I know I talk about a lot of deep and heavy things. And I do that because if there is not a space created to speak about these types of issues, how will we ever be able to grow? How will we be able to move on? How will we rid the toxicity within ourselves to heal?
There won’t be. I won’t be. So, I decided to create my own world to speak about these deep dark issues so that I can grow and allow others to feel comfortable in releasing their demons as well.
As those reading this can see that I titled this blog, ‘I felt like a sex slave growing up’. And as heavy as this is to say, that is exactly how I felt. I created this blog to allow myself to release some of my inner demons when it comes to this topic because I have not spoken of it much in the past. I have been very open about my previous sexual assaults, domestic violence, and some of my issues growing up. But, I have never been open about this topic. And to be honest, it is hard, and extremely emotional. But to move forward sometimes you must face the pain that weighs you down.
I feel like I have spent most of my childhood and teenage years fighting the demons of everyone else. And I have no answer as to why my path was led this way, but I have a choice to change my path of the future. And part of that means I face the things that I have experienced in my past and deal with it and move forward. I have mentioned before the first thing I truly have memory of is 4-year-old me being sexually abused by my half-sister. And one of the most distinct memories of that night is that my birth mother walked in on it happening, but my half-sister played it off as me sleeping in her bed because I was having nightmares and wanted a slumber party. And she believed her. And went back to her room and went back to sleep. I can still remember the feeling of that house. The feeling of that room. Laying in the bottom bunk bed, doing, and being shown things that I should not have ever witnessed. I can still see that night so clearly. And it was 21 years ago. And this was just the beginning to a life that I never had the chance to sign up for. I was born into this family. I was born in this “curse”. I was born into toxic, abusive, erratic, and traumatic behaviors and family life. None of this life did I ask for, but how I evolved from it and moved away from it, is what is the most important part of this story.
The reasons as I felt like a sex slave growing up is that I somehow always ended up being tasked with a sexual favor from a sibling. And a lot of it I have pushed from my mind for the fact of not wanting to keep reliving such traumatic events. But it didn’t seem to matter to anyone else (and by anyone else I mean to my siblings and my birth mother) that I was becoming a product of sexual abuse. And I was evolving into that because of the sexual abuse that my half siblings endured. And that is a cycle that does not need to continue. We should not be spreading what we think is right on to someone else because they were shown that. I cannot speak on the events that happened to them to make them put that on me. But I can speak on what I went through. I can speak on what I was told and what I had to deal with day in and day out. And whenever I looked up I was either being abused physically or sexually by someone who was a year older than me and by someone who was 7 years older than me. And this continued until far after my teen years began. I was about 13 or 14 when the abuse stopped from my half-sister. The abuse by my half-brother sexually stopped around the age of 10 or 11. But the physical abuse didn’t end for a long time. On top of the mental and emotional abuse from them both including my birth mother.
Some of the things I had to do was to become orally fixated on my siblings. And if you don’t know what that means I am not sure how I can phrase that without making myself cringe far more than I already am when I think about it. The other assault that stands out to me was that my half-brother wanted to have sexual intercourse with me but was in fear that I was going to get pregnant, so instead he wanted to take a back-door approach so that there could be an avoidance of any accidental pregnancies. So, some of the most excruciating things have happened to me. And I felt like I was a sex slave that no one saw my pain. And if they did they ignored it. And by they, I mean the woman who gave me life. I felt like she saw my pain and didn’t want to do anything about it. I felt as if she knew that I was silently struggling, and she didn’t care to ask. And when I told her when I was 12 years old what happened with my half-sister she stated to me that “oh baby, she only did that because she was a part of the generational rape curse, her father abused her, so she did that to you because she thought that it was okay”. So, justifying this behavior was only like a deeper stab in my back. It was a deeper cry for help. Why wasn’t she getting help if she was sexually abused by her father? How can I be the only one who sees that this is incredibly wrong?
I know the statement, feeling like a sex slave, is heavy but it is exactly how I felt. And I felt I explained a lot of things without giving graphic details. This, however, resulted in a lot of behaviors that I couldn’t see coming my way because I was blinded by the damage that was brought to me. So, more damage began to pile on top of the preexisting damage. And my life began to spiral out of control with the sexual abuses and issues I endured. I always struggled with my sexuality. I always struggled with the ability to determine who only wanted me to for sex and who wanted me for me. And it turns out in my teen years everyone only seemed to want me for sex. Hence, the sex slave. I felt like I had “please take advantage of me, I have already been a slave to sex, take even more from me” written on my forehead. On top of growing up as a young woman with hormones raging through my body, I was extremely misguided. And not having a mom to be a mother to me to raise her daughter in the right way. Being raised by a single father (which I give that man every single part of my heart). It was a difficult time. And honestly it still is. I am not as naïve now however. And that is what guides me through it all.
How do we change this cycle of abuse that keep occurring? How do we change this epidemic? I am not sure. But I do know that it takes one step at a time to not repeat abusive behavior. To guide yourself away from the pain. To be who you truly are outside of the pain and outside of the damage.
I am taking one step at a time reliving my truth. Healing my own wounds. And wanting to create a community. We are a community of survivors and we do not need to feel like we are alone.
I want to do something bigger than me.
So I start with these words to me.
So that I can guide me through this pain.
So that I can keep learning how to Love this Battered Woman. 💜🙏🏽
So that I can be the beacon of light for others to learn how to Love a Battered Woman, a Battered human, too. 🙏🏽💜