Invisible Girl’s Story: The Torment Within

As a child i could never imagine someone that i loved or look up to dearly would ever hurt me mentally or physical. As a child my perception of life is supposed to be as positive and loving environment no matter who i was with, or wherever i was. That wasn’t the case for me. I learned at a young age that i would have to grow up in fear everyday and that the situation that i was in would never get better. I had to learn at a young age that i would have to fend for myself because i knew that my parents weren’t going to be there physically or emotionally for me. I knew that i would have to cope somehow growing up with all the pain that i endured the best that i could, and accept the fact that i felt emotionally and physically abandon by all those who i thought loved me, and i knew i could never change that as a child nor would i be able to change that into my adult years as well.

At the age of ten i was raped by my brother. I endured many unspeakable things that a child at that age should never have to go through. At that age i just though it was just a normal thing and that i was supposed to go with it, at that time i felt the need that i needed to go along with it because my brother was an mentally abusive person as is, but knowing now what he did, i didn’t imagine as a child he would inflict that mental abuse and physical abuse on me, especially when i looked up to him so much. I knew the things that i was forced to do where wrong after while after being forced to do them. At first it started off small with the sexual acts. I remember coming home from school one day and he wanted me to do things to him and i told him i didn’t want to, but i knew i had to, but i didn’t imagine the next thing he would make me do would mentally damage me for life. that day was the worst one yet, i remember him going upstairs to grab my dads condoms and i asked him if we should even be doing this and he said not to say anything, i remember him slipping the condom on and he told me to lay down on the bed, i told him that i was hurting when he put it in me and i told him to stop, i was so scared i didn’t know what to do, he wasn’t stopping, he was trying to get in all the way and couldn’t so he finally stopped after i told him to about three times. he never did that again but i still had to do the sexual acts to him. I didn’t think that it would happen so many times throughout the week, i thought he was just going to make me do things to him one time and that would be. The torment that he put me through happened for a year on and off. I would be so scared to come home from school, cause i knew if i had said something to anyone or said no to him or cried about doing the acts he told me he would hurt me or even worse he would kill me. I never knew it was my last day on this earth, i just had to hope for the best and pray that the abuse would stop. When i hit sixth grade all the sudden the abuse had stopped, he never told me why or said sorry to me, At that point i was really confused, but so great full that it stopped, at least that’s what i had though in my head. In reality the abuse never stopped, Instead of sexually abusing me he started mentally abusing me and beating me up. Every single day I had to live with the burden of thinking that the abuse was my fault. That I was the problem. That I needed to let it go. So, growing up, that’s what I did. My young spirit and fragile, forming identity were broken. Finding any peace or relief from the situation seemed impossible. As I continued to grow older, I trained my brain to shove those dark memories into the back of my head where they were nearly unrecognizable. However, nothing stays hidden for long. Those repressed memories resurfaced and I became a very closed off person. I could not control myself and essentially my entire demeanor became very cold. I did not know how to handle my feelings or cope with all the intense pain I was feeling. I began self-harming. This seemed to be the only way to feel any type of relief from my life. If I was the one controlling the pain, it felt almost okay. Because the rape and abuse that i went through as a child i felt cutting was the only way out because i knew i could not tell anyone, or feared that they would not believe me. All the mental damage and memories from him became apart of my everyday life througout middle school and high school, i was just really good hiding the pain and the scars. For the longest time i would not tell anyone or even tell anyone how i was feeling even on a good day i would still feel sad and depressed and full of anger and resentment, i could never control the feelings that i was having, But in my head i knew i could control all that numbness with cutting and that would make those feelings leave for a bit, At this time i was hitting into my young adult years and for the most part i thought i had it all under control, or was it? for the most part everything was actually falling apart but i just didnt process anything about my life because of the damage. I thought in my head that the abuse with him was done and now that i was on my own everything was going to be okay, But once again my life had taken a turn for the worst. At the age of 22 i had met a girl within my local town, we hit it off great and we eventually ended up dating and that’s when i ended up coming out to the friends and family i had, just as i thought i would have love and support in that area of my life time, i was was completely wrong, i was given an a choice to be kicked out and live with my girlfriend or leave her and stay at home, and of course at that time she was my everything and i wanted us to have that future that i thought would mentally help me and make me feel loved, so i chose to move away with her, not knowing that the ending months of our relationship would be so toxic. In the beginning the relationship was great, further into the relationship it started to get mentally and physically abusive. In my mind i dint want to see the red flags, i was so head over heals for her, i had noticed that we would start fighting more and she would drink a lot and then come home and we would get into arguments that shouldn’t even had been an argument. When she would get upset with me she would put her fist up in the air at me as if she was going to punch me, she never hit me but she was always threaten it. I was scared and confused why this was happening, i just wanted us to work out and not be toxic, it got to the point where she would pin me down on the bed if we where fitting and want me to kiss her and make up with her, i’m the type of person if i’m mad i need my space, we where totally two opposite people and you know what they say opposites attract, yeah that wasn’t true for us anyways. It took me months to even realize that i needed to end this relationship that was mentally damaging. Every time i would try to end things she would come back at me with she would kill herself if i left her, or that because i didst love her she would end her life, or just if things in our relationship that she felt wasn’t being reciprocated with love she would end her life. At that point i knew i couldn’t live like that anymore i couldn’t handle the mental stress that was going on in our relationship, i could handle the fact every time i tried to communicate with her and we would fight she would pin me down and hurt me. What was the hardest decision of my life in my relationship i knew i had to finally end it once and for all, so that i did, she ended up moving back with her parents, and i was left there with all these emotions that once again that i could not control. after a while we decided to reconnect and just take things slow just as civil people at that point. i thought things where going good until one night what i thought would be an innocent meet up would turn into a nightmare really quick, i had agreed to meet her up at the park near my apartment, i agreed that i would see her but just to talk and no sexual things were to be involved. At first things where going okay, at one point and time she started reaching over to hold my hand and i had to keep telling her that i did not want any of that and that i would leave, eventually things turned for the worse she had pinned me against the car door inside the car and forced my head to kiss her, i told her know and she told me that i know iIm want to kiss her, then she procedded to put her hand up my basketball shorts and that’s when she sexually assaulted. That night i went home feeling more hollow than ever. Every repressed memory and feeling came flooding back. I could not believe it happened again. I started to think nothing in life would ever get better for me, I eventually made the hard decision to press charges against her. I had done the same thing with the sexual assault that i thought was best to do or the only way i knew how to cope with that and now on top of that the re occurring memories of the past abuse, I just ended up shoving everything down and doing what was best…cutting. About a year or so after the assault is when my mental health really started going down hill, at this time i was 23. At the age of 23 i started to unleash all the years of abuse from my brother and and start talking about the domestic abuse that i went through. My mental health was so low at that point i didn’t care about anything i would continue to do negative actions against myself and hurt myself as if i was so ashamed about myself and felt the abuse from those people was my fault and i needed to punish myself.
I got so bad that i ended up going into my first mental hospital, i lost my job, i became so secluded from reality itself. My first visit to the mental hospital was the first time that i had brought the abuse to my mothers attention. As i feared she didn’t want to believe it nor did i think she actually believed me. As if i didn’t already feel low and lost in life just to hear that from your parents wasn’t something that i could comprehend at that time, that was just one more thing that i would have to go through life and learn to accept that my family and friends would no longer be a resource or a support i could count on, the ending result off all the abuse landed me in 8 different mental health facilities just within the age of 23. I am 24 now and have been a year free of being in mental hospitals and 3 weeks free from cutting, that might not seem like a lot but for me its a big step that i made in my life from the mental and physically abuse that i had to go through and then learn how to cope with it all at once at the age of 23. The best thing that i did for my life was move away and focus on my mental health at hand and get all the resources that i need to overcome the pain and hurt and continue my recovery. I am going to be honest with you the memories with never leave you or will never hurt less but you can choose to turn those negative feelings and fuel it into a passion or positives, i’m not perfect but i know i will always have to work on these emotions from the abuse but find a positive way to fuel my future and the people around me, I am currently looking into becoming a peer support specialist and a public speaker. that’s the only positive way that will help me with the negative emotions while helping others at the same time. Everyday for me will be an journey of up and downs of the abuse but i know i can get through with the resources around me and sharing my story. For me now my way out of my emotions is blogging about my story instead of inflicting those bad memories and abuse onto my skin. I’m thankful to be here and be able to share my story and my hope for other victims is to feel comfortable to come out with their stories and just know there not alone because life is short and can be hard if we cant connect with someone that has gone through the same thing, gives me a little more happiness in life knowing if i could just help one more survivor out.