Brave Girl, Speak

Throughout the court process, my case was always referred to as a “he said, she said” case because there was no physical evidence to corroborate my disclosure. Hearing those words always stung.

During some of the initial interviews, I was asked questions such as “when did the abuse begin?” A bulk of the investigation took place around my 14^th birthday. When I was asked that question I struggled and began to feel like a failure because I could not remember the date my abuser hurt me the first time.

As a child, time does not consist of hours, days, weeks, or months. Time as a child equals memories, holidays, vacations, playing on weekends, birthday parties, and ball games. The summer flies by, the school year drags on, and Christmas and birthdays can’t come fast enough. A child generally will not recall that on x/xx/xxxx, her stepdad tried to french kiss her in the kitchen. But- what she can tell you is everything that surrounded that moment… where she stood in the kitchen, who was in the house at the time, what her abuser was wearing, what she did immediately afterwards, the fear and confusion she experienced, etc. Unfortunately, the court of law needs cold, hard facts to prosecute offenders.

Not only could I not recall the date the abuse began, but Ialso could not give investigators an estimated number of times it happened. Later in my healing journey I remember thinking, “if only I had carved a tally into the wall at the back of my closet every time my stepdad abused me.” It is really easy to get caught into a cycle of blaming yourself for not keeping the “data” of your abuse so that you can have a strong enough court case with evidence to get justice. The way I am able to overcome those negative thoughts is to remind myself that I was just a little girl trying to survive. I also reflect on the knowledge I have gained in college and graduate school about the way the brain grows and develops and the impacts of trauma on the brain. In a future post I will share more about that.

Being somewhat of a perfectionist, more left brained than right, and a fan of math, the inability to precisely answer the important questions left me with a burden of guilt. The “if-then” statements used to rattle my mind regularly. I continue to strive to find peace in “not knowing” the answers to the questions that weighed so heavily at one time.

In exciting news, North Carolina has passed a law that prohibits sex offenders from frequenting parks, libraries, arcades, recreation areas, pools, and amusement parks. These places are now safer places for our children. You can read all about the new law here. There is also a section that talks about the petitioning process for offenders and how one Assistant District Attorney may appear in court 10-20 times for these petitions.