I was an Abused Child...

***Author's Note:***
This is rather graphic. I've detailed sexual abuse that I suffered, so if you would rather not read anything of that nature, please close this. I do have plenty of other reading material, and I would be honored for you to peruse my port! Thank You!

I'm going to do my best to keep this short, but my story is rather long and complicated. A picture of the woman who molested me is included at the bottom. Hopefully, someone around *Nyack, N.Y. will see her and keep their daughters away from her.

I've dedicated myself recently to making the public aware of the consequences of childhood abuse, of any form. The after effects can be quite severe and damaging to a person, and the scars often last a lifetime. Some people, as they grow into adulthood have such a hard time living through no fault of their own, and to me that is a tragedy.

They live their lives haunted, scared, lacking confidence, and self-esteem. This is no way for anyone to live.

To be subject to a life such as this is cruel and unjust. Adults that abuse a child, in any way, should be held 100% accountable for their actions. Unfortunately, more often than not, that is not the case. The abuser denies all abuse, and oftentimes, will turn on their victim. They will call their victim a liar, tell people their victim has problems; there's a plethora of ways the abuser will seek to set themselves free. And the very fact that abusers are allowed to go on with their lives; the fact that they are not held accountable for their actions is wrong.

As they move forward, so does their victim get left behind emotionally. Their victim is stuck in an emotional rut for life. Some victims are stronger, and have the ability to move on to a degree, and live productive, and happy lives, and I say, all power to them.

Others are left lacking the ability to trust, therefore, their relationships suffer. They lack confidence and self esteem, therefore they hold poor jobs, and do not advance very far in different aspects of life.

Then there are some of us who are somewhere in between. We're trying desperately to move on, because we refuse to allow our abusers to maintain a stronghold over our lives; we refuse to allow them the power they once had over us, yet, at the same time, we are unable to get past a certain point in our lives. We've tried.

For me, personally, I've been to countless counselors over many years... all to no avail. I've written to talk shows, politicians, news anchors, any and everybody I could think of.

No one cared enough to simply send a short note back to me. It’s been that way pretty well my whole life. In very short summary, my history:

I was born to a single woman. My father was considerably older than my mother; she was around 20. I’ve never gotten an accurate age. My father wanted nothing to do with me as he was married, with children of his own. I’ve recently found out that my mother, for some reason, would not release me to be adopted for many years. She wanted me kept in foster care. I went on to 3 different homes.

The first foster home, I don’t remember, but I know they wanted to adopt me very much, however, they were unable to obtain the license in time. I’ve got some real smart law makers in New York to thank for that.

The second family, whom I still keep in touch with, I don’t want to get into details about them, because although my life with them was miserable, I don’t want to hurt them.

The third family I went to, I lasted less than a year. I don’t believe they knew what they were getting into when they took me into their home. Now... the woman who abused me...

She was a single woman in New York. The wonderful state of NY thought I would be better served by being adopted by her. She is a child abuser, and a child molester, and her name is Kathy. She is an active member of GLSEN and that means she's free to be around teenage girls to molest again. I've emailed several members of GLSEN and not a single one has responded. So much for protecting our children.

I wasn’t living with her but just a few months when she molested me the first time. I was 9. A very sheltered and naïve 9. I had no clue what this woman was doing to me, but I knew it was wrong and that I was terrified of her already because of what she'd already done to me.

That night, that first time she touched me, she had a party with several of her friends over, all lesbians. My bedroom wall shared the living room wall, so of course, I heard everything going on. They laughed, and talked, and had a good time. They talked of very personal things, including their sex lives, and what they did with their lovers.

Finally, around 11 pm, she said good bye to her last guest. She did whatever for a few minutes in the living room, and came straight into my room. I was just on the verge of sleep when she came in there, and almost immediately, I felt my pants being pulled down.

I froze. I absolutely froze. I just could not move. I could barely breathe. Instinct told me to stay frozen. She started speaking softly to me; I did not respond. To this day, I cannot remember what she said. I do know that she was trying to determine if I was really asleep. Oh God help me, but I was wide awake. And terrified.

Silent I was on the outside, but inside, oh inside my head was a cacophony of screams which only grew louder as I felt her finger going up inside my rectum. The pain was almost unbearable. I struggled so hard not to cry out, that’s how I terrified I was of her, already. She wouldn’t stop; she seemed to move her finger around for an eternity.

At 9 years old, I was pleading to whomever for death, just to escape the horror within my mind and the physical pain she was inflicting inside me. And then, then she just stopped. She jerked her finger out of me, pulled my pants back up, and just left my room and went to bed like nothing had happened. That night was the first sleepless night I’d ever had.

Since then, I have more sleepless days and nights than I have sleep. I don't rest much. Still, to this day, I have nightmares about her.

She’s a very rigid and domineering woman. She gets that from her own mother, who was pretty cruel to her, from Kathy’s account, anyway. Kathy, in turn, was pretty cruel to me, after that first time. I was entrusted to her care, and she thoroughly destroyed any chance I had at trusting people, and getting past what had already happened in my first 9 years. She made the 7 years I stayed with her a living hell for me.

It’s something I’m very bitter about and am having a hard time getting over. I do not get along with women. I’m extremely distrustful of everyone, although, some of that distrust I attribute to my life before I met Kathy; however, she has contributed considerably to my lack of ability to trust. To me, she should have been kind, nurturing, and helpful to me with regards to getting over my already hurtful past. She was none of that. She added to my misery and pain tremendously.

The second time she molested me came not too long before she adopted me. We were driving back from her father’s house in upstate New York, and it was dark. I was actually sleeping this time, and I awoke to her hand all over my crotch. My jeans had already been unbuttoned and unzipped; jeans and panties already lowered. Her hand movements were seemingly never ending.

Again, I just froze. But this time, it was more than fear. It was fear mixed with rage. I truly believe that had I been stronger, both emotionally and physically, that I could have killed her right then and there.

Finally, mercifully, I felt the car swerve, and she stopped. She struggled to put my pants back up, but she ended up having to leave them unzipped and unbuttoned. When I appeared to her to have woken up; quite an act for me, she said I had become restless, that my stomach was bothering me, and I had undone my jeans myself. I had no choice then but to let her believe that I bought that story.

I had no say in the matter of adoption other than to go along with what was not my choice to begin with. My life had been decided by people that knew very little about me, or what I had already endured, and they knew nothing about her. Nothing, and they didn't take the time to find out.

The third time she molested me, was again, in the one place that was mine: my room. I should have had privacy; I should have felt safe there.

As the first time, I was already in bed. I woke from a half sleep to weird moaning. Being 10 at this time, I didn’t know what orgasm or masturbation was. I was completely and utterly clueless about sex, except for what she had already ‘taught’ me. I kept trying to go back to sleep, but the moaning just kept on. I began to get scared. I thought there was something wrong with her for Christs’ sake! The weird noise finally stopped, but before I knew it, there she was.

Raising my arm, lowering my arm. Whispers of “Are you awake?” Whispers of other things that I don’t remember anymore. A hand, lightly tracing my face, my neck, down the whole length of my body. A hand, taking my hand, forcing my hand to caress her naked body. She leaned closer, I could feel something being forced into my mouth. The woman actually had put her nipple into my mouth and was trying to get me, a 10 year old child to suck it! Nausea wracked my guts. I had an almost uncontrollable urge to bite her, and bite her hard. Now, I wish I had. I would have spared myself the ensuing years of mental torture she made me endure. But I didn’t. I lay perfectly still, and kept my lips clamped as tightly shut as I could.

I had a kitten named Tippen. Tippen, bless her sweet heart, chose that moment to jump onto the bed with me. Kathy promptly locked her into my closet. She again approached me. Tippen began clawing frantically at the inside of the closet door, trying desperately to get out. Kathy hesitated, then picked up my arm. I did something that made her realize I was awake. When she raised my arm, and let it go, had I been asleep, my arm would have fallen limply. I let it stay in the air for the briefest second, and then let it fall. Kathy realized her mistake, and says “Oh, hello!”, and then turned around and left. I waited there, lying very still, but very aware for what seemed an eternity before I finally got up to rescue my sweet kitten who had rescued me that night from God only knows what sick things Kathy would have done to me, and possibly more times afterwards.

But the next morning, I asked her what that funny moaning was last night, that it had woke me up. She said, “It must have been the wind.”

She never touched me that way again. But she made up for it in other ways.

I was already adopted, by the third and thankfully, final time she sexually molested me, and had started to shut down emotionally. Except for one emotion. Rage.

I had a huge and violent temper by the time I was 11, largely due to Kathy and what she had done to me. She put me into counseling, but I felt very uncomfortable with the counselors she chose. I had no say, and my feelings were dismissed, as they always had been. I saw several counselors while living with her, however, none were willing to listen to anything I had to say about the sexual abuse. For years, I clammed up, never spoke of it.

I had a guidance counselor in high school who I finally told my story to. He believed me. He was the only one. What resulted in my telling him about it was CPS getting involved, and several of Kathy’s friends. Kathy was talking to a social worker, and told her I had so many problems, that I made it all up, and so forth. The case was dropped and I was branded as a liar and a trouble maker.

She then brought me to a friend of hers house. There, they had several of their mutual friends who were alerted to what was happening. They then sat around, several adult friends, and me, a teenager, and told me that while they believed that I believed it happened, they could not believe that Kathy would do such a thing.

I quit talking about it right then and there, and for years after, I spoke none of what happened. I took a lot of abuse in other ways from her. I was belittled, taunted, teased, talked down to, ridiculed, ignored. I was also kicked, punched, slapped, thrown against walls and furniture, thrown down stairs. I had things sail across the room at me. All courtesy of Kathy. The same woman that the State of New York was confident was an excellent choice for me.

To this day, I have no clue why she adopted me, unless it was to take out her own miserable childhood on me, or simply to fulfill her own sick and twisted sexual desires. I’ve confronted her several times since I’ve turned 18. Her answers varied from-

“It never happened”, to-“I don’t remember anything like that”, to- "It could have happened, I just don’t seem to recall”.

I’ve told her several times that I want no apology. I want no explanation. I want no sympathy, nor pity. But there is one thing I want. From her. And that’s acknowledgement.
Acknowledgement of the abuse. Acknowledgement of my feelings. I want to hear these words:

“Jacqui, I did this to you. I lied and I take responsibility for abusing you.” That’s all I ever wanted.

To all abusers out there, hear my words:

The emotional repercussions of abuse that you heap onto a child are tremendous. We never ‘get over it’. We never fully recover from what you have done to us. We never asked for what you have done to us, nor did we deserve it. ‘You’ were the adult; therefore, you were responsible for our well-being and you have failed miserably in your duties. We, the innocent victims of your selfishness now have a life faced with many challenges that we should never have had to face; burdens that never should have been put upon us.

The energy that we have expended fighting the demons that you have fraught upon us could have been used in other, more productive ways conducive to a happy, and less burdensome life.

One of my many goals in life is to be a voice for children that are where I was, once upon a miserable and lonely time. So many children are being abused; yet there are so few voices on their behalf.

It’s time to change that.

I fully intend to achieve my goals, all of them. I have begun to reach out to adult survivors of abuse, and my efforts have been rewarding, both for myself, but more importantly, for them. I wish very much to reach out to the children, too. But I’m unable to do that alone.

I’m a single parent in Alabama. I’m thirty four years old, and have not accomplished much by way of helping others. Not near as much as I wish to. My biggest dream is to start a foundation for abused children. I want to also create a safe haven for children to come to; for them to talk to someone who has truly been there, and who can honestly say that they understand.

I’m in the process of writing a book on this very subject, however, the market is rough and no one wishes to hear yet another ‘woe is me’ tale.

Folks need to be educated, not preached to. Abuse is something that is not to be taken lightly, nor should any child’s plea for help fall onto deaf ears as my pleas were. I often wonder how many children that were abused, and went on to lead much more difficult lives, would otherwise have gone on to lead more normal, happy and productive lives that were not hampered by the negative issues forced upon them.

Abuse should be a thing of the past, not a recurring reality.

I have high hopes, and goals. If I never accomplish them, I’m sure going to die trying.

Thank you for listening. I hope my words do not go unnoticed like so many other words of mine. I truly believe I’m working hard for good and worthy goals. I just need a little help in making them realities. I hope I will get a helping hand. Just to spread the word about abuse, and how terribly wrong and unjust it is. And perhaps to enable victims of abuse to enjoy even some of the freedom that our abusers have enjoyed for years. I'd like to be as free as Kathy. I'd like for us all to be free.

*She no longer lives in Nyack. She now lives in Rhode Island.