A Survivor of Abuse: Triggers

It's easier to look back now and and see the "signs" that abuse must have been a part of my past. Until those memories began to return I never would have guessed so many odd behaviors I couldn't explain were trying to tell me something.

I have two instances in my life that, knowing what I know now, should have been huge indicators. At the times I simply explained it away as being an empath - having an ability to feel what others feel.

The first time was in high school. I was taking a family education class (you know, the one where you get the fake baby, only we had plants...much quieter) and we had come to the section on child abuse. I sat through 45 minutes of pictures on how children had been inflicted with injuries by people who were supposed to love and take care of them. I saw pictures of water burns, cigarette burns, broken limbs, and other things I've blocked out. This was just day one.

By the time class was done I was so upset I spent the rest of the day in my room, hiding. I wouldn't even come out for dinner. My family knew what had upset me, but none of us knew why I was so upset. It must be my tender heart, we all said.

The next day I couldn't make myself go to the class. I was a straight A student who never missed school unless I was really sick. That was the first time in high school I purposely didn't go. I made my way across the street to our church's seminary building where instead of hearing about the evils forced on little children I was able to hear about the Savior and His love for us.

Skip forward many years. I now had three children. My boys were 2 and 4. One evening I received an email from someone close to me. It was one of those pass along emails we would get and then forward to those on our email lists (before social media). It was the story of a little 3 year old boy who was lured away from his mom by two others boys at a local store, and basically tortured then killed.

By the time I was done reading the horrific things that were done to this little one I was sobbing. I prayed and prayed the email wasn't true, but an Internet search proved it did happen several years before. In my mind the little boy would take on the face of my two boys and I could not make it go away.

The entire next day I tried my best to be normal, but then I would begin the uncontrollable sobbing again. My sweet husband called in the late morning and I tried to explain what had upset me but like the time in high school he couldn't understand why I was so upset. As I was supposed to be a part of an activity that night with some of our local teenagers, he willingly gave me a priesthood blessing. It immediately helped calm my mind, and I realize now the veil was placed back over my memories so I would not remember. It wasn't time yet.

While typing all of this out I have had one more memory come. I remember as a teenager reading a book called, "Secrets" written by Blaine M. Yorgason and Sunny Oaks. It was a novel involving all types of abuse coming out into the open. I hated that book, but I still have it. It felt wrong to get rid of it. I don't recall much of what was in it; another form of repression on my part. Maybe one day I'll feel strong enough to read it again.

After that email both my husband and I knew I couldn't handle anything that had to do with the abuse of children. I had to stop watching the news. Many of our favorite television shows were switched off if abuse was a topic. I knew this was a trigger for me, I just didn't fully understand why.

Life is Like... Cheering for Everyone's Team

My younger son, B, loves sports. Being born into a family who isn't overly involved in sports has come as a grave disappointment to him, but we're all learning to cope. I simply prefer to cope with a hand full of chocolate.

In seventh grade B decided to try wrestling. I have no idea what that must have been like as an actual participant, but as a parent it was excruciating. I have never wanted to jump up from a bleacher, run down to the floor, and pull the hair of some unsuspecting fellow athlete in my entire life! All so he would just leave my son alone!

Fortunately I was able to temper those natural mama-bear instincts. Even more fortunately B decided against continuing on for another year. Instead we tried basketball.

From the parental point of view, basketball was a refreshing change. I didn't have to watch as my son was contorted into unnatural positions and was able to keep my inner beast under control. The only problem with basketball is B hadn't been playing it since he was in the womb. While other young men whose fathers had coached them since the dawn of time dribbled the ball up and down the court with the ease of the NBA, my son was learning how to play with others. It's easy to keep the ball from being stolen when no one else is there to steal it.

Basketball lasted a little more than a year before he decided it was fun when with friends, but it definitely wasn't something he wanted to continue. His latest venture is track. There are two different types of runners in track: sprinters and long distance. The first year he joined B decided to be a sprinter.

Being a sprinter entails running your absolute hardest in the shortest time possible. For me to understand the desire to make this happen I imagine a group of people being chased by a mountain lion, but if I make it to the goal first I won't get eaten. Just don't ask me why the mountain lion no longer hungers for me once I've crossed the finish line.

Sprinting wasn't B's absolute favorite, especially on the shorter races. The longer races seemed to be a better fit (like once or twice around the track). He did well, but suffered from shin splints.

During the summer one friend talked him into trying cross country running. He enjoyed it enough to decide on abandoning the sprinters and joining the long distance runners in track this year (and yes, there IS a difference between cross country and track). This is where we get in to the best part of our post.

There is a mentally handicapped young man on the team this year. He wanted to join the same team as his big brother, a senior this year. The young man obviously can't run the long distances, but that hasn't stopped him from running. His event is the 100 meter dash.

The team has had about 5 track meets this year, and in every single one I have seen something that makes my heart absolutely sing. Our sweetheart of a young man stands ready at the starting line, grinning from ear to ear in anticipation of running another successful race. The official raises his hand while the other runners get into position, and then BANG! the gun goes off.

Lanes two through eight are quickly emptied as the other runners have crossed the finish line in mere seconds, while our young man pumps his legs as fast as they will allow. Along the way are each of his other teammates who are clapping and cheering him on every step of the way. Interspersed we see members of the other teams who begin to do the same. They pump their fists in the air, cheer at the top of their lungs, clap their hands to give encouragement. And the farther down the lane he goes, the louder they get, until a massive yell of triumph comes from the lungs of every person there. Parents and students alike from three different schools all come together to cheer for and encourage one young man.

It's pretty awesome.

Sometimes life is like finding a moment to cheer for every one's team. We tend to get separated into various groups whether at school, at work, at home, at church, whatever. Groups can easily get competitive, and if we're not careful, competitive can turn ugly. But every once in a while there's someone who is able to erase boundaries, make us look a little deeper within, and remember we're all on the same course in life, whether we realize it or not in the daily grind of living.

A Survivor of Abuse: Remembering

Years ago there was a commercial for a fast food restaurant that supposedly had such a good deal a person was willing to break open an adorable piggy bank just to get that food. There was a moment when the little piggy was hiding in a closet and the shadow of it's owner would come through the wooden slats, a hammer in hand, ready to destroy the precious little being in order to obtain some sort of wealth inside.

I hated that commercial.

Why did I hate that commercial?

As I look back over my life there have been obvious clues that there was something deep within the recesses of my mind I was so afraid of letting out. Of course it's so much easier to look back and see the pattern unfolding, than to try and make sense of it as it's happening.

About five years ago I was coming to a crossroads. Things were simply not right with me. Though my depression was a bit more under control, I felt more attacked mentally, emotionally and spiritually than ever before. I knew I need help, but not the usual doctor/counselor/therapist/medication sort of help. Everything in my mind kept screaming at me that I was nothing. Yet this didn't make sense because all I had been taught in church said I was of so much value.

A few months previous my parents had been introduced to energy work. This wasn't my own first experience with it as I had been using it to get rid of many of my allergies through NAET. What my mom and dad had found, however, was a whole different line of energy work. My mom had offered more than once to introduce me to Sue, and had offered to pay for my first visit as well. One afternoon I was so desperate for the inner voices to go away I finally called my mom and asked her to make me an appointment.

It was awesome. It was difficult. I felt like a little child in her hands, something delicate and afraid and hopeful and trusting. Near the end of our second session she was deeply concerned that I had so many doubts of being worthy of happiness. She could sense that deep down I absolutely did not believe I deserved a happy life. In another session she stopped me once and said, "What happened when you were three?" I thought this particularly odd because only two years before my NAET doctor had asked me the same thing when realizing there was something that happened to me at the age of three that was keeping me from healing. 

"We moved to a new house," I told her. 

"Did you ever suffer any abuse?" she asked.

I answered with full confidence, "No." She sat there and stared at me, a subtle notion of I'm so sorry for what you're about to go through on her face.

Two different people asking me the same thing. What happened when I was three? I had no memory of anything bad happening. We had moved to a new house close to where I live now. We were there until I was about eight and we moved again. My best friend lived across the street, and my older brother's best friend lived two houses down (I always thought of him as my boyfriend).

One night as I had been pondering on so much I was in bed and a thought came out of absolutely nowhere. "I wonder if the reason I can't lay on my back is because he was so heavy." I've never been able to lay down on my back. I would get dizzy and disoriented and unable to breathe. I always thought it had to do with a nerve in my back that would somehow pinch. Not anymore.

I began to sob, gut wrenching, soul crushing sobs. I was afraid of waking up my husband so I went into our living room. I sat on the floor in front of our couch and pressed my face into the cushion to muffle the crying. 

I had to be making this up.

No way could this be real.

How could I have forgotten?????

After an hour I went to Facebook and not so subtly asked if it was possible to have forgotten something so horrible for so many years. The answers were a resounding YES! Many brave women came forward and told me they too had repressed those memories. I was grateful for their courage, but I hated the truth forced on me.

Still I didn't believe. The next morning was Sunday. The moment I saw my bishop and my husband I asked for a priesthood blessing. We went into the bishop's office where he asked what was going on. I told them, so afraid to look my spouse in the eyes. What if he didn't believe me? 

They placed their hands on my head and gave me a blessing from my Heavenly Father. I immediately felt peace, and was told in no uncertain terms that it was real, and it was time to start healing.

I have no doubt there is a time for everything, and in that moment I knew my body and my mind were ready to begin dealing with the horrors forced on me when I was too weak to fight back. That was when I realized why I hated that fast food commercial so much. For too long I was the little piggy bank, hiding in the closet, terrified of the shadow outside the door just waiting to take my wealth.