One-Hundred Eighty Four

184 people read my blog post the very first day. It’s bittersweet. On the one hand, I’m hopeful it helped someone, anyone and on the other hand it is never easy to share about intimate details of your life. For the first time in my life outside of my husband and some with friends, I am sharing my story and honoring the little girl inside me that didn’t know better. The first time I told my husband how I lost my virginity, I told him as though it was normal. He instantly said, “That’s not okay, you were a child and he was not.” I responded with, “No, no. You don’t understand, it wasn’t like that.” He simply moved on, left me to be and over the years he pushed it when needed, listened to me share feelings and circumstances, held me as I uncovered things, loved me through my trauma both body and mind. See, this may be just a tad bit too much information, but it’s my blog so fuck it. Receiving oral sex always made me uncomfortable, it had my whole life and a few years into our marriage. I would get sweaty, my stomach would churn, my breathing would feel forced, overall I just didn’t want to do it. It was something I would force myself to allow, I was embarrassed and felt as though it’d cost me my boyfriend or someone would tell others thus making me the target of people’s judgement. I spent years truly caring what others thought, conforming myself to fit in whatever box they wanted me in, shrinking myself smaller to fit in spaces that weren’t made for me. It wasn’t until I married Chris that I was able to dial it back, then years into our marriage I finally was able to start choosing myself and start being who I wanted to be. It was actually one of the first things that drew me to Chris, if you know him then you know he’s unapologetically himself. It’s intoxicating to know someone like him, but to love him? It’s a whole new level. He never asked me to be anything except myself, he loved me in all my forms, at every stage, through every depressive episode, through every high and every low. He met me where I was and helped me build from there.

After about a year of consistent therapy sessions, working through things, and tackling my trauma head on I had came to terms with the fact it was sexual assault. I hadn’t accepted it as rape yet. I couldn’t recall the events of that night, it was splotchy and majority of the details were just wiped from my memory. My brain seems to do that, it just shuts off during trauma then working through it helps me to locate lost memories. There’s multiple things throughout my life my brain has protected me from, it wasn’t until the past couple years that I’ve truly recovered what was taken from me and the trauma I had endured. One day during a session, my amazing counselor and I were talking and somehow I got the courage to tell her that oral sex was difficult for me. We hadn’t even delved into the particulars of that specific situation, we had glazed over it and discussed the overview but I always changed the subject and went to a topic that felt safer, less intimate. But for some reason that day, we discussed the way I felt and the particular of oral sex being something that always felt scary for me. I explained that it had from the first time, it was one of the only memories I truly still had from that night, that I remembered thinking oral sex was uncommon and I hadn’t at that time even really known what it was. As we talked, I said things like “I know that’s silly” and she’d say, “No Elizabeth, you were a child, it’s not silly.” She finally said “Your body stores trauma and recognizes trauma that your mind doesn’t. That could be what happens in those moments.” By the end of that session, I was a sobbing mess. In the wake of that revelation, it was like my body relinquished the hold it had on me in that space. It no longer had the same reaction and over the next few months then ultimately years, it became safe with Chris. My body found comfort and safety with him. He is home for both my body and mind, he has healed me in more ways than I could ever begin to explain. I could go on and on about the ways Chris has saved me but I don’t want to get too far off track. I promised you guys the rest of the story and I’m a woman of my word. After that night, he disappeared. Poof, he was gone. To say I was devastated is an understatement. I didn’t know how to function most days and I was just going through the motions, doing the absolute bare minimum. I texted him multiple times a day, pleading for him to just please talk to me. Nothing. I knew I was upset it wasn’t as magical as I had dreamed it would be, but trauma and the whiplash of going from someone that’s supposed to save you from your situation to ghosting you, it’s a tough pill to swallow. One that can chew you up whole and spit you out. After about two weeks of being ghosted, I texted him and told him I thought I was pregnant. I don’t remember having the thought process of lying about it, just that it popped into my mind and I was scared. I told my closest friend at the time and she dismissed me, told me she doubted it. He did respond, but his response was, “That’s impossible, we used a condom and it’s too early to know anyway.” I was frantic when I responded, told him that I knew I was. He never responded and that was the last time I heard from him. Months went by, I fell deeper into my depression letting it consume me more than it had ever before. I was acting out, barely skating by, at one point I was committed to a facility (That’s a story for a different time.), I isolated myself more and more. Eventually I told an adult, a resource officer that I had grown close to. He took a special interest in me, he was one of the best people I’ve ever known and truly cared and loved what he did. He gave me the space to decide to report and was there for me as much as he appropriately could be. I also had an English teacher at the time that took me under her wing and created a safe space for me in her classroom, allowed me to sit with her during lunch, and kept tabs on me. She truly will never know just how much she did for me and how her classroom was the only place I felt safe during those times, there and with the resource officer. On a random day, we were walking the trail for gym class. Out of nowhere, I decided to report him. I decided the officer was right and right then and there I created an 11-year-old girl that I knew he was talking to. I might catch flack for this, people might judge me. But I swear, I believed she existed from the moment she popped in my mind. About six months ago, I uncovered that I made her up. She never existed, it was just someone I said existed because I think my subconscious believed I had to have her to lean on. It wasn’t until I was about two years into my marriage I accepted it was sexual assault. After having Penny and through therapy, lots of late nights with Chris, I uncovered what happened and was able to accept it was rape. That night Chris just listened as I talked, never reacting or guiding, just listening. He raped me. It was invigorating to remember and to face it head on. That was when my bond with Chris strengthened even more and I learned I was safe with him, more than I already knew. I found myself tackling things that I previously had avoided or excused. He opened up this huge space for me to be brave, strong, and to speak my truth.

When I reported him, I was terrified of what was to come. I knew my parents wouldn’t take it lightly, I mean I had snuck a boy into my room and had sex with him. Although as a parent to a beautiful little girl, I now know beyond a doubt even if I had never had the experiences I have, I would rush to my baby girl and pull her into me. I’d tell her everything was going to be okay, I’d hold her and create the space for her to feel safe sharing with me. I told the officer, “My parents are going to absolutely lose it, I’ll be in so much trouble. I know I have to, to protect that little 11-year-old girl.” He responded, “You don’t have to do anything you aren’t comfortable with, but oftentimes kids think their parents are going to do one thing and they do another. I am sure they love you and just want what’s best for you.” I sighed as tears rolled down my face, I told him I was ready. He explained that I had to tell them, that one of them had to come down to the school in order for me to give my statement, it’s a requirement  for an adolescent to have a parent/guardian present while giving a victim statement. I called my dad first, at that point in my life we had developed a pretty close relationship, until that day, we were never the same after it. I was crying so hard on the phone and rambling through things like, “Promise me you won’t be upset.” “I don’t want you to be disappointed in me.” “It’s really bad dad but I really need you to be there for me.”. Finally he said, “What is it Elizabeth, you’re worrying me. Just spit it out, it’ll be okay.” He must have heard the hysteria and fear in my voice because he had never been sincere like that before. That’s when it all just free fell from my mouth and rolled off my tongue. He sighed, followed by, “Goddamn it, I swear you beat all I’ve ever seen.” I remember looking at the officer and seeing the pity etched in every crevice of his face, I was embarrassed. Humiliated actually. He continued, “Well, you made this fucking mess, you deal with it. I got shit to do, okay?” I was crying so hard I couldn’t respond. He spoke louder this time, “Elizabeth, okay?” I continued to be inaudible, that’s when the officer stepped in on my behalf. “This is Officer X, we’re going to need you or her mother to come here.” Another drawn out sigh came from the phone. “I don’t want no part in this shit.” “Someone has to be here, either a parent or guardian while she provides us with —“ I interrupted the officer through sobs, “Please dad, can you come?” Before I finished he was telling me to call my mom and hung the phone up abruptly. The call with my mom was uneventful, I learned from the first one and spit it out quickly. She lacked emotion when she spoke, letting me know she’d be there as soon as she could.

Once she arrived I was placed in a room with her, an officer I didn’t know, and the one I had disclosed the information to. They explained a bit of the process to me, handed me the notepad and asked me to write down every detail from start to finish. Starting with the first time we spoke, ending with the last, and everything in between. I was humiliated writing details, I didn’t know how to explain certain things, I didn’t know oral sex was called oral sex, I was pretty lost to all of it. It may sound silly to not know what oral sex was, but my parents never had that conversation with me and in school it was just “going down” on someone. When I finished writing, the officer took my pamphlet, read it, then told me he had to ask me some questions to fill in the gaps. My mom chimed in and asked if she could step out, I agreed with that. The officers told us both that she had to stay, I wanted to crawl into the biggest hole and disappear. In that moment I wished I had never came forward, that I had just stayed silent. But that 11-year-old little girl. I tried to put on a brave face as silent tears fell from my face. The officer was kind, explained to me there was nothing to be embarrassed about, that I did nothing wrong, and they were adults that had heard it all. My mom put on her best fake smile, letting me know as soon as I got in the car that evening, my ass was going to be in big trouble. The officer asked questions like, “How many fingers did he use when he penetrated you with them?” “How long did the penetrative sex last?” “How long did he perform oral sex on you?” Ah, that’s what it’s called. “Did he take your shorts off or did he move them to the side?” & much more.

By the end, I was a complete mess and I just wanted someone to hug me and tell me everything was going to be okay. To tell me that I was doing the right thing. Fuck it let’s face it, I didn’t want someone to do those things, I wanted my mom. She was stone cold, when I begged her to take me with her and to not make me go back to class, she refused. Thankfully the officer I had reported to allowed me to stay in his office and get cleaned up for as long as he could, then he had obligations he had to go to. I went to class with the biggest ball of dread deep in my stomach that I had ever had. When I got home, my mom did inform me that it would be a long, long time before I’d step foot out of our house other than school. I had a boyfriend at the time, I asked if I could still see him that weekend like I had already been told. She told me I’d have to wait for my dad to come home. Later that evening, I built up the courage to ask him, I walked into his room where he was playing on his computer. He never looked in my direction nor acknowledged I was even there. After a whole lot of babbling and circling the question, I finally asked. He gave me the dirtiest look and said, “Why so you can whore around with him?” I began sobbing instantly, unfazed he looked straight at me and said, “Shut the door.” I went immediately to my mom and her response was, “You know how your dad is. He’s upset, what do you expect?” My dad didn’t talk nor look in my direction for the better part of three weeks and my mom did the bare minimum at acknowledging me. If it had not of been for the officer and the teacher during this time, I don’t believe I would still be here.

Don’t worry, there’s more for next time. Thank you for allowing me to tell my truth. Until next time, all my love.