Precious

This year, this day seems to be hitting me harder than normal. I don't know why its hitting me so hard it just is, and I want to scream at the world to stop for just a little while. I need a break, I want to crawl in a hole until it blows over and I can come out free and whole. The kids are getting older and asking questions, I am sure that’s part of it. I think its a lot of little things that have added up, and its hard. This year its more about me. Because I know that Vincent and Mariska are taken care of. Their little hearts are cared for and they don't have every want but they know that I love them with out a doubt. I know that the time is coming for the focus to be on them and to make sure that their questions are answered and their heart is cared for. Right now, this day I am worried about mine. Its not fine and it definitely is not ok. My heart ; its heavy and broken and sorrowful.

I have really been enjoying my children, the little things that make them who they are things they love, things they do, their little mannerisms that make me smile. And I think the part that breaks my heart is that the crime that was committed gave me my two biggest blessings. And trying to find rhyme or reason to that is futile. I can ask questions all day long and there will be no answers. I have said a million times a million I would do it all again to have my children. My children are absolutely the biggest blessings ever in my life. I don't want it to seem that I am not grateful for them each and every day. What bothers me is their kind tender little souls will someday have to learn about the evil that happened to their mom. That is the hard part, and they were a result of that evil .....that is gut wrenching, that is unthinkable. Its easy for me to separate them from that day. It happened, and I tried to gather all the broken pieces, for two weeks. I cried and just couldn't understand why again, what was wrong with me?!? Then after two weeks and feeling like I had the flu, oh I was so sick and a girl at work laughed and said girl you are pregnant. That thought never crossed my mind.....So I took the test and I waited and I saw two pink lines and I was in shock, and I laid on the floor and cried with my dog Rizzo. I knew that nothing would ever be the same. In these moments, things changed, I swept the broken pieces under the rug, because I was going to be a mom. In that instant nothing else mattered, absolutely nothing. They are my most amazing children that bring me joy, bring me life, bring me peace that I never thought I would have.

But this day before they were even in the picture, before they were conceived is the part that kills me, that tears at my soul, the day that I wanted to be normal that I wasn't listened too and I was assaulted. The part where the broken pieces are, the ones that I swept under the rug about what happened to me, those are the pieces that tear at my heart. I don't even have the words to how difficult this is, its unthinkable, heart wrenching, terribly sad that I had to experience that day, that Charles took what wasn't his to take. Its hard to acknowledge the pain, when I have these two most amazing people in my life because of that pain. As wonderful as they are and all the happiness that they bring, there is a sadness, and that is the part that I want to understand. Without that crime, with out those pieces I wouldn't be the person that I am today. There are no nice neat boxes for dealing with something like this, and oh how I wish that there were. But its messy, its scary, and makes you realize just how fragile that life is. One moment I was being raped, the next I was becoming a mother.

There was a time when I wanted my children to think that he wasn't a bad guy, he wasn't evil he just didn't listen to me. And as I began to look more closely, it was so much more, he knew what he was doing, I believe that when he came to my house he knew what he was going to do. He never had any plans to take me shopping. And oh that’s all I wanted, I remember taking a shower being excited wondering where we were going to go, I believed that I was going to help him, I believed that I was going to spend the day with a good guy. I was going to laugh and help, and pick out clothes for his trip to Afghanistan. He had a good job he worked at Raytheon in McKinney, and was doing some contract work. I mean really why in the world, would he want me to go shopping with him?!?! But then that thought never crossed my mind, I was going to be normal and in that, I turned off all reason, ignored every red flag, and was like that little girl getting ready for a date. I get angry at myself, I can remember the excitement that I felt that morning. Think of a first date, I have never had one but I imagine this is what it would be like, I was that excited. He was late, said that he got lost. I said that was ok, he smelled of cologne and smoke.. He was tall so much taller than me, I think I gave him a hug, there was a stiffness to him, not kind, he had intentions that I knew nothing about, I was ready to go, he was not. And how we ended up in my room, I don't know. I remember talking about a mobile of birds that I had above my door, it is said that it kept evil spirits and bad men away. I guess not.....mine must have been broken.

My mind was on overload, I know that I wanted to go shopping but things didn't seem to be going that way, I can remember feeling scared and I ignored it. I think there was a piece of my heart that knew, and I just didn't want it to be true... I wanted normal, not rape. I wanted shopping, and laughing that is what I wanted. I tried so hard to believe that, it never happened. He went through the motions and I don't even know . He knew exactly what he wanted, exactly what he was doing. The more I pleaded, the more he ignored, and the moment it changed and the moment I gave up was when that orange pillow fell on my face, because I knew what was going to happen, I knew what I was good for. That was the moment, the moment when you can't believe what is happening, what is being taken and your body is there, but your soul can't be there, can't understand what/why/ how is this happening and that moment is the most helpless, terrible moment because there is absolutely nothing that you can do. Its totally completely shattering. That is the part that I hold in my hands, today, 11 years later, those broken, shattered and  slivered pieces.  I am more than trying to make them all fit back together into something that is precious, and pretty again. That is where I am today. Loving my children and all that they are but sad for the things that tear at my heart, that morning when all I wanted was normal.

 

I heart your heart.