I knock on the door....
No one is at home....

I dial your number

No one answers the phone....

I look for answers

Searching for a clue

I call your name

Always looking for you....

I cried all alone

I screamed into the air

I needed you today

But, you weren't there.......
COPYRIGHT-2008 LRK

Later Ya'll...^Belle^

******THIS POST DEALS WITH VERY SERIOUS SUBJECT MATTER. WHILE IT ISN'T DEEPLY DETAILED, SOME DESCRIPTIONS MAY BE DISTURBING TO THOSE OF YOU THAT HAVE EXPERIENCED VIOLENCE AND RAPE.

Life can change on a dime. The night I was raped, my life, as I knew it, was over. Never again would I be the same.

He took more than just my virginity that night. He took my safety and peace of mind. He took away my trusting nature.

He took away my ability to sleep at night. Gone were the times when I could crawl into bed and drift right off in easy slumber.

It has gotten some better over the years. Sometimes, the next morning I will remember being trapped in a hellish nightmare that never seems to end and that I can't escape. Other times I don't.

I know from my daughter, there were many nights I would wake her. She would walk down the hall to my room and find me fighting and struggling with something and someone that wasn't there. Not visually there at least.

Sometimes I will wake my own self up....Heart beating fast inside my chest, pounding so hard that it makes my head hurt.

Sometimes, I wake up and can still feel the cold metal of a gun pressing into my flesh or right between my eyes.

I can go back to that moment, I hear, see, feel, smell everything about it...

I can hear me pleading with him not to kill me, to reconsider, to think about my parents....

"They know I was with you. They will know you did it." I cried.

"They'll have to find you first. Do you have any idea what a wild animal will do to a body." He sneered, pressing the gun harder into me.

I remember praying silently for God to give me strength. Reciting the 121 Psalm inside myself, then saying it out loud with trembling lips,as he played with the gun, rubbing it on me, pressing it against my cheek, running it over my breast, then back to my head....

I WILL LIFT UP MINE EYES UNTO THE HILLS FROM WHENCE COMETH MY HELP

That seemed to make him even more angry and he slapped me hard back and forth across the face,but I didn't stop.....

MY HELP COMETH FROM THE LORD, WHICH MADE HEAVEN AND EARTH.....

He slapped me again, harder.

HE WILL NOT SUFFER THY FOOT TO BE MOVED; HE THAT KEEPETH THEE WILL NOT SLUMBER.

He threw the gun down and never picked it up again.

Since then, I've heard many women talk about resigning themselves to what was going to happen. Please....PLEASE....understand, I'm not saying that is right or wrong. We each have to do and react in our own way. I just knew that I wasn't going down like that...I would go down fighting, kicking and screaming. No way would I be bullied or frightened into giving him something that I didn't want to give.

When he raised up to lower his jeans, I let the SON OF A BITCH have it with every ounce of strength I had left inside me. Darn near knocked him through the window and he came back at me with everything he had leaving me paralized for a minute.

It happened and I can't change it.

Sometimes it seems far away in the past. Other times, it seems like the present.

Sometimes it seems like a dream. Other times, it seems like reality.

Sometimes I just want to be alone with it. Other times, I need someone to help me through it.

There have been many times, when I would wake up in the middle of the night to the sound of The Yankee's voice speaking softly to me, assuring me that I was safe while holding me tightly in his arms.

For so long, I carried this around inside me all alone. Ashamed and wearing it like a dirty secret.

Nobody in my family knows, and only 3 people in my circle of friends know, so, I find it odd, that I have been writing about this. At first, it was strange and I would be tempted to go back and delete the whole post.

Since first blogging about this, many women here on the stream have came forward with PM's,letting me know that I wasn't alone, and that they had experienced the same thing and that has inspired me so very much.

Thank you to everyone for your kind comments, public and private.This isn't easy for me to write or talk about, but I have discovered that, things kept locked away in the dark have power and control over you.

LET THERE BE LIGHT.

Later Ya'll...^Belle^

Therapy has been good for me. It hasn't been easy, but it has been good. It has given me the tools and knowledge to connect the dots with my past and present.

Some things were easier to talk about than others. Some topics I ignored. Some I paid lip service to, basically wasting my time.

The issue that has been the hardest to deal with was rape.(It just took me about 5 minutes to type that last word).

For many years I refused to even say or use the word as it applied to me.

Dr M warned me when I started therapy that it had taken years to build up all the walls and barriers I had built around me, and they wouldn't all come down over night or at the same time.

Little by little, I have been peeling back the layers. Sometimes, it seemed there was no end in sight. That changed on Friday.

I always feel very mentally and emotionally exposed after a session. Especially if I have been honest with myself and Dr M. Sometimes for days following an intense session, I would be angry.

The anger didn't manifest itself with physical violence but in other ways. I would dash off angry emails, some I would send, most I didn't. I burned a stash of 106 cards and letters once, as if burning them would erase the pain. I even beheaded Beanie Babies.

Having someone on the outside of my therapy that I could talk to, vent, cry or scream to, was very helpful. The inspirational messages or pep talks I would receive before a session, a text message that would always arrive 15 minutes before a session that simply said: YOU ARE STRONG, reminded me that I was not alone. Another text message always arrives after a session that says: I AM HERE FOR YOU.

I have won some small battles with certain issues that I have. I can now see where they come from, I know what the triggers are...Not that I always deal with it properly because I don't, but at least now I can connect the dots.

I was stunned and shocked on Friday as my therapist, Dr M spoke. I couldn't believe the things he was so calmly saying:

"You have no one to blame for being raped, but yourself"

"If you had not worn that yellow sundress, it would have never happened."

"You brought it all on yourself"

He continued to list all the reasons why it was my fault. I sat there crying, shaking my head, unable to process what I was hearing.

I finally screamed, telling him to shut the f**k up. He leaned forward in his chair.

"Haven't you been telling yourself those very same things? Maybe not out loud, but you have certainly been saying them to yourself."

He was right. I had.

Somewhere deep in my mind, choices I had made, things I chose to ignore made being raped my fault. Had I not made the choices I made and not ignored the things I ignored, it wouldn't have happened.

"But, you didn't really believe it. Did you?"

For some reason, that was very hard for me to admit. Just like, initially, it was hard for me to admit:

I,too get scared.

I do need other people.

Sometimes I am weak.

Sometimes I need to be reassured.

Sometimes, I need to be comforted.

Sometimes I need a shoulder or an ear.

Sometimes I feel insecure.

Sometimes I don't feel loved, needed or wanted.

Sometimes I don't want to try anymore.

Sometimes I just want someone to hold me when I cry.

Sometimes I want someone to be strong for me.

Abuse isn't always physical. It can also be mental and emotional.

I do have feelings, and I do feel hurt.

I do matter.

Friday, I was able to admit something else:

It wasn't my fault.

Hearing those 4 words come out of my mouth, wouldn't have much value to most of the people in my life. They wouldn't understand or get how huge or what a giant step that is for me.

It was so good to be able to share that with someone who has been in the trenches with me during this journey.

All it takes is one step to begin the healing process. I took that step yesterday.

Later Ya'll...^Belle^

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Later Ya'll...^Belle^

Love never dies a natural death. It dies because we don't know how to replenish its source. It dies of blindness and errors and betrayals. It dies of illness and wounds; it dies of weariness, of withering's, of tarnishing's.-Anais Nin

Here's all you have to know about men and women: women are crazy, men are stupid. And the main reason women are crazy is that men are stupid.=George Carlin

Later Ya'll...