Survivor of Rape and Incest: Letter to my father

Thursday, May 18, 2006

Letter to my father

I've been writing this for months, I can never quite articulate what I really want to say. How angry I am. How much pain he caused. This is just a start and I don't think there will ever really be an end...

I fucking hate you.

You stole my innocence. You stole my ability to be a child. You stole my ability to trust. You destroyed the precious father daughter relationship I longed for.

You stole everything that was pure.

I was just a little girl. Why did you do those things to me? Why did you have to hurt me? Why did you always tell me I was daddy's special girl... that I was the most beautiful girl in the world until you would hurt me then you would say I was ugly and that you hated me. Is that why you hurt me, because you hated me and I deserved it? Is there something I did to deserve it? Was I not good enough? I always tried so hard to please you, to be the best daughter you could have and yet you still continued to hurt me.

Asking these questions are ridiculous. NOTHING I did or could have done was reason enough to do those terrible things to me. To hurt me in so many ways, to scar my life, to take away my childhood. To destroy my innocence.

The hate I have for you is so encompassing I think it will swallow me whole. I sometimes think about how I could cause you the same turmoil you have caused me, but that is just not possible. There is nothing that I could inflict on you that you would even remotely begin to equal the pain you have caused me.

How do you wake up every morning knowing what you did to me? How do you look at yourself in the mirror and not see the monster you really are? How do you laugh and smile and lead a normal life while I'm left struggling each and every fucking day?

Do you remember the hair brush? Do you remember the hot curling iron? Do you remember the cigarette burns you left on my thighs? Do you remember my cries of pain? Do you remember me pleading and begging you to stop? Do you remember laughing at me?

I remember.

I will NEVER be able to fucking forget. I will never be able to erase the pain, the memories, the terror or confusion.

I despise you. I can barely wait till the day you die so I can spit on your grave.

Fuck you daddy dearest.

FUCK YOU.

I decided to post this today because it's NOT MY FAULT. It never has been my fault. It never will be my fault.

My counsellor said that to me in one of our sessions, I can't remember if it was yesterday or last week but it has been sitting with me, weighing heavily on my mind.

IT IS NOT MY FAULT.

I am really very angry.

Today I recognize and accept that it is not my fault. I understand that tomorrow or next week or next month I may not. When we first started working on this, I saw it as all or nothing. I either accept 100% that it was not my fault ALL of the time, or I accept that it was ALL of the time. No in between, no grey area. I'm giving myself permission to have a grey area. To go back and forth with it either being or not being my fault. Eventually, I will no longer need the grey area and it will forever be NOT MY FAULT.

I need this grey area because I have hit a wall. I have been so terrified of even trying to accept that it's not my fault because of what it means and the changes it brings. To accept that it wasn't my fault means I have to change my way of thinking, my way of coping, my way of surviving. Everything. And I would have to do it all at once, leaving me floundering. With the grey area, I'm not floundering. I'm still scared, but I'm not terrified and pressed against a wall barely breathing. I can see the other side, I can see how it's not my fault and understand that it's not my fault and slowly let go of the shame and guilt, the hatred, the disgust I hold for myself. I can slowly start to adapt to the loss of those feelings and thoughts allowing room for new thoughts and feelings.

This is going to be a very long, rough journey with many bumps, hills and valleys along the way. I kind of wish I had a map to guide me, but with all you, my counsellor and the inner strength that sometimes seems never ending I'm sure I'll reach the end in one piece, a fuller more complete piece.