Secret Sorrow

I would like to share my story.

I grew up away from my mother. I spent my first 6 years with my loving grandma until my mother was ready to take me away from her. It was my mother and I was willing to start a life with her but this is where my life goes downhill.

She takes me home at 6 while she was pregnant, and with her boyfriend at the time. I was brand new to this woman, I’ve never actually knew who she was. She was a bitter woman, all she did was verbally abuse me… Call me names and always yelled. On top of this her boyfriend was weird. He loved pornography so much that he watched it during the day in her bedroom, she allowed him to do it while I was around. He always had a very large prom collection, magazines and VHS tapes….he started in on me since she worked late nights. He invited me to watch porn first and then started to sexually abuse me. He brainwashed me and told me that my mother isn’t doing this for him and I need to learn how to do this now so that I can be a great girlfriend/wife one day. This lasted until I was 8 or 9. I did tell my mother in between those times but she didn’t do anything about it. The only thing that made him leave is her finding out he was cheating on her with someone else.

Secondly, she meets someone new. He seemed like a good man. He always helped me with my homework and played with me. I guess one day I had this daunting feeling that it was going to happen again (experience from the last abuse.) He was intoxicated, and I believe he was going to rape me. I acted like I was asleep while he molested me. I started to snore. He picks me up and puts me in the bed. As he walks away, his pants were down, something else was bound to happen to me if I hadn’t acted.

I did not tell my mother at the time because she did not believe me not do anything the first time. They broke up and we moved to a new location. Everything is going well with her partner choosing. Her new boyfriend never tried anything with me. He was bi-polar and could get snappy and my mom was there to shield him. I felt like I was growing apart from them at this time. I spent most of my time in my room and to my self, this was my junior high school years.

My biological father was never in my life closely. He would call on occasions and send me gifts for birthdays and Christmas but we hadn’t seen each other since I was 2. A girl and her father always have special relationships, that’s what I wanted to feel. He flew down to meet me when I was 15, then I flew up to Jersey to be with him again, I was 16. We had a good time and I trusted him because he was my father. He breaks my trust by molesting me twice. This time I was really heartbroken but emotionless at the same time. I went back home and told my mother, this time she did something. She called him cursed him out and threatened to call the police but I told her not to because a side of me was still yearning for that relationship with my father. Me and my father continued to talk until I blew up and told him to never talk to me again. Then I ended feeling guilty for letting him go and tried for a relationship again, this was the last time I tried.

My mom gets a new boyfriend. He seemed nice at the beginning. He starts to move himself in… Then he starts to have melt downs. He always accused her of cheating which lead to an argument every night. I would have to be in the middle of it sometimes. He would leave, then she was allow him to come back over and over again. I am in my high years at this time. I hated being at home listening to them argue and throw things. With the behavior he had, we ended up getting into a fist fight. He finally leaves for good.

Today I have let my father go because it was doing nothing for me, but damaging me. I am now married and struggling with PTSD and wrong decisions I’ve made. One day I hope to walk through life without thinking about my past and what I’ve been through. I am working on counseling and group sessions to elevate these feelings.

— Crystal, age 26