After 38 years of hiding in a false existence and having to support a facade of a personality, I finally collapsed and all of my defences began to crumble. The fall has now had so many ramification's that each day I struggle to stay alive let alone motivate (what a laugh) to get out of bed and face the world.
Let me provide a few details - I am a 51 year young male - who at the age of 13 suffered many months of sexual & physical abuse at the hands of our wonderful Catholic Boarding system in Brisbane, Queensland, Australia. And without going into graphic detail at this point - after months of being sexual abused in every form your wildest imagination could imagine, I was then beaten with a leather strap for being a bad boy. Yet at the beginning of each journey of pleasure for the predator of God (what a load of hypocrisy) I was always told "That this was the way we look after our special boys". After summoning enough courage to discuss this with a more senior Christian Brother, the abuse stopped, even though I was told that I was just being silly making up such stories, but it was best not to tell anyone. So I went home for the term break only to return for the next term to be sexually attacked by the very Christian Brother that I went to for assistance.
My trust, my self belief and certainly my feeling of being normal was gone, shattered. I still recall with vivid recollection lying on the bed of the Brothers bedroom imaging that I was dead and that I was looking down on some poor unfortunate bastard - never fully realising that it was me. To say that I became numb is an understatement, to say that I withdrew from all or any real interaction with people is an understatement, to say that I did not dream of suicide at that age is an understatement.
I am now a broken and damaged wreck who daily dreams of death. In fact, as I am writing this, it has been less than 24 hours since I was released from the Mental Ward at the Royal Brisbane Hospital and not for the first time after failing to overdose.
I despise myself, I cannot stand to look at myself in the mirror, I now realise - that my defences that allowed me to fool the world that I was normal - that I have nothing to live for - apart from my four beautiful sons - and i believe that in recent years, they are the only reason that I have not been successful in ending this miserable life.
Over the past 30 plus years the only method of sanity has been an excessive use of alcohol and drugs (in all forms) yet even now these do not provide the safety net of bullshit to keep going.
I am in the process of writing a book about my journey to hell with the sole intent that if it can assist just one person confront and beat the demons of sexual abuse, then I will die a better person. I have also kept and continue to keep a diary of every day that I have to persist in this world and this will either be part of my book or a separate exercise.
I have endured the success and failure of over 20 plus jobs - always successful - though the self destruction process is so effective that I cannot maintain any sustainable employment, have lost my family, have lost my dignity and have lost the will to live - hopefully I can survive until my book is completed.
There is so much I could and want to say - though the purpose of this blog is to reach out to other people who are in similar positions and just as importantly to the parents and partners of childhood sexual abuse.
The Church (no matter what flavour you apply) have hidden and sidestepped this issue for too long and it is time that I and with the help of others truly bring to light what has really happened and be held accountable for their weak morals and denial in addressing what is probably one of the greatest blights on mankind that we have ever experienced. And by this I mean no disrespect to the plights of many other people, races etc that have and are still suffering - though if you look at the basic statistics that are often reported - that 1 in 3 boys are sexually abused and that 1 in 5 girls are sexually abused (and please lets not debate the exact numbers) because what is more important is that these are the statistics of those who have been brave enough to come forward.
Just imagine how many have not and are right now suffering a debilitating existence and add to this the large number of childhood and adult suicides that we can and will never know the reason for their action - this truly is a worldwide tragedy that is forgotten by all levels of Government and society.
So it time for the forgotten abused ones to stand tall. Not to be ashamed. Not be afraid to face the demons that have been in your rear vision mirror (as they have for me) and demand that society take action.
I hope that this reaches and touches people and they feel the need to share, communicate and assist in whatever way they can.
I will continue to add to this blog and build a better site to represent the CSA Front.
Thank you for taking the time to read this and hopefully comment (and I do not mind whether this is positive or negative) because until you walked in the shoes of a person who has been sexually abused - you will never know or appreciate their life.
Paul
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