Child Abuse Story From Tiffany

by Tiffany
(Location Undisclosed)

I am 21 years old now. I have 5 siblings. I am the second to oldest and have 2 younger sisters. Until recently I thought the sexual abuse only began when I was 11 years old but now people are telling me that the "fun and games" my older brother initiated when I was young was also sexual abuse. Starting when I was 7 years old, my older brother would ask all of us to get undressed (my twin brother and my younger sister who was 5 then). He would then touch us in our private parts. We would touch rear ends and he would also touch his penis to our vaginas. He and my twin brother would also "play together." We did this quite often. I knew it was uncomfortable at the time but it was fun too...?

When I was in 6th grade my youngest sister was born. A lot of his sexual abuse got worse around the time my mother was pregnant with her. I remember when I was just starting to develop breasts. We were all playing the backyard with the hose when he sprayed all the water directly at my chest. My t-shirt clung to me and he made fun of how I was starting to develop breasts. He then made me promise that when I turned 18 I would expose my breasts to him. Over the next year he continued to tease me about developing and asked me a number of times to promise that I would expose myself. He had lots of clever ways for touching my breasts right in front of my parents without them noticing. Like when he would reach from behind me to get something from the table and touch me on the way. I sat across from him at the dinner table and he would put his toes up on my chair wiggling between my legs.

He also would try to open our room when we were getting dressed, trying to see us naked. A few times he succeeded. He would take my bra and underwear and use them to arouse himself and masturbate. I was obsessed with having the door completely closed and locked before going to bed. To this day I do not know why.

My, at the time, baby sister was sexually harassed the most. As a baby he would pinch her nipples, suck on her nipples, massage her between the legs, and stick his hands through her diaper and try to stick his finger up her - this happened all the time, and in front of me and sometimes my other sister. When she started to crawl she would try to get away - hiding behind the sofa - he would trap her there and continue to do his stuff (or he chased her there). I wish I would have said more to stop it but whenever I said anything he would just laugh or give me a mean look. He would also often pull down his pants in front of me, then he would masturbate himself until he got an erection. I remember once he pulled down his pants and aroused himself then he took my little sister and placed her right on top of his penis. Another time he exposed himself lying down, then he moved my sister back and forth over his himself. I think he did this type of stuff in front of me on purpose because the more scared I got the more he laughed. His harassment wasn't just sexual - he would often put her on top of the refrigerator. She would scream and cry. I was always a very scrawny, short kid (he was twice my size) so I couldn't get her down, but he didn't care. Sometimes he would put her in the garbage can for a couple of minutes or hold her over the washing machine before he put her down.

One day I was in my room. Only my brother and little sister were home. All of a sudden I heard shrieking screams. I ran. There was my brother holding her over a 2nd floor railing that overlooks our living room, and laughing away, sneering at me. I told him to stop and put her down but he wouldn't listen. I thought for sure he would drop her (to the first floor) but I just stood there dumbly.

At the end of 8th grade, I came down with chronic fatigue syndrome. I didn't go to school for 2 years. I was home alone all the time with my brother and baby sister (my mother would go shopping and he would stay home). I became hyper about making sure I knew where she was all the time. I wasn't always successful. And I still couldn't stop him from doing what he did with her out in the open.

In 11th grade, he got reported and was taken out of the house. In 11th grade, I returned to school. I went into therapy. In therapy I always insisted that it really wasn't a big deal and that nothing really happened. In therapy, I realized that I was also verbally abused by my mother. I knew I was terrified of my mother and her wrath but I thought all parents did that.

I remember the time I had been home with my brother and sister and something really bad happened of which I have no memory. My mother came home and saw my little sister all spaced out and looking terrified. She screamed at me to tell her what happened - I just stared at her numb - now I realize that I wasn't all there, I was all shaken up myself but back then I just didn't think. She just kept screaming louder, "Why can't you talk" and then to my sister, "Why can't your sister say something"...until finally she slapped me across the face and I just started sobbing. That was the only time she hit me but her screaming and rage were very common.

I worked a lot in therapy about my terror of my mother. I have so many stories of her terrorizing me and I would just go into la-la land where I didn't quite hear her or know what was going on. She would then scream at me that I need a lot of psychological help for not being able to speak to her. I couldn't possibly include even a fraction of her verbal attacks here. Or of her expectations for me to run the house (I feel more like a servant than a daughter).

I am still very scared of her but I have come a long way and sometimes I even "talk back". At first, she screamed at me that I was taking her stuff way too personally or even that she was right to yell at me after all that I did.

I am shaking just thinking about putting my story out on this website. I am so confused because I have been reading some of these stories and mine is not nearly as bad. I guess I'm beginning to see how I was hurt but still feel numb and confused, to realize that I was hurt but still feel really numb and confused about the whole thing.

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