I felt like I was always meant to be abused

It happened…

I don’t remember when it started, but my first childhood memory was of it, and I was 4. It must have started much earlier, because I was actively performing sexual acts on him. It happened at length in three different stages. The first was the most severe. It was secret. He taught me using porn and practice. Usually it went something like this: me: “can I have this?/ can you spend time with my brother?/ can you get this gift for mama?” Him: “Yeah, sure, if you do stuff with me”. So I would. I felt bad because I was the one doing the stuff and I was getting what I asked for… and he would remind me of that. Eventually, after telling my mama at age 11, I started telling him no. That didn’t stop him from trying to touch me, flash me, and show porn to me as I was passing by his computer. Later when I was 16 he almost got in trouble, but I recanted. He then resumed flashing me, in close proximity to my sister, until I threatened him when I was almost 18.

Because it was all I knew, I coped. I divided that life away from normal life. I do have fun and happy memories. However most are tainted with connecting memories. I was not a happy kid. In fact, I was quite dark and troubled. I wanted to die. In fact, until I was about 21, I had no idea what it was like to want to live. I was quiet; I did what I was told. I was sneaky, and I cried a lot. Eventually I learned to shut off the tears, stay quiet, and make everyone happy. I worked hard at this.

It was:

It was my dad and my grandpa, concurrently. Though my dad was in charge. I don’t know if my dad knew about my grandpa, but somehow my grandpa caught on. My family lived on my grandparents’ farm, so there was easy access and many places to be alone. My grandpa intermittently weaves into my story until his death when I was 15.

I was scared to tell because I didn’t want to ruin my family. On top of that, my dad had explicitly taught me that I was just as much responsible as he was. When I got older and saw how wrong it was, I thought I could fix it and keep it quiet. That didn’t work and finally I was silenced by my entire family.

It made me feel…

Scared. Alone. Unwanted. I felt like I was always meant to be abused. This was intensified by being told that when I came to the states, (I was adopted when I was 2 years old from Russia), I had physical signs of sexual abuse. I have no clue if that was true. Maybe it was someone from the orphanage… maybe that was when my dad started… or maybe it was a lie. I don’t know but it did cause me to feel damaged beyond repair. How could I possibly survive in a world where all I knew was that I was pleasing men. I self harmed… sometimes just so I could ensure that no guy would ever want my body again. I felt like my words, desires, safety, and problems didn’t matter to anyone.

I told:

I told my mama when I was 11. I was in tears after my dad was physically abusive to my brother. She had asked before many times if he had touched me and I always said no. This time I said “yes and my papa too”. They yelled a lot. I was given rules to stay away from my dad and grandpa and to keep from leading them on. About a year or so later he started again. I immediately told my mama and she yelled at both of us. I decided that I could never tell her again. She decided for me that I could never tell anyone else because if I did, she would get in trouble too. But, my dad got worse and I made friends. When I was 16 I told a friend who convinced me, eventually, to tell my youth pastor. I did. He called CPS. A social worker came. My mom and grandma yelled. It took me about five minutes to recant. I lost my families trust, and I threw away my last opportunity to get justice. I convinced myself that I lied. That worked for about 2 years. I went to college, and that semester there was a strong focus on sexual abuse. It was digging into my brain and so I told a trusted friend, which was the hardest thing I ever did. I eventually made right the lies I had told other people (that I had lied on my dad) and I slowly got comfortable with telling my story.

I survived…

Well, I’m surviving. I survived the years by just living and by focusing my energy on my family. At this point I am still pretty broken. I also don’t have my family to focus my energy on. But I do have people. They listen to me and they care. I get to hear that I’m safe, wanted, and loved. I am working on believing that. I also survived because of God. He gave me comfort and peace when I literally had no one else. He’s given me strength when I needed that, and He is giving me time when, now, that’s what I need.

I dream…

I dream of a day that sexual abuse isn’t such a hushed topic. That there won’t be a scarlet letter painted on the whole family when they seek help. I would love to a time when family members will not feel like they have to pick between the abuser and the abused. I also hope that child protective services across the country will learn how deep the roots of abuse go in a family. That it is not always as simple as coming into the family at question with a giant wrecking ball.

I want…

I would like everyone to realize that abuse is lonely and scary. The damage from abuse is deep and confusing. It’s not easy to heal from and it’s not easy to explain the plethora of emotions in ones head, even five years later.

I would love for survivors to find someone they can lean on. To just receive care and compassion from, even if it’s just that. Don’t go through it alone if you don’t have to. And then to the younger me, if I could, I would say to not let the abuse define you. Because when you do, it becomes much harder to sort through the lies for truth about who you really are.

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