Mary
I read a survivor’s story of childhood sexual abuse at the hands of another boy… and I cried.
Not for this particular woman. She’s strong. She’s a survivor. She has chosen the path towards healing…and even though that path may take a lifetime it will be a lifetime of growth and positive change…and even though that path will be filled many times with pain it will be tempered with well deserved pride and joy at all she has overcome and with whom she has become.
No…the person I cry for is a little seven year old boy who for some reason probably thought his perverted behavior was normal. I cry for the little boy who grew up to adulthood and chose a very different path than the survivor chose. I cry because I wonder what created that behavior. I wonder who abused him. I wonder why he never had an adult in his life who saw what he was doing and reached out to him and gave him the help he needed to begin the healing process. Don’t get me wrong…I don’t condone his actions. I don’t excuse him. But where were the adults in his life who loved him enough to stop him? Where were the adults in his life who loved him enough to get him the help he needed…when he was a seven year old little boy? I cry because he grew up to continue the cycle of abuse.
And I realize I cry for my pain.
The pain of loving younger brothers and sisters who chose very different paths than I did. The pain of cutting myself off from their sick and abusive choices. The pain of knowing what they were like when they were babies, toddlers, preschoolers…tender hearted, gentle, inquisitive…and knowing what they are now.
I cry for my youngest sister who endured being raped by my youngest brother almost nightly for years before I found out. I cry for her growing up and going from one abusive partner to another. I cry for her three children who were also raped and abused by those same partners. I cry for the children her kids will most likely abuse in the future because they are not dealing with their past in a healthy way.
I cry for that same youngest brother who was molested and raped as a little boy by older sisters. I cry for those older sisters who weren’t strong enough to fight off an older brother when they were still toddlers. I cry for that older brother who tried to force me to suck his penis when he was only eleven. I cry for him even as I remember him holding me down and raping me when he was older and stronger. I cry for the atrocities forced upon him although I don’t know for sure what they were.
I cry for the little boy that was my father and the little girl that was my mother. And their parents as children. I don’t know all the details. But I know enough. The cycle reaches back and back and back…and forward and forward and forward.
I cry for my daughters when they were young and trusting. As a young mother I dealt with the physical and emotional abuse that was rampant throughout my childhood. I made sure that those aspects were not a part of my parenting. I taught them about safe touch and always telling a trusted adult when something didn’t feel right. I did so many things right. But I hadn’t yet actively remembered the extreme sexual and ritualistic abuse that I had endured as a child. I was open and honest with the man I married, the father of those girls. And still the cycle repeated itself. They too were subjected to rape and abuse by the daddy they loved and trusted.
I cry for family members I haven’t had contact with in over twenty years. They hurt me. They hurt others. They raped and molested and abused. Yet…they too were subjected to those same atrocities. They too were once little, defenseless, alone… They too were once victims. And now they are perpetrators. At different times in my life I have hated them. Yet always…beneath that strong hate…that overriding fear…that pervasive sense of terror…there has also been love.
As soon as I discovered what my daughters had been subjected to I kept them safe. I had never left them alone with my family members…only their father. Once the silence was broken…they never again spent a moment alone with him. From an extended family with over fifty first cousins and dozens of aunts and uncles they learned to create family with the four of us and whoever was healthy enough to be a part of our lives.
I don’t cry for the women my daughters became. They are strong. They are survivors. They have chosen the lifelong path of working towards healthiness in all relationships. I don’t cry for who I’ve become. We all experience our share of pain and sorrow and grief. But the four of us have broken the cycle. We’re each pretty awesome in our own ways.
But I do cry for my losses. I read the online newspaper from my home town. I cried when I discovered on Mother’s Day that my mom had died a month before. I cried when I discovered my baby brother on the registered sex offenders list in my home state…even while I was grateful and wished my other brother and Dad were on it also. I cried when I read the obituary for my niece’s four month old son. I cry because I only get the information that is reported in newspapers and on the internet. I don’t know the stories behind the articles.
I feel for every person who has written their “story” on Violence UnSilenced. I know first hand the depth of pain, the suffering, the horror, the fear, the terror, the tears, the inability to cry, the challenges, the unbelievably hard path to healing they have chosen.
Yet…for each of those stories of success…because that is what they are…there are the multitude of untold stories of how the perpetrators became who they are. Once again…I do not…ever…condone or excuse or trivialize what they’ve done. And I realize that some perpetrators may never have had any previous experiences to lead them to the choices they’ve made.
Yet…out of the ten kids in my family…I am the only one strong enough to choose to work (and it is constant, hard work) towards healing. Many have become and remain abusive. Some merely live in denial and allow the abuse to continue. Some have given up and just exist with what is.
But all were born, innocent and pure, into a family where betrayal and abuse and rape and violence were already the established norm of existence. None of them were responsible for the atrocities that they endured as children. And each of them is now responsible for the choices they have made in living their lives. Yet…what else did they know?
I have no answers. Only questions. And tears.
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Mary writes here. She asks that you keep all comments on Violence UnSilenced, rather than on her own blog.
Chibi Jeebs
Note: This post was originally written in January 2010 and appeared on Chibi’s personal blog.
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Jenn of Princess Prose has been writing a very educational and thought-provoking series on relationships. Part 4 hit particularly close to home because it involves trust. Recently I wrote about wondering if I’m good enough, and how trusting myself is a struggle. I know that a lot of my issues (or a large portion of my issues) could be chalked up to childhood, growing up, what have you; however, there is one piece of the puzzle that overrides everything.
When I was 18, I met a guy named Matt who was younger than I, but his… “extracurricular activities” made him experienced far beyond his years. He had brilliant blue eyes that flashed devilishly, and a dimple deep enough to fall into when he’d turn his disarming smile your way. He was trouble, all right. A whole lot of trouble.
The relationship was bad from the start. Right from go, we hid it from friends and family because of the age difference (as well, there was no way I could tell my family that I was involved with someone with the “pastimes” he participated in). He had a violently explosive temper that was quick to ignite; I was never afraid of him, but I was scared by his angry outbursts – I stood frozen in his doorway one night as he raged around his bedroom, yanking the phone out of the wall before chucking it out the window, and ripping the closet door off its hinges before launching it down the hall. He would be a heaving mass of adrenalin-driven fury one minute, and a sobbing puddle of remorse the next. I was always uncomfortably on edge around him, never knowing which version of Dr. Jekyll I would be spending time with.
He was my first. The first guy I was in a relationship with that lasted more than a month and a half. The first guy I slept with. The first guy I said “I love you” to. He fucked me up so badly, some times I’m amazed I’m able to participate in a healthy relationship today.
You see, he had another girlfriend. That’s right: the entire year and a half we were together, he was still seeing (and screwing) his “ex.” At first, he’d play the game where he’d pick a fight with me to give him an excuse to not speak to me for a few days; during this time, he’d go back to her. I’m not sure if the crawling back routine (which was more a grudging, pissy phone call on his part than a tail-between-the-legs apology) was because he missed me, or if he was just tired of his other plaything. That went on for quite some time until he either got sloppy or just couldn’t be bothered to hide it anymore: I discovered that he was still sleeping with her by spotting the hickies all over his body – I’m sure she was sending me a message, too. He messed around with a number of other girls during his tenure, as well, all girls who apparently knew he had a girlfriend (whichever one of us was “lucky” enough to bear the title at the time); he wore his philandering like a badge of honour.
Even though I confronted him quite loudly, he laughed in my face, at that point basically opting to have two girlfriends at the same time. I would threaten to leave him; he would challenge me, telling me to go ahead and try: I’d be back because no one else would want me anyhow. At 18 years old, I believed that I was worthless, useless, ugly, and unlovable, all at the hand of someone who claimed to love me. In the meantime, I was competing with a girl who was hell-bent on stealing “my” man (who, in retrospect, obviously considered him HER man).
Self-esteem issues? Check. Trust issues? Check. Major suspicion, distrust, and fear of any female to show the slightest bit of attention to “my” man? Check, check, check.
It’s been hard for me to trust: myself, my partner, people I don’t know well. In the beginning, it took a conscious effort on my part to trust Chebbar; I don’t know that we ever would have gotten to where we are today were it not for his unwavering, amazing patience and understanding. I still struggle with trusting “new” people, though, particularly those of the female persuasion – the above wasn’t the first time (nor, sadly, was it the last) I was burned by the “fairer” sex. And because in all of my infinite teen-aged wisdom I never thought I’d ever be one of those girls who ended up blinded by a quasi-abusive relationship, I still struggle with trusting myself: are my suspicions correct? should I even be suspicious? am I right to trust him? to trust her? can I even possibly rely on my own instincts and judgment?
I’ve known all along that my first “real” relationship was a bad one. Hell, deep down, I knew it was bad while I was in it. I’ve stood tall and been proud, asserting that it was a learning experience that allowed me to figure out what I would and wouldn’t put up with going forward. I’ve fooled myself into thinking that, because it’s over and I feel I’ve moved on, it doesn’t affect me anymore.
With some of the events of the last little while, I’ve realized I couldn’t be farther from the truth – that my past does still play a large role in who I am and how I react today.
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Chibi writes at Chibi Jeebs & the Neurotic Struggle.
Sandi
Thankfully, I’ve never been the victim of abuse or domestic violence. But I was someone who disregarded another woman’s cries for help. I dismissed her as promiscuous and unstable. It wasn’t until a more “respectable” victim came forward that I finally believed the allegations. This is the shame I have carried with me for over twenty years–a shame that only my immediate family knows about.
“Rob” and I met and became friends in high school. He was handsome, athletic, came from a “good” family and my parents loved him. Much to my father’s dismay, we never became romantically involved. We just remained good friends. He became my protector–if a boy broke my heart in some way, didn’t treat me well, cheated on me, etc., Rob was there to pick up the pieces and give the perpetrator a good talking to. I truly loved Rob like a brother. We remained friends throughout my freshman and sophomore years of college despite the fact we went to separate schools a few hundred miles away from each other.
During my sophomore year of college he came with some friends to visit one homecoming weekend and hooked up with a girl on my dorm floor. I wasn’t happy about this; not because I was jealous, which is what she assumed, but because she was a bit unstable and rather promiscuous. Just like I’d want the best for one of my brothers, I wanted the best for Rob and this girl was not it.
They continued to see each other. She went to visit him and he made some more trips to my school, to visit both her and me.
It was at the end of the our second term sophomore year when we were getting ready to head home for the summer, that she came to me. She had ended things with Rob. I was happy about this. Then she told me that she ended it because on several occasions he had acted violently towards her. I rolled my eyes and made it clear I didn’t believe her. Later a mutual friend gave me a letter from her. I never read it.
That summer, while back in my hometown, I ran into one of Rob’s former high school girlfriends–a girl that I had also been good friends with and always wanted to see them get back together. She knew about the girl from college and how I didn’t really like her. I told his old girlfriend what she accused him of and I was rather indignant about it.
I’ll never forget the silence and then the confession that followed. She told me the girl was probably telling the truth because he had also been violent with her, so much so that a male friend of hers once had to step in. I was shocked and horrified. I had no idea. I believed every word she told me.
I cut all contact off with Rob after that conversation. He never knew why.
Years later my younger brother read of his arrest in the paper–not for domestic violence, but for a white collar crime. I don’t know what’s happened to him since then, but I still keep in touch with his high school girlfriend. She is happily married to wonderful man and has two beautiful children. She has long since put that time behind her.
I don’t know whatever happened to the girl from my dorm floor. I know this, however: I will never again dismiss a victim of domestic violence because she doesn’t fit my definition of the “ideal” victim.
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Sandi writes at Widow for One Year.
Jill
When I was eleven years old my parents sent me to a new sitter. It was supposed to be fun, because my best friend was going too. I wish I could tell you all sorts of details. Not that the details are fun or nice, or polite. But all the same I wish I could share them.
I remember being 20-years-old and that same best friend asked me for a drive. She pulled over on the side of the rode and said, “I am charring Tom for what he did to us.” I remember the angry look of betrayal when I told my friend I did not understand her. As she spit out the words, “Don’t pretend you can’t remember being abused and raped for three years.” (Tom was the adult son of the new sitter I had gone to. He was in his early 20’s.)
I did not remember. On the surface one would think this is a good thing. It is not. Shortly after the car ride, I was asked to talk with the police. They had photos. He kept photos. I looked at them unable even in the face of them to remember. The awful horrible images repulsed me, and I understood that they were of me. No memory. I could see it in their faces, all of them thinking I was pretending to not remember.
The pictures were of me tied up naked. Things inside me. Those Polaroids were faded, but not enough to not recognize me, and what those images were of. How could I not remember those awful things? My friend threw the details of disgusting abuse at me. I still did not remember. I knew it was real, I was not in denial.
I can tell what I do remember. I remember the look on my father’s face when he found out. That look has never really left his face some 18 years latter. My parents will always see me as the daughter they could not help. I hate their guilt.
I remember the pain it caused my friend to know that I would be testifying that I had no memories. I remember how it made me feel like I was betraying her.
I remember how it felt to have the defense lawyer suggest that my lack of memories was an indication of how little the events impacted me.
I want to remember. My whole adult life has been a series of bad choices. A series of failed relationships. What is me, what is the abuse, I don’t even know.
I want to own my memories. I don’t want him to own them. I feel like a failure. I feel like I’m 12-years-old, and my voice isn’t really my own. How dare he have the memories. They are mine and I want them back.
