Do you feel guilty, ashamed or trapped by your past?
Do you want to start living for the future and put the past where it belongs?
As someone who has been there I speak from experience when I say that with help and time you can move on and start to feel better about yourself and put the blame fair and square where it belongs and that is not with you.
After many years of keeping it bottled up inside and being to afraid to even mention the word abuse I started to put myself back together when I talked about what had happened to me. I carried on talking to my abuser even after I escaped through my marriage because I was so scared of what would happen if I rocked the boat in any way. I never told my husband for years about it because I felt ashamed, somehow it was all my fault, I must have done something to encourage what had happened, why was it just me or was this also happening to my friends but like me they were also too scared to speak out about it.
To the outside world we seemed like a normal family, mum, dad and four children but behind closed doors no-one really knew the full horror of what was happening. My dad was a cruel, manipulative man who was prone to violent outbursts for no apparent reason. He would fly into a rage for the least little thing especially after he had been drinking, we were all very frightened of him including my mum who had suffered at his hands for most of their married life. I never felt he loved me, all I wanted was a normal loving father but he was nasty and sometimes quite vicious to me but on the whole ignored me till I turned thirteen and started to look like a woman, that is when my life changed, for the worse.
I won't go into the full story except to say it would take me the next thirty one years to get myself to a place I felt comfortable with myself and finally no longer afraid to speak out. How did I do it well I decided I was worth more than just being this frightened, timid little woman, afraid of my own shadow and dreaded showing my true self to anyone including the man I professed to love, my husband.
A friend of mine decided to go back to college and do a course and asked if I would like to join her, I really wasn't sure about this but said yes I would try it. After a few weeks my friend dropped out but I was loving being back in the classroom, I enjoyed the study and the homework, I found it gave me a focus and soon I was enjoying the interaction with the other people in the class. Instead of blushing everytime I was asked a question I was volunteering information and talking openly and honestly without feeling stupid or judged by anyone I was really enjoying this course and decided to start another one at the same time. My second course was even better than the first, I started to find out things about myself and for the first time in years I felt alive, vibrant and ready for new challenges.
After these courses finished I signed up for another one this time something which might lead to a career change and something I hoped would help me come to terms with my past and enable me to open up and let go of some of the pain I had been holding inside myself, souring my life and making me unhappy. As the course went on and I began to know myself better I started to open about my past, little things at first, what it was like being a child of a violent father and how it affected us all, how afraid we were.
The first time I spoke about the abuse I was scared but relieved, somehow my cloud had started to lift, no-one sat back in horror, judged me or avoided talking to me, I got praise for openness and my honesty and afterwards my tutor took me to one side and suggested I get some counselling sooner rather than later, it was the best thing that ever happened to me. I told my story, I talked so much in that first session I thought I would never be able to stop, it flowed from me like a river finding its way to the ocean.
After my first session things calmed down and I talked about my experiences at the hands of someone I was supposed to be able trust, my dad who had first abused me aged 13. I cried, I talked, I cried some more until eventually I saw it wasn't my fault as an adult now I could make the small changes that would make my life better.
I would recommend one to one counselling to anyone who has suffered at the hands of anyone else, please make that first step today, once you take those first few steps you can start to make you life whole again and rebuild your world.
If this inspires you let me know but most of all take care of yourself and start to focus on the future, your future.