And The Wall Comes CRASHING Down
Music washes away from the soul the dust of everyday life. ~Berthold Auerbach
7 years of secrets and silence and pent up emotions. 7 years of alienation from family, friends and peers because of the deep secrets she was told to keep. Big changes happening, Jr High School, A changing body, raging hormones and more and more alienated and isolated. A child who once had childhood friends in elementary school who had slowly distanced herself and isolated herself away from them all. Because I was different, I didn’t understand or relate to them in their world. I had knowledge of things in the adult world that they had no clue about. I felt that I didn’t belong in this World, in This Time Frame and I wanted to be ANYWHERE but HERE.
Books, Music and Bowling were my world. I could get lost in the books & music, in my own little world. I’m still frequently most happy in my world of books and music and still frequently have to be brought back from my own little world. My violin and bowling were lifelines to giving me self esteem boosts. I was good at both, Concert Mistress in the Orchestra at School, always involved in being a soloist in concerts, playing for the elderly in the nursing homes, frequently featured at church as a soloist before the sermon. I became close with some of my jr. high school teachers and my bus driver and would frequently avoid going home after school as we had a late bus 3 days a week. I would stay and talk with the teachers or ride around with the bus driver, play my violin for them, help them grade papers and basically frustrate the hell out of them because they knew I was intelligent but sometimes would barely pass my classes. I would ace the tests but failed to turn in most homework assignments.
For Bowling, my team usually came in first place and I generally won the trophies for Best High Game, Best High Series and Highest Average. This has followed me throughout most of my adult years, though because of Carpal Tunnel, my oldest Daughter has now replaced me in most of those categories. 
Looking back upon the years, reading other victims stories, reading about the common signs that many victims experience because of the sexual abuse and secrets they have forced upon them, I had all the signs of a child crying out for help. But nobody saw, nobody realized the pain I was in, not the ones who mattered the most to me anyway – my family. I was labeled a difficult but intelligent & gifted child.
Some of the outward signs I exhibited between the ages of 7 & 14:
- Issues with Weight, I gained a lot of weight
- Self Harm: Pulled my hair out, would frequently have huge bald spots, would chew the inside of my mouth so badly it would take weeks for it to heal.
- Suicide Attempts
- Nightmares and other sleep issues
- Isolation
- Loner
- Depression
- Avoidance of Family Life
- Emotional Outbursts that seemed to have no real known causes
- Started Smoking, Playing with Drugs & Alcohol
- Acting out in school, telling teachers off, skipping classes
Needless to say, there came a time when the secrecy and walls of silence had to come crashing down. The rocky foundation of my life could not sustain all the cracks and fissures and I didn’t have the tools to fix it all by myself. My Vice Principal by this time had recommended I see the school psychologist as he recognized there were deeper issues and that continued for a few months but of course I never told my secrets.
After one of my suicide attempts where I overdosed at school, my vice principal brought me into his office to talk. Trying to get to the bottom of why I wanted to die and why I was constantly getting in trouble, seeking negative attention, why such a charming, intelligent, talented, funny and loving young girl would want to end it all. I couldn’t answer him then but because I trusted him and knew he was truly trying to help me, I sat down and wrote him a letter which I sealed in an envelope and gave to his secretary the next day. I poured out my heart and soul to him, telling him everything that had happened. After he read it, he called me back into his office and convinced me after hours of talking and tears on my part that my parents needed to be told, so they were brought in, he handed them my letter to read. To say they were shocked and stunned would be an understatement – I know I finally felt like a huge weight had been lifted off my shoulders, but soon I would realize it was all just a fantasy and that the burden was still mine and mine alone to carry.
I was taken to see some shrinks and one of the nurses there was a member of our church. How humiliating that was for me, it would have been far easier to deal with a stranger. After extensive sessions these so called experts eventually told my parents that the abuse never happened, it was all in my imagination, I watched too many soap operas and read too many love stories.
It was then recommended that we get involved in family counseling which involved just my parents and I. I quickly found this whole scene distasteful because things I said privately to the counselor, that were supposed to be private were then shared with my parents in their private session with her and eventually I would be brought in. The scenes and comments and conversations that would ensue AFTER the session were many times more harmful to me than the actual abuse was. I eventually got to the point that whenever a session was scheduled I would disappear, nowhere to be found and I’d return home later and deal with the repercussions of my disappearance as it was far easier to deal with that then the condemnation for my private thoughts and feelings that had been shared in what was supposed to be full confidence. Eventually they quit trying to force me to go and they themselves also discontinued going.
Back when my story came out, Incest was a taboo subject, it didn’t happen, and if it did all evidence of it was swept under the rug and NEVER EVER discussed. So once again the secrets and walls of silence and denial by my mother began. It was many years after that my brother and sister learned of the events of the past, you see I was told that Grandma was too old to upset her, just get over it, and my mother pretty much denied that it ever happened after that point. My Dad… He never said a word, but I could see it in his eyes he believed and i know he walked in on his father touching me on more than one occasion but for whatever reason, he was still powerless to help me, to stop it, and that is his burden to bear for the rest of his life.