I took a break from yoga this morning and instead sipped tea by the fireplace, listened to the birds outside, with a heat pack on my legs.
Being part of Taking Back the Night panel, brought up old emotions and feelings and my body responds...it feels once again the essence of abuse; the fear of breaking the silence along with the frustration of not being heard...of finding the correct message that will pierce the inertia.
What will it take to get those who know but are frozen... unable to move? Can I speak clear and articulately? Can my voice be a representation of victims who are not able to sit in public breaking their silence?
It isn't like I have been voted to represent all victims; but sitting on stage as the only victim I slide into that position. I speak for the child...I feel as the child....yet with a voice that uses big words, and impacting metaphors....but is it enough?
The pattern has been broken for me...my silence is a thing of the past. I am doing what hasn't been done in my family before, I stood up and walked out. Not because I didn't love them, but because I did.
One of my brothers asked me, "Why do you seem to want to help all other victims, but not any of my daughters?" This question came after years of silence between us. He also stated, "Do you think this is how she thought it would end? Do you think she would have come forward if she knew her father's family would be torn apart stitch by stitch? I think she just wanted him to stop."
How do you make a molester stop? Can you? Is it possible to keep the family intact, completely and have a new healing way?
What I feel most, is that the family Unit becomes the sacred cow....and abuse is secondary. Decisions will be made to impact lightly the family which leaves abuse a wide berth to park itself into.
What I have seen is that most want to deal with abuse as a side job, but not the main event. The main event is to keep the family humming along like the past...remaining unchanged. Impossible.
IF, this was possible, the third generation of children would not be at risk by my father.
In my experience, in order to ensure that you are not repeating the same pattern, YOU have to act differently, your choices must reflect a change and your actions will no longer be the same...otherwise, you are still in the exact same environment that the abuse occurred in. If you work like hell to keep it all the same, the same will happen again.
Perhaps not to your daughter, but to someone Else.
While I have been cast out as mental and cold, bitter and certainly 'not healed'....I believe that my radical actions are the only defense against abuse within the family unit.
My mother tried to keep the family stitched together, to be vigilant, to be forgiving, to focus up ahead in the future, to not look back.....and in doing so, more and more victims littered the roadway of my father's life.
How is my response seen as negative. That I am not a hero and instead the cold hearted bitch who is 'refusing to be part of the family'?
How do you all expect to have little children come forth and speak up about abuse, IF my treatment will be theirs?
Our 'best' efforts got us to this point....where my father's reign has gone on for 40 years and counting....yes counting. He is allowed access to his Great Granddaughter. For Family comes before abuse.
It is kind to keep family first.
Is it?
Let us see.
What I know for certain, is that my pathway is empty of family cheerleaders, but one.
Out of a family of 14 children, one claps as I walk on.
Unless we do a 360 in the way we treat those who stand up and walk out of families of abuse, Abuse will destroy our families from the inside out.
The brother doesn't see my actions as being beneficial to family....they are not. But, they certainly create a harsh environment for abuse to flourish.
Being the oldest sister and one of Ray Huhta's first victims...I was challenged and berated for not stopping this in my youth, for not breaking the silence then...or in the years intervening...and yet when I do so....How is it received?
We keep putting the total weight of ending the cycle of abuse upon the victims....while bystanders seems to counter act our actions.
In the score board of help Ray Huhta received compared to what I have....there is no contest. Abuse wins hands down.
It could drop me to the ground If I would fully bring in the vast emptiness of family support.
When a family is infested with abuse, you can't save family without saving abuse too.
Impossible.
Abuses greatest weapon is kindness and softness and allegiance to family...it wins when the sacredness of family is focused on. Abuse rides along unscathed.
Abuse isn't an item that you can put on a shelf or discard....it is in the fabric of the folks that make up the family. In order to stop abuse, you, each member of the family has to remove abuse from their lives.
Your actions and words and deeds have to reflect this. It isn't a belief, a thought or an understanding.
Each of our lives will either tolerate abusive behaviors or not....
Family isn't a place, it is how we treat each other.
No longer tolerating abuse is a loving action towards family.
