A deeper look (Kicking & Screaming Draft) May 2008 FSC Blog

The news that my brother had been sexual molested came as a hard shock and would be the moment that would forever change my life. I went to school and shared a classroom with the person who had harmed my brother and the little girl I use to baby-sit. I had to sit in the same room and breathe the same air as this monster. I was fourteen when I heard the news.

From the day I had heard of my brother I started to dream the most horrifying dreams that made no sense to me. They would wake me up from a dead sleep soaked in sweat and tears. I was so angry and had no understanding of what was happening, as I never remembered what woke me.

I went to my eighth grade art class. I seldom went to any class since moving to this school. I hated it and I wanted to go back to my hometown. But I went to art that day. I do not really know what I was thinking or not thinking. I walked into the room and I took my seat. I started to listen to the teacher but I wasn’t really there. I was somewhere deep within my own head playing and replaying senses of horror and abuse. I was bubbling with such anger. The teacher left the room and I stepped put of my body.

I got up from my chair and walked towards the student who had harmed my baby brother and I beat him. I hit and kicked and bashed his head like a raging mad women. The teacher came running in and tore me off the student. I was taken to the office to be expelled from school permanently.

I was asked over and over again why I had beaten the other student. I just sat in the office on the chair refusing to speak. Refusing to look at the school counselor or the principal.  Again I was asked why I had beaten the student in my class. I looked at the school counselor and simply said he knows why. I got up and walked out of the office

For the next few months I was on a downward spiral that would take moving out of town and in with my dad to stop. After a couple of months of living in a new town away from the day to day stress of reliving the pain of my brother I was able to come to terms with my own demons. After receiving my school folder from my previous school I was sat down with a school counselor to again answer the happenings of the day in question. This time I told the counselor that the boy I had beaten up had sexual molested my brother and a little girl I thought of as a little sister. She asked me if I had also been sexually molested as a child. It was the first time I ever said yes out loud.

It was a quick process to have the police come to the school and take my statement. I knew at this point I would have to be honest with both my mother and my father about everything that had happened over a period of time in my youth.

Being honest gave me then opportunity to express my pain and my hurt and all the anger I had bottled up inside. I decided I was not going to be hurtful to those around me instead I focused all my rage into finding the boy who had harmed me as a child.  I started writing every little detail I could remember about my childhood, no matter how small it seemed. Then I would call the Police Officer in charge of my case and update my file. Over a period of four months I began to painfully remember the missing parts of my childhood. When the school ended I moved back home with my mom and started to build a strong relationship with her.

Years passed and I had a dream. It woke me from a dead sleep and it was an awaking I had never expected. In the early hours of the morning I went to my mom room and woke her to talk. I told her about the dream I had and she remained silent until I asked her if there was any truth to the dream, had I found the one way to find my molester? She confirmed what I had been not a dream but a memory of a conversation she never knew I had overheard.

I called the Police Officer in charge of my case. I told him to contact the Police in my childhood hometown and ask them the name of the Young Offender who had raped and drowned a five-year-old girl he was babysitting. I told the Officer the little girls name was Bobbie-Jo and what school she was attending when she was murdered. I told him if he got the name of him he would have the legal name of the person who had molested me. I received a call back a few days later and the Officer gave me the name of my molester. I told him I wanted to press charges.

I was told I did not want to ruin the life of this young man who since the incident I spoke of had not been in trouble with the law. I was told I did not have the right and no one would believe my hazy memories and me over a man who had become a model citizen. I told the Officer he ruined my life and yes I wanted to press charges. A month later my dad called me and asked if I watching the news. I turned the TV on and saw the Police Officer in charge of my case in handcuffs for sexual assault on an underage teenage girl. I felt betrayed and defeated. The very person I had been reaching out to had betrayed me.

Life moves forward and so did I with the help of some wonderful counselors and supportive friends and family. I had started to grow spiritually and I had started to become an adult. I had a baby and I was living on my own. Life had moved forward and so had I.

I was over 800 KM from home when I received the phone call that would give me the biggest choice of my life. The caller was an off duty Police Office from my childhood hometown. He wanted to know how I was doing and to say how proud he was of me for the strength I must have had to come forward against a man who had murdered my friend. I sat down. I told him I wasn’t that strong and that the Police Officer who had been handling my case did not press the charges as I had requested. I also said after his arrest I did not press the issue. The voice on the other end said he could not tell me what to do and did not want to push me into anything I did not want to do but offered to lay the charges. I did not know what to say. So I said nothing. After a few minutes of silence I said it was too late. I could not get the other children who were involved to come forward and if I was going to press charges it was going to stick because three would be an army of adult survivors standing tall with me and there would be no room for doubt. Before I hung up the phone the Office on the other end of the phone gave to me the greatest gift; the Legal name of my molester and his current address. I thanked him.

For the first time in many years I had the power in my hands. I knew where he lived. I could make this man’s life Hell. I struggled with the inner child in me. A large part of me wanted revenge for all the pain and suffering he had caused me. I wanted to make him pay for the nightmares and for the fear that I would never be good enough. For making me believe my parents couldn’t love me. For all the pain I had ever felt, I wanted him to pay.

After I got off the phone I cried. I cried more honestly then I think I had ever before. That little card in my hand changed my life. I never went to his home. I never punished him in anyway. I never pressed charges, I never beat him, I never tried to have any revenge. I put the card with his information in a box and forgot about it.

Two years ago and twelve years after the last call from the Police I was moving to Edmonton. I needed to go through the boxes I had and downsize. I found the box with my Police report and the paper with my molesters address. I was moving to the same city he was last know to reside. I felt like the wind had been taken from my chest. I was stunned and I then I started to laugh. I realized that after all these years and all the healing and growth I no longer was angry with this man who had “ruined” my life.

Somewhere over the years I had found peace with my pain. I took the papers to my mom and asked if she would do a releasing ceremony with me. That evening after my mate had gone to work we called on the four corners and released all the pain and anger to the spirits to take away. I burned all the information I had. I had also placed in the fire a special note to my molester that forgive him for sexually molesting me. In the time since forgiving my molester I have grown so much within myself. I am more secure and stable in who and what I am. I have found a way to show grace to a messed up boy who had been terribly hurt and only knew how to respond by hurting other child.  I have found peace with my inner child.