I'm putting this out here because I'm trying to get better at telling my story so maybe I can support other women, but I've only been able to get these words out once in my life and it was to my husband...

I was sexually abused for years.

For 3 years I was touched by my brother's best friend. (He was 14-17 and I was 9-12) He didn't have a good home life so he regularly stayed multiple nights at our house. It started with "innocent" playing Dr. and it got worse to me giving him hand jobs and BJs. One time when my parents were gone, he and my brother charged the neighborhood boys $10 each to come over and touch me. I was given some money afterwards and they convinced me that if I told I would be in trouble because I "wanted to do it." As I got older I started fighting back, and I started to get hit and even burned with a curling iron by this friend. (My brother wasn't as involved but he still knew.)

When I was 13, the boy and his mom moved so I was free, but I was having really bad social outbursts so I confessed to my mom what happened. I was so afraid, all I told her is that my brother talked me into playing Dr. and made it all innocent sounding. She put both my brother and I in therapy. It didn't really help me because I felt like I couldn't talk about it because my mom was so afraid someone would report my brother to the police that she said I could only talk about it to her and my therapist. My dad pretends like it didn't happen.

On a positive note, my brother got the help he needed and fought the demons. I truly believe the therapy stopped him from turning into a predator. He grew into a beautiful adult who married, volunteered, and repaired his relationship with me before he passed. I was able to forgive him, and before you say I was wrong for doing that, it has been so freeing. And so I've been learning to forgive the other boy. And it has been amazing to feel that lifted. Amazing to feel that if I ever saw him I wouldn't have a panic attack. Amazing to feel that I don't need to live in fear when ever I get a social media request from someone I don't know.

I still don't know how to talk about all this. One one hand, I feel free, on the other hand, I feel haunted. For some reason when I go to talk about it I freeze. Like the words are trapped in my throat. I don't want to be owned by this story. So here I am, learning to share, learning to say forgiveness is freeing, learning to say that we are are worth more than what's been told to us. Thanks for reading and stay strong for anyone recovering from similar stuff.