I M Perfect lady

Category: FALC

  • I run, because you can’t……for my sister friend.

    “There are only two mistakes one can make along the road to truth; not going all the way and not starting.”

                 Buddha

     

    I felt the loneliness today of my Aunt who ran away.  A woman I never met, yet I feel we are one.

     

    I felt her sadness of being misunderstood and unknown, how her choice to save herself, sentenced her to a life alone outside of her family.

     

    Ostracized for escaping, for saving ourselves, for walking free of abuse, we are not cheered, no clapping, instead we are jeered with sarcasm.

     

    I never ever thought my harshest critics would be from my own family, they are forever punching the already weakened psyche.

     

    The Little girl within feels so sad, empty of words to make them see. 

     

    Today I wondered about my Aunt and her life, how she survived without contact from her family, yet like me the family she missed is the same one that brings her pain.

     

    The intellectual part of me understands that the energy they bring me isn’t healthy, but my heart yearns for acceptance, for understanding and even empathy.

     

    Like missing the stick that is poking you in the eye.

     

    I have more empathy for folks who are set aside because of who they are, parts of themselves they cannot change.

     

    Maybe because my Aunt disappeared and no one spoke her name that I want there to be words about me.

     

    Perhaps this blog is a way that I too will not just simply disappear without a trace.

     

    In the first few days of my father being accused of criminal sexual conduct, I wrote.

     

    I wrote in disbelief, I wrote the words to anchor myself somewhere, to hold me in the sea of grief.

     

    Writing is evidence of my journey.

     

    I have kept all written communications from my family as evidence. I know that is an odd word to use. 

     

    It was the evidence I needed to sort out which one of us was in reality and which one wasn’t.

     

    My mental mind fought a long hard battle up against reality and in reality there are written words from a family who is not cheering me.

     

    In as much as I want them to be cheering, what I needed more were their words of mental ness to shine the way out.

     

    Maybe in the end their shouts of sarcasm are cheering me forward.

     

    They are showing me there is nothing for me back there.

    They were showing me how not to be.

    Showing me how far I have come.

     

    I feel the energy of my runaway aunt; she joins me in spirit as I run along, lending me her courage and strength.  I feel the spirit of many little girls whose time ran out, who were too empty to begin, I run for you. 

     

    I run towards wholeness with truth at my side.

    I feel you with me as I run.

     

    The refrain “you are the wind beneath my wings” came to mind.

     

    I am so grateful I was able to run away.

    I am so not alone.

    All little girls everywhere who suffered like I, I run for you.

    I run, because you can’t.

     

     

     

  • Authentically inauthentic.

    I had to look up the word Authentic, to see if I clearly understood what that means and is there a difference in being authentic and having an authentic relationship.  

    Authentic, "Of Undisputed Origin"…"authentic, genuine, bona fide mean being actually and exactly what is claimed."

    "Being actually and exactly" what you claim to be.

    The claiming part is where the sea of difference lies.

    We can claim to be anything, but can you actually and exactly follow through, that is where authenticity lies, where the rubber meets the road if you will, and if not, all else is meaningless.

    Stating claims isn't always necessary, we catch titles just by being in the world.  I have claims of sister, daughter, mother attached to me. How I am inside of these claims is oftentimes imprinted upon us as we see the adults in our world playing them out.

    And yet, each claim comes with its own definition or the definition of a dictionary, but that isn't always what we experience.

    A mother in the dictionary as a verb is, "Bring up (a child) with care and affection: "the art of mothering"…and as a noun, "A woman in relation to a child or children to whom she has given birth."

    And in reality I did get the noun version, but the verb part was lacking a few things…like "Care and Affection".  Other verbs, action verbs took their place and in doing so, my mother was not an authentic mother…she couldn't be exactly and actually as her role claimed.

    What we are not taught in school, that the words and reality will often not match, that there is very little authenticity.

    In Bird Watching, there is a saying, "When the bird and the Book don't match, BELIEVE the Bird."

    The other part of authenticity was to be of Undisputed Origin…and I take that to mean, that it is senseless to dispute how you were raised.

    I had to look up the definition of Origin to make sure.

    "The beginning of something's existence. A person's social background or ancestry."

    My social background and ancestry is my undisputed origin.  I fully own and embrace all of it, for if I didn't, I would be inauthentic.

    So, in knowing all that…what then is an authentic relationship?

    To me, there can be no authentic relationship, if you are not authentic as a person.  Whatever false claims you live will come forward into the relationship; it is simply impossible to keep them out.

    True authentic relationships allow into the relationship your social background and ancestry and not only expects but demands that you literally be actually and exactly that.  An authentic relationship will not allow you to bring in false claims.  

    Claims without actions of being actually and exactly who you claim to be is being authentically inauthentic.

  • Put a Happy Face on Hurt

    I had a saying that sat on my stove for years on a trivet, "Blessed are the Peacemakers, for they shall inherit the Earth."

    I was a young unmarried girl at the time I had gotten this as a gift, and the way I viewed it was that if you were the one to back down first or retract your wishes, it was a good thing, for it kept the peace.

    If you made things peaceful outwardly and held inside or covered up your true feelings, YOU Were a Peacemaker…for relationships settled back down.

    What I had failed to see at the time, was that while I was making outward peace, my insides were being crammed full of 'unexpressed true emotions', that I had 'settled' to calm things down.

    I had given up what I really needed to have peace.  

    I had silenced my truth feelings in order to get along.

    What I was doing was being a False Peacemaker, I was pretending to pretend that things were okay with me, when they were not.

    Oh, I can recall this feeling so perfectly, how the other person would be so happy to have her peacefulness restored, as I inwardly glowered in silence…while pasting on a happy face. 

    As I continued on into adult life, into married life I often times left arguments half done….my half was not resolved, but tucked away.

    My greatest fear was that IF I didn't acquiesce, all Holy Hell would break lose, that it was my job to keep the peace.

    Acquiesce – To accept something reluctantly, but without protest.  I had to look that up to make sure I had it right. RIGHT, OMG, that is the flavor of my first 46 years.

    Acquiesce is the perfect word to describe how I viewed being peaceful.  And here is the deal, I was the one who always had to give up 'something' AND do so without putting up a protest, to swallow silently….in order to maintain peace within our relationship.

    You have no idea how often I swallowed bitterness without protest.

    With a belly full of resentment and unspoken words and feelings I walked around 'believing' I was keeping the peace.

    What I was instead holding onto was a belly full of bitterness.

    Is that Love?

    Is that peaceful?

    Was I being even a bit authentic in my relations as I was waddling around chuck full of unresolved differences?

    When I stopped swallowing, but instead spit back my thoughts, my feelings and what I saw were our differences, my inner world began to lighten up, to feel so peaceful, while my outer world began to swirl in consternation.

    Where my mother used to see The Peacemaker, I became her Holy Hellion.  

    For you see, all the peacemaking efforts I had painfully swallowed in order to keep a loving mother and father, never produced that.  It was all for naught.  All I had done was to act in a play of pretending we all got along.

    I was the one who had made it worse.

    I was the one who hadn't spoken up.

    I was the one who kept it all a secret.

    I was the greatest pretender of all.

    I pretended that all the abuse didn't matter to me.

    I pretended to be unhurt, so we could have a family that didn't hurt.

    Yet, in the end….sadly and regretfully, all my siblings were hurt anyway.  All I had done was put a happy face on hurt…

     

     

  • Same Opinion Still

    In my book club we are reading Byron Katie's book, "Loving What is". This the first book that told me it was okay to not only accept my reality but it was also okay to move in harmony with what is.

    She writes, "Alcohol is honest and true: It promises to get you drunk, and it does; it promises to make things worse, and it does.  It's always true to its word.  It's a great teacher of integrity.  It doesn't say, "Drink me."  It just sits there, true to itself, being what it is and waiting to do its job."

    She is the one who taught me that Pedophiles rape, fondle, and do sexual things to little children.  She taught me not to argue with that, but to fully accept it.

    In the first weeks of my niece saying that my father abused her, there was total confusion; our family was trying to fit this new definition into their old worlds.  

    It came to me really quickly that we all would have to pick just one of our now two choices; Either he was a Father or a Pedophile, but he couldn't be both.  

    That is exactly what happened, but it was a very slim minority that could see him as a pedophile and then take the steps needed to show that.  Most instead found it within them to keep the father and to glance but not stare at the pedophile ways.

    There is no one in our family who doesn't know he has pedophile ways, but there are some who believe they can keep watch on him, to see that he doesn't molest again.

    He is only doing what he has always done.  He has been the most authentic person in our family…as a pedophile he is doing perfectly his job…he always abuses little girls when give the opportunity.  He never fails.

    As we read and become more familiar with Pedophiles between Penn State and Sheldon Kennedy's story, we can see the timeline, the history and path of integrity these pedophiles have, they stay true to form, but we as the public or the bystanders waver and fail.

    We fail to see what their actions are screaming at us.

    We fail to hear the stories others tell us about them.

    And we fail to act like there is a pedophile in our midst.

    We want so desperately to instead keep our first image, be it true or false, we are the ones who fail reality….NOT reality.

    In reality, in the history of my father, starting with me…he abuses little girls.  My abuse started in the 1960's and he continued to stay true to course and my niece's abuse happened in 2004.  He never failed us.

    We failed him.  We failed to catch his signal…each time we didn't tell, didn't go to the authorities.  We failed to shut him down.  He is doing what pedophiles do.  Just as a murderer kills people, a pedophile sexually molests children.  When you fail to accept or acknowledge that It is you who is wrong not him.  He is showing you who he is…Believe him…as Maya Angelou says.

    My father is a pedophile and most have been acting deaf and blind, pretending not to know know know…

    For if you know know know it, then you will have to begin to change your whole life.  

    My whole life changed from being a daughter to being a victim of his pedophile ways.  If I ignored my abuse, I would not be living an authentic life.

    My authentic life is that I was sexually abused, raped by my father. 

    To ignore my abuse is to be inauthentic to me.

    Some may think that it is unkind to speak of this, to openly discuss what happened, that it taints the man who clothed and fed 14 children, but if I don't speak of it, it taints us all anyway.

    Somehow we believe that the words will wreck the family, tear up a relationship etc and that we can somehow manage to salvage a father daughter relationship.

    Really?  How?  He stopped being a father the moment he raped me and I stopped being a daughter and instead became a victim of incest, of a criminal sexual act.

    My mother even has written to me saying, "I failed you as a mother, but can we not meet then as friends…"

    Really, you just want to switch to a new role?  How?  

    Can we just re-label who we are and go on?

    Can we just slide in place labels that make us feel better so we don't have to be that which we are?

    How can my mother turn from mother to friend?  She will always be my mother.  A mother who knew and did nothing about her pedophile husband, except say she would be vigilant.

    Vigilant about what?  It seems she was the most vigilant about keeping a husband and her marriage. 

    Yesterday it came to me that I have been wanting so desperately for you all to accept reality of many pedophiles being pedophiles in the church, while you all are wanting so desperately wanting to keep 'good christians' there.

    I give up.  Just as I had to accept within my family, that many would not remove the label father, I get it now that you all refuse to change your images of who preaches from the pulpit. 

    You are allowed to keep that image…I am no longer going to tell you to drop it.  Hold it dear, hang on with vigilance to your church being the church of your dreams…It is not my job to change your minds.

    This whole exchange has brought me great clarity.  It wasn't that the Huhta family wasn't worth saving, it was that your mind was incapable of being changed.

    There was nothing a Huhta could do to make you all act any differently; Not the cutest among us or the most articulate or funny, not the blue eyed innocence…it wasn't us, it was always you.

    There literally isn't anything any of us can do about what you think…only you can.

    Inside each of you, you too get to pick….Is he a pedophile or is he just another minister?  You and you alone decide….and you and you alone will reap the consequences of your thoughts.

    How beautiful and kind the Universe is to deliver up to us bloggers, us victims of criminal sexual abuse by members of the FALC, to have another great example of Penn State, where we can see how authority has much to lose if the word got out, that there are members of this organization who are abusing children. 

    I see Don Daavettila as Joe Paterno.

    I see The FALC as Penn State.

    I see that the boys stories are being told….Carl, Jim and Josh.

    I see that the girls stories are being told, Me and Leah.

    I see and I see.

    And yet so many will not see. They want the 'game' of religion to go, they want the 'coaches' to remain someone to look up to.

    We are telling you what is going on and it is up to you to sit in the pews or not.  It is not up to us. We are free.

    Just as it was with my family, it would have been easier if I didn't care, if I didn't give a rats ass about what you all thought.  But, sadly it is your thoughts that keep allowing children to be abused.

    You have active pedophiles doing what active pedophles do, today, right now within your organization.  And there is nothing I can do to change your mind about it…you are the Penn State people who knew and did nothing.

    What I see is active blind and deafness where this subject is concerned…minds convinced against their will are of the same opinion still.  

     

     

  • Here in Support Of…

    http://thestory.org/archive/the_story_111611_full_show.mp3/view

     

    The link above was given to me on Facebook by Carol Cline. Thanks so much Carol for sharing this with me.  I highly recommend you all taking the time to listen to the podcast.  If you can't get there from this link, go to thestory.org and look for Sheldon Kennedy's story, "Why I didn't Tell".

    What he speaks of is so right on, and that the perpetrator doesn't groom, control and manipulate, JUST the child, but all who come in contact with him.  He is the master manilpulator.  And the child senses that no one will believe him, for all believe the master manipulator, the community buys his 'coaching'….the parents trust him, etc.  All are under the spell of his lurid game.

    What else caught my attention is when he speaks of The Bystander, of those who know and say nothing…how we need to educate the bystanders.

    Getting others to believe is educating the bystander. To try and get them to hear that the stories Jim, Josh, Carl and I are writing about is US trying to educate you, the bystander.

    The Bystander who is standing by and believing in the tales and reputation HE is spinning.  

    I can honestly say, I get the web that is spun around all the folks as well as the children, it is thick and powerful and incredibly hard to penetrate.

    You all are living in the web of lies and deceit that is spun IN order for his nest of sexual abuse to continue on.  He has EVERYTHING to lose, so he spins and spins and spins….lies and a false life.

    While he has control of our heads, your beliefs, your faith and trust, he can operate underneath and in the dark molesting children.  The molested child sees you believing in his tale, and can feel like I, how we can't make you believe differently.

    Perhaps what needs to happen the most is for you to at least ask the questions, dare to face this monster and see his reaction.  Dare to be bold and questioning, dare to not just be a passive believer, ask for more proof.  Look around.  Dig deep into His life and accept for now, the child's word.

    Just as Josh and Jim stepped forth to educate you ByStanders, they are doing so knowing you all will most likely NOT believe them.  Most likely you will look instead at the intricate web that was spun to keep you from seeing beneath.

    A minister is a grand role to use as a cover.

    All stand in a bit of awe just in the presence of "a Minister".

    Behind the 'role' of minister is a man.  A man that two generations have come forth and said what he did to them.  

    Is that enough to break the spell, to tear the web?

    As a person standing by….what do you do?

    Will you help fill in the tear?  Will you be the one who works deligently to help 'repair' this rip in his reputation….and allow the abused adult child go on not being believed?

    What will it take….A third Generation?

    Just know that we all are trying to educate the ByStanders.

    We are here in support of the Victims.

    Who are you here in support of…

     

  • To See the Child.

    As I talked to a young mother today, it came up that those of us who have been raised in the church, have mostly friends of the church, and when you speak out about behaviors that hurt you as a child, the other person has similar ones…that you both share experiences that mirror each other enough, that there isn't behavior that is shocking.

    I am not sure I am depicting this well, but it is like complaining to other folks who live Just like you…they don't see a problem, for that is how their moms act too.

    You may as well be telling another white person how it is to be white…and trying to convince them IT is wrong.

    So, as we discuss what is abuse or what your moral compass should be to report; those who have been abused since birth, are waiting perhaps for murder in order to see 'something' is wrong. For how can what has been going on for your whole life, SUDDENLY now be wrong.

    Just as I tried to explain to a sister to see a pedophile rather than her dad, when her dad has always been a pedophile….we are asking them to see what they have always seen, BUT this time see beyond what is showing. 

    For all the members of the church to suddenly start questioning or looking deeper into the 'allegations' we are making on the blogs, is similar to having my sister START looking for something that is already there.  

    How can you find what is in plain sight?

    This is what makes this incredibly frustrating on my part…that I am warning that the 'friendly' person is really the bad.

    It is much easier for the child to get it, for one day a normal loving person in their world changed into a very horrible person.  Yet to have everyone else now see what the child experienced, is a stretch.

    Not only are we mired in families of abuse, we are friends or relatives with other families of abuse, so to each other we all look normal…nothing seems amiss.

    And in the structure of these messed up families, is that the parent has the upper hand…always.  You are to love and honor your parent. The child's wishes, needs etc are not consider, for "Mother" knows best.

    Just being a child in this religion, you are taught to be a second class citizen, with no rights.  Now enter in an abusive person.  The child is easy prey. They have been groomed by the religion to silently suffer the short end of any scale….that is their normal.

    It seems nothing short of a miracle that I was able to see not only my abuse, but my parents, and even more miraculous is that I was able to walk way from it all. To realize that what I had thought was loving kindness, was just abuse.

    There was no part of love that I could extracate from there, for all of it had been tainted by either the religion or the abuse.

    I could feel the weight today of how a child must feel, to try and reason with the unreasonable, to make hear those who have been conditioned ONLY to listen to their ELDERS.  To imagine the pressure a child feels when all on the top can't hear you much less believe you.

    I am a big assed adult lady of 52 years. And very few if any have changed their minds.  Imagine then if you will how a young child with very limited vocabulary and life skills and experiences are supposed to change your view of your church members, your fathers, brothers etc…and at the same time have your very survival (your basic needs) be in the hands of your abuser.

    While I thought my voice in the blog was to wake people up to see what is in plain sight, maybe it is instead to show a child what you will be up against…you will be the one candle in a family of darkness. 

    If you are one of the lucky ones, you will find another member of your family to add to your shining light of truth.  It is like lighting a huge warehouse, with just one candle.

    My determination to wake you up, hasn't been working very well.

    Mostly it seems is that I am talking to myself…what comes back is mostly anonymous defenses.  It isn't the children that need to be taught, but the adults.

    Adults who have been taught to not believe, hear or pay attention to the feelings and lives of children….are to be taught to see the child.

     

  • Remain Unmoved.

     The gift that the scandal at Penn State is offering is it is encouraging others to stand in the long line of abused children, whether it happened recently or years and years ago.

    The adults who are standing today, are great examples to others that we can't sit down and silently pray that it will go away.  It won't.

    What I find so infuriating is that many will HEAR about abuse, but not believe it.  Which is the biggest problem victims have is being believed.  Imagine, we are not believed.

    What does 'believing' us mean?  What will show us you believe?  What actions are your changing to tell us that you are now 'believing' in the news?

    What I just get so floored by is that people listen, but they don't believe. They hear, but they continue on as if we had not spoken.

    Josh commented on my blog post, "Shattered Dreams" stating that not only did his Uncle abuse his father, he also abused him.  That means that Eric has gone on abusing now for many years.  What will that mean to you all who sit in the pews?  What will happen?  Will you contact the Chairperson of the Board of the First Apostolic Church and DEMAND he not preach?  Will you start to then question many things, or will you hear it and just pass it on as 'their story' their life, and go on unchanged?

    I believe there is active listening where it instills actions and then there is passive listening where it requires nothing of you.

    What I want to impress upon you, that passive listening is the greatest gift to Eric, it will allow him to freely abuse in the third generation.  Imagine that?

    Passive listening is what Joe Paterno did.  Passive listening is what those in Higher Positions did.  Passive listening is how so many boys were abused, while the coach horsed around in the showers.

    I don't know what it will take in your world for you to act upon knowledge, for you to stand up and get 'involved'.  

    What I see most is the courageous abused children, even those who are now adults stepping forth…. and speaking out. How many will be believed?  Just as in the Penn State case, you will draw a side, you will decide who to believe and why….I would be curious to hear the other side.

    Josh is telling you, do you believe him?  Do you dare not act?  For all who will passively read blogs and then go on with life unchanged, you are exactly what is needed for sexual crimes to be committed, again and again and again.  There is a term for you all, accessories to the crime.

    Those who know and remain unmoved.

  • They just are not believed.

    "Being Loyal to dysfunction, is a sign of abuse….and when you can speak of it, tell your truth, you begin to function again."  This is what I heard on Sirius radio.  

    What I had not considered is what does dysfunctional mean.  How when we get hurt we tell others about our injury, yet when it comes to abuse we remain mute.

    It's being mute that is dysfunctional.  We don't talk about being hurt, being betrayed, being afraid, etc, we go mute, not functioning.

    Being silent about being hurt, is actually what dysfunction looks like. I didn't know to break it down that simply.

    We become loyal to being silent….

    I also thought of how we the victims are doubted and feel the only 'proof' lies within us, that many don't believe us, for the scars are all inside, there is no bloddy arm to show…our battle scars are broken trust, love shattered, and innocence gone.  How can you see that?

    What I just thought of is how many will eagerly believe that a sin can disappear with the words spoken, "believe them all forgiven…" yet when we are asking them to believe in our abuse, they want proof.

    What is the proof that your sins are gone?  Did you seem them disappear?  And yet you are so cock sure of this….without proof.

    How can a sin disappear?  Yet when it comes to a victim coming forth with stories of abuse, you want proof.

    This seems so weird, how you will eagerly believe on thing disappearing and yet we are asking you to see a person differently and you will refuse.

    Being loyal to abuse you fail to believe us.

    Being loyal to disappearing sinful acts….you believe.

    I can see how you would believe a criminal sin of rape disappearing so that person isn't a pedophile.  But yet a child's innocence disappears and you won't believe it.

    I would question the proof of disappearing sins.  In my experience they don't disappear, they just are not believed.

  • Less abusive to live a lie.

    "We call it 'verbal abuse' when someone tells us the truth about ourselves and we don't want to hear it."  Byron Katie

     

    The above sentence stayed with me and it occurred to me that we have been taught or led to believe that by telling the truth about someone is abusive.

     

    I know that I have become an outcast due to the fact that I speak the truth, about my family.  I state what is and this is seen as abusive, that it is much better to give a false identification of someone, to not share how they hurt you.

     

    Imagine, we are seen as being 'verbally abusive' for 'Telling'.  It is no wonder why children do not speak up, for we feel it will hurt them to hear the truth.

     

    Isn't it interesting that we protect the ones who hurt us.

    The question is why. Why is it so hard to state the facts, to draw the tough lines when abuse is clearly apparent?

    As Dr. Phil says, there has to be a payoff.  What do we get for our silence?  A father and a mother?

    It is unnatural for a child to estrange themselves from their parents, but what they fail to see is that it is natural to move away from abuse.

    That we were born into an unnatural environment, where the parents abused their offspring, they did not 'raise' them, but lowered and changed who they were.

    In society, it is pressed upon us that we are to love and honor thy parent, that family is sacred.  That is, for the normal functional homes.

    And what is the creed for the unnatural families? What is the rule we are to live by?  How do we unhinge ourselves from the parents that abused us…

    I had mistakenly felt that all would abandon my father…and instead they abandoned the truth.

    They abandoned the truth so as to not be abusive towards their parent, while they are now having to live a lie.

    It is remarkable to me now, that it is literally easier to live a lie than to live the truth.

    And it is abusive to our bodies and our lives to live this lie, but we do it to keep a parental relationship alive.  And the truth of this relationship we dare not speak of….So, we have a silent clause, a do not speak of 'the abuse' clause and if you do so you will contine to be part of this family and/or organization.

     

    We would rather abuse ourselves by living a lie, than to 'abuse' our parent by telling the truth and moving away from abuse. We somehow believe that it is 'less' abusive to live a lie.

     

     

     

     

     

     

  • Shattering Dream

    While commenting back and forth with Lynn C. Tolson, the Author of "Beyond the Tears", on facebook, it came to me why folks support the Coach and the Organization and not the abused boys…they don't want to lose that which they are a part of.

    Whether it is to be a fan of a winning football team and coach, or whether it be a family and father, no one wants to let go of that which they have looked up to, aspired towards, cheered on and been part of.   

    By looking at the abused child, you will see that your hero is a monster.

    It isn't the pain of the child, it IS the pain of the dream dying.

    Lynn asked on facebook, "Why is it so painful to support the abused children? Why, why, why (not expecting an answer). The topic of child sex abuse is so uncomfortable yet the victims live their entire lives in a world of hurt."

    It isn't the child's pain we fear, but our own pain as our family dies, our team isn't as grand as we thought, or that the icon coach is just a normal man, who didn't want to turn in a friend, or who didn't want the public to know that it is as vulnerable to abuse as any other organization.

    We fear our own losses so much that we will hold on to a false dream rather than feel it actually die.

    In walkng face first into my greatest fear, I was able to then see the abused child.  It seems we all have a choice in either holding up a dream or letting it die to save a child.

    What very few can do is let go of their own lives in order to save a life of a child, to spare them the shame, guilt and blame of 'wrecking' the dream.

    What hurt me the most, wasn't the rape of my father, nor even the image of him changing from dad to monster, but what hurt even more was being blamed for killing the family.  

    I wasn't rioting for his reputation…so it was seen as I was out to tear our family apart, when in fact all I was doing was standing by the abused children…the long list of girls who suffered under his hands.

    I wasn't able to stand in a picket line supporting those who knew and said nothing, and I was seen as a traitor to our 'family'.  

    It wasn't my pain that they couldn't bear feeling, but they didn't want to feel the pain of losing a family.

    We wonder why more folks are not lining up to give up the details of their abuse, it is to give evidence and facts that will tear apart their dream of family…

    It isn't that we don't support abuse, we don't want to support the tearing apart families, religions and organizations. But if abuse is within, your organization is decaying from the inside out, and eventually, there will be no good there to hold it up.

    Penn State has shown us it isn't the abuse that we can't bear to see, but the shattering dream.