pensiveramblings-blog

[pensiveramblings-blog]

Recalling Abuse

Carrena R. Morgan-Moss

I was nine years old the first time my stepfather crept into my room. I remember feeling something touching me, kind of sharp, sliding up under my nightgown. I remember feeling it touch my skin in places it shouldn't—poking inside me. I remember kicking at him and hearing him laugh under his breath before he got up and walked through my room to the other bathroom. My parents had a bathroom in their room. I was too afraid to scream so I just laid there.

The next morning, I went and cried to my mom about it. She got mad at me. She wanted to know why I didn't fight him—why I didn't come tell her sooner. I couldn't explain. She said I was making awfully strong accusations and I shouldn't do that. She asked my stepfather. He denied it until he saw me cry. Then he decided to apologize as if apologizing would make things ok.

That next night, I started sleeping in shorts.

For a while I avoided him. I thought my mom would leave him after that, but she didn't. I felt uncomfortable but I didn't really understand everything so I went on as if nothing had happened. That's how everyone else was acting. We were one small, happy family.

Until, a few months later when I asked for ice cream for breakfast.

A simple request: A normal nine-year-old kid asking for an unconventional breakfast. He told me of course I could have ice cream—if I sat on his lap for a minute. I was a quiet and obedient kid so I did as I was told. I sat on his lap at our tiny kitchen table. I sat there as he rocked me back and forth, forcing me closer onto him, hearing him grunt and feeling him shake beneath me. He hugged me, said, “Thank you,” and then he got me a bowl of ice cream. I stared at it, too uncomfortable to eat it. Too sick to want it. Too ashamed to move.

When my mother woke up later, I told her what had happened—tears pouring from my eyes—she looked at me and said, “Three strikes and he’s out,” as if that was supposed to comfort me. Shortly after, watery-eyed, she asked, “But who else is gonna love me?”

I shut down emotionally after that. I started to believe I deserved what happened to me. I felt like I couldn’t hurt my mother so I suppressed everything.

Around this same time, my mom started working night shift at a cleaning company. Ogden. She’d leave for work just before bedtime and return in the morning. I’d be left alone with him all night. For a while, nothing happened. He’d tuck me in at night, clear a path through my toys so I could go to the bathroom safely, and leave the kitchen light on so I wouldn’t be afraid. Things felt ok.

But one day, as mom was leaving for work, he winked at me. I didn’t know what it meant. I even winked back. That night, he didn’t tuck me in. I got myself ready for bed. I turned on the kitchen light and I went to sleep. I was awakened a little while later by him calling my name. “Rena! Rena!” I got up and went to my parents’ room thinking something was wrong. I remember him pulling me into bed with him and bear-hugging me from behind. I could feel him pressing into me and his hands crept up under my shirt. I kicked and screamed and then went stiff as my eyes watered. I hated him. I felt disgusting and broken and I didn’t even understand why. Why would he do this to me?

It became a thing. A game to him. The wink. I knew when I wasn’t going to sleep because of the wink. I knew which nights I’d lay awake waiting for him to call my name, quietly at first and then angrily and forcefully until I answered. I knew when he was going to creep into my room and play with whatever part of my body he found fun that night. I hate winks to this day.

But I couldn’t say a word. I thought if I said anything to anyone that it would hurt my mom and she was the last person I wanted to see hurting. At such a young age, I learned how to take on everyone else’s feelings to cover my own. I’m still figuring out how to break through that effectively.

At age twelve, the abuse stopped. I began sleeping at my aunt’s and grandmother’s more often. I found friends’ houses to call my own. I spent fewer and fewer nights at home. We also moved a couple of times and I got my own room where nobody had to cross through for any reason. Mom stopped working for a bit, and things felt almost normal for a little while. I thought all was well.

Sixteen years old, a time when most girls are experimenting sexually, or beginning their first relationships, I was at home with no desire to go out. I felt like I didn't have that part of me.

One late night, attempting to sleep, I heard my door creep open. I was used to the strange sounds in such an old house and I really didn't think much of it. Then my floor creaked. I turned over in my bed to feel him touching me before I saw him. I froze. I was a scared little kid all over again. I had no will to kick. I guess he saw that I wasn't going to fight and he left me alone. That was the last time he touched me.

The next day, I got a lock for the inside of my door and I've had one ever since. Even when we moved, I got a lock.

I've never quite felt safe at home with him around. Moving away to college was the most liberating experience. I didn’t like him being around. He'd kiss me on his way to work like any father would his daughter and I hated it. "I love you," he'd say. I’d have no response.

I slept in pajama bottoms right up until I met my wife. I still can't walk around without a bra. I wear that to bed, too. My body still goes stiff when I hear floorboards creaking in the night and when anyone touches me in my sleep.

Sometimes, I find myself in periods of self-loathing. I hate myself for not saying anything to anyone sooner, for not fighting harder against him. I hate knowing that I walked right into some of the abuse and that it’s probably my fault. I’m still trying to learn otherwise. I’m learning to break down the walls I’ve built around myself from seven years of being afraid and of hating my damaged body. I’m learning how it’s possible to not hate my mom when she let this happen to me. I even feel guilty because I know this wasn’t as bad as it could have been, but it screwed me up all the same.

This is what I mean when I say #metoo.