My daughter is finishing her nightly bath in the next room, and I am jealous of her splashes and her squeals of delight; of the fun she is having. I slam my cast down on the counter in vented frustration, and gasp when the pain shoots up to my shoulder. I hate this cast, I hate it. I hate that the doctor is worried and wants to give me a bone scan and an mri. I hate that I fell, I hate that I can't hug my daughter with both hands, that sex with hubby turns kinky and playful rather than the simple loving tenderness I'm craving so desperately.

I'm losing tremendous gaps of time; finding myself in clothes I haven't chosen. I smell a different soap on my skin. I watch myself as I choose a less preferred bra over a favourite. I'm frightened of these changes -- after so long, after so much progress, suddenly I feel as if I am falling down a dark, bottomless space with no hand outstretched to comfort me.

Later, as I'm giving the baby her bottle, the screw on my frames comes loose, and I holler for hubby. Not hearing a response, I holler again. Then panicked -- again.

Suddenly I tremble with the sound of his voice -- loud, harsh, annoyed: "I'LL BE RIGHT THERE!"

I cower inside myself -- I'm going to be hit, I'm going to be hit; I've been a bad girl; I've got to hide; help me; help me. Oh what do I do? pleasehelpme I've donesomethingsoverywrong I'vemadehimmad andhe'sgoingtohurtme he'scomingtogetme he'sgoingtohitme pleasehelpmeplease.

I press my daughter close to my chest, feel my tears as they drip on the top of her head, trying to keep it together til I get her down for the night. I cuddle her; I wish I could swirl her up inside of me; I wish she could stay in my arms for the rest of my life; and I sob as I set her in her crib and tuck her in. Her protests at being left alone for the night match my own, and we wail a little bit together.

I leave her nightlight on, close the door, and walk to our bedroom, where I crumple in a heap on the bed and soak a pillow. I can't stop crying; I can't stop the aching in my heart; I can't stop the fear that I am going to be beaten badly and I am going to bleed. I am terrified I am going to be raped.

I want to scream for help, but I feel no one is listening. I want to be held closely, but I fear my husband's arms. I have been spun back into the past and I know only pain, torment, horror, terror, and isolation. Nothing feels safe.

[switch]

Several minutes go by, minutes I don't remember losing, and I discover that I can move again. I can walk, I can talk, my eyes are not filled with tears. Someone within me is with me; someone strong is helping me to come back into the present, and reminding me that the trauma is in the past. She is holding my hand, and guiding me to the wonder that is my life right now.

[switch]

Suddenly everything is okay. I've forgotten the pain and whatever it was that bothered me, and when hubby tries to bring it up, I avoid the subject. Everything is perfectly fine. I am perfectly fine. I am  always perfectly fine.

The magic of multiplicity sets in, and I enjoy myself without memory or concern over what has just happened inside me. Our dinner is delicious and I savour every morself that is placed on the table. We clean up, and watch a movie (The Parent Trap), which my 5 year old alter Gigles finds fascinating and fantastic.

When she receedes for the evening, and I am left alone with myself again, the old haunting emotions come back. I have to start swallowing the lump in my throat, and hope it doesn't crash through. I have to blink back the pressure behind my eyes in order to thwart off the impending tears.

Frustration, agony, helplessness, fear -- when will I stop hiding behind furniture? When will I stop expecting someone to throw something at me? When will the memories of being pushed to the floor and kicked, the memories of having a broom shoved roughly in between my legs, the memories of my father raping me -- splitting me open from the inside -- as he tells me "you did this to me, you made me do this to you" and "I am an instrument of the Lord and of His righteous vengeance." The memories of laying on the floor for hours after he went away, of the blood stains on the carpet in my grandmother's bedroom, of the stinging when I peed and the bruises on my breasts.

It doesn't go away, it doesn't go away -- though I beg for it, though I ask for it, though I pretend it never happened, though I make my life a beautiful existence with everything I thought I ever wanted. It is still here. It is all still here. It lives in me. It lives in the people who live in me. And even those that I need and love; those that are my chosen "good guys" -- the folks who guard my back -- even they cannot protect me from the pain and the memories and the reality of what happened to me as a child.

I had to drink blood. I had to have sex with animals. My father snapped a bone in my wrist and refused to take me to the hospital. I was torn between two religious ideologies: God, and Satan. I had to decide which would hurt me less; I had to choose which would give me the greatest power.

I've been doing freelance web work for the past week for a friend of mine. It is for a youth ministry organisation -- a large, influential one. My job has been to take care of their link section: check for outdated or non-existent links and fix them. I also browse possible new additions for appropriateness and content. As a result, I have seen more xian web sites in the past 20 days than I have seen in 5 years. It has sent me plummeting downard, and straight back to my past.

It has sent me plummeting back to the days of silence. To the humiliation of my high school youth group -- the cruelty of my high school youth pastor. It has sent me back to the reality of people knowing (really knowing) things were not okay, and people refusing (really refusing) to intervene or do anything to help me.

How many times, how many years, how much of my life was I screaming "Help Me?" to them? No, they didn't know what was going on, but they didn't want to get involved. Pastor JR threatened me ("young lady, you are making me look bad to all of my friends") and soothed their worried concerns .... telling them I wanted attention, that I was "disturbed," that the best thing for me would be to ignore me. They made me nonexistent. I had no one to go to, and nothing in me made sense, and I curled up in a ball inside myself and died a little death every single day.

I never made a choice. I never chose good or evil, and when push came to shove, I simply disappeared. One self chose good. Several selves chose evil. In the end, the evil wins because it is fucking powerful. It moves in darkness, it moves in deception and secrets and betrayals -- things as familiar as my own bedroom.

Right now, this second, I am that high school girl. I am that girl saying,"ohmygod. please help me. please see my pain. my father rapes me while singing christian hymns. my mother left me when I was little and the hole that remains is something nobody can ever fill. I'm lonely. I hurt. please help me. please. please. please."

I want to write the youth pastors on those pages I saw this week, and I want to ask for help, but I know there is nothing that they can do. There is nothing anyone can do. There is nothing anyone can say. There are no healings for these wounds.

So I sit here, staring at these words -- watching the typos emerge out of my casted fingers -- feeling the ache in the pit of my stomach and the pain in the top of my forehead, and I want to cry for the injustice that has been my life.

Earlier today I wrote about my goal for the year. Right now, it comes down to this: I simply want to survive. I don't want to be swallowed up by the dragon. I don't want to let those fucking bastards win.

I hurt.

I hurt, I hurt, I hurt.