Give Up Your Child, Don't Kill Them

On the news this morning is the story of a woman in La Habra, CA who is charged with attempted murder of her 7 mo old.  Yesterday night, she dropped her baby from a parking structure and the baby hit the pavement and is now in critical condition.  My first thought was, what is wrong with people?  That is a question that is not easily answered.  We assume that she must have been overwhelmed, frustrated, or stressed out to contemplate on how anyone could ever do this to their child.  Maybe she was just crazy and needed help.  Now it is too late for her to get help, at least the kind of help she should have received to prevent such a tragedy.  It is not enough of an excuse to be overwhelmed, stressed out, etc to ever harm a child, period.  When it comes to your child or you see someone in your life that has children, you cannot take any chances.  Get help, get someone you love that has children help, don't put that child's life at risk.  You don't want to intervene?  You don't want to hurt your sister, sister in law, friend's feelings?  It doesn't matter, that child doesn't have a voice, you do.  If you are a mother who is feeling overwhelmed, can't take it anymore, feels like screaming, wants to pull your hair out, the baby is driving you crazy, GIVE THE CHILD TO SOMEONE while you get it together.  Give the baby to your husband, mother, friend, someone you trust, so you can rest, relax, "get away" if you need to.  Believe me, we have all been there.  We have all felt like screaming and running away and the feeling like you can't take it anymore.  The difference is that we recognize that this will all pass, but in the mean time, we ask for help.  We all need help and there is nothing wrong with admitting it.  What is wrong is hurting your child because you can't ask for help.  That child needs you, relies on you, looks up to you, trusts you, has his/her life and well being in your hands.  This is the most precious life you will ever have in your possession.  If you feel like you are literally going "crazy" or have inappropriate thoughts, seek medical help immediately.  There is help out there if you just allow yourself to get better.  It may be embarrassing to admit you need help, but that is better then have something happen to your child and then you go to jail.  That is embarrassing.  You can't come back from death, that is final.  If your child survives, it will have life long consequences for you and your child.  We need to give mothers the support we need in order to be the mother our child deserves. 
I make this pledge to my children and I hope others will follow:  "I love you so much that I will do anything to protect you, even if it is from myself."

Releasing the Anger

OK, so my anger towards my parents, especially my mom comes and goes.  I have so much resentment towards her because of my child molestation. 
I don't remember when the molestation started, but I know when it stopped, I was six.  I remember because the principal pulled me from class and my cousin was in his office.  My cousin, really the hero for it stopping, told the principal that he was being molested by our uncle.  Uncle "Perv" is what I now call him.  In that confession, my cousin also told the principal that I was also being molested.  I denied that I was being molested  for reasons I am still not sure of, but did state that my cousin was. Because of this, my uncle was arrested and eventually put in jail.  Maybe part of the reason I denied it is because before this happened, I told my Grandma (that is where it happened, my uncle lived there and she "babysat" my brother, cousin, and I and we would spend the night) and all I got out of her was "oh he wouldn't do that."  Later, I told my parents.  I remember sitting down with them and said that uncle so and so was touching me down there.  I was a little girl, I couldn't explain at the time that he was putting his hands down my pants and doing gross things.  I don't want to elaborate too much, but you can imagine among other things he would do that I shall not name.  I don't remember their reaction because I was crying, all I know is that it didn't stop.  I was still being "watched" by my grandma and all my dad said was that I couldn't go on his motorcycle anymore.  So you think he was molesting me on his motorcycle?  Ok... so it continued until that fateful day when my cousin rescued me, not my parents, not my grandma, but my 9 year old cousin.  Over the years I learned that they thought that maybe my uncle accidentally touched me, like brushing against me or something.  That I was a paranoid little girl and weren't sure to believe me or not.  Ok, did you ever think that maybe I was paranoid because  my uncle was taking me in the back room while my grandma was sleeping and doing those nasty things to me?  Even if they weren't sure, why risk it and put me in the same situation?  I guess because they needed a babysitter and instead of finding another one, it probably wasn't as bad as I was making it out to be right?  Even him being in jail didn't stop him from talking to me.  I was still being watched by my grandma after he was in jail and he would call from jail and she would put me on the phone with him because he wanted to talk to his baby.  How sick is that?  Then after he was out of jail (he did 7 years), my parents invited him over for Thanksgiving dinner.  The only reason he didn't come over was because I overheard my parents talking and started crying.  I didn't want to see that perv and all my mom said was "Why don't you like  my family?"  Ok, let me see here, because they are crazy sick people? If you were raped, would you want to see your rapist at Thanksgiving dinner?  Then another time I went with my family to see my grandparents and he was going to be there and I was told, "He will only be there for a little while."  So basically just suck it up and deal with it.  I spent the whole time in the kitchen avoiding him while he was in the living room.  I have all this resentment and I don't know how to release the anger.  I am not really mad at my uncle, he is a perv and I have accepted that.  Never in my life again, ever, but I don't hold any anger towards him.  What is worse then being molested is nobody believing you or doing anything about it.  I think I hold the resentment towards my mom because it was her brother and she is suppose to have protective instincts like a mother bear and not let anyone hurt her babies.  After telling my parents as an adult exactly how I felt, my dad seemed remorseful and would have done things differently.  My mom just didn't "get" it and I have the feeling that if she could have done it over, she would have done the same thing.  Her excuse was that she was a young parent (she was 27 at the time) and wasn't sure how to handle it.  To this day, she still keeps in contact with my uncle which boggles my mind. I try to have a relationship with her and most of the time we get along fine, but there is always this wall that is between us and I don't think I will ever put it down.  I heard a quote on Oprah before that "forgiveness is not about letting the person back in your life.  Forgiveness is about giving up the hope that the past could have been different."  Letting go of the anger is a constant battle that I hope one day I will win.

You Didn't Protect Me - Lyrics to a song I wrote to express my feelings on being molested

I may look tough
I may look calm
But inside me is a hurt little girl
You weren't there for me, when I needed it most
You didn't believe me ,when I needed you to
And when you did, the damage was already done
My innocence was stolen, you could have restored it
Time was ticking, you let it run out
Instead of a time of healing, it was a time of blame
Now you are left with the shame
You just stood by while I looked you in the eye, waiting for you to rescue me
But you didn't, you didn't protect me
No you didn't, you didn't protect me

You could have stopped it, but you chose to turn the other way
Now you’ll regret it for the rest of your life
I’ve paid the price of your mistake
A heavy price that is too hard to name
I have suffered, more than you could ever know and I am sick of carrying this load
I could never do to my child what you did
I will always protect them, I will always be there for them, I will always stand up for them.  I will never make your mistake
What I now know, is it is time to let go, it is time for me to show myself, that I can be better cause of this
I will not suffer anymore, I will bring down my wall, I will open my heart again
I will not let this define me anymore
I can heal, I will heal, I have to.  I was hurt by you and now I am just hurting myself
I want to be calm inside as I am out.  I want to not be scared, I want to not feel judged, I want to stop worrying.
 I want to be happy, I want to love life, I want to be free of this pain. 
I know this will always be apart of me, it has shaped the way I am, but it doesn’t have to control me. 
I need to show myself that I deserve to be loved and protected, even though you didn’t think I did.

I may look tough
I may look calm
But inside me is a hurt little girl
You weren't there for me, when I needed it most
You didn't believe me ,when I needed you to
You just stood by while I looked you in the eye, waiting for you to rescue me
But you didn't, you didn't protect me
No you didn't, you didn't protect me
You didn't protect me

Pumping blood back to the heart

Ok, well this is my first post and I wanted it to be about the main reason I am doing this blog.  I was molested as a child and I am still dealing with alot of pain from it.  Being molested was not the worst part, it was that my parents did not do anything about it.  I am in my 30s with two small children and my biggest worry is that I will never have the kind of relationship with my kids that I want because of the kind of person I have become because of what happened.  I love my kids more than anything, but I sometimes am closed off emotionally that I feel I have no control of.  I have been to countless therapists and read many books and nothing has seemed to "fix" things.  The only thing that does seem to help is talking about the sexual abuse with others, so I thought what better way to get my pain out then through a blog.  I of course will blog about other things too, like motherhood, day to day frustrations, humorous topics (even though the start of this blog isn't one), and just whatever topics may come up. 

I know there are many other people out there that have gone through the same thing, but we just keep it under the rug as if it didn't happen.  I know from my experience I have been told things like "it happened so long ago, you shouldn't still be dealing with this, "you have to just let it go, " was it really that bad?"  Those are from people that just don't get it or don't care to.  We need to clean the dirt that has been swept under the rug and bring it to the surface.  It is still a taboo subject and it shouldn't be.  By not talking about it or being made to feel bad by talking about it, creates a feeling like "we" did something wrong or that we should just "drop" it.  Talking about this openly and honestly is the only way we can help prevent molestation, help others heal from abuse, and to educate people about it.