Momma's Girl

***WARNING: THIS POST MAY HAVE CONTENT THAT YOU FIND OFFENSIVE OR EXPLICIT. SHOULD NOT BE SHARED WITH CHILDREN. PROCEED WITH CAUTION***


My parents divorced before I was born. My mother met a man shortly after I was born. She eventually married him. She had her fourth and last daughter a year and four months after I was born. My mother was trying her best to give us a life that she never had. This man that she had married was like a real father to me. He was there since the beginning and I hadn't met my real father yet. My mother wasn't comfortable letting me (just a baby) go to my real father's house. However, my two older sisters, were doing the every other weekend visits with him. As far as I knew, this new man in my mom's life was my dad. My younger sister would be like a twin to me. My youngest childhood memory is my 3rd birthday. I believe my mom had to work. So my sisters and I were being baby sat by my mom's cousin Mary. That morning of my birthday she [Mary] took us to our tribal Sunday's shaker church service. My mother is Native American and belonged to the church. I remember being scared of the candles people were holding. They sang a prayer and walked the walls of the church. Mary was holding me, I tried to bury my head in her shoulder. Not sure why this frightened me so bad. When the service was over everyone poured out of the church into the parking lot. There I would meet the man who ruined my life. This day, my 3rd birthday would be the day I have to go to his house for the first time. I was holding onto Mary for dear life. I cried out "I don't want to go with him," but there was no choice. He bribed me to go, "How about I take you to the store and you can pick out a toy, like a Barbie or something else." I agreed to go, but wasn't happy about it. This sort of bribery took place through out our relationship. My sisters thought I was this little spoiled brat getting everything I wanted. He was just keeping me happy for his sake. It's obvious to me now why this is my youngest childhood memory. It was one of the first traumatic moments in my life. Soon after, I joined my two older sisters and went his house every other weekend. He had a place out by a lake. It was the smallest place I would have ever lived in. It was a one bedroom mobile trailer. He made some sort of bed for my two older sisters in this cubby in the hallway. There was no room for me with my sisters. So I had to sleep in his bed with him. My youngest memory of the first time he touched me was around the time I was 5. This became a routine every time I was there for the weekend. He never said to me that this was a secret and to not tell anybody. I guess he trusted that I didn't know any better. Well he was right. There are images that I can't ever get out of my head. My father had a big pot belly, so big that he would set his dinner plate on it to eat. I will never forget the feeling of being high centered on his giant fat gut. I will never get the sound of the Vaseline jar being opened out of my head. I remember being in one of my foster homes and the girl I shared a room with would put lip balm on her lips before bed. Every time she opened and closed that jar I would just cringe and my whole body would tense up immediately. I will not have Vaseline in my house ever. The smell of his sheets are still fresh in my mind. The rhythm to his breathing I can hear right now as I type. The sound of his wound up alarm clock tick tocking as the night went on. I remember focusing on the ticks of the clock as he did his thing. Even though I had no idea that what he was doing was abuse, somehow it still felt wrong. It's this uncomfortable feeling, like you need to escape your body. I wanted to escape my body many times. Having this uncontrollable good feeling, but trying to make your body stop it. It was a fight I lost many times. In a sexual aspect my innocence was stolen. No little girl should ever know what an orgasm feels like. Of course, being a child I had no idea that's what my body was doing. It wasn't until I was in high school that I knew I already had experienced an orgasm. These horrifying memories I have will always be a part of me whether I like it or not. They make me feel like a gross and disgusting human being. There's not enough soap and hot water in the world to wash this human clean. There are times just the very thought of these memories are enough to make me want to vomit. He took so much from me that I will never have. I have to deal with this on a daily basis. It takes convincing that I do deserve to live a happy life, like so many others I witness. He didn't take everything though. I will persevere, I have already persevered. I now live a better life because of me and only me. In fact, I live a better life than he. He is in his little corner of the world rotting away. He thought he won this one.