I've been depressed since I was 12

I've been depressed since I was 12. I've been put on medication for it but the pills never really worked. I always felt like I was alone and inferior. I caught myself looking at older men, not necessarily in a sexual way, but as father figures, someone to confide in and to comfort me when times got rough. About a week ago I met a man who filled that "void" in me, who made me feel like I was worth something.

He is 25 and I am only 15, but he didn't seem to mind. In fact, he moved so fast it made my head spin. Being a virgin, I knew I wasn't ready for sex, but when he took me to his house and layed me on the couch, it was the hardest thing to say "No!". He was sweet about it, suprisingly enough. I did say no and I struggled to get out from under him, but he held me there and kept telling me how beautiful I was and how much he wanted me. He attempted to take off my clothes but when I fought him, he stopped. Instead, he took his off and proceeded rape me.

The next thing I knew, I was crying in the bathroom with blood all over my clothes. But no one found out. I kept it hush hush with the exception of his wife (very soon to be ex-wife). They hadn't been with each other for about a year and both had found other romantic partners. Still, she wanted to talk to me, to warn me about him...but it was too late. I came to find out that he has 5 warrants out for his arrest and had a very sexual past being a male pornography star, male stripper, and male prostitute. Along with this, he has three little girls at home.

I just want to let everyone who reads this to know that no matter how charming or sweet he is, he will hurt you. I've never been in a relationship with a man who didn't..whether it was physical, mental, or sexual. Trust no one. Someone's always looking to use you.
by Laurenon 11 Apr 2004

Easter weekend is always hard for me. It's become an anniversary of sorts for all of the sexual abuse of my childhood. So much of it happened over Easters, when my family traditionally had the same friends over. Most of it happened between the ages of 4-9, and right under my family's nose.

I've had therapy for PTSD and I've come a long way. I'm 33 and married now, living in Australia (I'm American), no kids yet, and am more together than I've ever been. I'm a writer and I teach writing at the university level, even hold workshops out of my home. I feel good about who I am and what I've done with my life. But every year as Easter approaches, I tell myself, "this year it will be better," but so far, it's not. Before I even realize it, I feel irritable, edgey, fretful, worrisome. I have the urge to drink, even though I rarely do anymore, outside of the glass of wine with friends or a pint guinness at the bar once every blue moon.
This year, I noticed I was feeling tired in the week or two approaching this weekend. Then this morning (good friday) I had to get out of bed early and try to sleep out in the livingroom. I couldn't. I feel restless, nervous. Had frustrating dreams last night. Was lost in a New York City subway station.
Been surfing the net this morning looking for advice and others like me and I found this site. Thank you for setting it up. I like the picture on the homepage. She reminds me how beautiful we all are, despite how we may feel otherwise at these times.

The feelings are so strange when I look at them. I feel like my little girl self is tangible, hanging around at my elbow, nervous, anxious. I feel thin-skinned, literally, like people could see my organs if they looked. I don't want to be around anyone this weekend, but don't want to feel alone either.
My husband is good, he's very supportive, but he doesn't really understand, either. He's still asleep this morning and with work and his studies, he has probably forgotten what this holiday does to me every year. This morning I wanted the write "EASTER IS HARD FOR YOUR WIFE" in chicken blood on the wall but I decided that printing up some stuff from a PTSD website for him would be better. Something about all this makes me want to be very dramatic, but I don't think I can get that much blood out of a chicken from the grocery store anyway. Besides, it would scare him.

I think the hardest part of it all was that it happened right under my parent's noses. In the same house. A few rooms away. In the cellar. In the backyard. And that growing up Catholic (though I'm more of a spiritual person than any kind of religious person now... orgaized religions just piss me off now), with the theme of what sinners we are and how we should be grateful for the resurrection drummed into our heads, I couldn't process it all as a little girl. Easter was supposed to be a time of redemption for us all, but with the sexual abuse after going church, my little mind couldn't cope. Being lectured about joy and love was too jarring when I was victimized the next minute.

I feel a bit better getting to share all of this with you. Thank you. I found a good quote this morning by Dr. Frank Ochberg, the Survivor Psalm: "I may never forget, but I need not always remember." That is hopeful. And the other side is, that when something inside me begs me to remember, I want to honor it, hold it, let the tears fall, uncurl the little child inside myself and tell her she is safe now and she will always be beautiful.
My story.
A friend of the family molested me for years. Easters stand out the most, but there were times over summers, Christmas holidays, etc. Whenever our families got together. From age 4-9. I'm 33 now. When I was 9, he took my virginity. Standing up by a lake, he made me bleed. My parents arrived moments later and sent me back to the house with him in his truck. They had no idea.

I remember staring at the blood in my bathingsuit with disbelief, like I was floating above it all. It seemed like he worked on me over the years, primed me for that final take. Once he even got a neighbor involved. Some Easter weekend. He called the neighbor over and said, 'Come on, she likes it.' I was 6 or 7. What was to like? Two big teenage boys choked me in the backyard and I liked it? I was terrified of them.

20 years later, the neighbor met up with me and my brothers on Christmas Eve. We all went out for a beer. I had forgotten about that time until one moment, at the end of the evening, when the neighbor said, 'You remember, don't you?' I felt something shatter inside me as the memory of that time in the backyard flooded me. I went down into the basement and sobbed where no one could hear me. I wanted to know why, how I'd forgotten and why I was reminded with that simple question. I wanted to hurt myself, I wanted to cut myself into a hundred pieces and scatter myself into the sea. But I didn't.

Before I remembered that, before I found myself in therapy, when I was 20 years old, I went on a date. I had broken up with a controlling, abusive boyfriend and thought that I should go on a date. Boy did I pick the wrong guy. I think the bad ones can smell it on us, they're attracted to us, and I know I was attracted to his ugly nature somewhow. I thought I deserved what he had to give me.

He was a stanger that I'd met that day and said yes to meeting him out that night. We met at a bar, I got drunk on gin and got in his car. He took me out to a remote spot and raped me in the car. I froze. I can remember his idea of sex so clearly, he pinned me, lifted himself up, his butt to the windshield, and plunged into me repeatedly. It was agony. He'd put on a condom in the middle of it, when I was laying there like a gaping wound. He broke the condom and just kept going. I left my body and seemed to watch side-on, but I felt every pound of pain.

I came undone. I was babbling. I spilled my guts, said I had been abused as a child, (it pains me to write this, it feels humiliating but I hope you all understand out there) and was coming out of an abusive relationship, that I was a mess, that I needed to go home. I thought I was trying to appeal to his humanity, only he had none to speak of. He listened to my tale of woe, he actually said, 'Let me make it up to you,' and he raped me again. I'll never forget those words.

He left me on the side of the road somewhere near my car. I was bruised all over and felt like I'd fallen down stairs. Something went cold and dead inside me after that for a long time.

A couple months later, I tried to take my life. A roomate had rented 'The Accused' and I threw up during the rape scene. It was all too much. My life was a mess with drinking and drugs and one night stands. I couldn't keep going. So one night, I got good and drunk and all set to carve myself up like a rib roast in the bathtub when someone happened to arrive at the right time. She told me not to push my luck. I was lucky.

I met a good therapist when I was ready to dig it all up and lay it all on the table. Bit by bit. Therapy is a hard and twisted road. So many times I wanted to quit, but I knew it was my lifeline back to someplace that had to be better. Nightmares surfaced, the deepest imaginable sorrow bled. For months I walked around feeling like I was barely stitched together and that the slightest touch would spill me into gore and body parts. Sometimes I was nauseous for weeks with only the first 5 minutes of each morning nausea-free. But I kept going. And that has made all the difference.

So now here it is years later. I married a good man and have a good life. And it's mine. But I had to work hard to get it back. And it's never really behind me. Not gone, not forgotten.

Easters are the hardest for me, when I feel closest to the pain and I feel all the tiny cracks of my fragility, despite how strong I tell myself I am for the rest of the year. I let myself have this time to mourn. To pray for all of us, we who shoulders this burden and try to hold onto ourselves in such a violent world. We who try not to let the anger burn us to cinders, and who try not to let the fear and hatred devour us alive.

Our lives do not end with these ugly things. These people cannot take everything from us, they just don't have that much power. We still have our will, and our will is our power.

Thank you so much for this place to speak. May the angels guide us all to freedom.

by Runs With Wolveson 8 Apr 2004

Labels: I've been depressed since I was 12

posted by Robert Heard at 4:47 AM