Bear Witness

Content warning: Abuse and assault 

The medicines were kept in the downstairs bathroom. There was an orange one, a red one and a purple one. I can vividly remember their names and their tastes- orange and purple were overly sweet, but otherwise okay. The red one tasted kind of awful. They all claimed to cause "marked drowsiness."

They were ostensibly for cold symptoms. I know because I looked them up just now. But I remember taking them not infrequently, and I remember that much of the time I didn't have a cold. In addition to everything else that happened, I want to state in this moment that my father drugged me. 

He would drug me to make me easier to rape. He would drug me to make me more sleepy and pliant. Even though I was a child whose body froze and who wasn't strong enough to fight back in any case, he still made the choice to drug me. 

He would explain away the unneeded medicine by saying that it would help me in some way. It would help with sleep or it would help with nerves, or some other reason. I remember thinking, "Wait. Why I am taking this again?", but before I knew it, the medicine cup was in my hand and I was swallowing the medicine because I was a child and he was my father.

As I remember these memories, all that I want is to have had a non-horrific childhood. Sadly, though I am slowly healing, I will never be able to change what happened to me.

For the past year, writing has been a cathartic way to bear witness to my own truths and not have to carry these secrets anymore. I hope to continue to use writing to help with my healing, and I wanted to thank all of you for going on this journey with me.

May we all find ways to bear witness. May we all find ways to bring the darkness back out into the light.