MY SECRET SHAME
Words I’ve Never Spoken
There are some things that are so horrible, I try not to think of them. Instead, I bury them, deep down inside. Somewhere no one will find them, not even me. But no matter how hard I try, they never disappear. Without warning, the memories sneak up on me in the dark of night and choke me with fear. They replay again and again and leave me no choice but to relive them as I lay there, helpless, stuck frozen, in fear.
When morning comes, I’m weary from lack of sleep. Memories from the night before linger in a fog, like a nightmare I can’t quite escape. It’s in these moments I realize I have questions that will never be answered.
The memories are hazy at best, but the emotions that accompany them are not.
Shame
Fear
These are feelings that never go away. They’ve stayed with me for so many years, it’s as if they’ve become a part of me.
I’ve never told anyone what happened to me. Now, I don’t even know how or where to start, but these memories won’t go away. I hoped maybe by writing about them I might get some relief, or perhaps even some closure.
Back when I was in kindergarten, we only went to school for a half day. I happened to be in the morning session. Both of my parents worked so I went to a babysitter’s house in the afternoon until one of my parent’s got off work.
My babysitter was a friend of one of my mom’s friends. Her name was Shirley. Shirley had children of her own, a girl and two boys, all of whom were older than me.
Shirley babysat many children. After school, we sat around a large dining room table and ate lunch. For some reason, I didn’t fit in with the other kids. It was the only time in my life that I can ever remember being teased. I remember one particular incident during lunch one day when one of the other kids said something mean to me, I stuck my tongue out at them in response. Another kid told on me and Shirley grabbed me, hard, by the shoulders and walked me over to a corner of the room. I was already humiliated and she was about to make it worse. Meanwhile, the other kids were already laughing at me. She shoved me face first into the corner and made me stand there with my back to all the other kids until nap time.
Nap time is what I try to forget.
Shirley made sure all the kids under age 10 took a nap. We used all three upstairs bedrooms for our naps. All of the rooms were made as dark as possible so that we’d be sure to go to sleep. The blinds were closed, the curtains were dropped, and the doors were always shut. She didn’t want us getting up and sneaking out.
One of the bedrooms we used for nap time was the master bedroom, one was her daughters bedroom, and the third belonged to her two sons. Since there were more kids than beds and bedrooms, Shirley put more than one of us in a room.
The master bedroom was the second darkest. She’d put two kids on the bed (on opposite sides), and another one on the floor. Whoever was on the floor laid on a towel (no matter which bedroom we were in) and we weren’t allowed to talk to each other. If Shirley heard us talking, she would come upstairs and spank us.
Her daughter’s bedroom was the brightest room. I’ll never forget that room because it was decorated with Holly Hobbie wallpaper and bedding. In this room, Shirley put one person on the bed and two on the floor. We had to be especially quiet in this room because the heat vent was connected directly to the living room below. If we so much as whispered, Shirley would hear us.
One day when I was supposed to be napping in this room, I had to use the bathroom, but when I tried to open the door it was locked.
Until then, I didn’t realize we were locked in.
The room belonging to her two sons was dark blue and had a bunk bed. It was the darkest room and I hated it. Shirley put one of kid in each bed and one on the floor.
My memory takes me back to a day Shirley tells me I have to sleep in the blue room with the bunk beds, but I have to sleep on the floor. There are two boys in the room with me, one on the top bunk and one on the bottom bunk. I don’t know either of their names. The bunk bed is next to me and I’m on the floor right in front of the door.
Shirley comes up a few minutes later and tells one of the boys that his mom is there to pick him up. He gets off the bed to leave and she tells me to stay on the floor.
The door shuts behind them and this time, I hear it lock.
I pretend to be asleep.
The next thing I know, there’s a boy laying next to me. He’s much older than me, but I don’t know how old. It’s dark in the room, but I can see enough to know that it’s one of Shirley’s son’s.
He starts talking to me, asking my name and how old I am. At first, I answer his questions. Then, he starts rubbing my back. He asks me if I like it, but I don’t know what to say. He rolls me over onto my back and starts rubbing my chest and stomach.
I don’t like what he’s doing, so I tell him to stop.
He tells me that it’s ok. He isn’t doing anything wrong. He says he knows I like it. I try to push his hands away, but they don’t move. I can see he’s starting to get mad so I stop. I don’t know what he’ll do if he gets mad and I don’t want to find out.
I’m scared.
He reaches into my pants and touches me where no one has touched me before. I keep my legs together and I start to cry, but he puts his hand over my mouth and tells me to shut up. He says I better not get him in trouble.
Now I’m really scared.
He pulls my shirt up and my pants down, along with my panties. Then, he pulls his pants all the way down. I try not to look at him. I don’t want to see this boy’s privates so I look away. He grabs my hand and tries to make me touch it but I resist him as much as I can. Frustrated, he yanks my hand, hard, pulling my whole arm with it and makes me touch it.
Tears are pouring out of my eyes and spilling onto my cheeks.
I’m trying desperately not to make a sound.
He touches me with his hand, over and over again, and he tells me how soft I am. He looks me in the eyes and tells me I better not move and I better not make a sound. He moves lower and takes one of my legs out of my pants, which allows him to spread my legs. I close my eyes as tight as I can. I feel his hands touch me once more before I feel his breath on me. I start to move away, but he grabs my hips and holds me in place. The next thing I feel is something wet. When I look down I see his head between my legs and he’s licking my most private parts. I kick him. He lets out a growl and grabs my leg.
He straightens himself up and lowers himself on top of me, his hand once again over my mouth. I don’t like the feeling of his body on mine. I want him off me! He starts moving his body up and down mine, his privates rubbing against mine. I have no sense of time or how long this lasts, all I know is that I’m scared and I want out of here.
I want to go home.
Suddenly, we hear Shirley at the bottom of the stairs. She’s talking to someone and it sounds like she’s about to come upstairs. The boy jumps off me and scrambles to pull up his pants and I do the same thing. For once, I’m glad Shirley’s coming.
When he’s dressed, he gets down close to my ear and grabs my face.
He snarls in my ear,
“You better not tell anyone what we did or I’ll tell your parents how much you liked it.”
I’m too scared to say anything back to him and I don’t have a chance even if I could. Shirley opens the door just as he’s leaning back. She asks him what he was doing and why I’m crying. He tells her I had a bad dream. She thanks him for being so thoughtful and for consoling me.
The rest of the afternoon goes by so slow as we watch TV. Shirley likes to watch Starsky and Hutch and Chips and I know that one of my parents will be there to pick me up as soon as Chips is over. It’s so hard not to cry while I wait for someone to pick me up, but I cry as soon as I see my mom. I run into her arms and give her a hug.
Shirley and her son are standing there watching me when my mom asks them what’s wrong. Shirley tells my mom that I’ve been upset since nap time and that I had a bad dream. Shirley says she tried to talk to me about it, but I wouldn’t tell her what it was about.
Later that night, my mom tries to talk to me, but I can’t tell her what happened. I’m too scared and ashamed of what happened.
It was my fault.
Something is wrong with me. Why else would that boy do that to me? I don’t want my mom to know that I’m bad.
Not telling my mom meant I had to keep going back to Shirley’s. Nothing else happened while I was there, but now not only did I feel uncomfortable, I also felt unsafe. I was always looking over my shoulder and nap time really was a nightmare. I never knew if or when I’d run into her son again.
I found out later that he was home sick from school that day and that’s why I never ran into him during nap time before or since although I did see him sometimes later in the afternoons. I’d often catch him staring at me or giving me a look that I interpreted as a warning.
I was never so happy as I was when I finished kindergarten and never had to go back to Shirley’s house again.
This is one of two incidents that happened in my childhood that I’ve never told anyone. I don’t know if I’ll ever write about the other. For now, it’s good enough that I was able to write about one of them. I just needed to get it out.
I already feel a bit lighter. Hopefully, as the days go by I’ll experience other benefits of telling my story.
One feeling will always remain, however, and that’s guilt.
By never telling anyone, I unwittingly left other victims vulnerable to this boy who later became a man.
If he attacked others, then surely I’m responsible.
That is something I will always have to to live with.
THANK YOU for taking the time to read my words.
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