So, I’ve thought long and hard about this blog post because it feels like such a momentous occasion; fifteen years since the abuse ended. It’s such a milestone, one that needs the blog post about it to be as equally special and important… So, I hope that what I say will improve your general understanding of abuse and its aftermath, and that in doing so, will provide a better chance of someone feeling really supported and that their experience is appreciated and validated…
“Why am I letting you comfort me?” He stared over her head.
“Because I’ve made sure you have no one else to turn to”
Kresley Cole
For so long I thought that the abuse I went through had started on
a particular date, but during the eventual process of reporting it to the
Police, they told me that the days prior to that first abusive act, were the
actual beginning. I was groomed. Manipulated so that when the abuse did start,
I experienced contradictory thoughts and feelings.
My first real interaction with my abuser was after I had been
attacked on my way to school one morning and I began having panic attacks and
flashbacks. So, my abuser offered to be the designated person for me to go to
when I was struggling. Since the Police have labelled this as grooming because
they believe he was planning the abuse the whole time; I feel kind of stupid
for not being even the slightest bit suspicious. But I guess that’s why he made
that suggestion – because he thought that in doing so, either no one would
guess what he would go on to do, or no one would believe me if I reported the
abuse.
It wasn’t just about other people though. Having my abuser be a bit of a confidante for me at first meant that when he did start to hurt me, my first thought was that I deserved it. I mean, why else would he turn from being such a kind, thoughtful person to being my worst enemy? It had to be my fault because I couldn’t believe someone could be capable to make such a U-turn in their personality, behaviour, and attitude. It meant that in providing me with that support the first few times I voluntarily visited his office before the abuse started, I initially struggled to feel resentment or hatred towards him. It was almost as though he’d created his own little protective shield.
I remember not long after the abuse had started, a member of my
family became very poorly, and my thoughts and opinions of my abuser were so manipulated
and completely twisted out of shape that I went to him to talk about it and to
cry! But when he told me that my relative deserved to die and that there were
children dying in Africa so I shouldn’t be so upset; I think that was the real
turning point in my inability to hate him and I actually felt embarrassed for
not being angry sooner! I mean, how stupid and naïve could I be?!
“The loneliest moment in someone’s life is when they are watching
their whole world fall apart, and all they can do is stare blankly”
F. Scott Fitzgerald
I think my abuser recognised the change in my attitude towards him
when I finally began fighting back – not always physically; mostly verbally. It
was one of the reasons why, when his colleagues were interviewed by Police,
they all said that they had suspected something purely from our behaviours
towards each other in public. I mean, we would go absolutely off it – he’d be
shouting so loud this stupid big vein on his forehead would be popping out, and
I would be red in the face.
In noticing my anger, I think he began to worry that if I was
really that furious then maybe there was a new, heightened risk/chance that I
would report him. So, he began tearing down all my relationships with the other
people in my life who had the potential to be the ones I would go and tell. He
started with my Mum and began threatening that she would get hurt if I spoke
up. Then, he moved onto my friends and began telling me that if I told one of
them, he’d be dishing out punishments to them left, right, and centre. So those
two possibilities of help were demolished with my urge to protect my Mum and my
friends. Then, finally, his colleagues. This time, he told me that they
actually all knew what he was doing and that they all agreed I deserved it.
With the very little media stories about abuse and rape back then,
I already felt pretty alone and intimidated, so when he left me with all these
doubts and fears about my relationships, I felt even more vulnerable and
detached. It was like he was the only person left in my life and so how could I
do something like report the abuse? It would mean he’d be gone too and then I’d
have no one left!
“Most misunderstandings in the world could be avoided if people
would simply take the time to ask, ‘what else could this mean?’”
Shannon L Alder
My abuser tearing down my relationships and any trust I had in
others, didn’t mean that I just stopped wanting help from the people he had
either threatened, belittled, or manipulated. What it did mean though, was that
I couldn’t just choose someone, go up to them, and tell them what was happening
to me. It wasn’t going to be that simple.
So, in knowing that I couldn’t tell anyone, I tried to show them
instead. I channelled my new-found hatred and anger towards him into my attitude
and behaviour choices. I began talking back to teachers at school; I would be
so rude and defiant that I was disrupting classes and was actually described by
my teachers as being ‘insolent’ on a number of occasions. My school rebellion
affected my friendships with people starting to label me as dramatic and
attention seeking. Irony is, I actually really was seeking attention – I wanted
someone to notice this change in me more than anything – but that wasn’t how my
friends were using the term. They seemed to be getting really sick of me and
after a while, I stopped caring about seeing them or keeping in touch and our
relationships kind of dwindled for a while and without them, the bullying
started.
I remember receiving messages online calling me everything ranging
from comments about me being underweight to the general ‘loser’ and ‘stupid’
you hear a lot of. And then they claimed to be my ‘worst nightmare’ when I asked
who the person sending them was. I remember eventually telling a teacher and
them saying that I really had to speak with my abuser and that he would get it
stopped. I begged for the teacher to tell my abuser their self, but I was
practically frog-marched to my abuser’s office and then the words about the
bullying came tumbling out so fast because of my sheer desperation to end the
interaction with him. The next thing I knew was that the bullies were lined up
in a room and my abuser yelling at them and just like that, it stopped. And I
remember crying – not from relief, but from the notion that now I needed to be
grateful to him! That everyone would expect me to thank him and show him some
respect and appreciation.
Whilst the anger went into the actions and things, I also
exhibited some of the most common signs that a child is being abused; I began
showering daily and for hours at a time, I lost my appetite and became
underweight, and I started self-harming. And still, it was missed. I felt like
I was standing screaming for help, and everyone had headphones on and were
listening to the soundtrack of their own lives. And it made me furious. Furious
with the feeling that no one was taking in notice. I mean, I didn’t imagine I
could get any more furious until the Police told me that when interviewing my
abuser’s colleagues, they all made statements along the lines of “I did wonder”
or “I didn’t see it, but I can believe it.” And I just wanted to scream at them
“why the hell didn’t you do anything about it then?!” If it were me, if I had
suspicions about a child being abused then you’d have to shut me up – I’d be
reporting it to all the relevant people! And hearing that they’d suspected
something but stood back and let it happen, made me question just how far the
abuse – and my mental health – would have gone if it’d been stopped sooner.
“There are many who don’t wish to sleep for fear of nightmares.
Sadly, there are many who don’t wish to wake up for the same fear”
Richelle Goodrich
During the abuse, I remember having such a varied and misshapen
view of sleep too. I mean, at first, part of me would absolutely relish bedtime
because it meant escape from the upsetting reality of my life. Plus, I very
often dreamt that I was either telling someone about the abuse or getting
revenge in some way. But I think that the period of time this lasted for was
really to do with the fact that I was still in a level of shock and still maintained
some aspects of a real naivety.
Firstly, I couldn’t believe that the person who I’d been thankful
for after the attack and who I had trusted and respected for almost a month
wasn’t really that person at all! Almost in an instant he just suddenly wasn’t
in any way deserving of or worthy of any sort of idolism or appreciation. He
deserved no kindness or gratitude. Irony is, having so much hatred and
negativity towards him was actually quite tiring. It was draining to use my
heart to hold disgust and then to almost lose sight of the good in absolutely
anyone else was just so completely exhausting. But that’s when the dreams of
revenge started to occur, and I started to look forward to night-time.
After a short while of that, I started to really resent sleep
because it meant that I could have all those hours of comfort, reassurance, and
nothing resembling pain, but then they were over and I was awake, I was feeling
not at all validated, completely alone, and in pain. Living in a nightmare. I
imagine it being a little bit like a plane crash; one minute you’re flying
steady, safe, and happy and then you drop and there’s a crash and everyone and
everything around you are ruined.
Pull me underground
Don’t know if you notice
Sometimes I close my eyes
And dream I’m somewhere else
Rag ‘n’ Bone Man ft. P!nk -
Anywhere Away From Here
That realisation that sleep was an escape from the abuse but that
meant it made me more reluctant to wake up, was probably the first warning sign
of the fact that I was going to become suicidal. I mean, I know there’ll be
people out there who dread waking up to their life and don’t end up trying to
kill themselves… But I think that for me, it was just this point where I wish
I’d talked to someone about it and which I believe that in doing so, it could
have changed everything that happened with my mental health. And maybe I
wouldn’t have become suicidal.
Back then though, mental health wasn’t something that was really
talked about at school, with friends, or in the media – so I didn’t know of a
single person who had tried to take their own life or who had succeeded in
their attempt. This lack of understanding and education on the subject added reason
to my failure to seek help so early on in my mental health’s deterioration.
I remember being in my abuser’s office once but, for a change, I
wasn’t with him. I was with his Deputy and was told to sit on one of the little
cushioned chairs around the coffee table against the wall opposite their desks.
And I was thinking ‘this is the comfiest I’ve ever been in this room.’ But it
was ruined by the fact that his Deputy had called me into the office to shout
at me for being ‘rude’ to my abuser. I remember her saying “I don’t know who
you think you are to believe you can talk to him like that!” and I felt my gaze
drift to the large window which looked down from the first floor onto some
grass. Almost suddenly, I began wondering whether I would die if I jumped from
it. The window wasn’t even open – in fact, I didn’t even know how to open it(!)
– so it wasn’t exactly a practical thought or something that could reasonably
be carried out. But it was a thought.
Another round of bullets hits my skin
Well, fire away, ‘cause today, I won’t let the shame sink in
The Greatest Showman – This Is Me
In the weeks leading up to the end of the abuse, my relationship
with my abuser was… fraught. Dangerous. I mean, if anyone got in the way of one
of our arguments, they’d find themselves in an absolute mess. I mean we would
both lay into anyone who stepped in to attempt to end our rowing. Which is why,
I think, his colleagues made the comments about suspecting the abuse because in
my abuser’s job, it was really inappropriate to talk to someone of my age
(sixteen by that point) in that way.
There was one instance in his office – where the majority of the
abusive acts took place – and he called me a bitch just as his Deputy walked
in. She just looked to each of us and then her eyes set on my abuser, and she
raised her eyebrows as though urging him to explain his choice of words and the
reason his face was bright red, and the stupid vein was popping out again! And
I won’t forget what she finally said when he abruptly turned away from her as
though refusing to answer her questioning look: “Aimee, this is what happens
when you act the way you’ve been acting recently. If you’re going to speak to
people the way you have been, then at some point, you’re going to get that
back!” I remember asking her if she was defending him and she replied, “of
course I am!”
I promptly left the office and made a huge fuss of slamming the
wooden door so hard that I glanced back in surprise when the glass window in
the door didn’t smash from the force of my angry handling of it.
That incident was a real turning point in my strength against my
abuser. It made me so completely frustrated and that seemed to channel into
some sort of power and defiance towards him. Which meant that our arguments
became a whole lot more dramatic and disruptive for everyone in the building.
It meant that when we’d start arguing people would literally scatter and rush
off; not wanting to hear or witness it and fearing they would somehow become
involved in it.
“The truth will set you free, but first it will piss you off”
Joe Klaas
Through the change in the arguments, on April 20th
2007, my abuser and I got into the fight of all fights! Just days before it,
he’d finally taken the abuse to its worst in hurting me to the largest extreme
and in doing so, I finally recognised that unless I spoke up, this was going to
continue. And whilst I couldn’t imagine a worse act than what he had done to me
the few days earlier, I hated the thought of that act being done over and over
again. I knew that was a very real possibility because if he continued to ‘get
away with it’ why the hell would he have any reason to stop?!
So, we had started arguing in his office and before I knew it, I
was racing out of the room, along the corridor, and down the stairs with him
not far behind me. As we went down the stairs, we continued shouting at each
other and just as we practically fell through the double doors into a corridor,
I was shouting “think of your wife and children!” And when I spun round out of
surprise for his lack of response, I saw him staring at his boss whose office
was on that corridor practically opposite the double doors.
“I’ve had enough of this!” his boss yelled so furiously I actually
saw spit fly out of his mouth “this is the last argument you two have! What
right do you have to say something like that?” he asked me. And it was the
strangest sensation… It was like… Like, my body hadn’t finished running away
but since I’d physically stopped moving, the words just tumbled out; like they
were still trying to run. So, I just blurted out what my abuser had been doing
to me for the past six months and his response? “Get the hell out of here you
manipulative little liar!” And he literally pushed me into the reception area
and yelled to the receptionist to call my Mum and tell her to come get me.
Whilst I waited for my Mum to come, I remember crying so hard I
couldn’t breathe and the whole time inside my head was an actual panicking
mess! I was frantically debating whether I should tell my Mum the entire,
truthful story or go back to my reluctant, difficult silence. But the mere
thought of telling my Mum what had been done to me made me feel actually
nauseous. I mean, I’d firstly have to tell her that I’d been keeping this
massive secret for so long, and I worried that would break her heart. And then
I’d have to tell her what he’d done, and I worried she’d be off hunting him
down!
So, when my Mum arrived, I told her that I’d just been told to
leave and that I had no idea why. She said to the receptionist that she wanted
to speak to my abuser’s boss, but they told her he was about to go into some
sort of event and had said he’d send a letter and that I wasn’t to return to
the building until she’d received it. And I remember very briefly worrying that
his boss would tell my Mum what I’d said and then she’d be finding out
something which – if she had to hear it – I wanted her to hear about from me.
That worry was so fleeting though because I knew that he wouldn’t want to risk
telling her. He’d know that if he did, he’d be risking her doing something
about it. And that wasn’t what he wanted. He wanted for it all to be swept
under the carpet.
“Everything and everyone that you hate is engraved upon your
heart; if you want to let go of something, if you want to forget, you cannot
hate”
C. Joy Bell
A while after leaving the building, my Mum received the letter
detailing the conditions under which I could enter the building again. One of
these was that if I were to undergo my GCSE exams there, it had to be in
isolation. Ironically, this meant that I was assigned an Invigilator to
supervise me and so I had a credible witness when my abuser began attempting to
interrupt. He spent months doing a number of things to mess with my education
and exam results, and in the end, I had to continue my study in a completely
different building!
Now, for me, there are limits to things. There are limits to what
a person can or can’t do to someone – and sometimes these limits don’t coincide
with the law – sometimes they’re about personal thoughts and feelings. So, for
me, I had come to see that my abuser was going to continue to affect my present
for some time, but I was adamant that he would not destroy my future; and the
exams he was interrupting, and manipulating were so important for my further
education and career goals.
The very real danger that he could seriously ruin my life left me
feeling so much more hopeless. I mean, the actual physical abuse had completely
stopped, but it was like that wasn’t good enough. Of course, it meant a lot and
I was grateful for my safety, but how could I really enjoy it when he was still
butting in and doing whatever he could to jeopardise things? It meant that
whilst I’d gotten used to the hatred, I’d been feeling towards him for the past
few months, there was a whole new anger, hate, and disgust. And it caught me
off-guard so that I really didn’t know how to cope with it.
That uncertainty and the notion that I was completely unprepared
and incapable, was a huge contributing factor to the fact that I began drinking
(yes, underage). Whilst the rest of my group of friends were drinking to have
fun and to be silly, I was drinking to forget. And the act of downing bottle
after bottle of cheap cider seemed to really release some of my anger and hate.
It felt like I was sticking my fingers up at my abuser and everyone who’d ever defended
him.
Drinking so much that memories of the abuse were bearable, numbed
me to the fact that the hatred was – as the quote says – engraving upon my
heart. It was becoming a part of me. It was starting to define my attitude and
behaviours, and if I wasn’t careful – I realised that it would take over my
entire life.
“If you spend your time hoping someone will suffer the
consequences for what they did to your heart, then you’re allowing them to hurt
you a second time in your mind”
Shannon L Alder
When I had the wake-up call that stopped my drinking, I found
myself left with reality… For two years, at least(!) because after those years,
I began experiencing auditory hallucinations. I stayed silent about them for ten
days out of that same fear as all those years ago around being locked in a
hospital and forced to take medication, then I finally attempted suicide (both because
of their command to do so and because of my own thoughts and feelings). But it
wasn’t until my second suicide attempt, that led to me finally reporting the
abuse to the Police.
I was moved to a Psychiatric Intensive Care Unit (PICU) for the
first time and as staff explained how secure the ward was (I had been running
away from the previous ward) I became more and more terrified that I would
never get out. Then, a girl with bandages covering her arms came and sat with
me in the walled and fenced courtyard and for some reason we began talking. She
told me what had happened to her when she was younger and I told her what had
been done to me, and she encouraged me to report it to the staff. It was kind
of like… a light at the end of a dark, scary tunnel; because it felt as though
maybe finally talking about the abuse would help get me out of there a whole
lot more quickly than any amount of medication or therapy!
When I told the Ward Manager, she explained that she was now
obliged to call the Police and gave me the option on whether she or I told my
Mum. In all honesty, I can’t remember making a conscious decision to agree to
talking to the Police… I guess I just thought that now people knew, telling the
Police was the next step. Almost like it was just a natural stage in an assembly
line in some sort of a production factory! And that notion really wasn’t helped
with the fact that there are actually a number of stages to a Police investigation
into an allegation of rape and abuse. But despite not fully understanding the procedures,
one thing that remained in my mind whenever I began to question my strength in
continuing through those procedures; was that I wanted justice. I wanted my
abuser to face consequences that were equal to his destructive, disgusting, traumatising
acts.
When the Police told me he was denying everything and that even
though his colleagues gave statements that they believed it could be true, no
one had seen it so there were no witnesses; I surprised myself by feeling
shocked at his response. I mean, I’ve always said that from those six months of
the abuse and all of the intense arguments and talks etc. I feel like I know
him better than anyone, and I had honestly thought that he’d finally admit his
guilt.
So, to hear that he was claiming to be innocent really knocked me
for six. I mean, it not only meant that I had the wrong expectations, but it
also made me feel like maybe I didn’t know him at all – and that was confusing
and painful. Being able to anticipate his answers in our arguments and
predicting what he was about to do when he'd call me into his office were kind
of… Comforting? Reassuring? I don’t know… It’s like when you’re going to the
Dentist for a filling or something – you know what’s going to happen; and that
doesn’t change how difficult it is to cope with it, but it does allow you some
sort of knowledge. Some sort of reasonable and realistic expectation. But then
the Dentist turns around and says, “I’m not doing that procedure at all; I’m
doing a different one!” and you had no inkling that would happen. No insight.
In my abuser contradicting my report, it meant that the Police
couldn’t do anything more about it, and they voiced how frustrating that was
because they said that they believed me but that the Crown Prosecution Service
(CPS) thought there wasn’t enough evidence to go to court. And I remember
feeling so completely hopeless and defeated. As though I’d been climbing a
steep hill and I’d lost my balance and was falling back down it. So, to get
through that, I clutched onto my Nana’s little sayings about how what goes
around comes around and what’s meant to happen will happen. I realised I needed
these beliefs because without them, I felt worthless. I felt that everything
that had happened to me was all for nothing because he wasn’t going to pay the
consequences for his behaviour.
“I feel bare. I didn’t realise I wore my secrets as armour until
they were gone and now everyone sees me as I really am”
Veronica Roth
Losing the biggest, most important secret I had ever kept, and feeling
that doing so had been so completely pointless, gave me the notion of extreme vulnerability.
I mean, I’d spent over two years hanging onto that secret and over that time,
it had kind of moulded into me – my heart, my head, and my entire life. It had
almost become a definition of me. As though it was all that I was. And I actually
think that’s pretty fair to say and feel, considering just how monumental it
(the secret/abuse) was. But it turned out that telling the secret, became a
whole new definition of me – the girl who had been abused. People knew now…
I once heard another psychiatric hospital inpatient saying that as
suicidal as she often felt, she didn’t want to be known as the girl who had
killed herself. She didn’t want to be just another statistic and another
argument to prove people’s view that mental health services are failing people
all the time. So many people are slipping through their nets and it’s not good
enough. And the same goes for the abuse. I mean, I’ve heard so many ‘jokes’
about people in my abuser’s job abusing children and I don’t want my experience
to be some sort of punchline.
My greatest annoyance about people knowing though, was the
recognition that now they would have to choose. That because my abuser had
claimed to be innocent, and I was maintaining that he was guilty, if someone
heard what had happened, they would have to pick a side. A person they
believed. And after months of my abuser pointing out that no one would believe
me if I told, I felt fairly confident that people would choose his side. I
mean, he was respected and powerful in his job, and I was just a young girl who
hadn’t done anything with her life yet. What reason would people have to completely
change their opinion of him based on something that couldn’t be proven?
In choosing his side, it didn’t just mean they believed him, it
meant they disbelieved me. It meant they thought I was lying. That I had made
the whole thing up. And it’s easy to say ‘don’t care about what others think of
you;’ but how can you not be upset by the notion that some people aren’t on
your side in the most important battle of your life?
Losing that secret and finding out who was really on Team Aimee
was a huge moment in my mental health journey because at first, it left me
feeling as though I had no real excuse to continue self-harming or attempting
suicide. As though telling people about the abuse and not breaking down or
falling apart when some of them didn’t believe me, should mean that my mental
health was suddenly better and stable. Like keeping the secret was the only
reason why I wanted to die. And I actually ended up having my most safe period
in the community when this belief came, and I began working with a lovely
Psychologist.
But of course, purely reporting the abuse wasn’t the ‘fix’ for my
mental illness. Whether it was a secret or not, the reality was I had been
abused and I would have those memories with me forever.
Cut me down
But it’s you who’ll have further to fall
David Guetta ft. Sia – Titanium
People talk about being ‘on the bottom’ when they’re at their most
poorly with their mental health, but it was like just when I thought I had
reached it and was feeling the most terrible I could ever feel and in the most
horrendous situation, things would get worse. It was almost cruel because just
when I would be thinking ‘this is the worst it can get’ and finding comfort in
that, I’d discover it was a lie and that actually, there were so many more
lower levels that would test my mind and body in ways I could have never imagined
I would even survive.
Feeling at this very low point meant that when I made my final
disclosure about the abuse to the Police a few years after the first one, I actually
felt safe. I mean, yes, I was in a psychiatric hospital when I spoke to the Police,
so I guess my chances of self-harming or attempting suicide were somewhat
hindered, but that’s not the safety I’m talking about. My safety at that time,
was in the fact that having made a suicide attempt that landed me on life
support in Intensive Care not long earlier, I felt confident in the knowledge
that no matter what he did or said, I couldn’t be knocked down/back any further
than I already was. I mean, he could deny everything until he was blue in the
face – he could even blame me for it – and I literally could never imagine my
mental health being any worse off.
Whilst this notion was in some ways comforting and reassuring, and
it felt like a huge motivation for me to take it as the ‘right’ time to finish telling
the Police everything that had happened; it was also saddening. And not because
of the sheer fact that it meant I was really poorly, but because whilst I was
sectioned under the 1983 Mental Health Act and detained in a psychiatric
hospital over 100 miles away from home, my abuser was being promoted in his job!
Into a position that was going to allow him more opportunities for unsupervised
contact with vulnerable children. It was like, he was in the one in the wrong,
but I was the one dealing with the consequences. The punishment.
One important lesson I learnt during my mental health recovery has
been the impact responsibility can have. I learnt how essential it is that you
take responsibility for your actions despite having the knowledge that others
may not do the same. It was a difficult thing to come to terms with –
especially when you operate on the ‘treat-others-how-you-want-to-be-treat’ kind
of ethic. It makes it frustrating to think that some people consider themselves
to be ‘above’ social niceties and just general good manners! But the important
contradiction to this is to recognise that you don’t want to be one of those
people. One of those who thinks they’re exempt. So, ignore what others are
doing and focus on your own behaviour and attitude. And believe that they’ll
get their comeuppance.
When I thought about my abuser and his career success, I felt some
of that old, more intense hatred return and relished the thought that finishing
my disclosure of everything he’d done to me, could have the potential to bring
him down a peg or two.
“Don’t judge yourself by what others did to you”
C. Kennedy
My abuser’s decision to continue with his claim of innocence in response
to the final report, was a hugely contributing factor to the way I began to see
myself as a whole. I mean, judgment, stigma, and discrimination are hugely controversial
and argumentative talking points around all things related to abuse and mental health.
Sadly, this means that when both of those topics are huge aspects of your life,
you’re almost double as likely to come up against the misunderstanding, rude,
and sometimes ridiculous, judgments of others! But the judgments you make
against yourself where your mental health and your experiences (abuse or not) are
concerned, can actually end up being a whole lot more dangerous and damaging
than those that others come up with.
In the beginning of the abuse, I held so many negative and
unhealthy judgments about myself with disproportioned blame and unfair thoughts.
I held myself responsible for a lot of the things that were done to me, and
even when I finally began to consider that it wasn’t all my fault, I still
criticised myself for not reporting it and for not being strong enough to fight
back.
Already having these unhelpful thoughts and feelings about myself meant
that when I had to face his denial again, it led me to recognise that I was
still really holding onto the unhealthy anger towards him. I mean, that thought
of him possibly facing consequences again really motivated me to delve into the
most painful of my memories and bare them all to the Police; and that made me
question what sort of person that made me.
I wondered whether that was malicious of me to be wishing punishment
on someone else…?
Or was I petty for still talking about something that had actually
finished over half a decade ago?
Or maybe it was manipulative for me to do what I could to impact
and influence his life?
Questioning my own integrity and my morals and ethics was – on the
whole – a massively challenging time for me in my mental health recovery. I had
thought I couldn’t feel any worse and at the time, I would probably say that I
did end up feeling worse after his denial, but looking back? I can see that
time as difficult but productive. That it (questioning and judging myself) was
a process I really had to go through to get to where I am today because it
became the greatest opportunity to discover who I was and to finally begin to
accept and like that person.
One of the greatest judgments I’d made which had the biggest
impact when I battled it, was around the blame of the abuse. I had slowly come
to realise that part of my reluctance to portion all the blame on him was the
fact that even if I did, it wouldn’t change the fact that he likely wasn’t
going to face any repercussions. Whereas, blaming myself would mean that I could
inflict the punishment on me. That the abuse wouldn’t go without notice. It
wouldn’t be ignored in the same dismissive way it felt when he denied it all
and took no responsibility.
In learning that the fact I was blaming myself was that it was
must easier – effort-wise – to do so, I finally began considering that just
because it was easy, that didn’t make it at all right. In fact, sometimes the
hardest things are the best ones. The right ones. The fair ones. So, I made the
decision to tackle that judgment and to portion the blame on my abuser with the
understanding that I needed to accept and believe that karma would get to him
eventually. And to be honest, reporting the rest of the abuse to the Police
helped this because it also absorbed me from the judgment that I had been
selfish in withholding this information at fear of the response I’d get and
without consideration of how it had the potential to protect others. So, whilst
my abuser is still ‘free’ and working in that very dangerous role, I know I’ve
done absolutely everything in my power to prevent him from hurting anyone else.
“The truth is, unless you let go, unless you forgive yourself,
unless you forgive the situation, unless you realise that the situation is
over, you cannot move forward”
Steve Maraboli
In finally lifting the blame I’d placed upon myself, the next
stage seemed to be tackling the element of forgiveness that seems to
automatically hover around abuse like a bad but curious smell… I mean, it’s not
just what the abuser and the survivor consider; it felt like everyone I ever
told/who found out about the abuse asked – or hinted around wanting to know –
whether I had forgiven my abuser. It’s kind of like when you break a bone and
people will ask how painful it is.
So, to answer the question: I will never forgive my abuser and I don’t
think anyone should have the audacity to neither ask me to, nor expect me to. Which
is why I chose this quote, because it recommends forgiving yourself for all
that you’ve done and not someone else for their involvement in the situation. In
all honesty, I think that even if I could forgive my abuser, the way I held
myself accountable with the abuse would have the most important and positive
impact on me, my mental health, and my ability to move forwards.
I found forgiving myself for the elements of the abuse that I
thought I had done wrong in – mainly failing to report it as soon as possible –
really difficult because there was a lot of acceptance to be done. And when my
mental health was at its most poorly, I struggled so much to accept reality because
of a huge fear that if I did, I’d be even more persistent in my suicide
attempts. So, being kind of out of practice in terms of accepting things, one piece
of work I did in Dialectical Behaviour Therapy (DBT) around ‘radical acceptance’
really helped me to see the positives of acceptance and why doing so, was really
important.
I learnt that unless I accepted the abuse as being a part of my
life, and unless I accepted that it was over now, I would never move on from
it. And it was so difficult to recognise that something which had a massive
defining impact on my life was just ‘over’ like that. I almost felt like
arguing that something like that doesn’t just ‘end.’ It’s kind of like when
they do mental health awareness dates and so many people talk about the fact
that mental illness doesn’t just go away after one day. Well, even when abuse
had physically ended, it doesn’t disappear and become forgotten about.
I was once in hospital after self-harming and a Healthcare Assistant
asked why I’d done it and I told her what had happened to me and she said “I
was abused too, but I’m not going around doing what you are. You’ve just got to
get on with it!” And I remember saying that everyone experiences abuse and
trauma differently and so, everyone copes with it differently – and that’s ok. I
just think that it’s so important that we don’t spread that message that a
person who experiences abuse should just ‘get on’ with their life. We should
appreciate and validate all the people (including me) who have struggled or who
are struggling, to do that. There should be no interpretation that to still be trying
to cope years later makes you any weaker or less capable than the person who
learnt to cope within days!
Appreciate your journey and recognise that abuse or trauma might
always stay with you in some respect, but you can control just how damaging or
positive that can be.
I told you I would prove you wrong
And now I’m here and I’m standing strong
Jess Glynne – Ain’t Got Far To Go
My abuser told me I was worthless. He called me stupid. He said no
one would believe me. And he said these things so many times that I challenge
anyone to not have started to believe them – of course I thought he was right! Of
course, I trusted him! He’d destroyed all my other relationships with people
who there was any remote possibility that I would believe them. He had made me
believe that he was all I had left. I felt that I had no one I could turn to
and say, “is he right?”
Looking back, I’m actually grateful for that now. I’m grateful
because it meant that finding the strength and determination to prove him
wrong, came solely from me. I mean, of course there have been some incredibly
helpful and supportive people in my life and in my mental health journey in
particular; but ultimately, it was me who made the decision to fight back. It’s
like that thing about how you can throw all the help and advice at someone, but
if they don’t want it or won’t listen to it…
So, being safe and happy, having my own home with my bunny and
cat, and having a mental health blog with over one million readers and all the
opportunities and collaborations etc I’ve done (and ones which I have coming up!),
leave me feeling like I’ve made it. I’ve proven him wrong and I’m standing
strong.
