Take and Take
I had imagined a life of success, wealth and happiness at a very young age. Ambitious and precocious, I had what it took to achieve all of it. All of it, until it was ripped from my being like a skinned lamb I stood watching my life dissipate before my eyes.
I could not stop it no matter how I tried, the pain of being violated tore it all from me. I devolved, but I fought. I was estranged from all I trusted for the delectation they showed in my pain.
“You deserved it.” “You asked for it.” “It’s your own damn fault.” I heard them in all their variations. I died with every utterance, only to be brought back by my fight, only to be run over again by the pain it played in my mind like a freight train on a boundless track.
It took so much from me. It took my sense of self, I didn’t know who I was anymore. Was I the girl that did all the wrong things good girls don’t do? Could I even trust myself anymore? Do I reconcile the fact that all my actions and decisions landed me in that unlucky place? It took my sense of trust in the world. A world that wounded me and left me to die. A world that inflicted pain upon me in my dire state of neglect from the shame. A world that was not there to protect me when it happened, a world that blamed me into solitude.
Guilt became my best friend, in all the seclusion and hurt, I found guilt as my redemption as a good person. I felt guilt when something went wrong, when I did something wrong, that is a signal from within that something good still remained. I held on to guilt. I held on to it as my life depended on it.
My life depended on it, for so long, my life depended on it. All the works of the universe to satiate my pain by keeping me here brought me here. One day I woke up and heard the voices change. One day I watched my daughters and the voices sang a different tune. One day I looked at my husband and the life we have built and the voices told me it was my turn to take.
I refuse to lay down anymore, I learned through the pain I was still here because the fight within me was of the universe. I stood strong when my knees were bent into submission to the power of the violation. I have withstood the provocations in agony, but I have served my time. My life still lays ahead of me. A life redefined, a life redrawn, a life redesigned, a life that is mine. I’m taking back what had always been mine. I have found myself, I found a raging phoenix from the ashes, I have found myself. Today I take back what had always been mine. Mine.