Dear Mrs. Bluth,
I don’t know where to begin. I am staring at this piece of paper that, according to my therapist, will be the springboard to my recovery, and I don’t know where to start. So many regrets, mistakes and youthful foolishness have brought me to this dark and lonely place. Please, bear with me if I sound like I’m rambling, I will try not to be too disjointed. It seems that from my earliest childhood, I’ve been on the fast track to failure, which lead to destructive associations and poor judgement choices.
My childhood was a fairly ordinary one, being the middle child with an older brother and younger sister and parents who loved us but were not too demonstrative. They did not believe in showing physical affection, but were generous with compliments and moral support. This seemed to be all right with my siblings, but I recall loving to cuddle with my doll and even the stray cats I played with. The thing I remember most is when my father’s youngest brother came to stay with us from Argentina; I was ten at that time. I was so excited, I remember helping to clean the spare room and gathering flowers to put in a vase, to make him feel welcome. My uncle Jack was everything my father (or mother) wasn’t. He was full of laughter, hugs, and generous to a fault. I loved him from the first moment he stepped into our house. I couldn’t understand why my parents seemed to disapprove of him playing around with us and when I asked my mother why, she said is that it was not proper for a grown man to act like a child; I could tell she had taken a great dislike to him.
I recall being sick and home from school when Mama had to go out to pick up my medication. She reluctantly asked Uncle Jack to look after me for a few moments until she returned. I heard the door close and soon, footsteps coming up the stairs and toward my room. The door opened and Uncle Jack came in carrying a glass of water and sat on my bed as I took a few sips. My throat was on fire and I started crying and he moved to comfort me, holding me and stroking my hair. I closed my eyes and was dozing off, when things took an awful turn. Not knowing what to do, I just lay there, pretending to be asleep, until the front door opened downstairs and Mama was home…. and uncle Jack jumped off the bed and raced out of my room. I knew something very wrong had happened because I felt unclean, like I needed to shower. I thought to tell Mama about it when she brought me my medication, but I felt ashamed and kept silent, pretending to myself that it had been a dream that really didn’t happen. But it did happen – again and again, many times over. It only stopped when my father caught uncle Jack molesting my little sister and uncle Jack disappeared from our house never to be heard from again. But what he did set me on a path of self-destruction.
The years followed in a blur of failures. I failed in school (where I was once an excellent student), failed at making friends preferring to keep to myself. I thought my past was like a mark everyone could see if they got too close. I barely scraped by in college and found it hard to get a job. And when I finally got one, I managed to get myself fired in short order, when the boss reminded me of uncle Jack. I started taking sleeping pills to help me sleep at night, diet pills to keep me up during the day and Scotch, to help me forget. Soon, I found myself totally dependant on all three. To complicate matters, I met a nice fellow at work who took an interest in me and I was beginning to have feelings for him. Things moved along and one day, as we were sitting on a park bench during lunch break, he asked me out on a date. All of a sudden my world imploded, I didn’t want to be anywhere near him. I couldn’t stand the thought of sharing anything with him and the idea of marriage set off a panic attack. My behavior must have been an Oscar worthy performance, because he kept his distance from that moment on. However, two weeks later, I found a note on my desk, attached to one red rose that read, “I know you’re fighting some awful demons… please let me help.” That evening, after work, we had dinner in a quiet little restaurant and I told him enough for him to understand that I was toxic and that I would only hurt him if he persisted. He looked me straight in the eyes and told me that he had also been abused as a child, but had been in therapy and was now well on the road to recovery. To say I felt relieved was an understatement. Here was someone who understood the hell I was living in and it gave me hope that I, too, could recover and lead a normal life.
He also said he’d be right by my side, no matter how long it took. He said he’d wait for me.
So, here I am, hoping that the letter I am writing to you will enable the therapist to understand the things I cannot put into words. Although she suggested that I need not actually send it, it could be cathartic just writing it, I decided to send it in case there’s another little girl in a grown-up body suffering in silence.
Thank you for helping me open the door to my nightmares and, hopefully, letting the sunlight in. My life is waiting for me to live it and this is the very first step.
Little Dina
Dear Dina,
In all of us lives a young child that recedes within our conscious as we grow, taking with it all the things good and bad that it has experienced and lies dormant, until something or someone awakens it.
You have suffered a severe childhood trauma. You were a child who was sexually assaulted and unable to defend yourself or share what had happened, you did what all children who wish to hide painful feelings do – you buried it in your sub-conscious, pretending it never happened, that it was just a bad dream. But it never really goes away. It only goes to sleep, until it’s jarred awake – and then the real nightmare begins.
I am so glad this young man is at your side and was the catalyst for you to seek help. He sounds like a keeper. With the therapist’s guidance and his feelings to encourage you forward, I foresee only sunshine and a beautiful future. But there’s much work to be done. There will be good days, bad days and great days and, with time, there will be good days and great days only. Stay the course with your therapist, and hold on tight to your young man because his strength and devotion is equally as important.
A warning to parents. Every family has the propensity for dysfunction, as it is comprised of individuals. If you have someone who resembles “Uncle Jack,” keep a sharp eye out for anything amiss. A family friend, babysitter or anyone who has access to your home and children should be carefully vetted. Better to err on the side of caution than to later be weighed down by guilt and regret.
