I hate Christmas

From November 1st to December 26ish my life is a constant state of anxiety, when I'm not home. I get super excited all year for Halloween but dread for the night to be over because I know when i wake up Christmas trees and lights and decorations will have started to appear. And that for me is not a happy thing. Its not a joyous time of the year. Instead I am reminded of Christmas eve 18 years ago. I know a lot of you reading this have heard this before but I personally find it comforting to talk about it and I hope someone who needs to read it and can relate will find it and hopefully find comfort. I was 12 at the time and living in Florida with my spermdonor (father) My mom and (step)dad loved in utah with 3 of my siblings. I flew to utah and we drove to Nevada to spend Christmas with my grandparents. On Christmas eve my grandparents went to their room to sleep, my parents and 2 younger siblings went to a spare room to sleep and then my older brother and I slept on couches in the living room. Right by the Christmas tree that was lit up. Sometime in the middle of the night my brother woke me up and told me to quietly follow him to the bathroom. I did. He locked the door and proceeded to rape me. He told me if I ever told anyone he would tell them I'm lying and he'd kill me. Then it stayed a secret trapped deep inside my brain until a couple years ago. Where it came to me and haunted me ever since. To this day anything playboy, Christmas tree, Christmas lights, and certain sexual things trigger me like no tomorrow. I've been working on them and trying to lessen the struggle but anyone who has PTSD its not a snap of the fingers kind of deal. And I have soooooo much trauma from childhood that I need to work through that I get overwhelmed A LOT and if it gets too bad I shut down. I recently have been told I have dissociation and that has felt the most right when it has come to "diagnosis" from over the years. It explains a lot. So just know that I dont "hate" Christmas I just HATE the memories I have with it. The other 3 times he raped me weren't specific occasions so I really dont get triggered by certain things.

Brainwashed

I dont wanna give too many details because I have been in process of writing a book and hopefully one day can publish it. But I am currently feeling sad, disappointed, hurt, betrayed, heartbroken and in awe. In October it will be 16 years since I made the decision to move to utah and get away from my sperm donor (SD) aka my real dad. Or did I make the decision? It was mostly me but he had things to do with it. All my childhood life I was physically, emotionally and mentally abused by both SD and his wifey poo. It was in October after a major hurricane that I finally would be out of his physical control. I finally had physical bruses that I couldn't hide and a guidance counselor confronted me. And then the cops came to our home to talk to us. He said I could do counseling with SD or move with family. I picked family and was sent to utah to live with my mom and (step) dad. I didn't want to because Florida was home but it was for the best. It has been 12 years since I last saw my Florida siblings. And 10 years since I had a cop call SD and tell him to no longer contact me. I was done with the abuse and negative things he said to me. And that's the last time I spoke to him. Which means my siblings too. It wasn't an easy thing for me to decide. But I couldn't take it anymore. I have thought about Hope and Ryan every single day since then and have only ever wanted a relationship with them. Hope turned 19 yesterday. And I wish I could have called her and told her how much I love and miss her. And Ryan. I talked to him on Instagram last night but when he asked who I was and I told him I was his oldest sister he deleted me and told me he didn't have an oldest sister. That crushed me and ripped my heart out. They dont even know who I am?! So basically my SD has erased me from existence and has brainwashed them (he did it to me when i was little) to think i dont exist? All because I ended the abuse our father gave me. After I turned him in and got away. If I had stayed would I have even made it to 30? Or even 20? How long and how far would the abuse have gone on? And the abuse obviously still continues with SD putting a wall between me and my siblings. Acting like I never was there. I so badly just want to know them. Know what kind of kids they grew up to be. Know what they do in life. But I cant. I have to live in pain knowing they exist. Knowing he FINALLY got the kids he wanted. He hates my mom so much that he's willing to lose a child because I came from her. I so badly just wanna rip down his door and tell hope and Ryan who I am and what he's done. But I know that won't help anything and I know it wouldn't help me feel any better. Its disgusting how you can beat the shit out of your own blood and then erase them from your life once they've stood up to you. But I know in the end I'm a far better person than he ever will be because I stopped and ended the cycle of abuse dead in its tracks. I refuse to hurt my children. I've been told by a few therapists over the years that "you should be an alcoholic" "you should be a drug addict" "you should be an abuser", because of things I've endured from childhood. But I dont have it in me too be any of those. Instead I stick it out. Yes it would be so much easier (for me) to abuse alcohol and drugs and sex and people and get rid of the voices that try to cut me down daily. But ain't no body got time for that.

Next chapter

A chapter in my life is coming to a close and a new one starts. I'm very sad and have mixed feelings about it. Here goes nothing.
John and I started dating in Sept 2007 and married April 2008. We got pregnant on our honeymoon with Tristan. Then had blakely may of 2011. These two are our world and we'll always agree on that. We have also agreed that getting a divorce is best for us.
For years..... ..i'm takling clear back to living in Florida. I have always found women to be attractive and what I wanted up date and be with. But because of how and where I was raised it was a big no no to like a woman. So I brushed it off. Until last June. There's a few things they help me decide that being with a woman is what I want. I never in a million years would choose these feelings. To break apart my family. But ive pushed them aside far too long and gave decided jo more. John is still a best friend and will always be in my life. Especially because of kids. But we've both agreed that its time to go into a different chapter of life. The kids always have been and always will be #1 and taken care of first. We aren't doing a messy divorce because of them. Everything will be civil and as least stressful as possible for them.
We told them a couple days ago. We wanted to wait till school was out so it wouldn't affect them there. We've been hiding this from them and most of you for a couple months because of that. But this summer is going to be a rough one. Tristan started bawling the second divorce came from John's mouth. And blakely laughed. I actually didn't expect anything different. That's how both of them cope.
If there is any questions please feel free to ask. We love all our family and friends who have stuck by us during this time in our lives.

Damn palmetto bugs

Most of you don't know what a palmetto bug is. It's an American cockroach. So there. That clears that up.

PTSD is a thing. And it's a real thing. And it doesn't just happen to soldiers who go to war. It can happen to rally anyone. Child abuse, rape, injury of some sort, a disastrous event or really anything that has harmed them. I have it for a few things but today's post will be because of child abuse. I started a new job today and worked my ass off. Then came home and took a nap. Only to awake sobbing uncontrollably. Add allergysto that and you get a mess of a person. Last night I had a dream that a roach was in our kitchen. Now I'm not talking Utah roaches that are little. I'm talking like a 3 to 4 inches big. Nasty little suckers. Anyways this roach got away before john (husband) could kill it. And then I woke up. So fast forward to my nap. In that dream I was sitting on the couch minding my own damn business and all of a sudden this roach appears. It's crawling up the wall. I start freaking out. John winds up to kill it and the mother trucker takes flight. I start panicking. I'm gonna die. For whatever reason john sits down by me and chills, while this thing is flying around. All of a sudden, as if it knows I hate it,  it comes flying right at me. Pause. This is not at all how tyre act in real life but dreams man. They screw with you. Unpause. It hovers about 2 ft from me and john smacks it sending it flying into the fish tank. Meanwhile I'm hyperventilating and bawling. We all get up to go see and so does twix our cat.  And what does she do?  Jumps right on in the tank. John gets it out and kills it. I go to my room and lay down. And in my dream I fell asleep. In real life john recently left to go help a friend. And in the dream I wake up and hes back. So he comforts me as I'm bawling. So then I wake up for reals to a soaked pillow and tears streaming down my face. You're probably thinking "she has PTSD to a bug?!" No. Not exactly. The PTSD goes to childhood abuse and how my spermdoner would taunt me with these bugs and later abuse me. So seeing that specific bugv that's not native to utah and I'm an adult now freaks me out. And brings up memories o f tat asshole and the things he did to me. I'm terrified of roaches. So you won't see me playing with any.

Where have you gone my dear?

Without going into too much detail and without giving away too much I'm going to tell you all where I have been from Monday to today Thursday. Without cell service, including internet. It was awesome for 98% of the time to disconnect from the world except a few calls home and to my mommy. So here it goes. There's an amazing company called Younique. They sell makeup. Well the have another part to them called the Younique Foundation (not the makeup foundation) and it's for woman who have been sexually abused when they were children. They have a house and cabin in Utah that they rent out 3 weeks a month for women to come and stay. We have all our meals cooked fresh right on sight. And boy can I tell you NOTHING is going to compare to the stuff we ate. We literally ate like royalty. And then we had groups and group activities. And classes we could take. Muay Thai was my favorite and freaking amazing!!!!!! I was having a pretty shitty day and I'll explain why in a minute and it helped get me to have a better attitude. The day before we had a photo shoot. I won't go into detail. But I did not have a good experience with it. I felt completely ugly and just not in a good place. I also struggled HARD with the fact that I wasn't the photographer and I also couldn't see my photos or have control over them. So it was really eating at me. Tuesday night I had to double up on xanax. And Wednesday I was just so drained and exhausted from putting so much negative energy into it. Tuesday night I asked the case manager, "cutie pie" as I called her, to sit and talk to me in private about the whole situation and that helped a lot. She is the sweetest thing ever and I love her freaking face. But we came to the conclusion that I'm a badass!!!!!!! And when we made out art journals that's exactly what I made.

I love it. I don't know where it came from but it appeared on the paper. Group therapy was really hard for me. I can't handle sitting and having everyone's emotions being poured out and I take on their emotions. I'm way too empathetic. And I need to learn to not allow them to consume my life. I did take a lot away from the retreat. I definately missed my babies. And John. And I needed/missed Loki A TON. He calms and grounds me. Im so glad to be home with my family. Im struggling a bit and a little low. I miss my girls. Im glad some live in Utah but others don't. Im going to miss the staff. They were incredible. But we can't contact them. Which sucks. Damn HIPPA and confidentiality. If you have any questions feel free to ask away.

Justice

I today saw a post about a dear friend who went on the news to talk about her rape and how it went to trial. But even though they had beyond enough reason to prove this asshat guilty they proved him not guilty. And since it happened till now it has always angered me. Now if I were to try and go to trial sure I don't have enough evidence. I do have one pretty big thing but I can't talk about it. I know it wouldn't hold in a trial especially since it's been 15 years and ones like hers aren't even making it. I'd LOVE justice to be served but I know that's something I'll never get.

And I want to put this out there. I did not say who my perp was in my first letter to get people to hate him, turn against him, etc. I did not do it to hurt him. I simply did it because A. that's my choice and B. I have every right in my journey and story to say as much or as little info as I want. I did not like it saying family member because I didn't want a certain person to be questioned. This is MY journey. This is MY story. From here on out I tell it how I want to and NO ONE will decide otherwise. If you do not like it feel free to leave and don't come back. I don't need negative people in my life. Every day is a daily battle to live with this horrible thing that has happened to me. Therapy is hard because I go back even a little and I trigger and spiral. I've bottled it for so long and pretended it did't happen that now it eats at me.

Dear survivor,

Dear survivor,
   That's what you are. Not a victim. A victim is usually believed to be dead. But you are here. And you are alive. And you somehow were able to make it out. Even though some days you may feel like you haven't made it out. I myself am a survivor. I've never once called myself a victim and I correct people when they call me that. I just don't like it. I feels weird. I am quoting this on Christmas eve 2015. Fifteen years exactly to day when I was raped. Its one of for times that I was raped by my brother when I was 12. The only "date" and one I  know when it happened was today. I won't go into detail because the point of this is to do the opposite of triggering people. I want to be able to help and let you know that it might be hard but you can live a normal life. I still face struggles and have flashbacks and days where I don't want to move. I get suicidal. I cry. Ive been hospitalized. But I also don't let my perp see those things so that he doesn't think he won. For 7 years I didn't speak a word to him. Until I had my first born. Then I slowly let him back into my life. It didn't take until earlier this year for me to finally tell my parents about all of the times and seek counseling and go to a group for people who have been raped. I also emailed my him calling him out and basically demanding an apology. Which he gave me in a phone call within 10 mins of the email being sent. It was good to hear an apology and some what of a reason as to why he did it. There's still no excuse for it but I'm at least able to start the process of forgiving. I know most survivors don't get that from the scum of the earth that hurt them and I personally know that doesn't help in the healing part. But you don't need it in order to move on. You can do this.  You are strong. This was NOT your fault. Your clothes didn't make him rape you. The way you were dancing or acting or the amount you drank dodnt make him rape you. If you said no and they did it anyways then it is not your fault. Don't keep silent. It may be scary to tell people. They may not believe you. They may turn against you. But they might also be there 100% and help you.  Those who don't believe rape survivors are just as bad as rapists. Your voice matters. Speak up. Get help. Write it out. Forgive when and if you can. Dont let  the scum control your life. Don't let them win. You've got this. You're not alone. You're NEVER alone. There's many more of us out here for you willing to help. All you have to do is ask.

Love,
   A survivor