Once upon a time.....it's the way all fairy tales start, it's also how I often think about my childhood. It wasn't a fairytale, but it was a different world, a different time, and it often feels like it happened to someone else. I am not that small helpless child any longer, although pieces of her still remain inside of me she is not the person I am now. I have grown up, I have moved from victim to survivor, but then again have I really??
Once upon a time there was this little blonde girl who wanted nothing more than to grow up and escape her living nightmare. She spent her days dreaming of being someone, anyone, just not herself. She spent her nights dreaming of flying away. Somewhere around midnight her supposed sperm donor would come home from work and he would have a small bag of circus peanuts with him. He would give those to her in exchange for being quiet while he did unimaginable things. Her tiny body was smothered by his weight, was torn apart and bruised by his desires. He had been caught before with her older sister so he had to be careful to not let the egg donor hear him as he mangled another life. The thing that truly bothered her was that she was never listened to, no one ever believed her.
When she was in first grade she held back at school, she didn't want to go home because she knew what was going to happen sometime in the night. Her teacher looked down at her as she contemplated what she so wanted to say. She needed to tell someone, maybe if she did they could save her. She told her teacher what had happened, how her father did things to her "down there" and she hung her little head in shame. The teacher looked at her kindly and simply said " That's how daddy's tell their little girls they love them." There was no safety there, no one was going to save her that day.
Years later, when she was already in foster care she told her egg donor what had happened...the egg donors response was not what should have happened. It was cold, it was painful, it was just plain wrong! The egg donor looked at the child and told her she needed to stop fantasizing about things! According to the egg donor, she had caught the supposed sperm donor with the older sister when she was 8 years old and after that the egg donor never left him alone with any of her girls. She claimed she never trusted him after that and he never had the opportunity. Although the little girl explained that it happened at night, when he came home and everyone else was asleep, she would not be believed and would again be told to stop fantasizing. That's the exact word she used...fantasizing...and all that little girl could think was "Why would anyone FANTASIZE about something like this?? How could anyone think that any child, any person, would fantasize about being raped as a two year old baby?" The girl did not understand why the egg donor would not believe her.
The girl was in college and still thinking about that comment from her egg donor. She thought maybe she was wrong, maybe she had just heard the story about her older sister enough times to think it was her instead. She sat down and wrote a letter to the supposed sperm donor, she asked him if he remembered doing it? She asked him if he knew what he had done so very long ago. She waited for over a week for the reply, half expecting it to never come. Finally, one day, she opened her mailbox to find a letter inside. the letter that she had been waiting for was there and finally the truth was revealed. He had written that he did know what he had done to her, that he was aware that he had ruined her childhood and that he was sorry. She stared at the words "I'm so sorry for all I did and I hope someday you can find it in your heart to forgive me" and she cried. She grew angry, he wanted forgiveness? How dare he hope for any such thing! She replied that she hoped he burned in hell forever for what he had done and that he could go to his grave knowing that there would be at least one person in this world that would not forgive him for tearing their life apart! She was bitter and angry, but now she had the proof that it was not a fantasy, it was real and it did happen. Sadly her proof was laughed away and she was again told to stop fantasizing, that the letter meant nothing. The egg donor believed the supposed sperm donor had written what she wanted to hear plain and simple, that it was not possible that it was the truth. The girl ended up trying to kill herself when she realized that even though he had written "I know I touched you in a bad way, I know I was wrong for doing those things to you" she was never going to be believed by the one person she felt needed to believe her. She needed her egg donor to believe her, she didn't know why, but somehow if she believed then it would show that some small part of her loved her youngest daughter.
Luckily the girl was found, she got the help she needed and she grew to realize that the egg donor was simply in denial. This was the point where she was diagnosed with a borderline personality disorder, she was told that she had a lot of stuff locked away and the therapist offered hypnosis to help her discover all that was there...the girl refused, she had enough trouble dealing with what she knew, she did not want to face whatever her mind had locked away from her. Surely if her mind had locked it away it must be very bad and she did not want to face that, not then and possibly not ever. She moved on, began to dream of a life without fear and she found the man of her dreams.
The girl grew into a woman and she knew there were two distinct people inside her. there was a victim and there was a survivor, she just needed to decide which to be. She chose to be the survivor because that one was the more desirable. Although the victim still comes through every once in awhile, still reminds her that she was a victim once, the woman has chosen to tell that victim that she has nothing more to fear and that she can be a survivor too.
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Have a great weekend and remember, when given the choice be a survivor, you don't have to be a victim!
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