I don’t really know how to actually begin but I started this blog over 3 years ago and I just happened to come across it again while I doing a search for black women surviving rape and this was the only thing I found. So I decided to pick back up writing because it does seam to heal my soul.
I was molested when I was 6 for 2 years, at 16 I was in an abusive relationship with my first serious boyfriend, Over a period of 2 years I was raped and beaten, he was 23 and I finally left him when I was 18. At 19 I was raped by a friend, i was assaulted again when I was 21, I was drugged and raped and only remember bits and pieces of it.
And I’m still struggling with it all. I use to wish that none of that happened to me, I use to cry all the time about why does it keep happening, I actually thought that I was only placed on this earth to be used and abused and that was just something that I had got use to. I was use to being hit and raped and beaten and being called stupid and all the names. I was so use to it that it was the only thing I would expect my partners to treat me as. No one should expect that kind of treatment.
After putting everything on the table and looking over what I had been through I realized that I held everything in. I never cried during any of the attacks, I didn’t cry after the attacks. I put on my face and just held it inside. And it started to slowly kill me. It just hurt me so bad some days I couldn’t breathe. There have been days where I prayed to God that I would die, that I wouldn’t ever wake up because the pain that I held in hurt too much for me to keep living. I have thought about suicide, I have thought about jumping out the window, about crashing my car and hoping no one would find me. I had drank so much trying to die from alcohol poisoning.
Ummmm……it still hurts me, I’m trying now not to keep those feelings inside of me. And its not like I’m holding it in on purpose I just feel like I cant let them go the way I did when a friend raped me. I cried years after he raped me and it felt good. For me crying is my way of letting things go.
I feel like when I cry people think I’m weak. Like for them crying is a sign of weakness and it shouldn’t be done in public, like its something that should be hidden. My ex-husband has even told me why are you crying? Its not going to change anything so why are you doing it? My father told me the same thing. And I think women should be allowed to cry with out people questioning her. Black women should be allowed to show how hurt they are with out having a time limit put on them, with out being looked at as weak. Because that’s how I use to feel, like if I got everything out of my system and let it go and let my body relax and cry and then deal with it I’m a weak woman because I had a break down.
I’m just now starting to realize that breaking down isn’t musically a bad thing. As long as you put yourself back together again then its ok. As long as your not completely drowning in your misery and pain with out a life preserver then its ok. Everyone breaks down in their life, its just apart of being human.
I’m a SURVIVIOR who is still fighting. I’ve survived, I’m allowed to express my emotions the way I feel as long as I’m not hurting myself or anyone else. I should not feel embarrassed or ashamed for the way that I feel. And just because I ask for help, I am NOT weak. And because I cry, I am NOT weak.
Eventually I will go into details about my personal experiences with rape and domestic violence but this is just a stepping stone for me.
Until next time
***Excerpt from “If You Called to Say Yr sorry Call Somebody Else I Don’t Use “Em No More When Prototypes Become Stereotypes That Keep Black Women Silent About Rape by Jly R. Shaffer”***
