I see those words, three little world that carry the world, those words in the title and my heart stops. I hear those words and the world stops. I can write them and it feels like those are words that are very far away, words for another time and place. Those are words that happen to good innocent girls, those are words that happen to people who tell and find support and love and care. Those are words that fit others but not me. Those are words that some how don't fit me because no one noticed, no one cared. Things happened to me as usual and I just kept on living doing everything that a little girl is supposed to do. No one stopped to care that this little girl was being hurt like this all the time;
no
one
cared
to
notice
Things were not seen and so much looked over. All these things left a little girl all alone trying to understand things that should never have been a part of her world.
Someday I want to be able to stand up brave and strong and say those words. Say the things that have happened to me without feeling less than and gross and disgusting. I want to be able to say the truth and not be ashamed; not feel like I am less of a human, not feel like such an outsider. I want to say the things that have been silent, and hiding for oh so many years.
Somehow speaking those words makes things clearer and more real than they have ever been and its more than difficult. Somewhere In my head I know those are the things that happened and somehow by not saying those words I can keep it far away and use other words that don't sting so much. I can say I was hurt, I can say people were not nice. I can say that people took things that were not theirs to take. I can even say that people just didn't listen. Those are things that I have learned to say and can come out of my mouth so much easier than the real words.
The real words don't apply to me because I always just cleaned up and kept going. There was no time to rest and recover, there was not time for healing. Night after night, day after day this is just something that happens to you.
The shame in the things that have happened to me is enormous, and that is also a part that keeps things silent. Things have happened to me that I don't have words for. Things have happened that I remember every detail of and can not bare to get them out of my mouth. These are the words that have happened to me my entire life, Before I even knew what it was that was happening. These words have happened to me before I can even remember. These words are so full of violence, and to fully comprehend that is unimaginable.
There are bits and pieces that I try to explain but words seem empty, when my heart is scarred. When My words today feel so heavy, I feel terrible that I need to speak them. I feel like a burden, that I don't deserve the love and support all this time later. I mean I am living and breathing, why burden someone else with the things that have happened to me.
There are so many factors that come into the picture with words like this. There are the truths, the reality the hard facts that are to terrifying to understand. Then comes the body memories. There are nights that I wake up and I literally can not feel my legs. There are nights that I wake up and the literal pain that I am in doesn't even have words. My body hurts just like it did on those exceptionally hard nights when his parts were fully working and I was the one who had to suffer. There are mornings my hips kill me because of the sins of my father and his little girl whose body wasn't made for what he wanted. I often get angry when my mind went away , I have said that a million times. Somehow that feels like the easy way out. Yet in the same breathe I believe that the pain was so great there was no other choice for my little mind as I had to endure things not meant for anyone ever. My little mind had no way to comprehend the things that were happening and the things that I was feeling. My little mind just wanted to be seen and so loved
I can remember a counselor once saying that it might have felt good ,what was happening to me and that was ok. That sometimes a body would just respond And I felt my insides screaming because there was nothing that was done to me that felt good. My body didn't respond, there were no good feelings just pain , such pain that I had to go away because it hurt too much to be in my own skin.
There are pieces of me that know the pain and pieces of me that know the real words that happened to me. Those things happening at the same time feel so completely overwhelming. Like my brain can't comprehend that I was in pain because of those things because I was being raped.
I feel like my words aren't making any sense and I am rambling, because they have been quiet for so long. There is a part of me that says it was just sex don't make such a big deal. As a little girl it was a big deal because the pain was inconceivable. As I got older, things were so much less painful, and I just learned to go away rather than have to experience the look on their faces, they liked what they were doing and I was just there for parts. For so much of my childhood I was floating as far away from my body as I could get.
Those things were just for my father and Albert. For Don and them there was a different level of violence. I didn't have a small body anymore, at least not like a little girl of 5. I was more aware, I knew what they were doing at least some of the time, but then again things happened that I don't have words for that I didn't even realize could happen to a person. I think that once I realized what was happening there was a fight, I fought with all that I had , it wasn't enough, they were bigger and there were so many of them but I tried, I tried to make it stop, make them see me as a person. There was nothing I could do, and after fighting for so long, I felt like I lost. Much of that day is a blur, there are pieces of things I remember, then there are parts still so clear .
The pain in the physicality of what was done is horrendous Today I struggle all this time later there are moments that I can still feel what was done to me. There are times I can still feel their hands, I can smell the smell , hear the sounds and taste the tastes. There are times my arm goes numb because I used to have to reach up and hold his cross so it didn't make any noise. That deep ache inside that I know today exactly where it comes from Those are the shameful things that are my life. I don't know how to process all that was my life. So much hurt, all alone.
As I matured and got older the pain lessened, and for that I will be grateful. The physical pain of a five year old is far different than the pain being caused by those same things at thirteen. At 5 I knew my body was in pain with no real knowing , as you get older the knowing comes and the shame that comes with that I can't even measure. I am ashamed of who I am, what was done and that still to this day, my heart is so broken.
The shame just grows and grows and grows as you come to understand as things get names and you suffer in silence because please who in the world wants to hear the things that have been done to you. How in the world does a person talk about the horrendous things that have happened, it doesn't lessen the pain or the knowing or the hurt in your heart that no one really cares what has happened to you anyway. So you keep breathing keep living, keep putting one foot in front of the other trying to remember to breathe and be a real live person.
Then again I just wanted to be normal and things were taken, only this time he put a pillow over my face on purpose. I knew as soon as I saw the pillow coming , I was gone . I was in a place far far away that he couldn't reach .
I don't know how a person survives all of this in one life. This just was my life. Somehow adding those words seems so hard. Parts of my brain know but an even bigger part of my brain wishes more than anything that I didn't so understand these three little words.
I
WAS
RAPED.
I heart your heart.
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