you read my stories they may seem all doom and gloom. Remember that the happy memories remained in another story. That's how we deal with life.
Good memories we carry with us on the other side every day. It is the bad memories that we fight with every night. Many years ago I would pray for a better life. Now as I look around and listen to all the people I have met, I have come to believe that my life, though hard and sad, was so much better then other's.
I've heard from people all over the world that are dissociate and who have survived unbelievable lives compared to mine. My heart continues to go out to these people. When they write me their stories and share some of their pain with me, I can only pray that their healing come quickly for them.
Each of us is blessed who have begun this healing process. We can now share our heartaches and know that it is understood by many. I hope that some, when they come across these pages truly know that they are not alone. My stories in my sites are the first things that I was able to write about. They are just thebeginning of the stories. Slowly I hope that I will be able to write more into them. I've yet to remember the feelings of terror and hurt that I only have pictures of now.
Know that it is a process and for some of us we can never find it all. That is because as dissociate we weren't there. If that means that I never know or feel all the details then I'm ok with that. Just remember to believe in your self and know that if you find yourself crossing these pages then you are where you need to be.
Writing these stories has been a relief in it's own way. Trauma and abuse no matter what any one else will call it, causes this to happen to us. Being born with the tendency as they say or chemical imbalance (and I do believe this) causes us to experience our lives differently then others.
I come from a large family and none of them seem to have been affected by living in this unit as I was. So there must be something to that theory. Years ago they thought you had to relive these traumas in order to move on with your life. Don't let anyone make you believe that. We are who and what we are.
If you are truly a dissociate person then your disorder may never be able to take you there. That's the blessing in it all. For some things WE weren't there. (note: I will put a page up with some of the ways I sorted through memories to decide which where real and which were imagined as such. A very good tool for me.)
I need to say a few more things before you go on with this journey. I have seen in my life and the lives of others, that being dissociation was a gift. I have known people who weren't able to block out the pain and have suffered most of their lives because of it. We truly are the lucky ones who can say "I never felt" and "I cant remember". Those are truly the words and the ones who were saved. Many who could not dissociate did not survive and make it as far as those of us who can. That may not be much to say and understand now; yet I do hope that some day along this path you will understand that.
Live your life now and make peace with your past. That's what I have found to be the best advice to remember. On my web sites I have links to friends who have joined me and experienced much of life as I have. We all traveled different paths yet the same in so many ways. Each of my stories started out small and I added to them as the need arose. Once you read some of them please come back and email me if you want.
This was my first writing in many years. It started to flow one night and has never stopped even now as I begin these pages here and in my real world. Lady J
this was my mess that I actually got to stand up in front of the first group of women and teach this to. I still have that original set of papers typed out on the elementry school type writer the kids teacher let me use.
When lady j found her voice. I used word symbols for many things in my life. Much like acronyms to make a sentence, my word symbols tell a story.
Instead of reading the letters across, I write, then and you read them down.
"This Is MY MESS" ©1990LadyJtalks
M E S S
E M P E
N O I X
T T R U
A I I A
L O T L
N U
A A
L L
______________
L L L L
A O I I
B V F E
E E E S
L
__________
L E E S
When all was said and done, I got to the time for change in my recovery.
It brought me to a point where life could start again for me.
This is where my "word symbol" landed on a piece of paper.
It was the word MESS.
I knew it meant something by the way it made me feel inside as I looked at it.
It finally made sense.
How to clean up all the mess of my life.
It no longer mattered how it got there, who put it there, or how long it's been there.
It was now my responsibility to clean it up.
I had somehow gained the "ability to respond".
First I laid the MESS out where I could see it.
Then I separated each part and dealt with each letter separately.
M stood for mental. The mind blocked for more than twenty years.
Unable to let ideas flow evenly.
E stood for emotional. A agitation of the passions,
a strong feeling of a subject. How we are on the inside.
The first S stood for spiritual. Our very being, our soul, the God like part of us.
Neither tangible or material. The essence of our being.
The last S stood for sexual.
It pertains to the sexes and how life all comes together to make new life.
______________________________________________________
I drew a line and began adding things up.
At first the bottom line looks like all L's to me.
But I have come to know that life isn't always
what it appears to be.
When I look closer then passed it, I saw more.
Are they L's or are they perhaps the angles.
This piece I dedicate to the Candy Man from whom I found my mess
I was in when I learned his angle.
Life at this point is not right or wrong, it just is.
As I turn the angles around I make them the right angle or right direction.
What was done is done.
Now We take these angle to any degree to start the approach of our new life.
Under the mental the L (or angle) now stands for label.
A functioning means of identification attached to some thing to
designate it's origin, owner and contents.
The L (or angle) under emotional is for love.
The intangible, elusive part of our world.
You can't buy it, touch it, hold it, give it away or receive it for a present.
You can only feel it in your being.
When one stops waiting for it to arrive or trying to give it away you can begin to understand it.
It's the part of you always with you.
Having it gives you the ability to show love and except the gifts of
feeling love others give you in showing their love for you.
The next L (or angle) is life. A living growing being. That's what we are now.
Life is the interval between birth and death.
The process of living not just physically,
but mentally, emotionally, spiritually and sexually.
The last and most important L (or angle) is for the lies.
It is plural because it has two parts in it to make one whole being.
It takes two parts to create life, influence life, and change life.
The first part of the lie keeps us remaining in a specific condition.
We occupy this place and that becomes all to us.
The second part is the deliberate falsehoods we where taught as children.
Since we never knew to give them back we passed them on.
Not knowing we convey the false image that this is how life is.
"It's time to give it back or get rid of it"
______________________________________________________
As I drew the line and added things up again,
what was left was the letters L E E S.
I knew it must mean some thing, and there was this feeling again inside.
It had to be a word. It had to be a tangible part, and there had to be a purpose for it.
I looked for it's meaning.
I looked under the L's in the dictionary.
There I first found the word lee:
the side or quarter away from the wind 2. cover, shelter.
(it did shelter us all those years. We never felt exposed till the cover came off)
But I had LEES ? plural? It took two
lees: pl.n. Dregs; sediment
Wondering what dregs is? So did I. If that was my answer what did it mean.
dregs: pl. n. the sediment of a liquid. lees 2. the basest or least desirable portion.
Sediment is the material that settle to the bottom.
Dregs is all the junk we either don't want or don't need any more.
When all is settle and the "lees" has been given back, washed away with our tears,
drained out of us or enough time passes to distance us from our past.
What is left?
A foundation to start to build on in this process that has begun now and continues.
Post 10
The phrase, "I remember", is a touchy one for me. You see, I DIDN'T remember.
It made me so angry. ALL of those years that I spent with the one person that harmed me so completely. So deeply. A person that I loved and trusted with my life. My best friend, the funniest, smartest man I'd ever known. The man I looked up to and held up as a guide to men I would eventually fall in love with. The man that shared my thoughts, inside jokes, bizarre sense of humor and memories of all things wonderful. My hero. My big brother, my rapist.
I never believed you could repress memories. I thought my memory was perfect. I remember building "Forts" with him. Lots of blankets and heavy books, shielding us from the bad guys. Making cinnamon toast and ovaltine under our fortress. Being Ginger Rogers while he was Fred Astaire. Us dancing through the house singing,"Heaven, I'm in heaven!!"
And, years later, being the first to rush up to him in the airport after he had been in a terrible car accident that killed his friend. Him, crying in my lap all the way home to Alexandria Virginia. Me telling him that we loved him and that there was nothing he could have done to save his friend.
The death of my mother. I took care of her for years. When she died,I took the train to DC. My mothers body was on the train with me. The funeral parlor took her body and I hailed a cab to my brothers house. I was shattered. Broken into a million pieces. He opened the door and I fell into his arms sobbing from grief and exhaustion. He made me a drink. Southern Comfort,tea, lemon, honey. It was seven am. We drank and cried, played my parents old radio shows, laughed, cried some more, drank some more. He tucked me into bed at noon. I awoke at 8pm. Eyes so swollen I could hardly see. He was there, with ice cold wash cloths, aspirin, and a Valium. My big brother. My buddy. My brutal rapist. My caring companion in grief.
It was only after I'd had my baby that little slide shows would appear out of nowhere. Bits and pieces of horror and pain. Brutal, disgusting images would fly through my head. At first, I thought I was just suffering from some sort of postpartum depression. I talked with my doctor. He said it was possible, but, he wanted me to see a counselor. My doctor had an odd, sad, look on his face.
My counselor was a lovely woman. I told her about my strange thoughts, the bits of horror going through my head. but, now the bits were turning into chunks of imagery. Very distinct, clear memories of being bound and gagged, raped with different objects, my brothers face and voice, different. This was not my protective brother, this was a sick and twisted evil person that sounded slightly like my brother. His voice was rough and cruel. His body forcing me to do things that no 8 year old should ever do.
I remember the way he told me that when I got older, he'd make purses out of my breasts. Share me with his friends. Maybe even sell my body to other guys. I remember bleeding, all alone in the bath room. I was young and did not know what to do. I distinctly remember finding an old, brown glass bottle of :Lysol, and pouring it on my genitals. It burned, so I rinsed myself off and went to my room. I lay there, all night, waiting for the monster to come again.
He visited me, through the years, until I was 12. Abruptly stopping what he had started 4 years before. I guess I was too old, not responsive anymore. I had begun puberty and he lost interest. Sociopaths can act like nothing was ever wrong, nothing was ever done. And, I would go blank. Shut down. My mind was no longer with my body. And, THAT is why I did not remember. All the years of being friends, best friends, with this person. He must have known I did not remember. I never slept well at night. Even now as I write this and he is 700 miles away, I still do not sleep at night.
When it all came crashing down, I could not believe it. "It must be my imagination" I'd say. Only, I could not deny the truth. It was real. It did happen. My path to forgiving my brother has been covered in boulders and unimaginable rage and hatred. I REMEMBER NOW. All of it. And, I forgive you Jeff.
Lisa
It made me so angry. ALL of those years that I spent with the one person that harmed me so completely. So deeply. A person that I loved and trusted with my life. My best friend, the funniest, smartest man I'd ever known. The man I looked up to and held up as a guide to men I would eventually fall in love with. The man that shared my thoughts, inside jokes, bizarre sense of humor and memories of all things wonderful. My hero. My big brother, my rapist.
I never believed you could repress memories. I thought my memory was perfect. I remember building "Forts" with him. Lots of blankets and heavy books, shielding us from the bad guys. Making cinnamon toast and ovaltine under our fortress. Being Ginger Rogers while he was Fred Astaire. Us dancing through the house singing,"Heaven, I'm in heaven!!"
And, years later, being the first to rush up to him in the airport after he had been in a terrible car accident that killed his friend. Him, crying in my lap all the way home to Alexandria Virginia. Me telling him that we loved him and that there was nothing he could have done to save his friend.
The death of my mother. I took care of her for years. When she died,I took the train to DC. My mothers body was on the train with me. The funeral parlor took her body and I hailed a cab to my brothers house. I was shattered. Broken into a million pieces. He opened the door and I fell into his arms sobbing from grief and exhaustion. He made me a drink. Southern Comfort,tea, lemon, honey. It was seven am. We drank and cried, played my parents old radio shows, laughed, cried some more, drank some more. He tucked me into bed at noon. I awoke at 8pm. Eyes so swollen I could hardly see. He was there, with ice cold wash cloths, aspirin, and a Valium. My big brother. My buddy. My brutal rapist. My caring companion in grief.
It was only after I'd had my baby that little slide shows would appear out of nowhere. Bits and pieces of horror and pain. Brutal, disgusting images would fly through my head. At first, I thought I was just suffering from some sort of postpartum depression. I talked with my doctor. He said it was possible, but, he wanted me to see a counselor. My doctor had an odd, sad, look on his face.
My counselor was a lovely woman. I told her about my strange thoughts, the bits of horror going through my head. but, now the bits were turning into chunks of imagery. Very distinct, clear memories of being bound and gagged, raped with different objects, my brothers face and voice, different. This was not my protective brother, this was a sick and twisted evil person that sounded slightly like my brother. His voice was rough and cruel. His body forcing me to do things that no 8 year old should ever do.
I remember the way he told me that when I got older, he'd make purses out of my breasts. Share me with his friends. Maybe even sell my body to other guys. I remember bleeding, all alone in the bath room. I was young and did not know what to do. I distinctly remember finding an old, brown glass bottle of :Lysol, and pouring it on my genitals. It burned, so I rinsed myself off and went to my room. I lay there, all night, waiting for the monster to come again.
He visited me, through the years, until I was 12. Abruptly stopping what he had started 4 years before. I guess I was too old, not responsive anymore. I had begun puberty and he lost interest. Sociopaths can act like nothing was ever wrong, nothing was ever done. And, I would go blank. Shut down. My mind was no longer with my body. And, THAT is why I did not remember. All the years of being friends, best friends, with this person. He must have known I did not remember. I never slept well at night. Even now as I write this and he is 700 miles away, I still do not sleep at night.
When it all came crashing down, I could not believe it. "It must be my imagination" I'd say. Only, I could not deny the truth. It was real. It did happen. My path to forgiving my brother has been covered in boulders and unimaginable rage and hatred. I REMEMBER NOW. All of it. And, I forgive you Jeff.
Lisa
Post 9: Billie's Story
Here’s a little about me… My name is Billie and if you think I’m a guy you’re wrong, I’m a chick. I was raised in Southern California. I’m 22 years old and can't believe I’ve made it this far. My mother did drugs the first three months of her pregnancy. Maybe that has a lot to do with my problems or maybe it's all the stuff I went through. I was a healthy baby and the drugs didn't affect me. The doctors said maybe later in my life they would see problems, like learning disabilities or ADD. I ended up with both. My mom did drugs the first 10 years of my life. I only have a couple memories of my dad. He was always overdosing on drugs and my mom had to put ice down his pants to wake him up. I haven’t heard from him in 14 years. I guess my early memories start with my sister’s dad. He and my mom were both druggies and drunks and since we lived behind a bar, they pretty much lived there. They left me to take care of my baby sister when I was only 4 years old. My sister only lived with us on the weekends because she was in foster care. I was also in foster care but the people let me stay with my mom because they couldn’t handle me. I was always crying, screaming and causing trouble. I was very attached to my mom for some weird reason. I would cry for hours and hours and wouldn’t stop. They didn’t understand and I couldn’t explain it to them at 4 years old. My foster parents weren't the greatest parents. I used to pee the bed and my foster mother would make me suck my underwear with pee on them. I don't know if she was crazy because now she’s a zombie on psych meds. Her daughter used to put stuff on her boobs and ask me to suck them. Sometimes I stayed with them when my mom needed to put me in a safe place, away from my sister’s dad. My sister’s dad used to beat my mom over and over. He broke her nose twice and shot her once. I saw all of this and so much more. He would beat me too. He raped me. He used to stick knives and pencils in me. He used to tie me up and he would make me do stuff to our dog. He used to play doctor with me. He was a sick man. My mom went to court ordered drug treatment when I was 6 or 7. I used to cry and scream there. My mom used to cover my mouth and nose until I passed out because she didn’t know what else to do. The people there told my mom to take me to the behavioral health center to be put on medication. I was put on Lithium and so many other medications from that point on. I first tried to hang myself in our closet with a metal hanger and all my mom did was yell at me and then cut me down. My mom stopped doing street drugs and is just living on pain killers and psych meds now. When I turned 12 was when I first started to really hurt myself. I start burning myself. After awhile, I needed to see blood so I started to cut. At first, it was just scratches, but years later, when I was 14 or 15, I started to cut with knives. I have scars everywhere from head to toe. I've had so many stitches from cutting. I've even cut a piece of my leg out. I've tried to kill myself so many times with pills, but God didn't want me to go. He has me here for a reason. I remember once the doctor told me that I wasn't going to make it through the night because I shot my liver. That was the worst night of my life but I made it through. The doctor was shocked. I had to drink this horrible drink every 3 hours for the next 2 weeks. At age 13, I was sent to Utah to a place called Heritage. At the time, I thought that was the shittiest place ever and I had to stay there for 2 years. I tried hurting myself a lot and I was a big safety hazard. Heritage really showed me life. I went to another place where my mother wanted me to get off medication because she thought that was the problem with me. They took me off all meds and I had horrible anxiety and didn’t sleep for days. I was scared and tried to hurt myself even worse. Heritage put me back on one medication instead of 7. My mother disagreed with this so Heritage went to court and got approval to keep me on my medication. Then, I was sent to Colorado. Many places wouldn’t take me because I was a danger to myself the first time I walked onto the unit. I started to try to kill myself, cut myself and pass out every day. The place in Colorado kept me drugged up all the time and couldn’t keep me safe so they sent me back to the Children’s Hospital. They kept me in a little safe room for 3 months and had someone watch me at the door all day. The only time I left my safe room was to shower and pee in the bathroom that was 3 feet away. They drugged me up on Seroquel and I don’t know how I was still walking and talking. After Colorado, they sent me to San Jose, California to Starlight. I begged my mom for a month to come and get me. I told her stories of staff being beat up. She finally came and took me out at 17 years old. I went home for 3 months until I tried to kill myself again because I couldn’t live with my crazy mom. I think she was still using drugs. She would abuse me physically and emotionally. When I tried to kill myself, Heritage said they would take me back if they could have custody of me. Even though I begged, my mom refused because she would lose money. They sent me back to Starlight instead and it was still crazy. I didn’t hurt myself once while I was there. I couldn’t. Because I was turning 18, if I hurt myself, I would be locked up forever. I started praying a lot, talking to God, and writing. I don't how I made it through there, but I did. I stayed there until my 18 birthday and my mom picked me up to go back home. That was the day that I changed and started a new life. The day after I came home, I went to meet my new therapist. Somehow, I was blessed with an amazing person. For the next 2.5 years of my life, she helped me with my issues like talking about my sister’s dad, my mom and hurting myself. I can't say I didn't hurt myself after treatment, but it wasn’t like when I was younger. My new therapist wouldn’t lock me up in the hospital if I felt like hurting myself or was feeling suicidal. She would talk to me, trust me and make a safety plan. I slowly stopped hurting myself and when I did, the space between each time would get longer and longer. I haven’t hurt myself in almost 3 years. I still feel like doing it sometimes but I wait it out or cry it out. I know I'll never hurt myself again and I can't see how I did that to myself. I am doing really well in life, I have to say. For me, the hardest time in my life was the beginning, so the rest my life isn't going to be hard. I’ve already had everything possible happen to me so I know how to deal with it. I get to have my childhood and my adulthood right now and I can balance it out. I am going to school to be a nurse so that I can help people. I want to help people in many ways. I also want to start a business as a public speaker and go around to treatment centers and talk to kids. I also want to be a Juvenile PO so I can help the kids in the system because I know how it is. I don't know what I'll end up doing first. I have a lot of dreams and I’m happy now. I still I have my sad days, but everyone does. That’s when you find love and support. I’m scared to die and I want to live forever. I have so much to see and to become and I don’t think my life is long enough for me to do everything. Time really does fly by. I know that I had to go through that stuff to be where I am in life. I couldn’t see myself growing up a different way because I wouldn’t be me. I had to go through all that to find my place, values and love. I had to go through that to find LIFE.
Post 9: Intro
The next story is from Billie. I am honored to be posting this story as a part of this blogathon and so happy she agreed to do it. Billie is very dear to me for lots of reasons. While I was working at Starlight, they told us we were getting a new girl who was so dangerous that she would always be on a 1:1. This meant that whoever her assigned staff was couldn’t be more than an arm’s length away at all times: bathroom, shower, sleeping, eating, you name it. Anyway, like most of the staff was probably thinking, I was wondering just how long it would take to restrain this girl for unsafe behavior. I also was secretly hoping I would not be her 1:1. Dangerous kids on a 1:1 can be a huge liability and I needed to keep my job. I ended up as her 1:1, at least for that day and in the future I would end up requesting to be her 1:1. I felt a connection to this girl that I couldn’t explain. She had some serious issues and I felt like I had something in common with her. I was hoping that I could help her in the way that I wished someone could help me. I remember a shy girl who didn’t want to be anywhere near the male staff. I remember how quiet she was and how hard I tried to talk to her. I got minimal, if any, response for a long time. Eventually, and I can’t remember at what point this happened, we started talking. I spent a lot of time with her in her room because Billie liked to isolate and since she was on a 1:1, I had an excuse to hang out. Once I learned Billie’s story, I was amazed. She is so strong and a true warrior. I am so glad to have kept in touch with Billie over the years. I really hope to see her again in person someday. We are miles apart but maybe a road trip is in order! Billie probably doesn’t know it but she has helped me so often, just by being who she is. They say people come into your life for a reason and I believe that. Billie, you are a warrior, an angel and a rock star! I love you!
Post 8
My name is Stephanie and I am a thriving survivor of sexual abuse. My life is filled with joy and happiness despite my past. I am a full time university student with the goal of becoming a professional psychologist. My intent is in helping as many survivors of sexual violence as I can because there is nothing more beautiful then seeing a victim transform into a survivor. I stand up for survivors in every way that I can wether it's doing fundraisers for sexual assault centers, being a friend to other survivors, or petitioning to speak about it on the Dr. Phil Show. (You can join my fight to get on Dr. Phil here on my facebook page http://www.facebook.com/group.php?gid=124324194260583&%3Bref=ts) Fighting this epidemic brings so much joy in my life.
I have many hero's in my life and every one of them brings me an immense amount of joy. One of these hero's is a woman named Mariska Hargitay, she was the first person to shine a light in the darkness that had become my life. During my depression all I could manage to do was watch tv, but this ended up being what saved me. I quickly got into the show Law & Order Special Victims Unit and this is how Mariska entered my life. She plays detective Olivia Benson on the show and for those who are unaware of what the show is about, she plays a detective who works on sexual assault/child abuse cases. I became engrossed in the show and I still am to this day. I became an extreme fan of Mariska's not only because of her character on the show but also because of her true character. Because of the show and the character she plays, the statistics of sexual violence and child abuse was thrown right in her face. She was appalled with what she was learning and quickly ran to action. She created the Joyful Heart Foundation who's mission is to heal, educate and empower survivors of sexual assault, domestic violence and child abuse and to shed light into the darkness that surrounds these issues. Joyful Heart has so much to offer from incredible healing retreats in Hawaii as well as local Urban retreats for survivors, they educate others on these topics, they spread awareness and they provide resources for those in need of help. A resent mission Mariska has taken on with the Joyful Heart Foundation is to eliminate the backlog of rape kits. In 2009 over 20,000 rape kits nationwide were never sent to crime labs to be tested and thousands more that were sent to crime labs sit there for years waiting to be tested. Mariska even met with members of Congress at the white house to urge efforts to reduce the rape kit backlog.
These are just some of the reason why this heroic woman brings me joy. It's because of her that you are reading these words that I write, it's because of her that I finally stood up and took my life back, it is because of her that I have all this passion burning in my soul. My ultimate goal in life is to work with Mariska in expanding the Joyful Heart Foundation to Canada. I will fight till I take my last breath to make this a reality and not just a dream. That is what brings joy to my life.
You can follow my blog at http://survivingvoice.blogspot.com/
Squish
Post 7
I Will Remember
Oh little girl,
I remember.
I remember
When you wondered
What you’d be like
At my age.
Are you proud of me?
I remember.
I remember
All the dreams
You had for the future
You knew
That once
You got out
You’d get to be happy.
Are you?
I remember.
I remember
How you
Hid your
Heart away
To protect it
To preserve it
For that special one
That would
Want it.
Yes, little one, I remember.
I remember
How you wanted it all.
The fairy tale
Someone to love
Someone who loved
Someone who would
Hold you
And softly whisper
“It’ll be ok!”
I remember.
I remember
Your pain
I handled
Your suffering
When you became
Too weak
And helplessly
Watched as you
Slowly died
And I took over
I was sad
To see you go,
But glad one
Of us could
Finally rest.
I remember.
I remember,
Innocent one,
How our pain
Slowly pulled
You out of
My arms
As I tried
To comfort
You.
As I watched
Your last tear
Fall,
I promised
You
That I would
Go on.
That I would
Live for you
I swore I’d live
Your dreams
And I locked
Them away
Deep in my heart
Now I feel
Them cry for you.
I’m not what
You wanted
Me to be
But, I remember.
Yes, even if it
Is no good.
I remember.
I will always
Remember you
And my promises
The promises
That keep me
Alive.
You, I won’t
Forget
So that someday
You can see
Your dreams
Come true in me
I will remember.
-Kerry
Oh little girl,
I remember.
I remember
When you wondered
What you’d be like
At my age.
Are you proud of me?
I remember.
I remember
All the dreams
You had for the future
You knew
That once
You got out
You’d get to be happy.
Are you?
I remember.
I remember
How you
Hid your
Heart away
To protect it
To preserve it
For that special one
That would
Want it.
Yes, little one, I remember.
I remember
How you wanted it all.
The fairy tale
Someone to love
Someone who loved
Someone who would
Hold you
And softly whisper
“It’ll be ok!”
I remember.
I remember
Your pain
I handled
Your suffering
When you became
Too weak
And helplessly
Watched as you
Slowly died
And I took over
I was sad
To see you go,
But glad one
Of us could
Finally rest.
I remember.
I remember,
Innocent one,
How our pain
Slowly pulled
You out of
My arms
As I tried
To comfort
You.
As I watched
Your last tear
Fall,
I promised
You
That I would
Go on.
That I would
Live for you
I swore I’d live
Your dreams
And I locked
Them away
Deep in my heart
Now I feel
Them cry for you.
I’m not what
You wanted
Me to be
But, I remember.
Yes, even if it
Is no good.
I remember.
I will always
Remember you
And my promises
The promises
That keep me
Alive.
You, I won’t
Forget
So that someday
You can see
Your dreams
Come true in me
I will remember.
-Kerry
Post 6
Love yourself. Heal. Breathe. You do have strength. Courage. Support. Believe in your heart. You can survive. You can tell your story. You can save lives.
-Brooke Souder
-Brooke Souder
Post 5: By Anonymous (Triggering)
Damaged Goods
I blankly stare into oblivion not knowing where my world ends and everyone else’s begins.
My crystal castle has been shattered around me.
I hopelessly try to pick up all the pieces before anyone can see.
I should have known better. I should have done better.
My boundaries got fucked, literally.
I couldn’t stop them, even when I asked for help, it hurt.
Death of innocence, death of a life, death of a child-they must all be mourned.
What good am I now? All used and damaged.
Now, I wait in darkness, with only the light of my computer to keep me company.
I sit here trembling in horror like when I was a child.
I cower in fear at every noise, like the child who was bound helplessly in a corner awaiting her attackers.
My skin crawls, if I think of someone touching me.
Stay back. I might break.
I can only hear the hum of my computer and the sobs of a whimpering child pleading to be helped.
I blankly stare into oblivion not knowing where my world ends and everyone else’s begins.
My crystal castle has been shattered around me.
I hopelessly try to pick up all the pieces before anyone can see.
I should have known better. I should have done better.
My boundaries got fucked, literally.
I couldn’t stop them, even when I asked for help, it hurt.
Death of innocence, death of a life, death of a child-they must all be mourned.
What good am I now? All used and damaged.
Now, I wait in darkness, with only the light of my computer to keep me company.
I sit here trembling in horror like when I was a child.
I cower in fear at every noise, like the child who was bound helplessly in a corner awaiting her attackers.
My skin crawls, if I think of someone touching me.
Stay back. I might break.
I can only hear the hum of my computer and the sobs of a whimpering child pleading to be helped.
Post 4: Poem by Angela Shelton
I can tell by the look in your eyes
That you need to confide
It’s okay now, it’s safe
Our hearts are open wide
Tell me your story
I’ve probably heard it before
Everybody’s got one to tell
And I know you went through hell
So pour it our darling, purge the pain
Holding it inside gives you no more gain
Tell me your story
I’ve heard it before
And after you, there are many many more
All I know is that we’re here right now
Healing is happening, even if you don’t know how
Let’s just be here for a minute
You survived you’re alive and here to tell it
So don’t cry your life away – begin it.
I know the words that you heard
The hurting and the yelling
You believed it was all true
Now it’s like a fog that’s lifting
into repeated pain, you’ve been drifting
I know it
No sense hiding, we’ve all been there before
The tears will change, don’t worry
It’s time to open a whole new door
I know it feels wrong
To have been through it for so long
To have seen what you’ve seen,
There is a reason for it, there must be.
All I know is that we’re here right now
just be here a minute
you survived, you’re alive and here to tell it
Don’t cry your life way - begin it.
Angela Shelton
That you need to confide
It’s okay now, it’s safe
Our hearts are open wide
Tell me your story
I’ve probably heard it before
Everybody’s got one to tell
And I know you went through hell
So pour it our darling, purge the pain
Holding it inside gives you no more gain
Tell me your story
I’ve heard it before
And after you, there are many many more
All I know is that we’re here right now
Healing is happening, even if you don’t know how
Let’s just be here for a minute
You survived you’re alive and here to tell it
So don’t cry your life away – begin it.
I know the words that you heard
The hurting and the yelling
You believed it was all true
Now it’s like a fog that’s lifting
into repeated pain, you’ve been drifting
I know it
No sense hiding, we’ve all been there before
The tears will change, don’t worry
It’s time to open a whole new door
I know it feels wrong
To have been through it for so long
To have seen what you’ve seen,
There is a reason for it, there must be.
All I know is that we’re here right now
just be here a minute
you survived, you’re alive and here to tell it
Don’t cry your life way - begin it.
Angela Shelton
Post 3
When I Dream
When I dream,
I see horrifying things.
Things you can’t imagine,
Things that make me scream.
When I dream,
I remember what was lost.
My innocence, my life
They took from me what I can’t get back.
When I dream,
I see things that haunt me
And things that cause me to cry.
When I dream,
I remember what he took.
He took my trust
He crushed everything I had inside.
When I dream,
The things I see
Make me want to crawl out of my flesh.
I want to scream!
When I wish,
I wish it was all one bad dream.
-Kerry
When I dream,
I see horrifying things.
Things you can’t imagine,
Things that make me scream.
When I dream,
I remember what was lost.
My innocence, my life
They took from me what I can’t get back.
When I dream,
I see things that haunt me
And things that cause me to cry.
When I dream,
I remember what he took.
He took my trust
He crushed everything I had inside.
When I dream,
The things I see
Make me want to crawl out of my flesh.
I want to scream!
When I wish,
I wish it was all one bad dream.
-Kerry
Post 3
THAT FATEFUL NEW YEAR’S DAY
By
Suzanne
(This is copyrighted through A Word With You Press as an Entry to their “A Few Words With You” contest. It is my Story of the day I left my abusive husband.)
I left him on New Year’s Day. I know it was New Year’s Day because I had just celebrated the beginning of 2003 with fireworks and wine. I had to leave. I had no choice. I was lying in a dark hotel room in San Diego, shivering, realizing my marriage was done, in the arms of another man. And I’d just got caught. And there was the chance that my ex-husband was going to kill me. I couldn’t go back to Las Vegas and walk in the house, not alone I wouldn’t. A lot had happened to bring me here.
My marriage had dismantled slowly, in an ugly, disturbing way. The first four years were happy, for the most part. We’d travelled to Hawaii twice, romping around on their exquisite, sunny shores, in awe of the colorful sunsets, mingling orange, purple, reds and yellows. A cruise to Alaska and a week in December in Florida, basking in warmth while the rest of the nation was frozen. We had bought a house in Las Vegas and I’d started a whole new life. He taught me to play poker and I had been a champion. I won a bunch of jackpots playing the poker machines. But there was the truth just bubbling underneath. He snatched me from my hometown and took me to Las Vegas, where I didn’t really know a soul. And the friends I made there I wasn’t allow to see much. He made it clear that they were weird or stupid.
It was the fifth year when it all bubbled up. Everything began to change. My husband’s shady past crept into our lives, and he indulged in it. Criminal dealings, secret meetings, friends who were not friends infiltrated our home and our lives. I awakened every morning to confusion and fear. And I was isolated from the others who lived in their normal suburban homes. I was afraid to tell anyone; whether they would believe me, and if they did, I might end up dead.
So my head went numb and my heart felt dead but I stayed because I was afraid. I tried to leave but he threatened my friends, and it was more important to have them in my life than to leave. When I tried to walk out the door during an argument, he’d grab me, shove me to the floor, and sit on me until I gave up. And I didn’t want to leave my house. I was attached to those four walls, to the staircase, and the balcony off of the main bedroom. It’s funny how much you can attach yourself to a building. And deep down, I still loved him. So I stayed. But the passion was gone and the sex mundane.
And in walked David. He started out a friend, who I could confide in when my world looked about to crumble. He started out cleaning our house then working for my husband in one of his dealings. He became aware of the criminal activities that took place behind the white picket fence and iron-barred doors and windows. He stood outside the door one night when my husband held me on the floor. And after a time, we fell in love, in secret. We shared passion whenever we could, indulged erotic fantasies, and my heart came alive again. My senses were awakened after a year of slumber. My affair with David kept me going. And the rush of forbidden sex, performed under the threat of a death penalty, of getting caught, and never living to tell about it, was like shooting cocaine in my veins.
So I sneaked around behind my husband’s back, uttering excuses of working late, attending a conference, meeting up with other friends. And when he found a hotel key once, I lied it was the key for my locker at the police station. I’d engage in passion, lighting my senses on fire, embracing true love before walking back into the darkness again. And then it happened. And I knew that my life had no choice but to change.
And so on that New Year’s Day, my husband found out, uttered his threats over the phone, and there I sat, isolated and afraid. I was in this hotel room and I couldn’t go home. I didn’t dare set foot in the house in case I never left again. His friends were trying to find me and I was naked, lying in a bed, in the arms of another man. And I was very much afraid.
As much as I was afraid, I felt relief. For the first time, that secret of hiding my love for David in the closet, could now pop out. The ugly secrets of my lonely emotional abuse, the criminal activities that I could never tell, it all could come out now. I could set it free.
I did go back for a time. I went to get my things. I had to take people with me, but I dragged items out, piece by piece, but I left so much behind. I said good-bye to the house I loved, took one last backward glance over the balcony, and drove away. I was starting all over again.
I remember the day I left him, New Year’s Day of 2003, because I began a new year with a whole new life.
By
Suzanne
(This is copyrighted through A Word With You Press as an Entry to their “A Few Words With You” contest. It is my Story of the day I left my abusive husband.)
I left him on New Year’s Day. I know it was New Year’s Day because I had just celebrated the beginning of 2003 with fireworks and wine. I had to leave. I had no choice. I was lying in a dark hotel room in San Diego, shivering, realizing my marriage was done, in the arms of another man. And I’d just got caught. And there was the chance that my ex-husband was going to kill me. I couldn’t go back to Las Vegas and walk in the house, not alone I wouldn’t. A lot had happened to bring me here.
My marriage had dismantled slowly, in an ugly, disturbing way. The first four years were happy, for the most part. We’d travelled to Hawaii twice, romping around on their exquisite, sunny shores, in awe of the colorful sunsets, mingling orange, purple, reds and yellows. A cruise to Alaska and a week in December in Florida, basking in warmth while the rest of the nation was frozen. We had bought a house in Las Vegas and I’d started a whole new life. He taught me to play poker and I had been a champion. I won a bunch of jackpots playing the poker machines. But there was the truth just bubbling underneath. He snatched me from my hometown and took me to Las Vegas, where I didn’t really know a soul. And the friends I made there I wasn’t allow to see much. He made it clear that they were weird or stupid.
It was the fifth year when it all bubbled up. Everything began to change. My husband’s shady past crept into our lives, and he indulged in it. Criminal dealings, secret meetings, friends who were not friends infiltrated our home and our lives. I awakened every morning to confusion and fear. And I was isolated from the others who lived in their normal suburban homes. I was afraid to tell anyone; whether they would believe me, and if they did, I might end up dead.
So my head went numb and my heart felt dead but I stayed because I was afraid. I tried to leave but he threatened my friends, and it was more important to have them in my life than to leave. When I tried to walk out the door during an argument, he’d grab me, shove me to the floor, and sit on me until I gave up. And I didn’t want to leave my house. I was attached to those four walls, to the staircase, and the balcony off of the main bedroom. It’s funny how much you can attach yourself to a building. And deep down, I still loved him. So I stayed. But the passion was gone and the sex mundane.
And in walked David. He started out a friend, who I could confide in when my world looked about to crumble. He started out cleaning our house then working for my husband in one of his dealings. He became aware of the criminal activities that took place behind the white picket fence and iron-barred doors and windows. He stood outside the door one night when my husband held me on the floor. And after a time, we fell in love, in secret. We shared passion whenever we could, indulged erotic fantasies, and my heart came alive again. My senses were awakened after a year of slumber. My affair with David kept me going. And the rush of forbidden sex, performed under the threat of a death penalty, of getting caught, and never living to tell about it, was like shooting cocaine in my veins.
So I sneaked around behind my husband’s back, uttering excuses of working late, attending a conference, meeting up with other friends. And when he found a hotel key once, I lied it was the key for my locker at the police station. I’d engage in passion, lighting my senses on fire, embracing true love before walking back into the darkness again. And then it happened. And I knew that my life had no choice but to change.
And so on that New Year’s Day, my husband found out, uttered his threats over the phone, and there I sat, isolated and afraid. I was in this hotel room and I couldn’t go home. I didn’t dare set foot in the house in case I never left again. His friends were trying to find me and I was naked, lying in a bed, in the arms of another man. And I was very much afraid.
As much as I was afraid, I felt relief. For the first time, that secret of hiding my love for David in the closet, could now pop out. The ugly secrets of my lonely emotional abuse, the criminal activities that I could never tell, it all could come out now. I could set it free.
I did go back for a time. I went to get my things. I had to take people with me, but I dragged items out, piece by piece, but I left so much behind. I said good-bye to the house I loved, took one last backward glance over the balcony, and drove away. I was starting all over again.
I remember the day I left him, New Year’s Day of 2003, because I began a new year with a whole new life.
Post 2
As I crumble into the sea
You take your ship in search of me
Through the enormous waves that engulf my soul
Your caring strength guides me toward the shoal
Upon the sand I start to rise
You begin to hear my unheard cries
You pick me up and pull me to the sky
Out of that storm I am taught to fly
If it weren’t for you I don’t know where I’d be
Probably drowning in the churning sea
Thank you to all the Angels. To all survivors who believe they can't be heard- you can, we hear you.
-Anonymous
You take your ship in search of me
Through the enormous waves that engulf my soul
Your caring strength guides me toward the shoal
Upon the sand I start to rise
You begin to hear my unheard cries
You pick me up and pull me to the sky
Out of that storm I am taught to fly
If it weren’t for you I don’t know where I’d be
Probably drowning in the churning sea
Thank you to all the Angels. To all survivors who believe they can't be heard- you can, we hear you.
-Anonymous
The Beginning
The Beginning
I don’t remember what day of the week it was. But, I remember feeling like I never have before. I guess the first thing to happen was seeing the Oprah episode with Mackenzie Phillips. Don’t ask me why I watched this. I don’t like Oprah, I didn’t really know who Mackenzie was but it caught my interest when they mentioned The Mamas and the Papas and that whole “family secret” thing, that could have just been television drama to get viewers. I watched this show and was speechless. She seemed so together on national TV talking about this. I couldn’t even imagine being in her shoes. Unlike the comments you see on the internet, the first thought in my mind was not that she was trying to make money and ruin her dad’s name. I identified with her for some reason. I could understand why she waited until now to come out with this. I was able to read Mackenzie’s book in October 2009. My therapist noticed that I appeared to be strangely connected to Mackenzie, someone who I knew very little about prior to watching Oprah. I could practically hear myself saying some of the things written in her book. While I did not become a full blown drug addict, likely due to parental intervention and threatening, I used drugs to deal with my life and the problems that I didn’t know were problems. I struggle with self injury and it’s true, addiction is addiction. When I feel like cutting, I try to remember nothing is bad enough that I need to hurt myself. It has been working for the most part and one day I will say this is behind me.
I’m not really sure when I stumbled across Angela Shelton…I think it was in February or March of this year. I should remember the date, like one would remember a sobriety date, because it changed my life. I think I heard about her through someone on the Mackenzie Phillips fan page, but then it gets a little fuzzy. For the longest time, I didn’t think I fit in with this group of people because the things that happened to me were not textbook abuse. I finally decided to share pieces of what happened on other blogathons and people told me I was a survivor. In my heart, I didn’t believe them but I also had some validation for my feelings that I have never had before. When my mother found out about what I was doing, she snubbed her nose and said I wasn’t abused. My dad mocked me. Maybe I wasn’t abused at the hands of a family member, or raped, but I definitely had things happen that have shaped my self esteem and who I am. I have this pull towards some special people I’ve met through Angela Shelton and they know who they are. I’ve learned a lot about not comparing and I know that I wouldn’t have anything in common with these girls had it not been for my past.
SQUISH! -Amy
I don’t remember what day of the week it was. But, I remember feeling like I never have before. I guess the first thing to happen was seeing the Oprah episode with Mackenzie Phillips. Don’t ask me why I watched this. I don’t like Oprah, I didn’t really know who Mackenzie was but it caught my interest when they mentioned The Mamas and the Papas and that whole “family secret” thing, that could have just been television drama to get viewers. I watched this show and was speechless. She seemed so together on national TV talking about this. I couldn’t even imagine being in her shoes. Unlike the comments you see on the internet, the first thought in my mind was not that she was trying to make money and ruin her dad’s name. I identified with her for some reason. I could understand why she waited until now to come out with this. I was able to read Mackenzie’s book in October 2009. My therapist noticed that I appeared to be strangely connected to Mackenzie, someone who I knew very little about prior to watching Oprah. I could practically hear myself saying some of the things written in her book. While I did not become a full blown drug addict, likely due to parental intervention and threatening, I used drugs to deal with my life and the problems that I didn’t know were problems. I struggle with self injury and it’s true, addiction is addiction. When I feel like cutting, I try to remember nothing is bad enough that I need to hurt myself. It has been working for the most part and one day I will say this is behind me.
I’m not really sure when I stumbled across Angela Shelton…I think it was in February or March of this year. I should remember the date, like one would remember a sobriety date, because it changed my life. I think I heard about her through someone on the Mackenzie Phillips fan page, but then it gets a little fuzzy. For the longest time, I didn’t think I fit in with this group of people because the things that happened to me were not textbook abuse. I finally decided to share pieces of what happened on other blogathons and people told me I was a survivor. In my heart, I didn’t believe them but I also had some validation for my feelings that I have never had before. When my mother found out about what I was doing, she snubbed her nose and said I wasn’t abused. My dad mocked me. Maybe I wasn’t abused at the hands of a family member, or raped, but I definitely had things happen that have shaped my self esteem and who I am. I have this pull towards some special people I’ve met through Angela Shelton and they know who they are. I’ve learned a lot about not comparing and I know that I wouldn’t have anything in common with these girls had it not been for my past.
SQUISH! -Amy
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