from victim to survivor - my own story.

NOTE: This post discusses child sexual abuse and may be a triggering subject for some readers.

“The unexamined life is not worth living.”

-Socrates

A little girl in a white night dress sits on the floor of her closet. Knees pulled up to chest, arms wrapped tight, she makes herself as small as possible. The door is cracked open, but the darkness is prevailing and only a tiny shaft of light falls across her form. She closes her eyes and prays that the sights and sounds outside the door will fade and that she will be safe within this room. She hopes someday that she will be able to open the door slowly and emerge into quiet peace.

I was a young child when I was sexually abused. Now I remember pieces of what happened, I remember sights and sounds. The smell of a man, the aftershave he wore. The red and black checks on a flannel shirt. The weight of him on top of me, crushing my life and suffocating me. The color of the walls (yellow) and the carpet (brown shag). But when I remember it, I remember it as a third party, watching from above, in the corner of the room.

Throughout my life, until I was 24, I blocked those memories out, along with most of my childhood. I went on with my life, as "normal"; as I knew "normal" to be. I didn't realize that people don't just block out years of their life. I didn't realize remembering a 6th birthday party was something most people take for granted. I thought it was normal to have violent nightmares every night. I argued with people who said it was impossible to die in your dreams, and if you did you would die in real life. I had died too many times to count in my dreams and I remembered every time thinking, 'it's not so bad.'

Every night when I fell asleep, the dreams would come. It seems like they were always there. I was in a house, or a building. I was hiding, always hiding, fearful of being discovered. I remember a clock that always showed up in my dreams, signaling that I would have to come out of hiding, and I remember always being chased and, sadly, caught by my captors. Waking up nightly in a sweat, completely silent, biting my lip until the blood came, I would open my eyes and lie still as a statue. I would look around the room fearfully, getting my bearings, then eventually drift off to another nightmare. It happened for so long, I grew accustomed to it. I knew no other life.

The world needs more love letters - a challenge!

"Do what you can with what you have where you are."
-Theodore Roosevelt (but probably really Eleanor!!)

Last night I wrote a love letter to a stranger.

Wait. Let me back up...

This year has not been easy. With financial difficulties, a battle with a fierce depression (I won!), a work and school schedule that leaves me breathless, deaths of friends and family members, a cancer scare, and another tough year at school for my sweet baby girl, I've been under a lot of pressure.

That's not to say I don't live a blissful life! I have a wonderful man who completes me in every way. I have three AMAZING kids, who make me smile regularly. I have a home and reliable transportation, and so far, I've got food on the table and heat that kicks in when it gets cold. I have a lot to be thankful for, but sometimes I start feeling sorry for myself, thinking things could be easier. Wishing I had the ((perceived)) bliss of someone else. Blaming the people I love for the pressure I feel. Complaining, whining... its a slippery slope.

When I start getting like this, I have a compulsive habit. I go on the internet and start searching for inspiration. I listen to TED talks (I really love TED). I read Christine Moer's blog. I sign up for happy lists. And I help people.

Sometimes people who know me comment on how many people I try to help through volunteering or donating or raising money or awareness. They seem to think that my efforts are due to a philanthropic, giving spirit. But... the truth is, it makes me feel better. The thing that people who don't do these things don't realize is the big secret: Giving makes the GIVER feel better most times than the receiver. It's true. Giving makes me feel better about myself and my situation, and that's why I do it. Don't get me wrong, I like helping make this world a better place to be, and helping people less fortunate than myself. But the reward of how I feel when I get to help people personally - well, that's worth more than anything I gave them. It makes me smile, it makes me warm and glowy, it makes me HAPPY.

This year time and money have both been constraints, so I looked for ways to help people that worked with my life and family. In May, I did a push to raise money and supplies to send to Joplin after the tornado. In June, it was the wildfires in Bastrop. In November, I signed up the whole family for delivering food. In between, I tried to figure out what else I could do and I found some really great things going on some of which don't require hardly any time or money, but can really help out other people.

For example:
Gateway (my church) doesn't start it's own ministries, instead they connect with local non-profits doing great work in the area and list their volunteer opportunities here. That's how I found out that 5,000 people were needed to deliver meals to needy families on Thanksgiving Day at Mission Arlington. All it required was my family, my smile, my car, and 4 hours of my time. :) Happy day!

Sometimes I just can't make my schedule work, though, so I am always looking for other options... like stuff I can do from home or my computer. That's how I found out about Love Bomb. When you sign up to be a Love Bomber, you get an email every Thursday with the Love Bomb mission. Usually it is someone with a blog who is going through a rough time, and hundreds of people drop warm love notes in the comments on the specified post. Maybe they just say "love bombing you today!" or maybe they write a lot to the person - its up to the Bomber. But that takes me 5 minutes every Thursday!

It was through Love Bomb that I found the most awesome idea of all time, which brings me to why I wrote a love letter last night. The World Needs More Love Letters is a project that can do good no matter who you are, what you have or where you are. Everyone has a piece of paper and a pen, right? The mission is simple: write a letter to a stranger. Leave it in a place where someone will find it.
This is why I was up at midnight last night, writing a love letter to a stranger. The world DOES need more love letters, and I'm just the one to do it. It was just a letter of encouragement, telling the stranger that they aren't alone, and that other people are in this fight together. It was a letter to give hope and encouragement to a person I don't know. A person I will never know, probably. And I left it in front of Dollar General on a pile of charcoal.

It made me happy, writing that letter. When I was telling the stranger not to lose hope, and to believe and have faith that things were going to work out, and that they are not alone and they are loved, something magical happened inside me. I believed it for myself. 


So here's my challenge to you. Go to their website and check it out. Then, tonight, when your kids are in bed and you're getting ready to turn in for the night, spend 5 minutes writing a letter to someone you don't know. You can pour out your heart. You can tell them they are worthy and loved. You can tell them they aren't alone. In my letter, I wrote what I needed to hear. Take a picture of it with your phone and email it to me. Then put it in an envelope and mark the outside something like "For You. (Yes, you the one who picked this up!)" Then tomorrow, while you're out and about, sneakily drop the letter in a place where it will be found by someone.

I'll post every picture I receive on my blog and facebook. We're all in this together, right? And the world DOES need more love letters!!