For a safe place, go to http://littleselves.blogspot.com/
There was no way I was going to marry again after Rick's brave heart finally stopped. I vowed I wouldn't do that to any other man. Besides, whether he meant to give me that message or not, I got it--he was the only man with the patience to put up with me.
I brought sexual issues into that marriage that were not my fault, that I was not even aware of. I was only aware of symptoms. But my husband had some--shall we say--modesty issues of his own, based on how he saw himself, his weight, etc.
After our wedding we checked into the Disneyland Hotel. Or rather he checked us in. He had me stand across the lobby in my little brown velvet going away suit with the corsage on the lapel, holding our overnight case. When he signed in, the man behind the desk threw his chin in my direction and said, "Who's she?"
At the restaurant, putting off going up to our room, we realized I was pointing to entrees on the menu with my card of contraceptives. He blushed and shoved it out of sight.
I don't mean to put my first husband down in any way. He had his own issues for his own reasons, many of which were anguishing for him. But all my life I'd been through the hells of abuse and its effects plus the strain of abstinence, waiting for marriage to do it right, and I was anticipating for the first time being in a relationship that was legal, moral, sexually free and fulfilling, ready to experience sex as God intended it. I was ready to be naked and not ashamed.
Each of these moments which he found embarrassing, including ones in our room that night, let some of the hope out of my heart. When we came back from our honeymoon to his parents' house and he was worried that they'd overhear us--not overhear us making torrid, passionate love but just talking and moving around--in the family room, the rest of the hope drained from me, the assurance that marriage would make things different, that sex was okay now.
But it all comes together here. Yes, as it turns out, I was in love with my father. And yes, the violations I experienced were sufficient to justify the severe symptoms I exhibited. I'm not any crazier than any other normal person would have been given the abnormal background I had--and there's NOTHING wrong with me!
He was a child molester but he was the perfect father for me. I wrote a novella about him called New Every Morning and the sub-title of the book is, "He hurt her. Now he is at her mercy. A different kind of love story." It is a love story because we were both broken, father and daughter, and God's love was big enough for both of us.
Now I am in love with my heavenly Father, the one who hand-picked my earthly father.
Yes, I had a husband with whom I could not let myself go sexually because he was "too good" and I saw myself as bad. How could I do those bad sexual things with such an upright, moral man? And I have a husband now with whom I can let myself go because, well, he is slightly flawed, too, so it's okay.
As Jerry says, we are each the sum total of all we have done, left undone, had done to us--and we needed all of it to be who we are meant to be. I would not be the person of compassion and fiery indignation for the justice of little ones if I had not been through all I went through. I don't regret a bit of it. I am victim and overcomer, simple lover of cuddling and complex amateur psychologist/philosopher/theologian, seeker of truth and inconsistent hypocrite. I am fearfully and wonderfully made, work-in-progress, wounded healer, God's forgiven child.
So are you.
And it is all, all so worth it, every single minute detail so marvelously designed and orchestrated, the end planned before the beginning for our very best good and His eternal glory, even now before He pulls aside the veil and shows us how that can be.
For a safe place, go to http://littleselves.blogspot.com/
Today I am thankful for violins.
Showing posts with label sexual abuse. Show all posts
Showing posts with label sexual abuse. Show all posts
Saturday, March 5, 2011
Friday, March 4, 2011
"You were there!"
For a safe place, go to http://littleselves.blogspot.com/
One of the ironies of my abuse is that it cost me my best friend. We grew up together (to the extent that I grew up with anyone who wasn't actually on our family travels with us) and my father molested her, as near as I can figure it, within days of his molesting me. We were both 13 and in looking at a photo of herself taken very close to that time she mourned, "I was still at the age when I was eating blueberry popsicles!"
She had apparently always envied me, although I am not sure why. Yes, I was the first of us to move to a foreign country, the first to get a book published, the first to marry and have children, but I didn't know we were in a race and she accomplished all that and more, earning a doctorate. I was delighted for her and have great respect for her mind and accomplishments.
But when my father molested her, she blamed me. I have never understood that. After we became adults, she was describing what he had done to her and I was appalled.
"I didn't know!" I said.
She glared at me and said "Yes, you did! YOU WERE IN THE ROOM!"
I felt all the air knocked out of me. What was she talking about? I couldn't possibly have been present when my father molested my best friend--and not know it!
And then memories started to coalesce, faint stirrings and rustlings, whispers, and I realized I had been in a darkened room one night with my friend when something happened. I knew my father had come in the door after she and I had gone to bed. But he had not turned on the light or spoken aloud or come over to talk to me. There had been a long silence and then--then I heard their whispers, at least his.
I remember lying there puzzled. What were they saying to each other? What did the two of them have in common that I did not share? It--mostly the silence--went on for some time and all I could feel was--left out. He was my father, not hers. I was jealous.
Now, decades later, she was telling me the content of their "tryst." He had explained to her that he was a doctor--which was technically true, just as it was true of her father; mine had a doctorate in physical anthropology. He said he needed to examine her breasts.
I talked to her mother about it just once. Her mom shrugged it off. "Earle just looked at her breasts," she told me. "I don't think it amounted to anything."
But for my friend, it amounted to everything. When the abuse was over, she went from sexual victim to militant feminist in a single savage leap. She asked me to watch a movie (I've forgotten the title) about two sisters reacting in different ways to the same molester. She told me one sister represented the "right" response to her abuse. I didn't realize until I had watched the whole movie (and then with a shock) that the sister she approved was the one who dedicated her life to bitterness.
My friend turned her own bitterness against the male half of the human race. "Can't you just hate my dad?" I asked her. "He's the one who violated you--not every man." But she wouldn't see it.
She hated me too. We made very rocky attempts at friendship for a few years but she seemed to blame me for everything in her life. "We're both on the same side," I tried to tell her. "I was his victim, too. And," I attempted to make her feel the intensity of betrayal I felt, "he was my father. He was the only father I had." She had no capacity for empathy--or sympathy.
I even tried to point out that my father was not the only moral offender here. Her father and mine had cooperated to save the negatives of the photos of naked little girls. That just infuriated her more. How could I accuse her father of such a thing? My mother, whom she idolized, told me my friend's father had propositioned her once. My friend wouldn't hear that, either. She wouldn't consider the fact maybe her father was also a voyeur and a reprobate. No, only mine.
It was my father and I hadn't stopped him. I hadn't protected her. It is the typical syndrome, to blame the mother.
Only I wasn't her mother. I was just a confused little girl soiled by the same slime.
"If I had had any idea he was molesting you," I told her, "my God, I would have stopped him! I would have done whatever it took to protect you somehow."
But it was too little, too late or too--something. She needs her bitterness and nothing I could say will ever convince her to let it go.
For a safe place, go to http://littleselves.blogspot.com/
Today I am thankful for hot chocolate with marshmallows.
One of the ironies of my abuse is that it cost me my best friend. We grew up together (to the extent that I grew up with anyone who wasn't actually on our family travels with us) and my father molested her, as near as I can figure it, within days of his molesting me. We were both 13 and in looking at a photo of herself taken very close to that time she mourned, "I was still at the age when I was eating blueberry popsicles!"
She had apparently always envied me, although I am not sure why. Yes, I was the first of us to move to a foreign country, the first to get a book published, the first to marry and have children, but I didn't know we were in a race and she accomplished all that and more, earning a doctorate. I was delighted for her and have great respect for her mind and accomplishments.
But when my father molested her, she blamed me. I have never understood that. After we became adults, she was describing what he had done to her and I was appalled.
"I didn't know!" I said.
She glared at me and said "Yes, you did! YOU WERE IN THE ROOM!"
I felt all the air knocked out of me. What was she talking about? I couldn't possibly have been present when my father molested my best friend--and not know it!
And then memories started to coalesce, faint stirrings and rustlings, whispers, and I realized I had been in a darkened room one night with my friend when something happened. I knew my father had come in the door after she and I had gone to bed. But he had not turned on the light or spoken aloud or come over to talk to me. There had been a long silence and then--then I heard their whispers, at least his.
I remember lying there puzzled. What were they saying to each other? What did the two of them have in common that I did not share? It--mostly the silence--went on for some time and all I could feel was--left out. He was my father, not hers. I was jealous.
Now, decades later, she was telling me the content of their "tryst." He had explained to her that he was a doctor--which was technically true, just as it was true of her father; mine had a doctorate in physical anthropology. He said he needed to examine her breasts.
I talked to her mother about it just once. Her mom shrugged it off. "Earle just looked at her breasts," she told me. "I don't think it amounted to anything."
But for my friend, it amounted to everything. When the abuse was over, she went from sexual victim to militant feminist in a single savage leap. She asked me to watch a movie (I've forgotten the title) about two sisters reacting in different ways to the same molester. She told me one sister represented the "right" response to her abuse. I didn't realize until I had watched the whole movie (and then with a shock) that the sister she approved was the one who dedicated her life to bitterness.
My friend turned her own bitterness against the male half of the human race. "Can't you just hate my dad?" I asked her. "He's the one who violated you--not every man." But she wouldn't see it.
She hated me too. We made very rocky attempts at friendship for a few years but she seemed to blame me for everything in her life. "We're both on the same side," I tried to tell her. "I was his victim, too. And," I attempted to make her feel the intensity of betrayal I felt, "he was my father. He was the only father I had." She had no capacity for empathy--or sympathy.
I even tried to point out that my father was not the only moral offender here. Her father and mine had cooperated to save the negatives of the photos of naked little girls. That just infuriated her more. How could I accuse her father of such a thing? My mother, whom she idolized, told me my friend's father had propositioned her once. My friend wouldn't hear that, either. She wouldn't consider the fact maybe her father was also a voyeur and a reprobate. No, only mine.
It was my father and I hadn't stopped him. I hadn't protected her. It is the typical syndrome, to blame the mother.
Only I wasn't her mother. I was just a confused little girl soiled by the same slime.
"If I had had any idea he was molesting you," I told her, "my God, I would have stopped him! I would have done whatever it took to protect you somehow."
But it was too little, too late or too--something. She needs her bitterness and nothing I could say will ever convince her to let it go.
For a safe place, go to http://littleselves.blogspot.com/
Today I am thankful for hot chocolate with marshmallows.
Thursday, March 3, 2011
Victims: These Bible verses are not for you!
For a safe place, go to http://littleselves.blogspot.com/
Receiving Jesus as my Savior when I was 19 relieved my guilt over my very real sins. God forgave me! GOD FORGAVE ME! But some of my guilt was false guilt for "sins" that were not sins at all. Certain Bible passages exacerbated that guilt and the passages seemed damaging to me. Verses like:
Do not think more highly of yourself than you ought to think. And In humility value others above yourselves.
I gave myself NO value. Applying these verses to myself made it easy for others to abuse me.
After all, no one ever hated his own body. . .
Oh yes I did. I couldn't stand living in my body, I tried to claw myself out of it.
Love your neighbor as yourself.
I hated myself. What I needed to hear was "Love yourself as you love your neighbor." I needed to learn to be kind and gentle, generous and forgiving to myself.
If anyone would come after me, he must deny himself
I denied my basic rights as a human being. I crushed myself.
Wives, submit to your husbands as to the Lord.
I took that to mean I must be willing to be treated like an animal.
Here's an example of what I was like when I was mis-applying those verses:
Undated, probably from the 1990s. . .
"You say I hurt people + that's true. You made it very clear and it's all true + it is so awful I can't stand myself. I can't bear to think I hurt people like that but it's true + you have it written down so it can never be erased or forgiven. . . So I am bad, sometimes I forget how bad. . . The easiest thing to do, since I keep hurting + hurting people, is for me to go away. but I have tried that + you won't let me. You say that is not the answer, divorce is not the answer, killing myself is not the answer but I don't seem to be able to be different so I have to go away but going away makes you angry and hurts you so I can't go away so I will give you a divorce but you say you don't want a divorce so I have to stay but you can't live with it so I will take myself out of the way permanently but you say I can't. That won't solve anything. So I can't go away and I can't die and I can't hurt you but I do hurt you so all I can do is what I did for my mother because I could not stop hurting her--that is be very still + quiet + not be a bother + just do my work cook and clean and do dishes + lie very quietly + not be needy + never move + not let you see or hear me cry + not let you know what I want or need. . .+ that makes me good because I am not in your way + not having needs + it's almost as good as being dead which is the best which is the ultimate gift I can give you but u will not let me because I would hurt you and that is bad + the closest I can ever be to good is to be still + to be nothing to be non-person but if I can make someone happy that is good too so I try hard + I have made many people happy but I cannot make you happy. . . I embarrass you + I don't blame you + I am sorry I exist if you had never met me it would be better but since you met me it is too late to not exist. That would hurt you. But if I had not existed in the first place it would have been best because I would not have hurt anyone. Jessica"
I want you to know this was me but it is no longer me. I am free, healed, whole, grateful. If you are where I was then, there is hope for you, too. Hang on until the Shepherd reaches you and pulls you out of the pit into His strong, safe arms and carries you home on His shoulders.
In the meantime, these Bible verses may be toxic for you because you may use them to condemn yourself and may apply them to yourself in ways that will make you vulnerable to being re-victimized.
These are passages written to normal people, not abused people. You who have never felt you had rights to start with have not yet reached the point at which you are free to make a choice to give up those rights for Jesus. Let God be in the timing of your applying those verses to yourselves, lest you unintentionally invite further abuse from those who want to exploit you.
For a safe place, go to http://littleselves.blogspot.com/
Today I am thankful for fires in fireplaces.
Receiving Jesus as my Savior when I was 19 relieved my guilt over my very real sins. God forgave me! GOD FORGAVE ME! But some of my guilt was false guilt for "sins" that were not sins at all. Certain Bible passages exacerbated that guilt and the passages seemed damaging to me. Verses like:
Do not think more highly of yourself than you ought to think. And In humility value others above yourselves.
I gave myself NO value. Applying these verses to myself made it easy for others to abuse me.
After all, no one ever hated his own body. . .
Oh yes I did. I couldn't stand living in my body, I tried to claw myself out of it.
Love your neighbor as yourself.
I hated myself. What I needed to hear was "Love yourself as you love your neighbor." I needed to learn to be kind and gentle, generous and forgiving to myself.
If anyone would come after me, he must deny himself
I denied my basic rights as a human being. I crushed myself.
Wives, submit to your husbands as to the Lord.
I took that to mean I must be willing to be treated like an animal.
Here's an example of what I was like when I was mis-applying those verses:
Undated, probably from the 1990s. . .
"You say I hurt people + that's true. You made it very clear and it's all true + it is so awful I can't stand myself. I can't bear to think I hurt people like that but it's true + you have it written down so it can never be erased or forgiven. . . So I am bad, sometimes I forget how bad. . . The easiest thing to do, since I keep hurting + hurting people, is for me to go away. but I have tried that + you won't let me. You say that is not the answer, divorce is not the answer, killing myself is not the answer but I don't seem to be able to be different so I have to go away but going away makes you angry and hurts you so I can't go away so I will give you a divorce but you say you don't want a divorce so I have to stay but you can't live with it so I will take myself out of the way permanently but you say I can't. That won't solve anything. So I can't go away and I can't die and I can't hurt you but I do hurt you so all I can do is what I did for my mother because I could not stop hurting her--that is be very still + quiet + not be a bother + just do my work cook and clean and do dishes + lie very quietly + not be needy + never move + not let you see or hear me cry + not let you know what I want or need. . .+ that makes me good because I am not in your way + not having needs + it's almost as good as being dead which is the best which is the ultimate gift I can give you but u will not let me because I would hurt you and that is bad + the closest I can ever be to good is to be still + to be nothing to be non-person but if I can make someone happy that is good too so I try hard + I have made many people happy but I cannot make you happy. . . I embarrass you + I don't blame you + I am sorry I exist if you had never met me it would be better but since you met me it is too late to not exist. That would hurt you. But if I had not existed in the first place it would have been best because I would not have hurt anyone. Jessica"
I want you to know this was me but it is no longer me. I am free, healed, whole, grateful. If you are where I was then, there is hope for you, too. Hang on until the Shepherd reaches you and pulls you out of the pit into His strong, safe arms and carries you home on His shoulders.
In the meantime, these Bible verses may be toxic for you because you may use them to condemn yourself and may apply them to yourself in ways that will make you vulnerable to being re-victimized.
These are passages written to normal people, not abused people. You who have never felt you had rights to start with have not yet reached the point at which you are free to make a choice to give up those rights for Jesus. Let God be in the timing of your applying those verses to yourselves, lest you unintentionally invite further abuse from those who want to exploit you.
For a safe place, go to http://littleselves.blogspot.com/
Today I am thankful for fires in fireplaces.
Wednesday, March 2, 2011
When the other woman is a child
For a safe place, go to http://littleselves.blogspot.com/
The worst came to light last. Of course I knew about the incident on the boat when I was 13--I had blanked out the substance of it but when I forced my mind to go there and fill in the blank, it did. (To my mother's credit, when I finally told her about it years later, she believed me and confronted him on my behalf.) I knew about the teenage secretaries--after all, they were my friends--and the errant babysitter.
But for most of my adult life, something was not making sense. The symptoms I had, chewing my cheeks raw, cutting my arms, the suicidal behaviors, were not accounted for by the relatively mild abuse I had endured. One humiliating experience, one life-shattering paradigm shift--but only one and that late enough in life so my identity was set and I could be objective about it. And without penetration. I have friends whose lives were a history of multiple rapes over multiple years by multiple perpetrators. How could such a mild history have left me so sick, so crazy?
WHAT WAS WRONG WITH ME?
I knew there must be more. Time after time I would sit down and demand of myself, Okay, what did my father do to me? The memory is within me somewhere. Help me find it. I HAVE A RIGHT TO KNOW!
What I was not prepared for was to be allowed into that memory the one time I finally came in as a friend. Instead of "What terrible crime did he commit against us?" I asked my youngest inner self gently, "What did you two do together?"
And then she trusted me. We played games, she told me in the silence of my mind, sharing something private and precious. He told me this and we would do that and that's what we called it and we kept it our secret from Mommy.
Where was Mommy? I asked. And knew. She was downstairs making breakfast, getting the boys off to school, grateful Daddy was willing to take over for her. Or she was taking the boys to church. A lot of it happened while they were at church. It was all at that one home in Yellow Springs, Ohio, our home for my first seven years.
I had a history all right, I wanted to exclaim. Seven years of seduction--
But when I let her share with me I have to be careful to see it through her eyes. He was her beloved daddy and it was the only love she got from him. It included whispers and touch and snuggling. It is precious to her. I know she wouldn't have wanted him exposed, humiliated, punished. She would have blamed herself if he had been sent to prison. She did want him to stop some of those things because they were yucky. They made her scared or uncomfortable--but she figures they must have been okay, if he wanted them. She wanted to make him happy. So she doesn't think about them. It wasn't his fault, any of it. It wasn't her fault either. There was no fault. She was at a place so early in development it was pre-shame. Everything was good and when I join her in that place, I feel her sense of perfect tranquility and wonder.
I split at that point. Part(s) of me rejected her, blaming her for her participation, disgusted and horrified at her for the real pleasure some of it had given her. They felt dirty and bad because of the acts and ashamed of being involved in them. Then one of those selves split too-- into two selves who could manage to maintain a relationship with Daddy, one by becoming a boy and doing guy things with him, the other by becoming a "nun." In either case, sex could be a non-issue.
But of all my selves, she is the most secure--in fact, "happy baby" is what she calls herself --and least conflicted. He was my daddy, she said simply. We snuggled together. We had fun. We had special times together. There were things he did, things he made her do which she didn't like and didn't understand. But she doesn't talk about those. She doesn't think about them. The others went off with those memories, those feelings. She just keeps the good ones. She likes the color green, because it is the color of new buds and grass and spring. She likes soft baby animals, real ones and plush. As I think about her right now, I think she would still be contentedly sucking her thumb if she could.
No wonder I felt awkward around my mother. Awkward and guilty--never good enough to measure up to her (because I knew I was a whore) but judging her all the same. She didn't listen to Daddy. She argued with him, which never worked. She didn't know how to please him, didn't try. But I could please him. Keeping her at arms' length, never fully trusting her, I wouldn't let her get close, I wouldn't confide in her--except in letters when we could be physically far apart. Lonely and longing for her love as a two-and three-year old, I still resisted her love. I did everything for myself, didn't need her, wouldn't be held, wouldn't be helped--and was angry, very angry at her for--I had no idea what.
For not knowing. For not protecting me.
Finally, maybe just a year ago when that inner child freely handed me the "happy baby" piece of the puzzle I am, I understood the dynamics of my emotions.
I loved my parents. I wanted them to stay together. I was devastated when I was 19 and they divorced. But did I want them to stay together so I could have my father? I was a parasite whose neediness required their being together.
There was another woman in my parents' marriage and that other woman was--me.
Only I wasn't a woman. I was just a child.
For a safe place, go to http://littleselves.blogspot.com/
Tonight I am thankful for moonlight.
The worst came to light last. Of course I knew about the incident on the boat when I was 13--I had blanked out the substance of it but when I forced my mind to go there and fill in the blank, it did. (To my mother's credit, when I finally told her about it years later, she believed me and confronted him on my behalf.) I knew about the teenage secretaries--after all, they were my friends--and the errant babysitter.
But for most of my adult life, something was not making sense. The symptoms I had, chewing my cheeks raw, cutting my arms, the suicidal behaviors, were not accounted for by the relatively mild abuse I had endured. One humiliating experience, one life-shattering paradigm shift--but only one and that late enough in life so my identity was set and I could be objective about it. And without penetration. I have friends whose lives were a history of multiple rapes over multiple years by multiple perpetrators. How could such a mild history have left me so sick, so crazy?
WHAT WAS WRONG WITH ME?
I knew there must be more. Time after time I would sit down and demand of myself, Okay, what did my father do to me? The memory is within me somewhere. Help me find it. I HAVE A RIGHT TO KNOW!
What I was not prepared for was to be allowed into that memory the one time I finally came in as a friend. Instead of "What terrible crime did he commit against us?" I asked my youngest inner self gently, "What did you two do together?"
And then she trusted me. We played games, she told me in the silence of my mind, sharing something private and precious. He told me this and we would do that and that's what we called it and we kept it our secret from Mommy.
Where was Mommy? I asked. And knew. She was downstairs making breakfast, getting the boys off to school, grateful Daddy was willing to take over for her. Or she was taking the boys to church. A lot of it happened while they were at church. It was all at that one home in Yellow Springs, Ohio, our home for my first seven years.
I had a history all right, I wanted to exclaim. Seven years of seduction--
But when I let her share with me I have to be careful to see it through her eyes. He was her beloved daddy and it was the only love she got from him. It included whispers and touch and snuggling. It is precious to her. I know she wouldn't have wanted him exposed, humiliated, punished. She would have blamed herself if he had been sent to prison. She did want him to stop some of those things because they were yucky. They made her scared or uncomfortable--but she figures they must have been okay, if he wanted them. She wanted to make him happy. So she doesn't think about them. It wasn't his fault, any of it. It wasn't her fault either. There was no fault. She was at a place so early in development it was pre-shame. Everything was good and when I join her in that place, I feel her sense of perfect tranquility and wonder.
I split at that point. Part(s) of me rejected her, blaming her for her participation, disgusted and horrified at her for the real pleasure some of it had given her. They felt dirty and bad because of the acts and ashamed of being involved in them. Then one of those selves split too-- into two selves who could manage to maintain a relationship with Daddy, one by becoming a boy and doing guy things with him, the other by becoming a "nun." In either case, sex could be a non-issue.
But of all my selves, she is the most secure--in fact, "happy baby" is what she calls herself --and least conflicted. He was my daddy, she said simply. We snuggled together. We had fun. We had special times together. There were things he did, things he made her do which she didn't like and didn't understand. But she doesn't talk about those. She doesn't think about them. The others went off with those memories, those feelings. She just keeps the good ones. She likes the color green, because it is the color of new buds and grass and spring. She likes soft baby animals, real ones and plush. As I think about her right now, I think she would still be contentedly sucking her thumb if she could.
No wonder I felt awkward around my mother. Awkward and guilty--never good enough to measure up to her (because I knew I was a whore) but judging her all the same. She didn't listen to Daddy. She argued with him, which never worked. She didn't know how to please him, didn't try. But I could please him. Keeping her at arms' length, never fully trusting her, I wouldn't let her get close, I wouldn't confide in her--except in letters when we could be physically far apart. Lonely and longing for her love as a two-and three-year old, I still resisted her love. I did everything for myself, didn't need her, wouldn't be held, wouldn't be helped--and was angry, very angry at her for--I had no idea what.
For not knowing. For not protecting me.
Finally, maybe just a year ago when that inner child freely handed me the "happy baby" piece of the puzzle I am, I understood the dynamics of my emotions.
I loved my parents. I wanted them to stay together. I was devastated when I was 19 and they divorced. But did I want them to stay together so I could have my father? I was a parasite whose neediness required their being together.
There was another woman in my parents' marriage and that other woman was--me.
Only I wasn't a woman. I was just a child.
For a safe place, go to http://littleselves.blogspot.com/
Tonight I am thankful for moonlight.
Tuesday, March 1, 2011
All you need to know about sex is--married people don't do it
For a safe place, go to http://littleselves.blogspot.com/
Growing up, the message I got about sex was, All you need to know about sex is--married people don't do it, at least not with their own spouses.
Allow, as Dickens would put it, that the father molests children (and a couple of young secretaries and at least one babysitter). Allow that his sexual preference is pre-pubescent girls. Allow that he is able to work it out so his job as a scientist involves studying the physical maturation of pre-pubescent girls. Allow that he has persuaded the research institute to let him photograph each subject naked and that, unknown to them, he (and a fellow scientist) have kept a copy of the exposed film in a safety deposit box.
Allow that his third child is a girl.
Allow that this scientist designs a boat to fulfill his dream of sailing around the world. Allow that he designs a separate cabin aft for himself and a "ladies' cabin" for his wife and daughter, as well as cabins for the rest of the crew. Allow that during the next four years, his daughter's prepubescent years, the trip her dad makes possible gives her a storybook childhood* as the "Pixie from Ohio" who got to dance in Bora Bora and watch sea turtle eggs hatch on Ascension and didn't have to go to school. Allow that during those years circumstances only align for him to be completely alone with her for any length of time on one occasion and that on that occasion he molests her.
Now allow that by the absence of privacy on the boat, it is clear that nothing sexual takes place between the father and mother, that everything between them is above board. There is no sex between people married to each other. Married people are perfectly proper and respectable and do not do that sort of thing with their own spouses. (Having screwed-up ideas about sex does all kinds of violence to one's understanding of the Bible text, "The marriage bed is undefiled--") The only sex of which she knows happens between people not married to each other. That is the modeling. That and a book he takes off the shelf and gives her to teach her about sex when she is 11--a novel about Eskimos fornicating in the snow. The female has to take the papoose off her back and lay it in a snowbank to make this possible. Welcome to Aberrant Birds and Bees 101.
Generational sins of sexual immorality, fornication, illegitimacy, adultery, sure, doesn't every family have that? Even on the boat, we have various configurations of that. But--just a reminder--in our family you will never catch the married people having sex with their own spouses. Just to be sure, they're careful never to be totally alone together. You would certainly know.
I still find myself wondering what it would be like to feel safe on my father's lap, to have him read to me, sing to me, pray with me, counsel me, even tickle me, and know he loves me and has my best interest at heart. I wonder what it would be like as a 13-year old sitting on his knee in a car full of people and not feel his hand sliding up inside my shirt to absent-mindedly unhook my bra.
*See His Scribe
For a safe place, go to http://littleselves.blogspot.com/
Today I am thankful for the indigo of irises and gold of daffodils.
Growing up, the message I got about sex was, All you need to know about sex is--married people don't do it, at least not with their own spouses.
Allow, as Dickens would put it, that the father molests children (and a couple of young secretaries and at least one babysitter). Allow that his sexual preference is pre-pubescent girls. Allow that he is able to work it out so his job as a scientist involves studying the physical maturation of pre-pubescent girls. Allow that he has persuaded the research institute to let him photograph each subject naked and that, unknown to them, he (and a fellow scientist) have kept a copy of the exposed film in a safety deposit box.
Allow that his third child is a girl.
Allow that this scientist designs a boat to fulfill his dream of sailing around the world. Allow that he designs a separate cabin aft for himself and a "ladies' cabin" for his wife and daughter, as well as cabins for the rest of the crew. Allow that during the next four years, his daughter's prepubescent years, the trip her dad makes possible gives her a storybook childhood* as the "Pixie from Ohio" who got to dance in Bora Bora and watch sea turtle eggs hatch on Ascension and didn't have to go to school. Allow that during those years circumstances only align for him to be completely alone with her for any length of time on one occasion and that on that occasion he molests her.
Now allow that by the absence of privacy on the boat, it is clear that nothing sexual takes place between the father and mother, that everything between them is above board. There is no sex between people married to each other. Married people are perfectly proper and respectable and do not do that sort of thing with their own spouses. (Having screwed-up ideas about sex does all kinds of violence to one's understanding of the Bible text, "The marriage bed is undefiled--") The only sex of which she knows happens between people not married to each other. That is the modeling. That and a book he takes off the shelf and gives her to teach her about sex when she is 11--a novel about Eskimos fornicating in the snow. The female has to take the papoose off her back and lay it in a snowbank to make this possible. Welcome to Aberrant Birds and Bees 101.
Generational sins of sexual immorality, fornication, illegitimacy, adultery, sure, doesn't every family have that? Even on the boat, we have various configurations of that. But--just a reminder--in our family you will never catch the married people having sex with their own spouses. Just to be sure, they're careful never to be totally alone together. You would certainly know.
I still find myself wondering what it would be like to feel safe on my father's lap, to have him read to me, sing to me, pray with me, counsel me, even tickle me, and know he loves me and has my best interest at heart. I wonder what it would be like as a 13-year old sitting on his knee in a car full of people and not feel his hand sliding up inside my shirt to absent-mindedly unhook my bra.
*See His Scribe
For a safe place, go to http://littleselves.blogspot.com/
Today I am thankful for the indigo of irises and gold of daffodils.
Monday, February 28, 2011
"You're in love with your father"
For a safe place, go to http://littleselves.blogspot.com/
I started seeing a psychologist soon after I married my first husband. I was severely depressed, I tried to jump out of the car on freeways, I was cutting myself. Obviously, I was crazy. At least that's what I thought and that's most certainly what my husband thought. Running through my head again, as it had constantly when I was a child, was the question, "What's wrong with me? What's-wrong-with-me? WHATSWRONGWITHME?"
The first professional I went to told me bluntly at the end of the first session, "You're in love with your father."
I was so stunned by such a bizarre statement coming out of left field like that I never went back.
The second psychologist I tried kept any diagnoses he might have had to himself and let me talk. I saw him off and on for years, as my children were growing up. I told him how awful I was, not at all like my perfect mother, and how good my husband was and how he deserved so much better.
Of what was happening at home in our relationship which made therapy necessary I remember almost nothing. I have one glimpse of the two of us sitting on the edge of our unmade bed. My husband had just asked me a question and I remember knowing I was going to answer it. I was just about to. I really was. In just a minute. He repeated it, whatever it was. I heard him, it registered, I was going to say something, I meant to, I had nothing against answering him. But I never actually did. I see myself sitting there, catatonic for a long, long time, as he got increasingly frustrated and despairing. Always on the verge of giving him a perfectly reasonable response, feeling no reason not to. I could sit like that for--well, time ceased to have meaning. Shallow breaths, totally relaxed muscles, making no movement whatsoever.
Therapy was like major surgery, with one or two minor distinctions. First the surgeon used no anesthesia. And second, every time he had me fully open and dissected on the table, he'd look at his watch and say, "Our time's up. I'll see you in a week." I had to somehow gather all those bloody intestines and organs and things, holding the traumatized raw edges and my hospital gown together so I could climb off the operating table and pretend to function like a normal person for another 167 hours.
I remember bits of therapy, too. I stood in the doorway of his office. I told him "she" didn't want to come in, "she" didn't want to sit down. She didn't want to play. And I remember (maybe it was the same day) I talked to him as if he were my father, as if he was the one who had molested me--"You did this," I said. "You did that." When he asked a question about "penetration," I freaked out and shut down. I don't have any idea why. Penetration was not my father's MO. Or if it was, I have not yet found that piece of the puzzle. (There are some pieces, as you can imagine, for which I am not looking very hard.)
I don't expect to get more graphic than this.
For a safe place, go to http://littleselves.blogspot.com/
Today I am thankful for tiered and misty mountains.
I started seeing a psychologist soon after I married my first husband. I was severely depressed, I tried to jump out of the car on freeways, I was cutting myself. Obviously, I was crazy. At least that's what I thought and that's most certainly what my husband thought. Running through my head again, as it had constantly when I was a child, was the question, "What's wrong with me? What's-wrong-with-me? WHATSWRONGWITHME?"
The first professional I went to told me bluntly at the end of the first session, "You're in love with your father."
I was so stunned by such a bizarre statement coming out of left field like that I never went back.
The second psychologist I tried kept any diagnoses he might have had to himself and let me talk. I saw him off and on for years, as my children were growing up. I told him how awful I was, not at all like my perfect mother, and how good my husband was and how he deserved so much better.
Of what was happening at home in our relationship which made therapy necessary I remember almost nothing. I have one glimpse of the two of us sitting on the edge of our unmade bed. My husband had just asked me a question and I remember knowing I was going to answer it. I was just about to. I really was. In just a minute. He repeated it, whatever it was. I heard him, it registered, I was going to say something, I meant to, I had nothing against answering him. But I never actually did. I see myself sitting there, catatonic for a long, long time, as he got increasingly frustrated and despairing. Always on the verge of giving him a perfectly reasonable response, feeling no reason not to. I could sit like that for--well, time ceased to have meaning. Shallow breaths, totally relaxed muscles, making no movement whatsoever.
Therapy was like major surgery, with one or two minor distinctions. First the surgeon used no anesthesia. And second, every time he had me fully open and dissected on the table, he'd look at his watch and say, "Our time's up. I'll see you in a week." I had to somehow gather all those bloody intestines and organs and things, holding the traumatized raw edges and my hospital gown together so I could climb off the operating table and pretend to function like a normal person for another 167 hours.
I remember bits of therapy, too. I stood in the doorway of his office. I told him "she" didn't want to come in, "she" didn't want to sit down. She didn't want to play. And I remember (maybe it was the same day) I talked to him as if he were my father, as if he was the one who had molested me--"You did this," I said. "You did that." When he asked a question about "penetration," I freaked out and shut down. I don't have any idea why. Penetration was not my father's MO. Or if it was, I have not yet found that piece of the puzzle. (There are some pieces, as you can imagine, for which I am not looking very hard.)
I don't expect to get more graphic than this.
For a safe place, go to http://littleselves.blogspot.com/
Today I am thankful for tiered and misty mountains.
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