Since writing this on Friday evening, I have had a few comments made to me. I also posted most of this in my msn support group for 'Abuse Survivors' and many of the members admitted that they also feel this way?

For years after abuse, the victim hides, we try to pretend it didn't happen to us! We feel different from everyone else, we feel people can tell whats happened from looking at us? which logically we know they can't but we can't help the way we feel. The inner child that we all carry is so submissive that it does as told by any adult and unless we get the chance to deal with the abuse early on it can haunt us for years to come.

Some nights even now as I drift of to sleep my inner child comes out, she cries about what she suffered and asks for help! But I don't know how to help her? as I am still trying to come to terms with it myself I feel unable to give her the care she so badly craves. She wants a mother who will love her unconditionally, who will protect her from the evil men in this world who intend to hurt her. I can't give her that protection yet as I myself am still not strong enough to do it!

I feel able now after all this time to protect myself as I am today, I feel capable of staying safe from harm by basically locking myself away from the world, I don't go out alone after dark for fear of being attacked or worse still raped again, I don't trust people until I feel I know them. Trust is such a major issue for me, and many, in fact every survivor I know. We have had our trust broken so many times in the past by people who are supposed to care about us that now we trust no one!

Can any NON Survivor really say that they don't trust people they meet? Do they fear everyone taking advantage of them? Do they feel that no matter what they can't be safe? Do they trust their doctor when they ask for help? Because I know I for one don't. I went to my doctor about two years ago and asked for help with my issues, his response was simply, 'I'm sorry you went through that, maybe some councelling would help?' But the place he sent me to had no idea how to help me, I was suffering flashbacks everyday, nightmares when I allowed myself to sleep, which wasn't often. In fact I hadn't slept for about four days when I went to see him, there was no free help available and it wasn't until I found a private councellor myself and had to pay for it that I began to slowly start the healing process. I have been told that others have been through trauma in their lives and they manage to get on with it! well I'm sorry, but a car accident, a house fire or some such thing is not as invasive to a person as childhood rape and abuse, so naturally they would find it easier to recover....

We had a chat about this subject in my msn group just last night and many said my words explained how so many of them feel, did I know this? No I had thought that I was alone with these feelings until they told me that most of them had experienced similar things at some point in their own healing. It made me angry! The Abuser gets so much help when caught and convicted and yet the victim gets nothing, we are persuaded by the police to go to court and tell about what happened, even though that in itself is very traumatic, we are asked to do it, being told its the only way to make them pay! But after we do we are left alone, in despair wondering why we dragged it all up again? It doesn't make sence to me.

I was 32yr old when I went to court with my first step father and had all but managed to block it out of my life, I felt that I'd dealt with it my own way and could move on, but going to court brought it all back up again. It took two days to give my statement to the police, it was long and hard as they needed details of everything that he had done to me, details about dates times etc.. but I had been just a child when it all happened so couldn't remember exact dates, I had to recall to the best of my knowledge how old I had been at the start and how old when I stopped it by leaving home, that was easy I was 16 yr old when I left, I couldn't take anymore so ran away and never returned.

But when did it start? how old had I been? I always beleived I was about 14 when the sexual abuse started but now I know differently, I have memories now of when I was about 11 or 12 so much younger than I first thought but the polcie don't know that, these memories have only started coming up recently as I deal with it all in therapy. My sister has memories from the age of about 6yrs being made to give him oral sex... That bastard has done so much damamge to my siblings and myself that I constantly wish him dead! I have no idea if he is dead and don't know how I'd react if I found out he was, would I be happy and glad? or sad and upset? after all he was a major figure in my life and as near to a father that I had.. but he hurt me so much!

Am I going crazy? why would I be unsure about how I'd feel? My Mother wasn't as abusive as he was and now she is dead I miss her? I have no idea why? she didn't love me or protect me as a mother should so why do I mourn her?

A totally confused fucked up mess, thats me today!

Well, to change the way I write in here and make it easier to understand just where I am coming from? won't be easy but I am going to try and explain just how abuse has affected me in my life!

As many readers of this blog now know I was abused either physically, emotionally or sexually for most of my life, from the age of about 5yrs until almost the present day. In fact in therapy today I suddenly realised that in some ways I am still being abused, not by a partner or family member though, but by the people at the place where I work? I hear many of you shouting out, how? why? why don't you stop it? why do you allow it?.... but you see for someone who has been abused this sort of treatment seems the norm and its very hard to recognise it let alone stop it happening.

So here I am now a 48yr old woman still allowing people to abuse me, because I don't really know any better? Bullying in the workplace is also Abuse, ok its not sexual or physical but emotionally it does just as much damage, and now its down to me to put a stop to it once and for all!.. I ask myself how can I do this? when I know I was never able to stop it before? and I answer myself with 'I don't know how'!

You see the damage of Abuse as a child lives on with a person for many years after everyone else has long forgotten what went on, it lives on in you, as a lack of self confidence, lack of self esteem and a low opinion of yourself and your abilities to carry out the most mundane tasks that you are asked to do at work! So you just accept what your told and beleive your not capable of more! until they start to give you more and more to do and suddenly you realise they are taking advantage of you to the most obvious extent.

Today in my therapy session I was made to realise that the cycle of Abuse that I beleived I had broken many years ago was in fact still firmly in place, I haven't actually severed the contact of the circle as yet, and until I do that I will always be open to more abuse by who so ever wants to or decides that they can abuse me! Thats not what I want, I want to be strong and capable of standing up for myself to the extent that NO ONE will ever abuse me again. Many times in this blog I have said the cycle was broken and I honestly beleived that it was, but today I had a very hard lesson to learn when I was told the signs are still there.. I have cried tonight for the first time in a long time, as I realised that what I was told was in fact true, I am still being abused and I have no idea how to put a stop to it!

When anyone shouts, raises their voice, gets to close to my personal space etc I am once again that frightened child from way back when, I cower in corners and try to remain un noticed in the hope that they will leave me alone. Some people think I am a confident individual, when inside I am actually falling apart, hiding the tears and wearing my mask that allows me to disguise my feelings from everyone. I have only been in my job for three months and already they are getting me to do the work of two people on my own, with no extra salary and no benefits from working myself into the ground, not so much as a thankyou either. The other person who's job I have been asked to take over is a young girl who beleives that she is in work purely to socialise and have fun, she sits around laughing and joking with the boys in the office and no one has the backbone to stand up to her and tell her to do her job or get the hell out! instead tehy ask me to do it for her and like a fool I do, because I need the job and don't have the confidence to say NO! As a child to say 'no' was a bad thing, if I said 'no' it meant a beating at least and possibly more, during my marriage saying no just wasn't part of the vocabulary that I was allowed to use, I did as I was told or he would let me know all about it!

So now many years on my past has returned to haunt me once again, everyday I go into work and for some reason become that timid child once more, the child who can't say the simple word 'NO'.. In the past even though I wanted so desperately to say no, I knew I couldn't, I had to take whatever they wanted to dish out to me, whether that was something I wanted or not, that included being raped at a young age and being unable to stop it happening, being unable to tell after it happened because of the threats that had been made to me, it includes the emotional Abuse that I suffered throughout my adult life where I was answerable to my husband for my every move I had to explain what I had done each day and who I had talked to, I didn't have time for me! time to heal from the abusive childhood and learn about my own capabilities as a person, I never had the chance to grow up as most children do learning from my mistakes and making decisions about where my life was going, those choices were taken from me by my Abusers, as I lacked self value and self worth, I never beleived I had the right to make a choice by myself? purely because I was never allowed to develope that side of me that most people take for granted when they have a good up bringing.

At what age do most people get to make choices for themselves, and get to learn from their own mistakes? I'm sure its much sooner than 48yr old! Now it's my turn, as my therapist told me today she is going to try and help me build up my self esteem and self worth, she beleives I am capable of much more than I know and wants to help me find a way to discover it all. I'm not sure how long this is going to take me to do, years maybe, but maybe not? I know that I do have some good qualities about myself, I have written and published a book under my own name and it is out there available for anyone to buy both in the USA and the UK, as yet its not that popular having sold only a few copies (about 60) but I beleive it would help many people understand how I coped with my life and my lot over the years. Maybe one day my writing will be recognised as something useful to help people understand the lot of a Survivor, because I know now that I am a Survivor, I survived the worst life could throw at me and didn't crumble under the strain I didn't become a jibbering wreck turning to alcohol or drugs as many before me have done, I simply blocked it out of my head and beleived it was my own fault that these things had happened to me. I know differently now of course and know that no matter what I did the Abuse would still have occured because the people who did it were in my life as I grew up!

How I blocked it all these years I really don't know, I guess I just didnt think about it, well didn't allow myself to think about it ever. It was far less painful that way to convince myself it hadn't happened, but deep inside I knew all along that it had, and now I am unable to avoid it anymore and find myself getting painful memories of the sort of thing that would make most people recoil in horror! I remember quite clearly at the age of about 12 or 13 being taken upstairs to my mothers bedroom, she was at work at the time, and being made to undress and get into bed with my stepfather! I remember clearly him doing things with a beer bottle which I won't and can't write about here because I still can't acknowledge that it really happened to me.. I wake up some nights with pain where I know I shouldn't have pain and then remember why the pain is there, I sat at work most of yesterday with a pain in my lower stomach because of such dreams. So this many years on the Abuse still haunts me and I have no idea how to make it go away, I can't seem to block it out anymore and wonder why? my coping techniques that I perfected for so many years are not working anymore and I have yet to find new ones apart from writing in here and talking to my therapist and friends..

So for anyone reading this today who beleives that once reported and conviction is acheived the Victim can move on with life, please beleive me it isn't that simple or easy! we all need help to recover from these horrors and that help should be there for us but its not! why I hear some of you ask? Because the bodies that rule beleive that its more important to put that funding to help prevent the abuser form re offending, the damage done to me is done and can't be undone, so I am on my own!

Two weeks have passed since I last wrote in here, it's been a very busy time for me with work and such hense why no input! apart from that trying to write how I've been feeling just hasn't been easy so I didn't try!Unlike me really as words are usually my way of getting things out! Sometimes though the words just don't seem to be enough these days and I often end up feeling even worse for writing them than I did before, so been avoiding I guess!

I've still been going to my weekly therapy sessions with my new Therapist, even though she doesn't let me avoid things! When we get to the harder bits and I attempt to change the subject she takes me straight back there and gets me talking, I guess this is a good thing really but my god does it hurt sometimes? For years I've avoided a lot of my issues by burying or ignoring them but I know that doesn't do any good in the long run as they just keep rearing their ugly heads again at some point in the future, so Talking about them in therapy, a supposedly safe setting is meant to be good for me? If its so good for me then why does it hurt so fucking much? Why do I end up feeling so drained and fragile?

These past couple of weeks we've been talking about my second step father and what he did on holiday in Cyprus! Something that bothers me a lot as I truely beleived I could trust him, hense why I agreed to go in the first place. I soon learnt that he was like most men, untrustworthy and a user! someone to cause me more pain and give me yet another story to tell. Something I will have to live with for the rest of my life I guess, I can't undo what he did, I can't take it away and pretend it never happened so I have to try and deal with it just like everything else!Back in 1982, just months after my mum had died and we'd been to court with my first step father over the abuse he caused us all, (my siblings and I) the second step father said he needed a holiday, like a fool I agreed to go with him to Cyprus for 10 days, I knew the island as I'd lived there for three years with my husband when he was in the army, the biggest mistake of my life! for years I told no one, after we came back I tried to lose myself in everyday life covering up what had happened.. My husband didn't know I couldn't tell him because I knew he would find a way to somehow blame me, I knew he wouldn't understand at all by this time though he knew about my childhood and what I'd been through, but still knew deep inside that I'd get no support from him at all. So I kept it quiet as I'd done with all the other stuff for many years, I was by now an expert at keeping things quiet, like so many other survivors I found my own coping techniques and lost myself, whenever I started to have memories about it all, I'd distract my head, do something else that required me to think about other things, I wouldn't allow myself to recall details about what he'd done.
Now looking back I often wonder how my husband didn't realise something was amiss? How did he not see that whenever this man came round the house, (which he did every week, because my husband invited him over for dinner) I would withdraw into myself, become very quiet and do everything possible not to be alone with him! For someone who claimed he loved me not to notice the change in me after that time has shown me now that he didn't really care at all! After my divorce I still had to contend with his occassional visits, he would pop over to see the kids? I couldn't tell them either they were to young to understand so often I'd pretend to be out when he came.

Many years later I moved away from the area and finally beleived that I could now not have to see him, but that wasn't to be. My Sisters not knowing what he'd done gave him my house and mobile number and he started pestering me with calls and surprise visits, I was cracking up, shaking everytime the phone rang, wondering if it was him, I confided in a friend on line and told her what had happened, she was great supportive and full of advice as to what I could do, but in the end I had to confront him over the phone to put a stop to it all! I remember that day very well, I'd told my sisters about two weeks previously exactly what had happened with him, they were shocked but didn't seem surprised at all? Which even now gives me reason for concern? had he tried something with either of them? I still don't know! He had started calling me at home late at night when he knew I'd be home, very late in fact when the boys would be sleeping, 11pm or later sometimes, I was a wreck. One particular night it got so bad that I had to disconnect and turn off all my phones so he couldn't get through, but he'd leave messages on my answer phone, telling me he was coming to visit etc. Finally one of my sisters saw the effects that these calls were having on me, I wasn't sleeping properly and looked a complete mess, I lost all confidence in myself at my ability to keep safe from him so she suggested next time he called to let her know, she didn't have to wait very long just the next day he left a message on my phone whilst I was out shopping with the kids. I called her and she came up, we decided to call him and tell him to LEAVE ME ALONE!.. I wrote a poem about it which explains what happened that day!

His Call!!

His Phone call came again tonight,
Out of the blue, gave me such a fright!
I heard his voice, I couldn't speak,
Felt so mild, felt so weak!
Why did he call again today?
I didn't wait to hear him say.
I pushed cancel, hung up on him,
Cause he was the one who'd committed SIN!
But, he called straight back, to talk to me,
What is it that he can't see?
My friend was there, she answered him,
Told him straight, 'I was not in'!
I started shaking, crying to,
What is it, that I need to do?
To get him now! to LEAVE ME ALONE,
Never to call me on the phone,
ALL my phones are now turned off,
Don't want to talk to him, had enough.
Don't want to see, or hear from him,
One day soon, I'm gonna win!.

His call Again!

He called again today, at four twenty one,
My sister made him wish, he had never done.
I was not there at the time of the call,
But he didn't know, I'd told it all.
I heard his message at four forty three,
Called up my sister, she came round to me.
She dialed 1471 on my phone,
Got his number, he wasn't at home!
She called him back at four fifty two,
Told him she knew what I'd told you.
What went on when we were away,
The memories I wished had gone away.
I called him names, they were not kind,
My sister she told me, she didn't mind.
He claimed he loved me, and my mum,
I reminded him, of what he'd done.
He said 'he didn't remember that day',
Or what he'd done when we were away!
As I expected, he denied it all,
But she told him, NO MORE TO CALL!
I called him a 'pervert' said 'Leave me alone'
Never again, do we want him to phone,
I hope he got the message, loud and clear,
Told him, 'STAY AWAY, NEVER COME NEAR'.

I clearly remember those days, and how I felt, lost, alone, trapped, isolated and fearful of going outside in case he turned up. But thankfully from that day to this I never heard from him again. I don't even know if he is alive or dead and to be honest I don't care! heartless though that sounds he put me through so much for all those years that I just don't care, if he is dead I hope he had a painful death, then maybe he could somehow relate to the pain he caused me. If he is still living then I hope he is very unhappy and lonely just like I was for many years because of what he did! I tried to talk about how he had made me feel with my therapist, and wow was it hard! I can truely say that I hate him though somewhere deep inside me is the thought that maybe I would like to confront him face to face and ask why? not that I'd get the answer I need to hear, he would most likely just deny it again, but I can live in hope can't I? that maybe one day I could ask the question of someone who abused me and get a decent truthful answer. I know it will never happen because ABUSERS don't think they do anything wrong, but let me assure you their whole being, their whole lives are wrong! what they do is wrong! there can be NO JUST REASON for any human being to Abuse another and anyone who does is just the lowest of the low! they deserve to rot in hell! and I hope they do!

Well it's been a week again since I was last writing in here!

This week I once again had my therapy session, it angers me so much that I and many victims of abuse have to find our own therapist and pay for it out of our hard earned money! we do nothing wrong yet we have to pay ourselves to get the help dealing with the pain and heartache caused by it all? Why is that?

The Abuser gets everything handed to them on a plate, first of all they get their victims, usually young or vunerable women who can't stop them! Then when we feel strong enough to report them if we ever do, they get sent to prison and generally get courses etc to help them understand what they did WAS wrong, and councelling to try and prevent them re offending? BUT! The victim is left to deal with it all alone unless they can afford to pay privately to get help... THAT IS SO DAMNED WRONG..

I know many victims who can't afford to go private and they struggle to come to terms with what has happened to them, I did myself for so many years.. luckily now I am in a position to be able to get therapy privately and try to help myself.. My doctor sent me initially to a so called therapist who admitted to me that she had no idea how to help abuse victims?

It seems doctors and health officials in this country receive just a half day of 'training' about Abuse and how to deal with the victims.. no where near enough not by a long shot! It makes me so mad... the type of things that get said to victims along the lines of 'get over it', 'it's in the past, forget it and move on', put a lid on it'.. forget about it' etc etc etc.... If you've never been there, it is so hard to understand the complex problems it can cause to us.. many survivors abuse themselves, end up in abusive relationships and end up being abused again and again, because they are drawn to that type of person unknowingly because they don't know anything different. The cycle then continues onto the next generation, like it did in my family!

I was one of those people until a few years ago, when I suddenly realised on talking to a friend that my marriage had in fact been abusive, ok he never hit me, but he did abuse me mentally and emotionally by controlling my every move.. I realised it was time to break the cycle once and for all... and after months of torment I think I have finally done just that.. but not everyone can do it, for some they just aren't strong enough and will live most of their lives being abused as my mother did before me..

Today in my therapy session we talked about me taking my first stepfather to court, the emotions it brought up and the type of questions asked of me by the judge? I remember standing there in the witness stand being asked how my abuse as a child had affected the sexual side of my marriage, I couldn't refuse to answer.. I was under oath so had to tell the truth.. sex in my marriage was often very difficult for me to cope with, and as he didn't really give a damn about me he wasn't prepared to try and understand.. so it often led to arguements and fights about why I'd say no! Why I couldn't cope with certain things or do certain things most people consider normal within a marriage.

Even after I'd been abused on holiday by my Second Step Father my so called husband didn't notice the change in me, I became withdrawn and sullen, moody, irritable and not that nice to be around, but he never asked me why? If he had I don't know if I'd have told him, as he would most likely have blamed me anyways.. we talked about a poem I'd written called 'Horror' it was about my feelings towards my second step father about what he did..

Horror!!

Shock, surprise, horror, hell!!

I thought I knew you really well?

You EVIL BASTARD, made me cry,

Could I please ask you why?

After all you knew, what I'd been through,

I'd never have thought that of you.

I'm sitting here now, writing this,

You certainly knew, how to take the piss!

I still can't beleive what you did,

By this time I wasn't a kid!

A thirty two year old mother of two,

I somehow thought, I could 'trust' you.

I woke to find you by my side,

God! you knew I hadn't lied?

Mum told you the truth, about my past,

If you were unsure, you could have asked.

But on that day, you were just as bad,

As the man I used to call my Dad.

You did to me, just what he'd done,

My life now ruined, can't have no fun!

I still find it very hard to believe that someone who is supposed to care about you can hurt you in such an evil way and not feel any remorse for it afterwards. This man carried on as if nothing had happened, he claims he did nothing wrong at all? So having forced sex with your step daughter is ok eh! NO IT BLOODY WELL ISN'T ok... it's wrong and always will be. Any man who can do that to a woman no matter who she is, related or not is nothing more than a COWARD in my books.. if a man has to force himself on anyone then he is not a man in my eyes, he is the scum of the earth and belongs in prison where all the scum should be..

Can anyone reading this tell me why these people do this evil to another human being? because I'll be damned if I know the answer to that, and somehow doubt I ever will... Today re-living these feelings and remembering those thoughts was very hard but in order to deal with them its something I must do.. but why should I have to pay? Why isn't this free to victims? why are we not compensated to provide the money for this? So many questions and no answers.. I GIVE UP!!!