When I first wrote this site I never dreamed that sexual abuse would be pushed into the minds and hearts of nearly all Americans via The Catholic Church. It is a good thing that sexual abuse has been pushed into the media as this type of abuse is only understood by those who have been abused and those who work closely with the abused. In fact, the abuser rarely understands the damage that they have done. This is a very selfish crime. I know. My abuser threatened a lawsuit if I went public with my memories of those horrible events. All I can say "go right ahead."

My own father is a sexual abuser having severely abused my sisters, his twin daughters. At age 49 I have seen first hand what that abuse has done to these two women that are now 53 years of age. I can also testify to the fact that both my father and mother will go to their graves never giving explanation or closure to their three kids. Although on some levels I forgive them as best I can, on other levels anger still resides within me. I think I will always feel a measure of anger and a deep sense of loss and sorrow. I try not to think about it because it hurts so deeply.

The public at large does a huge disservice to the victims of abuse by thinking this is something rare or something that a person can just get over. Or something being made up. { Why would anyone make up something like this?} No one gets over it fully--ever. It's like a part of you has been torn away. No more than I can regenerate a missing leg or arm can I just forget or undo the impact of my physical abuse, nor my sister's sexual abuse and the effects on our lives. It stands among us and between us like a huge thorn bush keeping us distanced and in pain if we reach to close the gap.

We are a family torn apart by this. I have one sister in my life and no parents. They are living, yet I am dead to them because I need answers that they will not supply. The questions will never go away and I cannot deal with them without those answers. I think I've earned those answers.

This site is the best I can do to make something good out of all of our shared childhood trauma. It has to count for something good and not just pure evil.

In my case, in the years before I came into recovery I couldn't form strong personal relationships with women. I divorced twice. Intimacy was sex, period. I couldn't trust women. I couldn't trust myself to make decisions. I couldn't commit to people or even business contracts. I didn't respect authority. In fact, I despised authority whether it was a boss, cop or God. I ran into legal problems because I hated even the flashing lights on police cruisers. I fought everyone to appease my anger. Yet to no avail. It consumed me and nearly killed me.

I knew there was a God. But my image of God was my so called Christian father kicking me, hitting me, pushing me and strapping me with his belt, swearing as he threw repeated tantrums and screaming almost daily. He forced us to go to church and berated us all the way home....in the name of God is how I saw it as a child. I was stupid in the name of God. I was bad in the name of God and I was worthless in the name of God! God the father. God my father. God the SOB that just keeps hurting me.

I see it now as driving a wedge between me and anything that could ever help me. If you fear and hate authority, there is no one to turn to. Not a soul. If you fear God because of a false impression, who can you pray to? So you turn to use people and substances to get you by. I wonder how many school shooters felt this way?

As with most abused kids all of us turned to find relief outside of ourselves. I did booze, drugs and sex while one of my sisters did lots of sex, pot and booze. In addition she uses people. { She is dying of aids}. I think better life choices were absent because of her view of sex.

My other sister became a PHD Psychologist dealing in women's issues. I know that until about age 40 she had trust and intimacy issues. Her education and sense of purpose seemed to override the symptoms that I and her twin experienced. It took us all at least 20 years of our adult lives to come to terms with what these acts of abuse had done to us. Maybe we haven't yet. But to say "just get over it" as many say these days shows about as much empathy as the abuse that was dished out earlier.

When a child is raped or beaten or both you tear away pieces of the child's inner being that I call the soul. A child processes information and experiences actions through a limited perspective of life. You see, you cannot know what you know until you learn it. If a rape or severe abuse comes before the intellectual knowledge to process the experience, that experience leaves such a deep imprint that any knowledge gained after the fact usually cannot even dent that original experience.

It's like programming a computer with updates and those updates do not override the original programming. What I know about abuse today barely covers over the damage of that abuse because I lived that abuse before I could intellectually handle it. A five year old cannot understand what a 49 year old can understand. Files corrupted at 5 can rarely be completely retrieved and fixed at 49.

With people you cannot reformat a hard drive and simply erase the horror and fear. Counseling helps understanding and healing. But counseling can never remove ugly memories of someone forcing their will on you and you are helplessness to stop them.

The worst part about this abuse is that the word "TRUST" is removed from you at a very young age. I don't think there is any circumstance in life where "trust" is not the basis of a relationship. All things depend on trust. If you can't trust your parents, a teacher or a priest who can you trust?

Men and women alike are the former victims of sexual abuse. The Priest Scandal is on the cutting edge of gaining wide spread understanding that men are people too and experience the very same trauma that female victims suffer. Male or female, the loss and damage is profound and life long. Pain is pain no matter who or what you are. We all cry out when we are deeply hurt. Many victims suffer from Post Traumatic Stress Disorder just like soldiers do. It's that serious!

The stereotypes and jokes have got to stop. We cannot solve problems and heal people in an atmosphere of a Jay Leno monologue. Each of us has scars and open wounds in our lives no matter how we were raised. If I place a discount on your pain and you on my pain our society can never advance to what it could and should be in the realm of compassion and humanity. As long as certain problems are joked about they will remain unsolvable and many people will suffer in silence from the shame that the ignorant have thrust upon them with their insulting rhetoric.

Fellow Christians keep saying "just forgive." If forgiveness means I have to say that what happened doesn't matter any more, I am nowhere near that point. I doubt I will ever be at that point. It has impacted every single day of my life for over 50 years. It matters. It's an unwanted unasked for part of who I am. And as for my abuser, he admits nothing and blows us off with a "Just get over it." How does one just get over it? It brought me to the brink of murder and the brink of suicide. You just live with it one day at a time and try to do no harm to others or yourself. That's the best one can do. I have no more answers than that.

Upon editing this site during the rebuild and proof reading what I originally wrote, I can honestly say that nothing has changed in my view of this subject three years later. I'm 52 now and find this subject still rips me up with every single news story I hear or read of more children being abused.