From Survivor to Thriver Allison Watt

There are very few words that capture me the way that thriver does. It is a word implies a journey of both the heart and soul.

     For me my developmental journey started when I was seven/eight years old.

From then onward I would never know the Alli that had once existed. Abuse changes you. Not just because of the excruciating pain that happens during the abuse, but because of the pain that lingers deep inside of you for the next twenty, thirty, or forty years. It is an ongoing journey of healing and self discovery. It eclipses every moment of your life, from falling in love, deciding to have children, to your career. Sexual abuse from a family member redefines all that you once knew. What is trust, love, and faith? Do these things run together or are they separate entities designed for some, but not all? Life questions come at you in your adolescense,and no one has prepared you to answer any of them.You are not only discovering sex for the first time, but all of the emotions that come with it. The problem: none of it was your choice.

     When you lose the right to choose who your first time is with, who your first love is, who your family is, you experience this overwhelming feeling of loss, confusion, and anger. Childhood sexual abuse is a complicated monster that exists for many people (1 in 4 girls and 1 in 6 boys). What happened between me and my cousin can only be described as a relationship. He had fallen in love with his cousin that was 9 years younger than him and made me believe that loving him meant doing whatever he asked, keeping any secret he needed me to, and being the person that he could lean on. For seven years I believed that this sick feeling every time he touched me was love. That the pain I felt was love, that his manipulation was love. For me, love had become abuse.

     Learning that everything was backwards took experiencing one moment in time. In middle school we had a speaker come in to talk to us about bullying. He started off like most middle school presenters did at the time; talking about stick and stones, self respect, and general respect.Then his speech took a turn.He sat down, faced a gymnasium full of kids and proclaimed something that every survivor should have the opportunity to share.He disclosed that when he was younger he was sexually abused. He talked about the confusion, about not knowing that what he was experiencing was actually abuse, and that it took someone telling their story for him to realized what was happening to him.

     I stumbled out of the gym with memories flashing before my eyes. I got to my locker and asked my friend if their cousin ever touched or kissed them. She gave me a face of disgust and said "Eww no, of course not! Does yours?” I recanted and said no, of course not. From that moment nothing was the same. I started having panic attacks, stopped sleeping,and prepared myself to be ready to endure what Ryan was going to do when he came to visit. After a year of this, I reached a breaking