Child Abuse Story From Chantal
by Chantal
(Oshawa, Ontario, Canada)
Emotion abuse story:
I was the youngest of four children, all girls. My father had very explosive anger problems and was fairly emotionally abusive. I've read a lot about abuse for my school project I am doing, and it fits my childhood to a T. Finally realizing why I have the trust issues is really empowering.
My father used to call us names and kind of torment us. My eldest sister suffered from a long last eating disorder. My other sister had become very suicidal, and my other one has become addicted to heavy drugs. It is fair to say that I am the lucky one; by age 11 I was free from my abusive father. But that also means I've spent the majority of my life without any father figure, be that good or bad.
I feel very sorry for what I allowed my father to do. Not only did he call us names but he had violent outbursts and on a few occasions actually physically abused my sisters. He also destroyed my mother's family heirlooms on many occasions.
I'm very lucky compared to my sisters. The only emotional problems I've seem to obtain are trust issues, and I do often get depressed. I feel guilty a lot of the time for allowing my father to hurt my family. I also feel guilty for not being a drug addict, or having an eating disorder or being suicidal. I wonder why I was so lucky.
Thank you for this site. It's really helped me learn, and sharing my story is like getting a load off my shoulders because I do not trust even my closest friends enough to tell them about this.
Note from Darlene: I regret that I can no longer continue the practice of commenting on visitor submissions to the degree I have in the past, as I am currently writing a book on healing from child abuse. I ask that you please read my post of June 24, 2009 titled Announcement Regarding my Comments for a complete explanation. I welcome you to follow my progress on my Facebook page at Healing from Child Abuse. When you get there, don't forget to click onto the Become a Fan link. I do hope to hear from you there.
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.
