“The winds of grace blow all the time; all we need do is set our sails.” Dear God please show us The Way.

“None of this “let it go” crap that you get even a few days after the abuse happened?”

Hah – you hit the nail on the head there! I had the same thing happen to me when I was raped, IMMEDIATELY after the rape happened! That after blaming it on me and telling me “I must have wanted it.” God Save Us All.

When my mother-in-law died just a few years ago, and I was so sad and grieving, three days later I was told that “there was medication for that” – three days after the fact! I wasn’t even allowed three days to grieve. I asked him how long did he think a person should be allowed to grieve, or perhaps he didn’t think people should be grieving at all. My so-called white “friends” wouldn’t allow me to stay quiet and still, but kept insisting I “join the party” and drink and smoke with them. I had to lock my door and not answer it to get them to leave me alone. I finally went to my Latino friends who CRIED WITH ME. Even men are allowed and expected to cry in Latin America. White society in America is so rigid and false. It’s sickening, really, and explains why we are constantly at war. What else happens when emotions are suppressed the way they are?

Our society, white middle class educated pill-pushing pill-popping pay a professional for everything has been raised to never show emotion of any kind except “How are You? Just Fine!”

We have been raised to be a culture of Stepford Wives and I for one am sick of it! Glad to see you are, too!

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You also wrote: ” “What do they do in other cultures–just let you vent? ”

Hahahahaha – No, they don’t just “let you* vent.”

They go over, find him and BEAT HIS ASS!

People learn a lot quicker in other cultures instead of here with the b.s. of “help the poor abusers because they have mental problems or come from dysfunctional childhoods” and all that c$%^&*. If that were the criteria for “becoming bad” then I should have turned out to be a serial killer!

So that’s the answer from me. I tell you, living in other countries (France and Guatemala, Central America) and around other cultures (educated middle class professional white culture, rough Black American “hood:” culture, American Indian, Hippie and California culture) has really opened my eyes. What a difference from just the one we might be raised in. Until I did this, I really didn’t understand a thing. Now I am barely catching on. And I tell the ones you are describing that they are welcome to “forgive the abuser if they wish,” but I believe in justice and preventing abuse from happening again. They can just go to hell as “aiders and abetters and enablers” in my mind.

That’s why I LOVE Law & Order, Special Victims Unit. Olivia doesn’t take any crap off anyone! And they always say, almost every single show, “IT’S NOT YOUR FAULT.” Amen! I needed that!

*note: “let you” explains what happens to us in our culture)

Christine, can you do a whole post about shame and not just the shame that we feel, but the shame that the mother and family feels and blames on the child who “tells?”

Finally I understand why I was and still am so hated and feared. Because I wouldn’t and won’t shut up, and the more truth and facts I presented, the worse it became for them. No place to run to, no place to hide. They’ve been hiding under their rocks all these years, while I dug myself out and am standing in the Light.

No wonder they wanted me GONE GONE GONE. And were “checking up on me” to see if I had changed my tune. Of course not. Just like the bluebird sings, so do I. Caught in a trap or flying free, I haven’t changed a bit at all. None one of us has. So now I can let go and finally go free. I will tell my story and to heck with the rest.

Here’s an excerpt from this excellent article:

http://lightshouse.org/lights-blog/outcast-scapegoat-or-black-sheep-of-the-dysfunctiona-family#ixzz2DhAyhHIZ

Outcasts, Scapegoats, and Black Sheep of the Dysfunctional Family

Toxic and dysfunctional families project their shame and sense of inferiority onto a designated other.

Woe to the scapegoat, the whipping boy, the outcast of the toxic and dysfunctional family. This person is made to carry the hidden blame and shame of relatives who refuse to acknowledge their problems.

Dysfunctional families are steeped in shame, and cannot look at their issues. They have poor insight into their own behaviors and problems, and will do anything to appear normal or exceptional, despite the fact that in reality, they are terribly crippled by their fears, addictions, mental disorders, abuse, neglect and insecurities.
… (more)

“When somebody leaves the dysfunctional group, everyone turns on them.”

My response:

Ahhhh, thank you. That’s true! My mother made sure of that… it’s like the “disconnect” in Scientology. If you leave Scientology you receive letters from everyone disconnecting from you and you become “fair game” for any Scientologist. I belonged for a year when I was 18 and I tell you, when I left it was actually pretty scary!

That’s exactly what all these family members have been doing to me, and attempting to “draw me back in” to see if I have “changed my ways” or am I still going to “tell.”

“Wow. That’s it. In another nutshell! I was laying here thinking I was losing my mind and not knowing what to do about it. But now I can begin to see it for what it is. I’ll spend some time looking this up and I bet I find a lot of information. I know I had to give it one last try, but I have and now I hope I can lay all these ghosts to rest. And get some peace. No contact really does work! And in this day and age it’s so easy to block someone, trash emails unopened, and defriend someone on FB. LOL! And I was smart enough not to accept any of their “friendship” requests. At least I was smart enough about that!”

My mother always accused me of “brainwashing” my sisters and brothers about the abuse that she always swore “never happened” when they went to her years later and asked why she allowed it to happen and why she didn’t protect them. I had been gone from home and had no contact with any of them, but she accused ME of “brainwashing them” and she said “There you go again, you’ve been talking to Katie!” (My nickname at the time). I was stunned when I was then accused by those same sisters of “brainwashing them” in a letter when I hadn’t talked to them in years.

It was as if they were coerced into writing those letters by some threat, I don’t know what. I’ve been their torture totem all of my life and I am so tired of it. I think family members who “tell” should have the same legal protections under the “whistleblower act” as many whistleblowers used to be involuntarily committed to mental institutions when they reported government financial corruption. This was just ten or twenty years ago!

We are being bullied by our family members and ganged up on, and this has to stop. The perpetrators and their enablers all need to be held responsible for their actions. The victims need to shine a long, hard bright light on them so they know we mean business!

I will never shut up!

Yes. That’s it I believe. No more PTSD and no more “triggers” once we go “no contact.” I tried for the last couple of years and it’s been pure hell. Nothing has changed but it’s only gotten worse. I thought that by trying to stand up for myself to this bunch and get the facts stated, they would have to stop trying to destroy me, but no. Nothing is going to change their mind. It’s like living in the Deep South 50 years ago and they are the KKK and they are going to hate whatever and whomever they want to, and “hang ‘em high” because God forbid they don’t have a scapegoat and they might have to look into the mirror!

So I will tell my own story out loud and proud, of all that I have accomplished in spite of – or perhaps because of – all that I have lived through.

“A lie left unchallenged becomes the truth.”

True enough when I kept silent all these years. I told some or even many close friends, but I rarely made a “public appearance” out loud in all this time, hoping I think that if I shut up my mother would finally “love me” because she sure hated me when I wrote to her at age 38. Well, that didn’t work eiher and my sisters made sure their children heard the same terrible stories about me, and now that I see that this happens over and over to so many who speak out and “tell” I can tell you it “WASN’T MY FAULT” and I “DIDN’T DO IT TO MYSELF” AND I DO DESERVE COURTESY, FACTS AND RESPECT. That’s all I’m asking for and I am going to get it because I am going to get it myself.

This is the beginning and the end of my story. Now all I have to do is fill in the blanks. And their actions and mine will do that for me. I just have to get it down in black and white. So now we begin.

Dear God please show me The Way.

Thanks to everyone here. We will all “keep up the good work!”

This is what I got after 25 years of staying away. That $#%^&*IOPO()U* – saying prayers in church and “forgiving me” and giving Bible Classes to children!

Then, today, one of my oldest friend sees my notice about this wonderful website on my Facebook page and writes to me that I should be quiet. And I quote:

“Let it go–you’re only hurting yourself–I love you.”

I CAN’T TELL YOU HOW MAD THIS MADE ME, even coming from an old friend that I know does care. But I don’t tell her things because she is from the “old school” and I am constantly judged and I won’t be anymore.

I WILL FEEL THE WAY I FEEL AND TO HELL WITH THE REST OF THEM!

And now I’ve got another woman jumping in telling me I shouldn’t be saying they should “burn.” I told her on my own FB page that she is welcome to write her own story and feel about her own abusers anyway she wants, but that I don’t need to “forgive” or be told how to react to active abusers and enablers who should be in jail. In a million years I didn’t expect my so-called “friends” on Facebook to start lecturing me and giving me advice! I am 62 years old! Here’s part of what I wrote in the exchange:

“Everyone has the right to get ANGRY at some point at INJUSTICE that was done to them. Would you tell the Black Americans to shut up as to what the KKK did to them? Would you lecture them about “forgiveness?” I wouldn’t. I would let them feel whatever feelings they have, and let them work it out.

We American females have been so well-trained to keep silent and “forgive” and all that other nonsense that the problems remain, and the perps keep getting away with it. Sometimes a little “burn” is good for you, and it won’t kill you. If you have been abused and your perpetrator and his enablers are still alive and still doing it and you want to keep silent, fine. But I won’t. And that’s my position on it.

Anger moves people to ACTION. Do you think Martin Luther King didn’t feel anger at times? What do you think the marches for women’s minority rights were all about? They weren’t all flowers and sweetness and light. Anger has a proper place in our existence, and used properly it can be a driving force for good.”

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Those perps only get away with it because we have been beaten down into submission. I will NEVER shut up! The LOUDER THE BETTER!”

Now I will post something EVERY SINGLE DAY and if these people keep “giving me their helpful advice” guess what? There’s a “de-friend” button! Maybe they will learn one day to leave us alone and let us heal in peace. In Latin American cultures and France where I’ve lived before, it wasn’t like this. It’s only for white American females that we get this kind of nonsense. African-Americans in the United States don’t react this way, either! Stepford Wives we are raised to be!

I could be way off on this. But this has been my experience so far. Just thought I’d share it.