Child Abuse Story From Chanelle

by Chanelle
(England, UK)

Visions. Voices. Blurred images. All is combined, in a fiery trio of a flashback.

Pain. This heart-wrenching, tearing-apart, intense, soul-wrenching pain. The pain of having parents who don't love you. For twenty one years, living the illusion that you were the problem. Always introspecting, reflecting on ways to soften, soothe, encourage them to love you. So you try and be the pleaser, the protector, the saviour. All ends up futile. They still find reasons to reject you. They manage. They succeed. Twenty one years of living a lie. It's as though you awaken from a coma. Literally there, emotionally inexistent. Invisible. Dust. They hate you. They hate your essence. They hate your very being. Your existence. Everything about you. You.

Those foggy, piercing, unclear, voices. Those haunting words: "Why were you born? All you ever do is trouble." Then there are more voices. Louder, more of a shrieking kind of sound: "I cannot wait for the day you die. That day will mark the first day of peace. We'll all celebrate with a huge party."

Images. Floaty images cascading over my mind. Above me. I am not there. I choose to suppress. Suppress the torment. Deny. Happy facade. Happy exterior. Fake. Concealed plants, of truth, pain, rejection, seeps in. The memory wants some acknowledgement of validity. Self-doubt creeps in. Denial sucks out the truth. Like a vacuum. Sapping the truth.

Chest pains. Difficulty breathing. Brick-like sensations in the throat. You wanna cry. You wanna cry for that baby. The little innocent baby that felt invisible. In despair. Unimportant. You wanna cry for the little girl with the thick bronze-like hair bouncing, and those deep, intricate green eyes that witnessed so much. Those emotionless, empty, hollow expressions from Mummy. The leather belt prying on your smooth backside. Those sarcastic verbal and non-verbal messages from Mummy about you "never making it" and emphasising her point that you will definitely be a spinster "coz, who is gonna want you anyway?"

That soul-wrenching cry emanating from your little siblings mouth. That piercing scream for help. For protection. So you run in. Too late. The tears already accumulating on their satin, pure, holy faces...oh how you want to vacuum out their pain, how you want to comfort them. Wrap them up in cotton wool, in myriads of layers and protect them. Envelop them with warmth, love. Unconditional support. To love them for everything they consist of. Their holy, satin traits. Their holy, satin features.

I'm nauseous of slavery. The slavery of trying too hard to obtain the approval of my mummy and daddy and that of others...I am nauseous. I am nauseous. I am sick of vomiting out the sarcasm, the hurt, the abuse, the pain of seeing my precious siblings in pain, oh so much pain. Now, I want freedom.

I want and aspire to be free. To free myself of others' conceptions of me. I want to rejoice in my own identity. To be me, to love me, to care for me, to heal me. To energise myself, so that I am overflowing with love and giving, that will automatically seep into my gorgeous siblings and those satin features and bold, pain-filled eyes of those who have suffered pain. The kind of pain that haunts you for eternity. But also the kind of pain that is softened, soothed with just one iota of unconditional love, warmth, validation of the self. The precious, holy, self.