Victim?

 

I’ve never been comfortable with the term “victim.”

I’ve never seen myself as a victim. I don’t know if I’ve ever seen myself as anything really. When it all came together for me, it was like a flood. It was like bits of old 8mm film that had been disjointed and now it all showed in one piece. That was the first time I was even tempted to use a term at all.

Before that all the pieces lay separately. On their own I knew they weren’t right. My wife would tell me that any one of them would count as horrendous abuse. But I didn’t get it. I didn’t feel it. For me it was just my life. It was the life I had, the only life I’d ever known.

But the day they all came together changed everything for me. In that moment, I remember sitting devastated, sobbing helpless in my back yard as it played over and over again. All the images, the memories, the film that was my childhood.

What I cried for wasn’t me the man, but the boy I had been….and what grieved me? Not so much what was done…but how could a mother and a father be so committed to the destruction of one they were supposed to care for.

Even then, I didn’t see my now-self as a victim, and I didn’t see my then-self as a victim. I just wept for what was done to a little boy who had no way to fight back….it is that feeling of injustice that still drives me.

2 Responses
  1. MaxiLeigh

    I have never been comfortable with the word victim also. I was a child whose mother left her 3 children. My son reminded me saying “mother’ you were abandoned, put into foster care to be protected and cared for. Three lost children who did not have a voice.

    Did they both get confused with their duties? Did they not understand the word ” To Protect” ! What makes it worse, she was my biological aunt…. sister to my father, who she looked after as a child, as their mother had left them when my father was a baby

    Unfortunately I was still being abused until I was 26yrs old having an abortion and further miscarriage to that vile man.

    I have cried many a river believe me for my lost child. My little girl comes out to play now because she’s free; those around me and in my life are full of joy when she comes out to play!

    Today I am reborn, in control am grounded, aware and have many boundaries in place. Gone is the darkness, in place is such brightness, peace tranquillity as well as love.

    I was not a victim, I was a child who was robbed of her childhood by two grown up adults who were very confused about their responsibilities as foster parent’s!

    Today I public speak and Chairman for a Charity that supports female survivors of childhood sexual abuse. I am making change if someone feels uncomfortable about “The Conversation” I cannot help that!

    I have a voice, just listen, do not judge me by your lack of understanding, do not feel uncomfortable about ” the unspoken word”

    Childhood sexual abuse.

    I AM A SURVIVOR! many times over….. those of us who have survived have grown, become empowered beyond their wildest dreams, we are survivors very pleased to meet you.

    MaxiLeigh

Leave a Reply