The Early years...
I'm not sure where to begin. I was born in the mid 60's in a small New England town. My parents wanted a boy and to their disappointment they had a girl. I grew up hearing my mother tell all the different things that were wrong with me as a baby. My complexion, my legs, my hair and of course I was the wrong sex. Years later my mother told me that it wasn't that she hated me its just that I looked just like her and she hated herself. Therefore whenever she looked at me she saw herself and she hated herself. My mother didn't know how to be affectionate so my father had to teach her. She had two children under the age 2 and it was overwhelming. There were times when my cries would go unanswered.
School days or daze...
I started school early going to a local daycare.I hated it but both parents worked and my mother knew the teacher. When my mother would leave me there before the other children came I would cry. The teacher would take me in the back room and let me paint to try and quiet me down- she was an artist.She befreinded me and then betrayed me. She introduced more pain and abuse into my 5 year old world than I had experienced before. When I would cry for my mother she would tell me my mother wouldn't come for me because she didn't care about me only those who were abusing me were the only ones who cared about me.
Next I went to a private girls school where the abuse was continued. When I "acted out" (like doing the opposite of what everyone else was doing or just getting up and leaving the class or building) they said it was because I was too young to be in that grade. No one questioned the strange behavior. School was not a safe place and neither was home. My sisters and I would go to sleep listening to my mother yelling at my father and throwing dishes at him. We would wake up to a clean kitchen and no one would mention what happened the night before.
By the time I was 7 I had headaches nightly and by age 9 they were so bad that I was hospitalized to find out what was wrong. Back then 9 year olds didn't have migrane headaches. There were times that everything around me would just fade away and I would see and hear nothing. If I couldn't see or hear then I couldn't hurt. It was safer for me to just go inside myself but at the time I didn't know that when I was inside someone else was outside. There were many times that I would get into trouble for things that I did that I didn't know why I did them. I knew that I did them because that's what I was told but when I was asked why, I had no answers. The one time I told my mother about other voices in my head she told me they would lock me up if I ever said anything like that
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Teen Years...
By the time my teen years came around I was angry at the world. I hated life and dared to live on the edge but at the same time I was scared, lonely and full of self hatred. At school I was a bully. At home I would take care of my younger sister and clean the house so my mother wouldn't be angry. But no mater how much I did she always found something wrong. During that time our family went to counseling and I was chosen to also go on my own because I was the cause of our families problems. The counselor I was going to was conviniently connected to the group of people who were abusing me and she would tell them what I told her. This of course led to more abuse and I learned how to disappear even more so that others could come out and live for me. I had wanted to become a minister and the pastor at the church we went to took it upon himself to help me out. Under the guise of having books for me to read he would get me alone and then abuse me. During many of the fights with my parents I would tell them as soon as I turned 18 I would pack my bags and be gone. My mother would say that she would pack my bags for me. I did't wait till then. I was gone at 17.
Older years...
After I left home my life was changed all around. My freshman year in college inspite of all I went through I became a christian. I no longer hated the world but I still had a lot of self hatred. Over the years I learned about the love God really did have for me. I learned about a God who heals the broken hearted and those who have been beat down. I cried when I realized that during the times of abuse Jesus cried for me. I don't mean that I understand all of this or know why things happened but I do know that He is the one who is bringing healing in my life inspite of all the things that happened. I am still on this journey and I have good days and bad days but I'm still walking.
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