If it is one thing that I have learned over the past thirty years, it is that when something happens, no matter what it is, and you cannot deal with it alone, no matter how much you think you can, you must tell someone, you must get help. My life has been literally almost ruined by all of the secrets that I have kept. No one person is equipped to deal with atrocities against human nature. I certainly am not, and I have learned that the hard way.
I was so smart, so gifted in school, but I was keeping a horrible secret. I was being molested by my uncle. I didn’t tell anyone. I was too terrified. The threats he made to me haunt me to this day. I still dream about it, waking up in a cold sweat, not realizing that this is now and those days are gone. Gone in time, but not gone in memory. So I threw myself into my studies and my Catholic upbringing. When the peak of the abuse was raging, I would study the Bible and Catholic texts as if they were my only salvation. I wrote twisted prose and dreamed of wanting to be a songwriter, if only there was some way for me to put my angst out there and out of myself. Instead, everything twisted inward, and by the time I got to high school, I had gotten good at being the covert rebel. I was above reproach, because I was at the top of my class. I volunteered. I could have intelligent debates and win with my teachers who I assumed must be much stupider than me. So I skipped school a lot in the afternoons. Being raised Catholic, I never got into anything illegal. I never have really. I just skirted the borders.
Then I got to college. Full scholarship plus living expenses. But I was in the throes of a terrible eating disorder and so introverted that I couldn’t function. Then I was raped by my boyfriend. I told no one. This made things completely not manageable. My parents pulled me out of school and sent me to treatment. I returned to school the next year, but barely went to class. I ended up moving upstate and getting a job, seeing a therapist, and trying to act like the adult I knew that I should be, but was completely not.
And then something happened. I needed to get out. So I went to nursing school. Figuring I could live anywhere and make enough money at it. And the degree would only take two years. I was no angel, however. It was during this time that the pills started, slowly, so innocently. All prescription. And I did take them as prescribed. It took years for me to wander down the road to addiction and excess. I got my bachelor’s degree in nursing as well. I started working in an ICU, and I was an excellent nurse. I even finally came out as being a lesbian/bisexual to my family and friends. And I entered into a serious relationship with a woman who would end up destroying me. I married her. I fell into the throes of addiction, she was abusive, and I was diagnosed with cancer. The cancer only made the addiction worse, because the legitimate pain could not be managed due to my sizable tolerance to prescription drugs. And I told no one.
The one thing that has saved me, and I am glad for this that I live in this time, is that I have always had the internet. Friends across borders, far away, that genuinely cared and that I could bare my soul to. It was one such girl that helped me save myself. And I fell madly in love with her. She knows all my secrets, big and small, and I don’t have to bear the burden by myself. Yes, it feels unfair to place part of my load on someone else’s back, but we all have strong shoulders when it comes to helping others. Most of us do. I can carry far more of someone else’s load than I can of mine. It’s the separation from each that exists to make this possible.
I was recently raped at gunpoint, and I barely know how to deal with this. I do the best I can. I know I am not alone, but it’s very hard not to feel that way. But I do things better this time around. There are no pills, there is no self destruction. There is taking one day at a time. Slowly, trying not to destroy myself in the process. What will come of it, I am not sure, but I’m hoping for the best outcome.
