Melanie
“Motionless”
For the longest time I never spoke out about my past because it was something I was ashamed of, like I did something wrong. I kept silent also because any issues that happened in my family were never discussed.
I remember as a kid during a family get – together my cousin D tried to get me to show him my private parts when I was about 9 years old (he was about 11). I said “no” and ran away thinking he was just being a naughty boy. A couple years later when I was 14, I’d visit my aunty and cousin D, which was when it began. Numerous times we were alone in auntie’s bedroom watching TV; he talked and asked me lots of questions about sex. I disclosed that I had just lost my virginity to a guy I really liked and he used this as means to take advantage of me …or “teach me” is what he used to tell me. He convinced me that he was experienced and knew what he was doing, so he said he thought he could teach me how its suppose to be done. I had the feeling that this was wrong, that we shouldn’t be doing this but I was afraid my dad would find out especially since my father disliked him very much after the incident when I was 9. I got used to the routine of most times we were alone, when the time was “right,” he molested me.
After several attempts to get me alone in church, I finally said “no” I won’t let you do this anymore. He apologized, gave me a hug and said it would never happen again…and it didn’t. I thought that was the end of that chapter of my life. It wasn’t.
About a year later my stepfather started making inappropriate sexual remarks towards me. He would say things in such a way that would make me look like I started it. Then his 28-year-old brother, after only living with us for about a month, would try and force himself on me every time we were alone in the house, but he never succeeded. I started to feel like maybe there was something I was doing, or not doing to make these guys take advantage of me that way. “How could I be so vulnerable?” I used to say to myself. It was only until I was 24 when I realized that being silent was my way to survive, my way to protect myself from the negative reactions of my family members, the shame, and the embarrassment. It was striking to me that even when I spoke out about my stepfather and his brother, I was the one that got blamed, or was the liar. Even my own mother didn’t believe me but I don’t hold it against her because I knew that she had her own abuse issues to sort out, that caused her to not think straight.
My mother and I left the house, left that town, and left that family to start a new life in in another town–where problems continued, of course. I left my grandmother’s house where we had been staying simply because my mom and I didn’t get along, and like in my childhood, no one cared whether I was there or not. So while living on the streets looking for a space to stay, calling whatever friend I had at the time, I befriended a girl named A who was dating this man who apparently had access to a music recording studio. He was a very charming guy who had a great sense of humor and really liked me from the first day we met. Almost everyday I would go to his shop where he welded and hung out. My friend T, A, her boyfriend, and I became closer. Sometimes when it was just A’s boyfriend and I , he would say things like, “I like you. I want to be with you secretly.” I would reject his offers to be with him in any type of way. He continued to bother me about it every single time we were alone, all he kept hearing from me was “no” “No” “NO!” Eventually I found myself lying there, motionless, with him on top of me…crying.
He was raping me. Every time we were alone… I don’t know why I kept coming back. I wanted to be a singer so bad since music was my only escape, that I thought he’d stop. He told me after every time that he was sorry, gave me money and that it wouldn’t happen again.
The anger would keep me awake at night, crying and begging God to heal me… and he did. God has healed me emotionally from all the pain and hurt I went through, and he has given me the strength to forgive the men who used me. Through my education to be a social service worker, God has taught me that those experiences that I suffered weren’t my fault.
For many years I blamed myself for what happened, and it controlled who I was. Along with my spirituality, my husband and my two girls continue to help me become a strong, motivated, young mother who is living my dream to support and encourage other females who have been abused.
I am a survivor. I am free. I am healed.
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Melanie tweets as @LadyRoyelle
The Caged Bird Does Not Sing
~The free bird leaps on the back of the wind and floats downstream till the current ends and dips his wings in the orange sun rays and dares to claim the sky—-Maya Angelou
“I know what’s different about you,” I said to my sister on our last walk.
“What?” She smiled.
“You don’t need me like you used to. I like that. I like that you’re finally coming into your own skin. It’s about time, Sis. When do you sign the divorce papers?”
“In a couple weeks.” She grasped my hand tightly.
“LIBERATION!” She squealed. “I can’t wait to get away from that man, get my own house, begin a fresh life.”
My sister never got the chance to sign those divorce papers. Her soon to be ex-husband killed her two days after that walk.
::
We were going to have a surprise shower for her. An “Emancipation Shower.” A “New Beginnings Shower.” Candles & Cosmopolitans. Salsa & Sangria. Sushi & Sex and The City.
We were going to fill her new home with love, love, love.
We talked about painting her living room some funky color like bubblegum pink or crazy cranberry. We talked about how nice it was to see her smile again.
He left work early on May 26th. He sat on the couch like a demon- devil and waited and waited. He was never a man, so I shall call him “the murderer” or “the devil.”
Nevertheless, he was not what she deserved, or for that matter, what the world deserved.
He was nothing at all.
The Beretta pistol was so small, the devil could conceal inside the palm of his sweaty hand. I imagine he rubbed the iron between his fingers anticipating her absence, his absence, his final control. I imagine he tasted the metal upon his toxic tongue. I presume he was prepared to go straight to HELL.
She came home from work about 5:00, ran upstairs to put on her walking clothes, hoisted her hair in a ponytail. She texted our dad.
“I’ll see you on the trail, Pop. I love you.”
Her last words. The last time she’d walk down the steps. Her final beautiful breaths.
And mine.
He locked the front door, lingered like a predator.
Perhaps he said a prayer to whomever murderers utter prayers to. Perhaps he gave last rights to himself.
I wonder why God didn’t intervene. Why He’d allow the cage to remain closed.
There were two alternatives. She stayed with him or she died with him.
He placed the gun to the back of her beautiful head, her healthy head.
He blasted three times to make sure. He had to make damn sure my sister never gained consciousness, had to make damn certain she couldn’t fly away.
Maya Angelou was wrong when she said the caged bird sings. That’s just not true.
The caged bird cannot sing until she is set free; she cannot form a pleasing melody of verse until the cage is swung wide open.
Only then will she sing her sweet song of freedom. Only then will her wings reach the orange of the sun’s rays.
Sing, My Sweet Sister.
Sing. Sing. Sing.
(never forgotten. never released. we will be together again someday, my sweet sister….. love love love. always. forever)
~~~~~My new prayer. My new words. I have no more words::::::
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This post was written by Kim Sisto-Robinson, and originally appeared on her blog, My Inner Chick, on January 11, 2011. Please visit this post as well: http://myinnerchick.com/help-for-domestic-violence/
Miss Crystal
I am a religious Private Practice viewer. Every Thursday I take a hot bath, drink some wine and watch Grey’s Anatomy and then Private Practice on my DVR.
I know I am not the only one who was affected by tonight’s episode of Private Practice. One of the main characters, the tough-as-hell, no-one-messes-with-her-ever doctor Charlotte King, was brutally attacked by a man. He lacerated her arm, broke her hand, her shoulder, her nose, her eye socket and then raped her.
For a billion different reasons that you could only get if you watched it tonight, this was one eye-opening episode.
But for me it hit very close to home. It awakened memories I thought I had buried deep. A reference point in my life I could gloss over and not have affect me.
Eight years ago I was raped.
I was 17. And I thought the world was mine. I had left my parents’ home in Arkansas and moved back to California to be with my then-best friend and her brother, my fiancée. I ended up moving to a ranch that belonged to an old family friend. A ranch that my mom had worked at training horses, and where I had worked when I was 11 years old, spending my summer mucking out stalls, bathing horses, and wandering the lush country side.
Moving there was wonderful. I was surrounded by horses and dogs and baby sheep. I was in heaven. My boss was a woman. Her husband had left her (a few months before) and the ranch they had spent their whole life building, to be with another woman. She was happy to have the company and I was happy to be there.
One night she was going out with some friends and I was in charge of closing up the barn and feeding the horses for the night. Her husband was there that night, he would come and do some things around the property on occasion. She was nice enough to let him still keep cars and such on the property and he would work on them on weekends.
I had finished up feeding and raking the walkways and was drinking some water in the tack room when he came in. I asked him to look at a tooth that was bothering me, he was a dentist. But while he had his hands on my cheeks he was not looking in my mouth, but in my eyes. And it scared me. I was all of a sudden aware of how stupid I was. I tried to make some comment about going home and calling my boyfriend as I shrugged him off and walked away. But he grabbed the back of my hair and threw me into the wall. I was stunned. I kept wondering what I did wrong, why was he mad at me? He was like a grandfather. He taught me how to drive a hay baler. I went to get up and he punched me so hard in the stomach I couldn’t breathe. I fell onto some saddle blankets and couldn’t get up. I remember gasping like a fish while he pulled my pants down. And my mind could not wrap around what was happening. What he was doing to me. Months of sex with my boyfriend, but this hurt like I was being torn in two. And I couldn’t understand what was being done to me.
I screamed. But he laughed. No one could hear me. There was no one for miles. And the dogs just sat there, watching.
When he was done, he was so calm. He leaned in really close to my face and told me no one would believe me. Then he got up and walked away. I don’t know how long I had lain there. But eventually I got up and walked the half mile in the dark to the house. I couldn’t even look at myself in the mirror. I just took a shower and went to bed. The whole next day I was in a daze. That afternoon when I went home for lunch my boss was there. She screamed at me. Threw dishes at me that cut me and left scars. He told her that morning that I had begged him for it. I tried to calm her down and tell her but she wouldn’t listen.
I was sitting on the floor, bleeding, and she leaned down and said, “No one will believe you. Everyone knew your mom and that she was a liar. No one will believe you.” Then she left.
I cleaned up the glass, and called my best friend Mike. I told him to come and get me. That I was leaving. He called my boyfriend and they came that night and took me to a girlfriend’s house for the night. I made plans to go live with an aunt and uncle, and the next day my boyfriend took me to their house.
I didn’t tell my boyfriend what happened. He had been my best friend for 6 years, and he would have killed him. And all I could think of was that I could not let him go to jail for me.
He broke up with me a few days later.
I told no one what happened.
Who could I have told? I had no mother. No one to hold me and make me feel safe. No one to tell me I would be ok. I was scared shitless waiting for my period.
And I blamed myself. My first step-dad had been very abusive. And isn’t that the statistic? Once abused you are twice as likely to have it happen again.
Once attacked you are always a victim.
I can’t tell you how to make the pain of rape go away. I can’t tell you how to prevent the flashbacks. Or how to stop the nightmares from reoccurring.
I can tell you that when you think you have moved on it will will haunt you unexpectedly. I can tell you that in the worst moment it will debilitate you. When you are all alone is when you will remember and cry and no one will be there to hug you.
February 2003 I was raped by a man I knew and trusted. I was 17 and I was so in love with life. Some stupid TV show that I love brought those memories back to me almost 8 years later.
And all I know to ease the pain right now is to write it out, and hope it won’t haunt me all night.
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This post originally appeared on Miss Crystal’s blog, Miss’ Boudoir, on November 5, 2010.
Maiyo
Until I began writing this, I’d forgotten that my mother was left-handed.
Depending on the way she clutched the steering wheel on the way home, I’d fly up the stairs and place myself between my bookcase and the door of my room. There was no lock; she unscrewed the entire doorknob after realizing it gave me a sense of control. Shaking, sobbing. I’d wedge myself in front of that door, knees bent, feet against the wall; and she would stampede down the hall, steadily breaking herself into my cage. I occasionally vomited over my legs, caused by the stress of violently lurching forward from whenever she made contact. It only ended when tears or screams etched her face.
Threats were strewn throughout the length of the struggle. She’d hammer the door down. She loved me. She’d lock me inside for a week. She loved me. She’d kill my dog, toss my parakeets out a window. She loved me.
Apparently, I was the most contradictory aspect of her life.
Whenever I finally opened the door, whether from terror or fleeting hope, the results were almost always the same. Her fist was like a freight train; the other hand coiled around my neck being the only maternal embrace I knew. Even then, I couldn’t always make it to my room. Our meetings frequently took place on the stairwell, in which I was whisked down by my ankle or other stray limb.
After eighteen years surviving an alcoholic, manic-depressive mother who refused medication, I relocated to my father’s house. For nearly two years, I lived with his family; and in that stretch of time, my mother attempted suicide only to fail miserably. Since driving head-on into oncoming traffic, she is now incapacitated and resides in a nursing home. I last saw her in the shock and trauma ward of a hospital, swollen like a sack of flesh supported by tubes and wires. There will never be a time in my life when I hear an apology or declarations of love leave her mouth. She has lost the mental capacity to speak; there are no longer any words to be said between us.
The only reason I’m able to share my experience is because of those who I hold close to me. They are the ones whose faces I fought to see everyday. Their smiles were the scarce drops of gasoline that kept the engine rolling, and words alone cannot express the kindness and support that I have received from my friends. While I’d like to think that I’m still healing, the love that surrounds me is mind-numbing. My boyfriend amazes me beyond belief, having stayed by my side through my vehement depression and post-traumatic stress. I’ve gone through stages of grief, self-hate, contemplations of suicide, and multiple identity crises.
Just three years prior to this day, I couldn’t begin to fathom how much of an impact a small handful of people would have on my life, and now I am enveloped in their warmth.
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Maiyo blogs at http://little-notches.tumblr.com/
