Abuse is a sensitive subject and it is very personal. There are several types of abuse and different degrees of abuse. ABUSE IS ABUSE IS ABUSE!!! NO ONE DESERVES TO BE ABUSED!! There is physical abuse, mental abuse and sexual abuse. If you have experienced any or all of these, you will understand exactly what I am talking about. Often times the various types of abuse will overlap into each other. And it is possible to experience all of them at the same time.

If you are currently in an abusive situation – SEEK HELP NOW!!! There should be various agencies within your local area that should be able to help you. There are various apps that can be downloaded to your phone that you can use to signal for help immediately. I know that each situation is different. Talk to counselors, teachers, pastors, police, area agencies, family members, reach out to someone for help! REACH OUT NOW!! YOU ARE WORTH IT!!

Abuse may happen to you as it happened to me. But, abuse does not need to define you. It is not something that you will ever forget, but you can learn to process what has happened to you by seeking professional help or reaching out to someone that you can trust to help you work through it. I chose to seek God. He has helped me work through what has happened to me, and He has given me the opportunity to try to help others.

THE ABUSE WAS NOT YOUR FAULT!! IT WAS OUT OF YOUR CONTROL!!

“Vengeance is Mine, I will repay” saith the Lord. (Romans 12: 17-19)

Abuse happens at all economic levels and it is no respecter of persons. My abuser was a “So Called” Christian in the church who happened to be my step grandfather. He was the only grandfather that I really knew and it used to make me sick when I was sitting in church as I grew older and he would stand up and testify and I would sit back in the church pews and think to myself “If you only knew what he was really like and what he did to me.”…. you would not hold him so high in regards and think he was such a saint…

It is has only been the past several years that I have actually verbalized that I was abused to those closest to me so they would have more of an understanding of who I am and what I had been through. I wanted my actions and my life to make more sense to some people so they could understand some of my decisions.

I grew up in an era where sexual abuse was not talked about. The reality of it was that no one wanted to deal with it, admit it or be a part of it. I remember when I first told my mom. She was sitting at the sewing machine in the dining room and I was sitting at the dining room table and her response to me was “It happened to her, by one of her uncles.” I was shocked and stunned. Then I was hurt. I was hurt because, I felt – if it happened to you, then why didn’t you protect me and teach me and make sure that it never happened to me? I never understood this. As I grew older, I had to come to terms that my mom did the best that she could and I know that she loved me.

However, that did not stop me from trying to protect my daughter to make sure that this was never going to happen to her. The cycle had to be broken.

I want to let you know that no matter how old you are when you reveal something of this magnitude has happened to you, there are those who still refused to believe you and don’t want to think that something like this could have happened. In fact, when I did reveal it to someone who knew my step grandfather, she did not believe me. She asked me if anyone else knew. I told her yes, my aunt as my step grandfather tried to do it to some of the other granddaughters, but, they were smarter than I was. This person never spoke to me again. This is where in my opinion comes the “Blind Eye”, the denial, and the refusal to accept that this precious christian could do something of this nature. When it was my life and innocence that had been violated and robbed.

Once you have experienced abuse, it changes your life forever. I was robbed of my innocence and that is something that I could never get back and this abuse has affected me throughout my entire life.

According to the National Sexual Violence Resource Center (NSVRC) Nationwide, 81% of women and 43% of men reported experiencing some form of sexual harassment and/or sexual assault in their lifetime. One in three female victims (1 in 4 male victims) of completed or attempted rape experienced it for the first time between the ages of 11 and 17. Now, that is “REPORTED”. These figures do not include the “UNREPORTED”.

I suppose you are questioning why I chose to seek God as my counsel. Especially since this occurred with someone who was a so called christian. I can tell you that this did not happen over night. I distanced myself from him as I grew older, I wanted nothing to do with him, and I was not sad when he died. I do not know if he ever asked God for forgiveness before he took his last breath or not. I do not know if I will see him in heaven one day. I do struggle with this at times. I have tried and tried to forgive him, and I have prayed to God on multiple occasions on this situation and I have found that it is only by the grace of God that this has been put behind me. I do not want this issue to keep me from seeing Jesus one day.

Why didn’t I tell someone? I did. I told my mom. It took me 6-7 years to tell her. And once I told her, that was the end of it. I was a product of the era.

Our precious heavenly Father, I pray right this very minute for all of the people that have experienced abuse in their lives. Put your arms around them and give them the sense of peace that you are there. We know that it is the evil one who takes hold of these abusers and we pray for their salvation and healing to stop hurting people. Some of them are wolves in sheep’s clothing clothing, just like my step grandfather. The evil of all evil is looming around us. Protect us I pray, in Christ Jesus name I pray. Amen.

This topic is open for all of those who are hurting. We will dig into the physical and mental abuse as we continue to discuss abuse within the writings of this blog.