To My Sexual Abuser
To My Sexual Abuser:
I remember the first time you took me to your bedroom at your mother’s house. With the rouse of “playing a game,” you molested me. I was only six-years-old–before I’d even lost my baby teeth! This went on for years. It happened whenever you could get me alone.
But what you did in 1974 at my house on 1111 North 13th was the worst of all as you raped me.
That summer you often came over with the pretense of visiting my brother whom you had no interest in before or after. Your smile was a lie. You used my mother’s kindness against her, violated her trust. You saw a weakness and took advantage of it. That makes you a predator.
On the evening you raped me, I was only nine, and you were nearly 16. When you got me on my bed, I could see my Mrs. Beasley doll sitting in the corner. My Baby Crissy doll, whom everyone said looked like me, was there too along with my other little girl things.
I screamed out more than once, because you hurt me so badly. There was blood. Do you remember that? Was that why you never returned after that? Did your conscience finally get to you? Or was it merely because you had moved across town?
I doubt that you have any remorse. I’m convinced that you lack the capacity to understand that what you did to a child was wrong. You probably made all kinds of excuses for yourself. So let’s put this in better perspective—there’s NO excuse for what you did, and you were old enough to know better.
I think you even convinced yourself that I liked it. You often did that flirty eyebrow wiggle, which I came to recognize as a sexual message. I hated that. I wanted to punch you in the face whenever I saw it. I was a child. All I wanted to do was dance and sing and dream. And I had that right, but you took that carefree innocence away from me.
After you raped me, I had an injury, which I told no one about. I eventually healed physically, but I hurt badly inside. You invaded my perception of myself like you had my body. You made me a liar to my mom and yours. I couldn’t tell anyone my dirty secret, which filled me with shame, and I didn’t want to hurt anyone with the horrible truth.
Someone did see you one time though. Someone knew. Your mom knew too but never intervened.
Do you have any idea how negatively this abuse has affected my life? How bad it made me feel about myself? How it damaged my spirit? How different it made me feel from other children? For years, I struggled with respecting myself enough to demand respect from others.
To this day, people think less of ME for something that YOU did. They whisper that I don’t come around. They can’t understand why I don’t want to see you. They don’t understand that someone never gets over a sexual assault. I’m the one who’s perceived as troublesome or unreasonable, because of what YOU did.
What YOU did even caused a rift between me and my mother. Years after this abuse, I told her what you’d done, she didn’t know what to do so she made excuses for you. It has taken me a while to forgive her, but I have, because it was never her fault but entirely YOUR fault.
I’m a Christian, and I’m trying to forgive you as God wants us to forgive, but I’m having a very hard time doing so. I thought I had once. I shoved the pain down deep like I always had as I didn’t want to hurt your wife and children. And I tried to be polite when I ran into you, but it was too hard, and I realized that I hadn’t forgiven you. I hope someday I can, and I trust I will, because I’m strong—I’m a survivor.
Bobette