It is time to put this on record; I have no issue telling my story again and again, but it is easier to have it ready to present, in written form -it may also be easier to access... The lovely people who ask about me sometimes feel that they may have intruded but honestly, if those things were talked about more freely, then the victims would feel safe to speak up much sooner. So, please never feel bad for me when the information you asked for is not all happy news.
Yes, my past is troubled and for a long time it was very, very confusing for me. Being educated makes no difference when letting information come up to the surface provokes excruciating tearing pains. So, I buried it all in the depths of my subconscious, masked the discomfort and was unable to talk about it until I ended up in therapy for anxiety & depression, in my early forties. There was no choice then, it was either 'reach the bottom and kick it to resurface, or let go and sink'.
This is the usual age range, and the usual setting, when victims of sexual abuse in childhood speak out at long last; they have been kept quiet by the perpetrators' clever conditioning and by the shame and confusion that grew in them, year after year, with much neurological damage left unattended.
The victims who do not speak out are the ones who could no longer bear to live with the shame and the painful anguish of what was done to them; so they end up living a non-life, heavily medicated to numb the pain, or they take the drastic step to end their days. A preferred method of suicide for victims of sexual abuse is defenestration, which does not surprise me as many of my childhood (and early adulthood) recurrent dreams were of flying -the ultimate escape, the final grab for freedom...
I was very fortunate indeed to have a steady anchor in this world, a love of nature & animals and of my son, neither of whom ever judged me or hurt me. In my deepest bouts of depression the closer I got to feeling suicidal was the feeling useless & unnecessary upon waking, unable to face yet another day of being pointless, just taking up space in this world, for no tangible purpose. Being my son's mother and my pets' carer was the only anchor that kept me in harbour in those dark times; their life depended on me and so I carried on.
While the love of my fellow parishioners was a balm to my shredded soul, I found it difficult to confide in them for fear of either being misunderstood or imposing... It is a great burden to carry and sharing it is not an easy feat. It gets easier after a decade of self-discovery and practice.
My child was my ray of sunshine, my intellectual stimulant, my rock -a tough function for one so young, really. My pets were able to take on any aspect of my illness, soothing me with their love and loyalty and grounding me with their own simple needs.
For a long time I survived out of a sense of duty.
I am grateful for that and praise God daily that I had those crucial points of support in my life to carry me through the storm.
The longer I survived the more intense this gratitude grew; every year I survived made me less of a victim. Now I am a survivor, but it took me a long, long time to get here. A very dear friend of mine could not get her head around this and insisted that depression can only be beaten by making the decision and getting on with it... No. We are still friends and I love her dearly for all her kindness but she does not understand depression, its causes and its effects. My counsellors were the only ones who truly understood what I was going through, but they were not 'loved ones', so it took a lot of work to benefit from their assistance and truly grow into who I am, who I was meant to be. Certainly, I made many mistakes along the way, but I have forgiven myself for those as there is no point in adding to the burden as you age. Forgiving oneself for being in this state in the first place is the very foundation for recovery; it is not easy; it is probably a lifetime's work, but it is worth putting in the effort -and steering clear of any negative influences.
Being forgiven by the person who matters the most in one's life is like receiving a drop of water in the midst of a drought. That it should be a child who accomplishes this phenomenal feat is both humbling and inspiring. The least I could do was to make the effort to try and forgive, too... It took a lot of work and many years, but each tiny step, painstakingly taken in the soft sand, drove me closer to solid ground.
I can honestly say that I am happy to grow older, have been so for several years, now... Yes, aging has its drawbacks, but on the whole, the sense of quiet victory at enjoying my life wipes out any remaining winge about 'getting old'. I made it! It is my life and I hung on to it.
It may sound pitiful to most people that for a long time I found contentment in the proximity of others' happiness; but I still feel this now that I am happy and I consider it a blessing. Happiness radiates and even an unhappy person will benefit from from hanging out with happy people and experience moments of joy that are invaluable. Making my son happy made me happy, making my dog happy made me happy, supporting children with complex needs made me happy, rescuing wildlife makes me happy... Giving is extremely rewarding in itself. Through my current illness I have had to learn to also give to myself in order to have anything of worth to offer the world.
I have been battling with Long Covid for seventeen weary months, but that is easy compared to the healing journey from being abused by one's family.
My earliest memories are of my brother's manipulations intended to make me appear naughty and unreasonable, so that our parents would always trust him rather than me; I was ordered to always respect my brother because he knew best, being senior by five years. So, after years of emotional and mental abuse, the first instances of sexual abuse occurred when our parents would put him in charge while they went out for hours to offer support to elderly relatives who lived in the country and did not have a car. It was made clear to me that this was a privilege, having my sex education taken in hand by my big brother; it felt wrong and I was reluctant but adequately conditioned to comply, since I was always to do as I was told... "And if you tell mum she won't believe you and you'll get punished for telling lies." I knew he was right; she had put him on a pedestal and childhood friends have told me in recent years that they were always baffled by this. So was I. But what could I do? My mother often said glibely that I was the little doll she never had as a child; sadly I had my own personality to develop and never was allowed... I was a tomboy and never lived up to her expectations, which entailed much humiliating scolding and even bullying; this objectification was a very easy path for my brother to follow and get his own way. Having received Safeguarding Training myself, I now know that all the clues that I was abused were present in my behaviour, but there was no such thing as Child Protection and Safeguarding in those days and people just minded their own business, so labelling a child 'difficult' was a lot more convenient than opening Pandora's box.
So, I stopped screaming at my brother in frustration and complied. I was quiet, I studied hard because my schoolwork was the only thing that kept me safe from being interfered with; my mother was adamant that I should do well at school so having my head buried in my books was my 'safe place', usually in the company of the family cat. Aged ten, I started to reveal that I had a remarkable talent for foreign languages; English was easy and exciting because I was encouraged to express myself in this new language, so I did -and never stopped. French, in comparison, was the language of oppression and unhealthy secrecy.
I would never have survived had I not been able to come and study in this country then settle here, thus putting the English Channel in between my abusers and myself, for most of the time. Of course, when my little angel of salvation was born I felt duty-bound to allow him to know his family, however stressful that was for me. No regrets: He learnt to love his grandfather who was delighted to be able to be himself with this little 'mini-me'. I got to have a few moments alone with my father and understood that he too suffered from the family dynamics. Loyal to the end, he would not survive retirement and the lack of escape from 'home' (where the hurt is). He enjoyed coming to visit us in England; I now realize that he would not have travelled anywhere if it wasn't for us living abroad.
My little boy learnt to accept being confused by his grandmother's behaviour and I found great solace in his questions, which enabled me to not feel so alone.
My brother tried to exert pressure from afar but after my initial disclosure, he lost all grasp on my life and had to face the music when I finally alerted the authorities as to his deviant tendencies, for the sake of my nephew.
I had to face the consequences of dropping a bomb in my family but, as my father had died a few years previously, I had no qualms letting the truth be known. There was no justice to be had since the statute of limitation had expired, but telling the truth at last was liberating as well as initially traumatic. Of course, typically, they tried to shame me, they tried to silence me, they threatened me, so I cut them out.
In 2011, I changed my name by Deed Poll because, besides having lived in Britain longer than I had in France, I needed to ensure that the abusers would no longer be able to find me. I chose 'Willson' because it is the most common British name of Celtic origin and I insisted on the double L to give it the meaning of my life: I have survived because I had the WILL and my SON. This is to answer a question that is very often put to me. I did not change my name on a whim; I needed to.
Admittedly my life has been a mess, but it is mine and I value it. I have no financial achievement (my family made sure to block my access to my father's inheritance) or career success (the struggle with burn-out has taken its toll on my health) to show for all my efforts, but I have my life and believe me, that has been the most arduous gift to hang on to. For some of us, just living is a victory. Literally.
Never underestimate what a victim of abuse has been through and never assume that they'll get over it just by moving on. Always encourage people who hint at abuse to express themselves and either offer support and understanding or refer them to someone who can. It is not easy to deal with a disclosure, I imagine that it must be very uncomfortable, but it is even more so to be the discloser; so if you are not feeling up to it, it is fine to admit it and refer the person to a trained helper -there are Safeguarding Officers in almost all organizations nowadays and it is worth making use of them.
I personally prefer to be made a fool of for believing a disclosure rather than turning away from someone who claims to be a victim. Ego has no place in the effort to beat abuse. Those who may be tempted to play the abuse card for attention, or whatever their motive, are in need of help themselves, if only to fix whatever it is that is driving them. Rebuking is not an option.
Together, we can put an end to the reign of terror that has been inflicted on victims through shaming and careful silence. Let's talk about it. Let's change attitudes. Let's be vigilent.
which triggered this article; fruition at last!
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