Child Abuse Story From Anonymous22

by Anonymous
( Location Undisclosed)

I'm a seventeen year old girl. After twelve years of physical and emotional abuse, with the help of a friend, I recently got out of my situation. I'm trying to help myself and change the way I think about the things that happened to me.

The first time the abuse happened I was five years old. I was playing with my little sister and we were fighting over something. All of a sudden my dad lost it and came over and grabbed me and threw me into the wall. There was blood everywhere. He screamed at me about how he was sick of me being selfish and fighting with my sister. He told me this was what would happen to me if I ever misbehaved. This was the beginning of a long road of abuse.

I still can't understand why it only ever happened to me. My younger siblings never got abused. He was so loving towards them. It was always me that was never able to be loved by him. Nothing I did was ever good enough. I tried so hard to do everything he told me to so he wouldn't have a reason to hurt me. He always found a reason though. Sometimes it was because I loaded the dishwasher in a way that the dishes didn't get clean. Sometimes I forgot to do chores. Sometimes I asked to be allowed to do things that he didn't think I deserved to do. Whenever he was stressed out at work he would hurt me. He would kick, punch, throw things at me, throw me into walls and furniture, push me down stairs, or slap me. Once, my wrist broke when I got pushed down the stairs. My fingers and toes have been broken by being pushed into walls. I've had concussions and I was always covered in bruises. I found out that I should never cry, fall down, or beg for him to stop because that would only make it worse. I learned to just wait for it to be over. Then, after he was done hurting me, he would ask me what I would tell people when they asked me where the bruises came from. If I didn't have a good answer it would happen again, and it would be worse. I got really good at making up stories of where they came from and hiding what was really happening. So many times I just wanted to scream out the truth of what was going on, but I was so terrified of him. I didn't have the courage.

At the end of last year, one of my friends came right out and asked me if my dad hit me. The whole story spilled out. She convinced me to tell. I got CPS involved and they came to my house to talk to me. After they left I got thrown down onto the cement for telling. CPS didn't find enough evidence against him though, so nothing happened. I guess my dad was fed up with me and life with us though because he left soon after that. He's left before and was always threatening to leave but he usually came back within a week. He hasn't come back and I don't really know what's going to happen. I don't want to press charges against him.

My mom blamed me for my dad leaving. She knew what was happening but she was never strong enough to stand up to him on my behalf. She begged me never to tell anyone, she always needed my dad. She suffers from bad depression. About a month after my dad left, my mom tried to commit suicide by taking a whole bottle of pills. Now, she's in the mental hospital diagnosed with severe depression and anxiety.

I'm still in high school, but I've had to step up and be the parents for my three younger siblings. I love them and I'll do anything for them but it's hard to take care of them all by myself with just a little help from my grandparents. I'm in charge making sure everything gets done. I try to act like everything's okay. I try not to let anyone see how hard it is to be the parent when you're only seventeen. On the outside it seems like I'm fine. I do really well in school and I have good friends.

I'm very confused about everything that's happened. I don't know what I did wrong to make my dad abuse me. I don't know why it only happened to me. I know I shouldn't blame myself because of my mom's suicide attempt, but if I hadn't told anyone what was happening she probably never would've tried to take her life. I pretend like I'm fine but in reality everything is a disaster. I'm trying to get over what has happened to me. I don't think it's possible to ever heal completely though. It takes such a toll on an innocent child. It messes up your emotions for life.

Darlene's comments to this "Child Abuse Story From Anonymous22" can be found at Comments below this submission. Depending on system activity, there are sometimes delays in comments going live on my site; but rest assured, they do eventually appear. So if you don't yet see them, I hope you will return later to read what I, and possibly others, have written. I thank you for your patience and understanding.

Email addresses, phone numbers, home addresses AND website/blog URLs in visitor comments are STRICTLY prohibited, and could result in being banned from making further comments on this site.