#23 and 24

It was the best of times, it was the worst of times - to coin a phrase. What happens to victims of sexual abuse? Are we survivors, or are we simply surviving? I wish I had more answers.

The swiftness with which life flows amazes me, and others I suppose. It doesn't feel like three years has past since I first undertook the monumental task of setting my life to pen and paper. Nothing remains lurking in my shadows that has not seen the full light of this day. I wish I had better news.

I have come full circle. I am not at the beginning, but I am also not at the end of my quest for peace - my illusive peace. I stand by my first observation. The truth is only what it is, the truth. Nothing more. You see, I was sexually abused as a child. I know that to be true. So what? I get no comfort from that fact, so where's the freedom promised by truth? Even the truth provides no shelter for some. The truth of the matter is were it not for love and being loved, all the truth in the world cannot contain what it is that sets one's soul free to fly.

Truth is, I will always be earmarked by my past, as we all are, and the sexual abuse plays a part as well. I may always fall subject to the aftereffects of a crime so horrible as to defy the brains of mainstream America.

Hey, you out there - haven't you heard the sound of this child's heart breaking, through the voice of a fortyish victim screaming out a tale deemed too uncomfortably and intimately perverse to be told? Where is my joy? Where is my peace? Why is my heart still breaking?

Why? Because the story is unending for so many children caught up in abuse at the hands of loved ones. Many will carry their childhood scars throughout adulthood as well.

Truth is we are crippling our society by refusing to deal with all the unpleasantries of how many children end up adults with scars without any support from outside at all.

Should a child tell? We will answer yes in a heart beat. Yet how many small voices have been heard to no avail? For the umpteenth time, go figure. That tremendous sucking sound is the sound of all the ignored being sucked into their own private 'blackholes' the rest are calling life. Shouldn't they be missed in society? What aren't they bringing to our table because they are not able to attend the party? And what if all the triggers in our society resulting from childhood sexual abuse were missing?

The world would be a better place. Simple as that...

Is it ever simple? Every day that passes at its own whim simply prolongs the matter like a crying babe left unattended. Another day of sameness across the globe, as we ignore the point of the matter.

Time flows unimpeded, a fact. And unimpeded, it charts its own course. Left to its own design, is there justice in this universe? Truly, and as perverse as the injustices - to the naked eye.

Or soul.

Time, being what it is, passes. And so do the days of our lives, one after another. Day after day. The first the same as the last, unless we do something to mix up the natural order of things. As surely as we have a first when we are borned, we will have a last in death. The last, like the first, comes in all fashions.

As time would have it (I would like to add a disclaimer here, to state I would have chosen it differently if things were of my own doings.), both Momma and Daddy died within a year of each other. Both suffered long and hard from their various cancers, and died bitterly. Their illnesses were kept from me. I never knew until it was too late. I had said to myself that I wouldn't tell my story as long as they were living. My wishes were never to destroy my family, but to bring light on the price of incest, which actually cannot be paid, in terms of dollars or otherwise. At least not when it's being ignored.

I am left to pick my head and heart apart wondering if things could have been different for any of us. Do they know through it all how much they hurt that little blonde-haired girl that popped from their loins that cold December day, and how truly she loved them in spite of it all? Do they know their little blonde-haired girl loves them now, as pen hits paper?

Don't ALL parents know their children are loving them, no matter what? Could it be some quirk of nature that allows only the young to love unconditionally?

I am thinking of a sea of children's broken hearts, beating in unison, breaking in unison. Can we bear it?

I do not know if we are ready for the weeping...