Just a Girl
“But moooom, why can’t I go?!”
“Because I said so. I have my reasons, and I’ll tell you when you’re older.”
“Oh what, mom, were you molested or something?”
“No, I was raped.”
What started as a typical argument with my mother about not being allowed to go somewhere I thought I should be able to go (after all I was thirteen years old, and that’s practically grown-up), ended with a story she wasn’t planning to tell. I don’t remember where I wanted to go or why the conversation took that direction, but it did, and I learned exactly why my mom was so protective.
When she was sixteen, my mom went to an event at her high school. It doesn’t matter what, it only matters that she was walking home alone through a field near the school. That was normal for her. What wasn’t normal was the man in the field with a gun. I don’t know every detail, partly because she didn’t tell me and partly because I didn’t ask. He forced her to the ground and threatened to kill her if she screamed. When it was over, he got up and left like it was nothing, like he hadn’t just taken her virginity and something more.
She made it to a payphone and called some friends of her sister because they had their own apartment so she didn’t have to go home. The next day she went to the police, but they didn’t take her too seriously – she told me she couldn’t describe the man’s face but she could describe every single detail of that gun. They told her without a description there wasn’t much they could do, and she was dismissed. The local paper ran a small article that didn’t mention her name, only referred to her as the “alleged victim.” They probably had to but she said the day she read that “alleged” was one of the worst days of her life.
Hearing my mom’s story absolutely shut me up. Not just that night, but for almost a decade. I didn’t tell my sister, I didn’t tell my friends, I didn’t tell ANYONE. The only time I recall talking about it again was when she told my little sister several years later. It’s not that I forgot about it; on the contrary, I thought about it almost every day.
Almost.
One night, I guess I forgot those lessons. I was seventeen and believed I was safe among friends, with just a touch of that teenage invincibility we all thought we had, so I drank too much at a party. Way, way too much. I talked to a boy I didn’t know, and I let him convince me we should go into one of the bedrooms. I remember laying on the bed because sitting up was just too hard, and I remember him kissing me. I remember feeling vaguely afraid but the fear didn’t last long because blackness followed. Every time I regained consciousness, I wanted to move, I wanted to leave, and I knew that it wasn’t right and why was he looking at me and laughing, quietly, to himself? But I couldn’t move, and I couldn’t stay awake long enough to yell or tell him to stop.
I could have followed in my mother’s footsteps that night. Fortunately my guardian angel, also known as my little sister, was watching out for me. She realized she hadn’t seen me for awhile and went looking. As much as she drives me nuts sometimes, I was so grateful that night that she’s fearless and rude and didn’t see any problem opening bedroom doors to find me. When she saw me on the bed with my pants half off and that boy standing over me, she grabbed my shoe (also fortunate that those were the days of big chunky heels) and hit him in the head. Hard. And then again. Then she dragged me off the bed, fixed my clothes, and pulled me out into the hallway. She told him if he tried to touch me again, she would kill him and immediately found us a ride home.
Thank god for overprotective mothers and sisters. I never put myself in that situation again. It would be disrespectful to both of them if I did. And even though I know that I chose to drink too much, and I agreed to go in the bedroom, that what happened after is NOT my fault. And I will NOT stop telling people about it because if one girl reads that and avoids my mother’s fate, then that’s more than I could save if I kept my mouth shut.
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Just a Girl blogs at Dramatic Sigh.
Amy
She could hear him. She knew it was him. Who else would enter her home so late at night? Who else would disrupt her slumber in such rude ways?
As a little girl woken in the dark of a peaceful night she was frightened, afraid of what was to come. She knew the door between her room and the hallway gave her safety, but what was going to happen beyond it frightened her most.
She woke with the moonlight pouring through her window, curtains softening the glow. Perspiration on her neck created ringlets in her hair. Her nightgown hung to the floor and she was a picture of sweet, sweet innocence. Tiny painted fingernails and toes, stuffed animals sharing her bed, she was everyone and anyone’s little girl.
Before long she could hear the mumbling and the voices begin to escalate. “Oh come on, get off my back!” he would say to her mother as she questioned where he’d been. His voice carried, perhaps because he was so tall and his presence so ominous in their small home. Perhaps the drugs and alcohol had something to do with it, though? Perhaps it made him louder?
The little girl knew that something louder might be coming and she wished with all of her might that her mommy would not say anything more to the man. She hoped that if they didn’t speak…if he didn’t get mad… maybe the house would be quiet and cozy once again. But his callousness cut this mommy too deep and she would wince, showing just enough pain to fuel him and the exchange would continue. It was if they were tied by a rope to the back of a truck…once the truck started, they were all going along for the ride, to be dragged, pulled along, no matter the cost.
Another question from the mommy and the responses grew louder, the obscenities and vulgarities thrown at the woman hurt this little girl almost as much, as the words bounced off the walls and embedded in the her memory. Yelling turned to screaming … and it seemed odd to this child that no one else could hear. She wondered why no one stopped him. She wondered why no one came. And later, she would wonder why no one protected her or or her brother.
In her small room it would take a seemingly long time to get from the bed to the door. She didn’t dare open it, but if she sat down by it, she could hear better, and understand a little more clearly what was taking place. A plate or glass had been thrown and it was easier to identify through the small crack where the light from the hallway sneaked in. She placed her hand on the doorknob and wait for some courage, but it never seemed to come.
She imagined the man’s icy eyes and knew how his size towered over her mother’s. The beginning of a struggle was heard and the little girl held her breath hoping that it would end quickly. A gasp from her mommy and she wanted to run to her, but what would she do? What could she do when she got there? Her mommy would sob and as the man squeezed life out of her mommy he also squeezed some out of the little girl. He would eventually succumb to fatigue and end the bout with more profanities directed at the mommy. Each word cut into the ribbon of innocence tied sweetly around the little girl, eventually shredding it and fraying the edges of her heart as well. Each blow that landed robbed her of the serenity of a child because there was no safety. Each helpless moment chipped away at the block of courage that she had to stand on and eventually she felt none, but was left instead with stepping stones to shame.
For so many long nights, though, that little girl could only hang on to her bedroom doorknob, and wait for the noise to stop.
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Amy tweets as @abeeliever , and blogs at Una Vita Bella.
Andrea
Moderator’s note: A young family member of mine went through something very similar to this. Experts tell me the Internet, cell phones, and smart devices have ratcheted up dating violence, abuse, and bullying among middle and high school kids to a whole new, unimaginable level. — Maggie
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“Unmasked”
Yes, I came from a broken home. My mother realized it and fought to mend it for her three children–and she succeeded. Yes, I experienced domestic violence throughout my childhood; sometimes brutal attacks, sometimes no more than a smack here or there. Does that mean I asked for the emotional and physical abuse I’d experience later on?
When I was 14 I met a girl who told me about a boy she knew. The boy and I talked online through messengers, email, and other means. I was insecure and desperate for love I didn’t experience at home, so we developed a long distance relationship.
After a year I knew that this boy was not a boy–his pictures were different every time, his voice on the phone was not male, I called my friend’s number which was “routed” to get to him (to avoid long distance, obviously) –I didn’t care. I knew it was that girl who initially introduced me to “him.”
Then I entered high school and it got worse. I “broke up” with the boy to date the girl. She did to others what she did to me (while we were dating), made it a point to leave little clues around so I’d know. She took sex on her terms when she wanted it, which I gave her because I so badly wanted to have a relationship. She withheld all affection when she didn’t care enough to make an effort. It lasted almost two years.
Finally I brought it up. She would follow me around school, doing things just to hurt me, make me angry and sad. When I went to school officials (the security lady, my choir teacher, my counselor) they listened, understood. Then she went to them claiming I was the one doing the harassing. Even her friends didn’t take her side after that.
I almost dropped out of high school.
Eventually she left. I took my last year of school to fix myself, to understand it, to put it behind me.
She’s still doing this, using up wounded, fragile people because it fulfills something lost inside herself. She did it to one of my best friends (who is a gay male) and one of my friends who knew her then.
She kept trying to continue the cycle–creating false identities and trying to contact me, calling me to deliver verbal and emotional abuse–until my good friend (who is also one of her victims) told her that we had all of the fake IDs she’d created and all of the abuse she’d dealt out saved and would sue her for everything we could. I haven’t heard from her since that.
I grew up being hit and thrown and bruised. I entered my teenage years being bruised emotionally and sexually because I thought it was the only kind of love I could ever experience.
Now I am about to move in with the man I will marry–a man who is kind, patient, loyal and generous, who loves me for exactly what I am–and I am not a victim. I will never be a victim of anyone ever again. I broke the cycle of my father and my father’s father and my mother. It ends with me.
And I am stronger for it.
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Andrea blogs at The Revenant Cupcake.
Amber
The summer before 7th grade, I spent every afternoon floating in Katie’s pool. Her dad was a contractor, so they would live in whatever McMansion he’d just completed until it was sold, and this one had a pretty spectacular pool. One day, as I dried off in the sun next to Katie, I told her a secret and asked her to promise not to tell anyone. Katie broke her promise, making her at once the best friend I ever had and someone I hated for years after. In fact, we never spoke, though we were in many of the same classes, until she moved to Oregon after 10th grade.
Earlier that year, my parents had turned an office into a bedroom for me, and I had my own room for the first time since my little sister was born. But having a room of my own turned out to be less a privilege for me than an opportunity for my stepfather. I told Katie that August afternoon what my stepfather did to me while my mom was asleep. Sometimes it was while I was asleep. I was always a sound sleeper, but I would wake up in the middle of the night, at least once a week, to the feeling of a man’s rough hand in my underwear.
I didn’t tell Katie everything, though. I never told Katie about the mornings I would wake up to find him standing over me, fondling himself, asking if I wanted him to make me breakfast with a tone so casual, one might think it perfectly normal to rub your cock as you stand over your 11-year old daughter and ask her how she wants her eggs. I didn’t tell Katie that I’d started taking my sleeping bag into my sister’s room and sleeping under her bed, but that even that was not always a deterrent. I didn’t tell her about the cocktails he would offer me when my mom was at night school. I didn’t tell her about the way he would try to make it seem like I wanted it, like the time I woke up with his dick in my hand, like I’d reached out to grab it. I didn’t tell her about things so traumatizing I still can’t make them real by typing the words.
But I told Katie enough. She made a promise she couldn’t keep, and two weeks into the start of second grade an office aide pulled me out of 5th period and took me to the guidance office. The person I met with, however, was not a guidance counselor. I know now that she was a social worker, but at the time I thought she was a cop. I thought I was in trouble. She asked me all sorts of questions and I felt my face burning as I realized Katie had told my secret. I knew she had, because I hadn’t told anyone else.
I don’t remember much about that questioning, because the rest of my memories from 7th grade to my senior year are blurry, painful apparitions in my mind. I do remember that I was taken from my school in a sheriff’s car to the station, which didn’t ameliorate my fear that I was in trouble, nor did the trip downtown to Hillcrest Receiving Home, a purgatory for foster kids that might as well have been a minimum security prison, save for the kind woman who rubbed my back as I sobbed into a rough institutional pillow at lights out. They brought my little sister in later that night.
I think we were in the receiving home for three or four days. We wore unfashionable donated clothes that fit poorly, and they tried to make things as nice as possible by taking us out for ice cream and bowling, but it still felt penal. I was taken during that time for additional interviewing in a room with toys and a two-way mirror. I was given my first gynecological exam, at 11, an experience that felt to me as much a violation as my stepfather’s actions.
On the last day of my stay in the home, we had “school,” which consisted of some worksheets in math and language arts that were far below my grade level. My mom picked us up that evening. Her eyes were red and puffy and they would not make contact with mine, except for one split second, and they were full of hate. Hate for me.
The car ride home was my extradition to a new prison. My mother told me on that car ride home that I was a liar. She told me I had behaved atrociously toward my stepfather for months. She referred to a special evening episode of Oprah that had aired in June or July, dealing with incest, and said I must have gotten my inspiration from that to falsely accuse my stepfather. That Oprah episode was certainly pivotal, but not the way my mother painted it. It had merely given me a name for what was happening to me and the courage to tell just one person.
We never pressed charges.
For the next year, I allowed my mother to convince me I’d made it all up for attention, or to get back at my stepdad for something. During the therapy sessions ordered by a family court and Child Protective Services, I spent an hour a week telling a counselor that I’d been confused, that what I’d confessed to authorities was just a vivid dream. A dream so vivid I remembered, in some of the scariest parts of the dream, the exact placement of the glow-in-the-dark hands of my alarm clock’s dial and the ragged sound of his breath near my ear.
And then, a year later, when the cost of my court-mandated treatment and living in two households became too much of a burden for my family to bear, my parents realized I wasn’t getting out of this until I gave the therapist what she wanted. After over a year of lying, I’d become pretty well convinced of the fiction my parents had spun for me, but now I was supposed to renege so that I could “get better” and we could work toward rehabilitating my stepfather and reintroducing him to our home.
I can’t remember when, but at some point, my stepfather admitted to the truth in a joint couple’s session with his own mandated therapist. I remember my mom coming to my room sobbing in my lap, begging for my forgiveness. I don’t remember events and time lines; I just remember the confusion. I remember girls on the bus to school who stared and, even worse, the girls and boys who wouldn’t look at me. I remember my next door neighbor bringing me a gift when I came back to school after a week’s absence. She gave me a tin box decorated with roses, full of makeup. It was my first and, thankfully, only “sorry your stepdad rapes and molests you” present.
I also know that, at some point, our therapists decided that under strict circumstances we could start slowly reintegrating my stepfather back into the house. A day here, a weekend there—provided my door was fitted with a lock from the inside and therapy sessions continue for at least another year. I remember being happy, or maybe just relieved, because this meant I hadn’t really ruined our family forever like my mother said. I remember happy vacations, but I also remember the chronic excema I developed on my hands from constant stress. I remember easing into what seemed like comfort, leading to nights I would forget to lock my door. And I vividly remember the day my stepfather took that as an invitation.
The difference is that this time I told my mother, and that this time she believed me. Even so, it was not the incident that led to her finally sending him packing. It took an affair with a woman two years older than my mom to inspire her to kick him out for good. Though I’ve forgiven my mother for much of what happened to me, that is something I’ll never quite get over: that what happened to me wasn’t enough for her to end it. That it took an affair with a grown-up and a stranger to make her leave and secure my safety once and for all.
The confusion I felt over that year I spent convincing myself I’d lied or misremembered things led to an extremely delayed reaction to my abuse. It wasn’t until I was 16 that I truly got angry about it, and by then I was no longer in therapy where I could have help expressing my anger productively. I drank heavily once my mother had passed out from drinking herself to sleep. I smoked, a habit I am still to this day struggling to kick. Despite his transgressions, my stepfather ended up winning in the divorce settlement the house we’d grown up in. My mother and sister moved 40 minutes away from my high school’s district, and I moved in with my best friend.
In an act of rebellion, I got my tongue pierced in a stranger’s bedroom. I skipped school more often than I attended and slept through the first four periods when I did go, nearly failing my senior year. I lashed out at my mother when she would call and called her every bad name I knew. At one point she told me she’d paid her penance, as though it was up to her to decide when I should stop being angry. She accused me of doing drugs, which I hadn’t been, at least not until after that accusation. I began smoking pot, figuring, “what the hell, if I’m going to be accused of it anyway.” I slept with the first boy who asked me out, on the first date. I just remember thinking I wanted to “get it over with.” I met a man six years older than me, lied about my age, and slept with him too. At school I was called an ugly slut, and I began to put on the weight I am still struggling to shed 12 years later.
For two years after high school graduation, I engaged in more and more risky behavior and alienated my friends, lying and thieving, until I felt I had little choice but to move across the country where no one would know about my past or what an asshole I’d been. I started over, and I’m certain that act of freeing myself from that small town where everyone knew this about me is what helped me survive.
I’ve done a lot of healing, but while I declared just a few months ago that I am not irrevocably broken, lately I am beginning to feel I’m not as mended as I thought I was. I am almost wholly unable to completely trust anyone. I am always bracing myself for the inevitable betrayal, and the sad thing is, I’m usually right to. The one exception was my husband, and I felt that my ability to trust him completely meant I was—hooray!—cured. But then this man with whom I’d finally felt I could invest my unmitigated trust betrayed it, and that revelation triggered the worst PTSD I’ve experienced in over a decade. Two weeks ago, had I not reached out to friends in a moment of clarity, I’m certain I’d be in a hospital today instead of writing this.
I realize now that I will spend my whole life breaking and mending from this. The difference between my 29-year-old self and my 11-year-old self, is that I know how to ask for help. I know that it’s not my fault, and I know that my anger is righteous. The difference between me then and me now is that I have a voice.
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Amber now blogs at Pieces of Amber.
