I have tried approaching this before but it never seemed "real" to me. I always felt like I was telling the generic version of my story and that's not fair to me or my heart. If I am going to tell it, I am going to tell it right, like I felt it, like I STILL feel it. No other way makes sense...
Stability and security were never things I had growing up. My parents divorced when I was two and, at that time, they went into "pleasing themselves and their significant other's" mode. Of course, when you are 2-3 years old, you have no idea this is even a thing. Your parents are the most amazing beings to ever walk the earth.
The abuse started pretty much immediately on my dad's side. My stepmother hated, no, despised me. She did whatever she possibly could to hurt me, well, punish me, for just existing. She beat me and punched me to the point of knoking the wind out of me. She would lock me in closets and tie me up in plastic bags as punishment for wetting the bed. I remember getting freezing cold and scalding hot showers/baths as punishments also and, one time, I remember her pulling my pants down in public and beating me just for leaning forward in the car. She would verbally belittle me, tease me, and just constantly pummel me with her snide remarks. There was not a soft spot in that woman's heart for me and I let her hurt me as much as she wanted just so I could see my dad. He never said anything or stopped her from doing any of it because he wanted her to be happy and, if hurting us is what it ook, then that is how it had to be. I loved my dad so much and was blind to all of this until after he died 6 years ago. People will do a lot for those they love I guess. It just broke my heart knowing he didn't love ME enough to make her stop...
The abuse on my mom's side started when I was 4. She used to go out every week to bars and would bring people home all of the time. One of he men she brought home sexually abused me. When she broke up with him, she was all too happy to pry it out of me what he did and turn him in. It was like she used my misfortune as revenge against her ex. Soon after, she started dating another man, who is now my stepfather. She was a little more serious with this one. He started sexually abusing me almost immediately. I didn't tell anyone for awhile because I didn't want to hurt my mom and he told me not to tell. Well, my stepmother thought I was acting strange and she pried it out of me. She got such enjoyment out of it because she hated my mom and just wanted to use it to hurt her, of course, who cared about what was happening to me? Anyways. I turned him in. When my mom picked me up from school afterwards, she begged me to go to the cops and retract my statement because "He makes he happy"...so I did because I didn't like to see my mom sad. I was 5. Five freaking years old and having to make a decision like that! Needless to say, the abuse continued until I was 11 years old, almost daily. This is when I started getting violent with him whenever he got near me. It seemed like I was magnet for this crap as a child because I was also abused by 3 other people THAT I KNOW OF by the age of 15. I was pretty much told by my stepmother that I might as well keep my mouth shut about those ones because no one will believe me since I withdrew my statement about my stepdad. So I did.
It's almost three years now since my CPTSD came on. I realize how much of my childhood that I have suppressed and, the memories that have tried to come out, usually leave me shaking and crying uncontrollably, even though I can't even make out what they are. I look back now and I cannot believe that I made it through my childhood alive. People wonder why my faith is so strong and how I can believe in God after all that I have seen and after everything that I have been through. How CAN'T I believe?? How else would I have made it through my childhood? Who else was looking out for me? It certainly wasn't my parents or family that was supposed to be. They were only looking out for themselves. I was an alone, scared, angry, confused girl left to deal with it all on my own.
Holding it in only created problems far greater than I could ever imagined. That's for another day...
No comments:
Post a Comment