*******trigger warning – sexual abuse*******
Anyone who follows my blog knows that I went through a very difficult time last Spring (of 2009). The reason for this was my struggle in recovering the memory of the first vaginal rape. Being vaginally raped was my deepest trauma and the truth I ran from the most. I thought recovering the memory was going to kill me. I got very sick for several weeks with bronchitis and the early stages of pneumonia.
Up until this point, all of my abuses took place outside of my body. I did not appreciate that I had an orifice that could be penetrated or that a grown man could insert a part of his body into mine so that I was harmed inside of myself. I was only 6 or 7 – I did not have the first idea about intercourse. I didn’t really appreciate what was being done to my sister when she was raped in my presence because I was not directly next to her, and it was dark other than the firelight.
Here is what I remember … Instead of stripping naked and going to my table, I was invited into the cabin with my sister. We were both wearing sheer nightgowns that anyone could see through. I felt uncomfortable because men were drinking alcohol and watching me. I had no idea what it meant. I believe that my virginity was auctioned off that night. I was paraded around in a sheer nightgown like a prize cow, and men bid on who got to “deflower” the little kid.
What I do remember is that I was brought to a room with a large bed on it. I was told to lie down in my nightgown on my back and wait. A man came in the room, and he raped me. I had no idea what was coming. I did not know that level of pain could happen in that part of your body. I did not understand the mixture of fluids – blood and semen – flowing between my legs after the rape. Nobody talked to me about what was going to happen or what it all meant.
I remember curling up in the bathtub, feeling so much pain and violation and wanting to die. I did not want to exist any longer. I believe this was the moment that I become a multiple with a diagnosis of dissociative identity disorder (DID). “Annie” (the name I have created to represent my child part) no longer wanted to exist, so she went to sleep inside of me.
On the heels of this event, I experienced a second betrayal that sealed the deal, and Annie was gone for decades, leaving the rest of my soul scrambling to figure out how to exist with no inner child.
Photo credit: Lynda Bernhardt
Blooming Lotus 