Closure. *trigger warning*

Dear Abuser,

If you ask me how old, Id tell you I was between 8-9 years old when it started. If you ask, how many, Id tell you three perpetrators. If you ask how long, Id say 2-3 years, although my memory says maybe it was a little more, but I cant remember that far back, because someone stole my memory. I should have been out in the garden playing with friends my own age, I should have been riding the swing and sliding the slides. Rolling around in mud and getting down and dirty, oh wait I was. Do you remember? I do. While youre daughter was out playing, I was inside, playing with you. Or do you not remember? I wish I could say you dont know me, but you know me all too well. Youve been inside me, thats why were here today.

Most people who know they were abused, have some sort of proof. But you were smart, you were oh so smart. Where I could have had thousands of scratches and bruises, you left not a scar. You left me whole, but little did people know I was broken. You slipped in and out, you snaked your way into me, you held me, felt me, but never hurt me. Or so you think. So many years gone by, and yet close my eyes and it feels like yesterday. My first time, do you remember it? I do. I remember every time you walked in me, every time you held me, every time you made me think you were someone to trust, but I soon realized then what I know now, that you were just a pervert, something was and is wrong with you. I used to look into the mirror and like what I see, but for years Ive looked into the mirror and I dont recognize the person staring back at me. I used to be carefree, now Im terrorized. I used to believe in fairy tales, now I dont know what to believe anymore.

You may think its about you, but thats not true. Its not that I dont want to expose you, no, this time its about me. Im not going to expose myself. This isnt about YOU. Its all about Me. Who am I? Well thats something you wont have the pleasure of knowing. I am the woman you raped behind the dumpster when no one was looking. I am the child you lured into the school closet to feel up. I am the little girl who you were meant to protect, the one you used and abused. I am the one you slowly broke, the one you held close, who you felt outside and within. I am the one you broke, but you might have won then, but I wont let you win again. I will NOT let you hurt me anymore. When I leave you will not come with me. When I walk in the dark, you will not lurk in the shadows behind me. When I lock my doors at night, you will not find your way into my bed again.

You may think you broke me, and for a long time you did. You took everything that made me, me and shattered it. You bent me until I could bend no more. You felt me, till I could feel no more. Before you came along I was someone, I was somebodys child, somebodys sister, somebodys friend, but you broke me. Like a thousand piece of shattered glass you left me to pick up the broken pieces of my life. You left me with years of depression, hours of suicidal tendencies. You left me standing on the side of the road waiting, waiting for that light to flicker, to go green, for the traffic to move, and for me to move with it.

Maybe you dont remember me, maybe I just a number on your list, but I will ALWAYS remember you. Remember that time we were driving home in the car, you shoved your hands down my uniform and said oh its just a game. Remember the time you made me lie on the bed, naked, broken, confused and alone? I do. Remember how you used me, played games with my head, made me believe I wanted this!? Well I didnt. You hear me now, I DIDNT. You took away EVERYTHING. You took away pieces of me I didnt even know existed. You STOLE my first kiss, you stole my right to intimacy, you stole my right to sex, you STOLE every part of me, over and over again, but I wont let you steal my soul. I WILL NOT let you take away anymore.

You ripped me open, day after day, you tore me apart. But not once did I change your mind, you took away my faith and stole my heart. You let me believe this was in my head, taking away my power and shame, leaving me lifeless in my own bed. You brought me shame, it wasnt mine to keep, but I couldnt give it away, even after you left. What had I done to deserve such fate? To have you call my name, have your fingers with me, against my will, to have so much regret and so many holes to fill.

Do you know what a trigger is? I didnt either, but I had to learn. Your disgusting smoky breath, your hands inside me, the times you made me watch as you made me scream, silently, disgustedly, you watched as you made me scream, not in pleasure, but in pain. You used my body against me, you let me believe I betrayed myself, I didnt want it, but you made me believe it was all my fault! What kind of monster are you? You stole from me, you left to believe I was special in all the wrong ways, you left me cry myself to sleep for endless days.

What was it all for? What did you gain from it? You took everything that makes me a woman, you started with an innocent child and ended with a broken woman. So you enjoy feeling up young girls? Raping women? You probably loved fooling around with the boys too! Youre not a human, youre an animal. You may not remember, but I will always remember how you raped me, over and over again. And where was your wife? Only a short distance away. You think youre so smart, you think you got away with it, and maybe you did. I trusted you, I thought you were on my side, but that was never true.

You broke me in ways I didnt even know how. But I wont let you steal my rights no longer, this has to end now. I protected you for years, and Ill never know why. I was never ready to tell my friends or my parents. YOU watched them fall apart, you watched them as they moved away, but that wasnt enough. You needed more, you needed a new way to hurt, and you were an animal looking for his next prey. I wasnt a victim of opportunity, I wasnt a deer running through the forest, I was just there. Your new toy, something to sink your teeth, and hands and tongue into. If I told them, I would see the fear on their faces, and mine would multiply by tenfold, so instead I pretended the whole thing wasnt real

I tried, I tried so hard for years to forget. And for almost four to five years, I did. I had no clue what happened, except you know the thing about memory? Its impossible to erase. What you did, I couldnt erase. It all came back, every dirty, perverse, retarded thing you did. Your family may never know, your friends may never know, the world may never know, but I will ALWAYS know. I will always know what you said, what you did, I will always know what you took from me.

For years, I didnt talk, I would eat too much or not at all. I didnt sleep, I cried myself to bed night after night, I cried in the shower, on the way to college, on the way home. All I did was cry. When I started to drive I would drive endlessly for hours trying to make sense of what happened to me. Trying to understand, replaying every thought, every action. I was so in the past, I hadnt realized the damage I was doing in the present.

You left me feeling guilty for years, the guilty might fade away, but it may never leave. But the truth is Im not GUILTY, you ARE! I may never have been able to take you to court, but I have made my peace with that. I will make peace, I will grow stronger, I will cry the first time I find someone I love, I will hurt, I will need to stop, I will discover myself as I go on. I will learn to grow, to go on, to reach new heights and go new places. I have slowly stopped being a victim, I will go on as a survivor, I will make it my mission to take down perverts, like you. I will stop being that little girl you raped, but you will ALWAYS be a PERVERT. The world may never know, but I will always know what you did.

A life, one life, you think about your life, your wife, your kids, but you forget about mine. You are the cause, and now like millions of women and men, I am the effect. You made me go through hell, even when you were finished with me. I never said NO, but I never said YES.. You pinned me down, you were stronger, and you won. You devastated my life, you sent me spiraling down. You lost nothing, but me, I lost everything. My damage was unseen, hidden, I will carry it with me for a lifetime to come. You took away parts of me I never knew I had. You stole my worth, my time, my safety, my right to intimacy and to everything thats meant to be natural and good.

For a while, I believed that this was all I was. I had to force myself to relearn my real name, my identity. To relearn that this is not all that I am. My independence, natural joy, gentleness, and steady lifestyle I had been enjoying became distorted beyond recognition. My life was put on hold for years, my structure had collapsed. You will never have an idea of hard I worked, how much time energy and money Ive spent. How many tears Ive shed and men Ive fooled around with. You took an innocent child, and turned me into a frustrated, confused adult. You took away my right to intimacy, so I ended up in bed with strangers finding the same.

I didn't want anyones pity and am still learning to accept victim as part of my identity. You made my own home the most uncomfortable place to be. You cannot give me back my sleepless nights. The way I have broken down sobbing uncontrollably, the times Ive thought about swerving that wheel just a little to farther to the right, the times Ive stood by the edge of the road waiting for the traffic lights to change. The times Ive cried endlessly holding a blade to my wrists, falling asleep praying that I wouldnt be able to see the morning light. You took away over 10 years of my life, you took away my right to intimacy, you took away my right to safety, but one day, somewhere and somehow I hope someone takes away your rights too. I know they say forgiveness is the key to happiness, but I cannot forgive. I will NOT forgive you. You do not deserve my forgiveness, you deserve to burn in hell.

I will never forgive you, but I will slowly learn to forgive myself. I will spend every new day learning how to be me, whoever that may be. I will learn to fight and protect those who mean everything to me. I will not sleep till I fight for justice, I will not shed any more tears, not for you. Now, now its about me. You may never get to read this, but the world, the world will know. They will know how you pinned me down, how you stole my innocence. The world will know what a monster you are, how you enjoy raping little girls, how you molested your own daughter.

I will move on, I will move away. If there's one thing you taught me, its never trust anyone. I will have children, and I will fight fiercely to protect them. Most people fear the monster's under their beds, I had to fear the monster in my bed. I will NOT let you take away their rights. You may have been my first, but you will never ever be the LAST. I will love, and be loved. I will have sex and enjoy it, I will cry, I will share with my husband, I will tell him the monster you are. I will find happiness, but you never will. You stole my virginity, but you WILL not steal my right to SEX.

There is only one sin, only one. And that is theft. Every other sin is a variation of theft. When you kill a man, you steal a life. You steal his wife's right to a husband, rob his children of a father. When you tell a lie, you steal someone's right to the truth. When you cheat, you steal the right to fairness. When you rape a woman, abuse a child, you steal their right to intimacy and sex and everything that is natural to them. There is no act more wretched than stealing. I am NOT my abuser. I am not my abuse. It is just a part of me.

(To all the men, women and children who have lost themselves to sexual abuse, I am with you. When you have cried, I have cried. Your sleepless nights have been my own. You are not what they did to you, you are YOU. You are NEVER alone. There is always Hope and there is always Help!)