ashamed:redact

SBY, February ‘24

Trigger warning: Discussion of childhood sexual assault

Whiteout in Saskatchewan (March 2007) / Taken by BriYYZ on Flickr

“Near Regina SK. Yes there is a road there!”

I don't really know what to say here to make you believe me. I don't particularly know how I could explain myself in a way that makes it clear. I don't remember it very clearly at all. If at all. I have nightmares that show me it, sometimes, but I don't always believe them. (I guess then how are you supposed to believe me, if I can hardly believe it myself?) I was a victim of circumstance. Or maybe curiousity. Or maybe capriciousness. I was 10. Or 6 or 7. Or, actually, maybe 9? I think I met her when I was 9, but I didn't meet            until I was a little older. The timeline is fuzzy. I want to believe it was her who did it, because she was a child, and I can forgive a child. But the nightmares are bit insistent otherwise. Perhaps I should start somewhere else.

I was told, by my mother, that after a sleepover with          , (at my house, where I grew up, where I still live) I told my mom that she . . . . . . ..  with me. I think this probably happened. I don't really remember. Why else would a kid say that? What I've been told, is that before then, I did not know what that meant. And when pressed, I told my mom that it had to do with “. . . . . .. . . . .”

Recently, though, I started having nightmares. A lot of them. I haven't even told my therapist, because I'm afraid of them being real. I don't want to believe they're real. It can't be real because I would remember something like this. If it were real, I would know. Consciously, I would know. It cannot be real, I cannot believe that it's real, because if it were real then that would mean that I was . . . . . . . . . and nobody knew, and nobody tried to stop it. But I want you to believe me. I need you to. I need somebody to.

My mom told me that she spoke to my friend's dad after the sleepover, and he reported back that she denied all of it. Which really proves nothing. If she did . . . me, she obviously wouldn't want to get in trouble for doing something wrong. And if he . . ..  me, too, and maybe even her and . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . ., which is not out of the question, really, then it makes sense that he was covering his tracks.

Something that occurs to me now is that she never even . . . . me, and that simply the association with her father made me bring this up to my mom. It's possible that she never tried anything, and that I was a kid trying to find a roundabout way to tell my mom that I was . . . . . . ..

What I was told, by nightmares, is that                     (and there's the distinct sensory memory of clawing on the leather couch, the smell and fingernail feel). There's another pair of eyes. Her older brother.. . . . . ., and I let . . . . . . . . which is odd, because, famously, I didn't like             , and I still don't like being touched. ... ..... ..... … ..... .... ..... ...................... .......(it made me feel locked in place) and there was nothing I could do as. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 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And then I usually wake up.