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TRIGGER WARNING: This post deals with an account of physical and emotional abuse and may be triggering to some people.
“I say I am stronger than fear.” ~Malala Yousafzai
“Don’t be scared.” It’s so easy to say, yet sometimes, for many of us, so hard to accomplish.
When I was about three or four years old, my dad locked me in the chicken coop in our back yard. This was a punishment. I was naked and screaming, literally jumping up and down with terror.
Another punishment consisted of my mother rubbing human waste in my face.
There are other things they did, other things I went through, but I’ll let those two examples stand as confirmation of the physical and emotional abuse I suffered as small child.
Then when I was nineteen, some friends and I were physically assaulted by another group of young men. No reason, no motive. We were ganged up on one at a time and not a single one of us managed any sort of self-defense.
The police told us “not to bother” pressing charges, so we didn’t. Those guys went home free and clear, but a few months later, I unexpectedly found myself almost convulsing on my bedroom floor, unable to breathe or move, absolutely terrified that the next time I left my house, I would die.
It was quite the on…