Will I ever be whole?

10. July 2020

Is it possible that sexual abuse in childhood can affect the person the whole life?

Is it really like a part of you is killed if you are abused as a child?

We don´t often talk about sexual abuse, and it does not make any difference if it happened when you were a child or when you grew up.

How does it affect a woman, when she is an adult if she has been sexually abused as a child? Is her attitude to sex when she is an adult different from those who have not been abused?

There are books about this and some are quite good. One I came across many years ago was “IS THERE NOWHERE TO CRY”

It was a wonderful book that described the feelings and the struggles and the loss of memory. The loss of memory was a way some of the victims do use simply to survive in the cruel world they remember.

The mind is clever; it shows you what you need to see when you are ready and not a minute earlier. When you are ready the memory pops up and you can work through the horror or you can decide to leave it and bury again until later.

When I looked back at my childhood everything was black before 12 years old. It was simply like I did not exist before that. No memories, nothing neither bad nor good. I often asked why and the therapists told me, When you are ready you will see.

Decades went by, nothing changed, I had no early childhood memories and I hated Christmas. Why did I hate Christmas I have not figured out yet but for sure one day I will understand. Something must have gone terribly wrong in my head during Christmas when I was little.

I have many memories of difficult Christmases after I left home and during my life, but I remember those. I remember when we were so poor and had no idea how to put food on the table. I remember my first Christmas away from home, the first one with my husband and his family. One day I might write about my adult holidays but not in this blog.

I sometimes think that victims of sexual abuse are feeling worthless. They are many of them always trying to please the man in their adult lives and truthfully they don´t know how to accept the love they are being offered.

The victims might feel that to be loved they have to be the pleaser and they become quite good at it. In this blog I am talking about women but as we know men are sometimes the victims.

One day about more than 20 years ago I woke up during night at 3 o’clock and I remembered the summer when I was 8 years old and my childhood was grasped away and I became the pleaser. He was 17 years old and worked at the farm my mother was a housekeeper. He was nice to me. I was lonely, He made a hut for us and there we pretended to be a family. I made mud cakes for him and we had afternoon coffee when he came home from the field.

After the coffee he told me to lay down and caressed me and told me he loved me. No one had loved me before and I was happy and felt secure. One day he was on top of me and went all the way, it hurt and I was afraid but he told me this was how couples like us did and I needed to relax.

This went on during the summer and I never told my mother or anyone. He told me if I said anything I would be punished.

In August he left the farm and I was alone again. I was free from the abuse but I felt abandoned once again.

Many years, many decades later my mother asked me what had happened!

She knew something was going on but could not for some reason do anything about it.

I lied to her and said nothing had happened. She would not have been able to bear it if she knew the truth and I did not want her to go to the grave with this on her conscience.

I am not angry or bear any grudge against my mother for not being able to protect the child. She did what she could, as well as she could and she had my young brother to take care of and she needed to try to have food on our table. That was just her life.

When my memory woke me up and told me that I could work through the horror I did.

I got all the help available and there was a lot of help. I worked through the feelings, through the rejection and much more but the scars are still there. I wonder if I will ever be whole, completely whole, and I wonder if I will ever be able to allow a man to love me like I am and enjoy his love to the fullest and trust him not to leave me.

During the Covid time and the isolation I have been working through my feelings intensively and have accomplished a lot. I know and feel that dreams are good, they are the first step to a bright future. My thoughts make my life. If and when I am thinking positive thoughts I am happy.

If I am worried and pessimistic my life becomes hell.

It is all in our mind, said a wonderful friend to me many years ago. She was one of the diamonds that have passed my way during a colourful life. She was blunt and honest and made me change the thoughts. She was the one that taught me about dreams and how wonderful and nourishing they can be. She is one of my very good friends, and there are many of them and more appear slowly even now.

This has been a blunt blog, a blog about something we don´t talk about often, difficult feelings and how to change them into something precious and good.

The abuse was neither precious nor good but it made me what I am today and it helped me to understand life a bit more.

In my meditation my mentor tells me, You are the only one like you, there is no one and never has been and never will be anyone just like you. I like that. I am happy to be me. I wake up almost every morning happy and looking forward to the day. Every day has a new adventure and something different and exciting happens.

The road to recovery is sometimes steep but mine has been perfect for me. I have got the teachers when I needed them and they have helped me to heal and they have nourished my soul, every day, every moment and will forever.

Gratitude is a wonderful feeling and I have a lot of her. She is my best friend and we walk hand in hand every day. Sometimes I don´t quite understand what to be grateful for when something new happens but my friend the gratitude arrives and shows me the road.

I have big dreams for my future. I nourish them and make them brighter and more alive one day at a time. Dreaming is a must.

Hulda Björnsdóttir