I’m Thankful for my Abuse
By: Mission Team
I can’t speak for anyone else but myself. I am someone who has been sexually abused and I’ve been taken on a painful but liberating journey of healing and forgiveness. Not one person’s journey is the same, and I know I can’t possibly presume that I understand what each person is going through. What I do know is that the Lord is a tangible and unmistakable presence in the rush of emotions and the overwhelmed feelings that can overtake a person who has experienced this trauma. Here are a few things that helped me in my journey.
1. Share with someone you trust
Healing and forgiveness can’t happen by yourself. I was trapped in depression, isolation, and loneliness until I took the risk to let someone in. For 12 years, I didn’t tell anyone what I had been through as a young girl. When I gave into silence, it allowed lies and insecurities to rule my day-to-day thought life. It affected my worth and my identity. Opening up to a trusted family member was the first step to me getting rid of the junk and lies in my life.
2. Forgiving through Jesus, not ourselves
In my head, I forgave the person who hurt me because I knew it was the right thing to do. As much as I said it to myself, it didn’t stop the flashbacks or the utter disgust I felt when I was around the person who hurt me. I would stuff away all the feelings, and say I forgave, but that didn’t fix the hurt. One day I got to the point where I didn’t feel I could take the memories anymore. I went to confession and shared with a priest all that I had been through. He told me to go home and look at the crucifix. That day as I looked at the cross, I forgave because of Jesus, not because of me. This led me to the next point in my healing process.
3. See the abuse as a gift and something that unites us to JesusThis was the hardest but most freeing thing that I’ve ever experienced. I remember while looking at the cross that day, I started to cry. I realized that Jesus was abused too. He knew how it felt, but his suffering meant something! It had a purpose, and mine does too. The abuse I received is a gift because it made me the most like Jesus that I’ll ever be. That’s what my suffering does. Without being abused, I wouldn’t know how much I need Jesus every day. I need his strength and his mercy on me for my own sins. When I look at the cross, I know that being like Him is the highest calling, and for that I am thankful.
4. Allow people to love you, build you up, and speak truth to youThis isn’t easy! Trusting people after being hurt isn’t something that I want to do most days. Closing in, self-protecting, and putting up a strong front is what was most comfortable for me. But letting people in is what heals me. When I seek out trustworthy people to share my wounds and my heart with and allow them to speak truth over the lies in my head, I am most alive and most thankful.
5. Share your storyOnce you are ready, sharing what you’ve been through with others will change the world. When another girl shared with me about going through sexual abuse, it changed my life. She was the first person whom I had ever met that I could relate to in this way. Can you imagine? 1 in 3 girls are sexually abused, and I never knew anyone who talked about it until I was 18! Her courage and openness with me lifted me from the decade-long feeling of being alone that was my reality. Now when I share my story, I am even more thankful for my suffering. Because I get to let other girls know they aren’t alone. C.S Lewis says: “Friendship is born the moment one person says to another; you too? I thought I was the only one”.
