While my story included sexual assault, it began with physical

While my story included sexual assault, it began with physical. My dad was physically and emotionally abusive for as long as I remember. He was the worst to my older brother. There were 4 years between us, and a sister in the middle. It all began with my dad. Without knowing it, he was conditioning me from the time I was born to accept, even expect abuse. He was the one that taught me to equate pain with love, to accept that people who love you often will hurt you. Because of him I formulated my survival technique. Never show weakness, never say mercy, never cry. Very early in my life I found myself locked in a battle of will with my father. Proving to him I was stronger than him, because I never gave in, never let him have the satisfaction of seeing me hurt. Over and over in my head saying to him, spiteful and almost laughing, 'you think this hurts me? You honestly think you can hurt me?!?' He was the one who taught me that it wasn't discussed, and my mom helped too. Every time that she looked away or left the room while he was beating us. Of course he told us that it was because he loved us. Of course he told us that this is what God expected of us.
And of course I forgave him, without him even asking. I've never been mad at him for this, held him accountable for just how much he damaged me, and paved the way for further trauma.
I was 9 when my older brother began raping me. He was never violent, always gentle, but he would never listen to me, never let me go when I said stop, always just holding me down. He bribed me with money, gifts, and protection from my father. There were many times when he got between me and father, took beatings for me. He stopped when I was around 12.
I began drinking, smoking, self-mutilating. Anyone who felt like sleeping with me got to. I never said no. I was too afraid to. So I just let them, hating it all the while, playing mad mind games and disassociation games to keep myself from freaking out. I spent all of my teen years consumed with hate and anger, mostly self-directed. For being so fuc*ing week all the time.
From 15 to 19 I had a boyfriend Travis. Just after a month into out relationship I was gang raped at a party Travis wasn't with me at. More men were there than I bothered to count. Sometimes now I wish I would've, just so that I would know. Sometimes I know that it was right not to. It went on for hours. We were outside, it was April there was still snow on the ground and real cold out. They were extremely violent; they beat me up a lot. Two or three of them would be on me at once, they raped me vaginally, orally, and anally. They cut me several times with a knife they had. They penetrated me with whatever was handy, sticks, flashlights, whatever. They laughed a lot. I can still hear the sound of myself screaming that night in the woods. Years down the road, at 19, I found out that hell was an act of retaliation, not intended to punish me but to punish Travis. At the time of the rape I knew that to some degree, but couldn't figure out how or why. I didn't tell him what happened. I was afraid of how he would react, what he would do to them, and how it would affect our relationship. So I told him what the rumor after the party was, that I had hooked up with a guy at this party, that I had cheated on him. He forgave me but punished me for it. Calling me a whore, refusing to touch me and calling me diseased. I tolerated this for two years and finally broke down and told him the truth, about that night and the shit from when I was little. During the two years after the rape, we never had sex, though we had been sexually active prior. After the rape I stopped drinking and therefore became completely frigid. Travis would try to touch me and I would shake so violently that he couldn't even get a good hold on me. After I opened up to him we began to work on repairing me sexually. Progress was slow, so somehow, I really don't remember how, we decided that he would just do it. Even if I was upset or crying or fighting him, he should just keep fucking me. So he did that, and while was he was he would whisper in my ear that he loved me, that I didn't need to be afraid, this was because he loved me. Somehow this actually worked, at times I did have really good sex with him.
When I found out not only that he was the cause of the rape, but that he had assumed all along the truth and still gave me shit for two years over me "cheating" on him. And that he himself was a rapist, I had to break up with. I felt so betrayed. I thought back on the "sex therapy" we'd had and realized that it wasn't for me, he didn't care about me. In all likelihood it was what he wanted, he was turned on. I thought he was trying to help me, to heal me, but it was for him, for his pleasure.
My next boyfriend was bad from the start. We were heavy into drugs together, we had lots of threesome and group sex. Always me and men, never other women, usually mock rape, always degrading and demeaning, but whatever. Soon I was sleeping with men for drugs, unable to afford as much as I wanted to ingest. Kevin snapped the camels back one night when we were in a fight, about some guy that he wanted to see fu*k me that I didn't want to fu*k. This arguement was going all night, towards dawn I headed to bed, leaving Kevin with a bunch of his friends, still partying. A while after I fell asleep I woke up to the door opening. Kevin and his friend, and Kevin held me down so that this other dude could do it.
I saw Kevin only once after that. I entered rehab but was only sober for about two months. Last October I was raped by a man I met at the bar. I was leaving with him to go get high. I knew it was stupid, and knew I was putting myself in a bad situation, but I did it anyway. It probably was the easiest of all the rapes to deal with. It was the shortest in duration, it was only one person, he was stranger, not someone I'd have to see again, and compared to all I've been thru seems so minor.
Obviously, I am unable to talk about this. My parents found out about the childhood abuse, and gang rape at 15 when I was 16. We had exactly two conversations about it. They asked me if I was alright, if I felt I needed therapy. They believed me when I said it was fine, that I was fine, that I didn't need help. I am pretty estranged from them at this point.
So I am stuck in this cycle. So angry, addicted to drugs and alcohol, and sex. I can't have normal loving sex with my boyfriend. I finally have one that is a decent person, who I know could never hurt me like these other men did. He's the first man I've been able to say "No" to. But I make him hurt me in bed. I can't get off unless I am in pain, so I make him hit me, choke me, slap me around. And I am so mean to him but can't help it. I have to remind myself constantly that he is not all those other men. Force myself to look at him with kind eyes and not the stone cold defensive look I usually reserve for men.
He knows there are things wrong with me, knows that I have "issues", but I refuse to even name the traumas to him, tho I know he connected a dew dots on his own. I still self mutilate. I have nightmares, hallucinations, panic attacks. I forget to eat and take care of myself, so I am beginning to have quite a few physical problems.
For over a decade now, this had been my life. Rape has been my life. And I hate the hard and cold and bitter person it has made me. I hate the way any morals I had were thrown out the window while I tried to run from myself and my past. I hate that I walk around saying, 'better living thru denial', honestly believing it. I hate knowing that it will always be this way. There is no answer, no solution, no light. I've turned myself into this thing, so mute and weak; I can never get back to what I was. When I reflect on the years all I see is more pieces of me that were lost, that died. One by one I can see the where the pieces fell.
I know what lead to what, I know why Seth hurt me and why I felt the need to let so many other people hurt me. I know the role my dad and mom playing in contributing to this paralysis. I understand completely the cause and effect, where the dominos started to fall. But it doesn't help. It doesn't change anything. And I can't.
I read stories of people and how they've made the move from victim to survivor. That their liberation came when they realized it wasn't their fault. Newsflash, every one of us are victims, and will be as long as we are alive. You can't refuse to be a victim. You were made into one. And that is a status all of us will have for the duration of out lives. Strictly based on definition.
As far as placing blame, my true enslavement began when I realized that it wasn't my fault. That's how weak we are and that's how strong they are. No amount of willpower will ever best muscles or guns at the moments when it really matters. When it comes down to it, "they" can fu*k you whenever they want to. That's how small we are. And it's not our fault, it's the way it is. And that's where my real frustration comes in. For the rest of my life I know that if a man gets a notion in his head that he wants to fu*k me, he will, and that's that. Regardless of whether or not I decide to say no. I am only safe as long as a man allows me to be. I'm only safe until they decide they want to hurt me.
I am 22 years old. And all this doesn't come close to completing my stories.
by Angel Longsleeveson 16 Aug 2004

Labels: it began with physical, While my story included sexual assault

posted by Robert Heard at 5:30 PM