Child Abuse Story From Abbey
by Abbey M
(Cobram, Victoria, Australia)
Up until I was 7, my family, which consisted of my mum, dad, my older sister Bree, and my older brother Jake, lived in a small house in Queensland. We didn't have a lot of money. Dad worked two jobs to cover the food and the bills. Mum stayed home and looked after me, and although I saw Mum every moment of the day, it was a different story with Dad.
He started a morning shift at the local Mill around 2:00 a.m., came home for lunch for half an hour, which he usually spent sleeping, and then went back to work at 1:30. He would come home again at 5:00 p.m., then go to work in a pub until 10:00 at night. I never really missed him through the long days, because I never really knew him.
When I was 7, we became extremely poor, and Dad couldn't cover the costs needed. So he began asking Bree and Jake to cough up a bit of their own pocket money. Bree worked in a hairdresser's studio in a nearby mall, and Jake worked as an apprentice mechanic. They weren't too happy, but did it anyway.
But one afternoon, Bree came home and told us she was fired. She never told me why, perhaps because I was only 8, but Mum, Dad and Jake knew. Jake wasn't doing so well either, and decided to move away to New South Wales. It was a long way away. I missed him so much. It was just me, Mum and Dad and Bree. Bree didn't go and apply for another job, and Dad was infuriated that she wasn't there to supply us with some extra cash.
I was hopping off the bus one afternoon, when I heard yelling inside the house. I walked down the back gate, and saw Dad in the backyard, hitting Bree with a piece of wood. I started crying when I saw that horrible scene, and Dad turned around and looked at me, then threw the wood away, up near the fence.
I ran over to Bree. Her back had a gash from the corner of the wood. Her left leg was bleeding and blood was coming out of her mouth. I remember her whispering to me, "Abs! Go to a friend's house and call Jakey, okay? Tell him what you saw!" So I ran as fast as I could.
I ran to my friend Matilda's house two blocks away and up near the pub. I asked Matilda's mum, Carmen, if I could use her phone. She was confused, but let me. Carmen heard every word I told Jake, and she offered to let me stay at their house that night. Carmen took me around to my house, and picked up some of my clothes while Dad was working. She asked me where Mum was. I told her I had no idea. So she took a look at Bree and ran her up to the hospital. Bree stayed overnight in hospital and I stayed at Matilda's house.
The next morning, Carmen took me and Matilda to school and had a chat with my teacher about my mum not being home, and what had happened to Bree.
Weeks went by. Dad called up one day to ask if Carmen knew where we were. By law, I was underage, and if Dad wanted me home, he could take me.
I was foraging through some letters the first day I got home, when one appeared with my mum's name on it. I opened it up, and Bree read it to me. Turns out, Mum ran away because Dad had been sexually assaulting her. She apologized for leaving without a reason for so long, and Bree was really mad at her. But I missed my mum so much.
Dad kept hitting Bree every day. She often had cuts and bruises all over her. The teachers always asked what was going on, but she lied and made up excuses. Because I had no marks on my body like her, they just assumed that she was very clumsy.
One day, I was sitting in class when I got called out by my principal. He told me that Bree and I were to leave school that day. We were moving to a town in Victoria, along the Murray River. I had a few minutes to say goodbye to my friends.
Bree and I started a new life, minus Dad, down by the river. Because I was only nine, I had absolutely no idea what was going on. Looking back, it seemed like Bree had told someone what was going on, and we were sent to a foster home.
We lived with a couple named Michelle and Tyson. They had a little girl called Lillyanne, who was four. I loved having a little sister. But one day, after Bree began working again, she decided she'd had enough. She moved out of Michelle and Ty's house and into her own with a friend from school. She was in year 12 that year. I missed her more than anything. My whole family was not like it used to be. I had not heard from my dad, thank goodness, and my mum was far gone from my life. My brother had moved to the States. My sister was still a few kilometres away from where I lived. Everything had changed.
I was 14 when I picked my life up after eventually realizing what had happened to my sister and my mum. I was in secondary school, and had a great bunch of friends. I had met a nice guy called Bronson. We were together for eleven months, when I noticed he started getting picky with the things I did. If I went out at night after 8:00, he had to be there with me. If I talked to other boys from school, he went up to them and always asked what we were talking about. If I didn't tell him where I was going, he would get angry and start yelling and cursing at me. I knew it wasn't the right relationship for me, so I started to think of ways of how I could cut my ties with him. I decided the best way was to just be straight. So I approached him one afternoon after school at the locker bays, and I just told him that I thought we were going our separate ways, and I thought he was too pushy with me. Suddenly, he lashed out at me across the face. Then he pulled me in and kissed me. He whispered, while pulling on my hair, that he loved me and he was disappointed that I had embarrassed him in front of his friends. I tried pushing him away from me, but his friends cheered him on, as he edged me into a locker bay. I knew what was coming, and started screaming, but he put his hand tightly across my mouth and that day I knew how exactly how my mother had felt, knowing she went through that EVERY single day.
Some ask, if you are raped, are you still a virgin? My personal opinion is; no. I had scratches on my face and a bruise on my arm from where he had grabbed me. The next day, I avoided him. I assumed it was over, but according to Bronson, it was far from over.
My math teacher, Mrs. A, walked past when Bronson grabbed my hair and pulled me over. She told him to let me go. He didn't and started saying he loved me and wanted to spend every minute with me. Mrs. A asked if he was hurting me. I lied, because I knew what would happen when no one was around.
"No. He's fine." I faked a smile. "We're just messing around."
She smiled and walked away. He praised me for lying, cooing, "Good girl..." and by stroking my hair. And then he kissed me deeply. I hated him so much.
Every now and again, he lashed out at me by yelling and swearing, and now the only physical pain he gave me was bruises from grabbing my arm so rough. I say "only" because I knew he had the power to do so much more, but he chose not to. There was worse physical pain out there than a couple of bruises on my arm.
One afternoon, Mrs. A was on duty in the canteen. I knew what I was up for when I saw her towering over top of the canteen barricade. I tried to just whisk past her. Had there been more people in the canteen, she would have let me get away with it. But not this time.
"Abbey. Abbey" Mrs. A repeated herself in her Canadian accent. I turned around. I wasn't bothered with the pain of hiding it anymore. "What happened to your arm? You didn't fall..." she suggested.
I shrugged, "It's nothing."
"Abbey...tell me the truth, sweetie. It's okay...it's safe to tell me..."
I broke down in tears and told her everything...that decision possibly saved my life. It appeared that many girls had been molested by Bronson, and many more had 'secret meetings' he had organized with them, where he would stroke them and treat them to luxuries. He slowly worked his way onto them, until he had complete power over them. One girl was even in the news. She had saved up her money and ran away to Wisconsin, somewhere overseas, and tried to deal with the pain he had caused her. She could not cope, and stood at the top of a local bridge for a few hours, contemplating all the heartache he had caused her, before tumbling off the edge. She had made the ultimate decision to "check out" of her life, all because of the pain my own ex had caused her. That was the scariest thing, to know that I held hands with someone who had caused another girl so much pain that she believed suicide was all she had strength for.
I had seen it, and I had felt it. I once believed that child abuse was only through parents and their children, but now I know anyone is capable of committing child abuse. It doesn't matter who it is, if they are hurting you in any way, it is abuse!
I know I have not dealt with the worst, but what I felt was absolutely nothing short of pain. Speaking to someone will do you much good in the future, even if you're feeling like your abuser will be angry. Would you rather them angry at you, or would you rather them physically hurting you?
Lyrics by Guy Sebastion from My Beautiful Friend:
"A million hearts are hurting, 'Cause they love you, Close your eyes and feel, Their arms around you now"
There is ALWAYS somebody to talk to. A teacher, a friend, a parent, an adult you trust, a police officer, a doctor, soooo many people love you too much to see you being hurt. Speak up, save your soul...
Thank you for reading such a long story.
XoXo
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