NO BLAME NO SHAME/ A LETTER TO AN AUNT AND UNCLE

I was very taken aback when I heard that you wanted to hear from me or have me stop and visit.  At nearly 50 years old, the usual reception I have received from so many is less than stellar. 

I hear most of my news from the west coast where my mothers brother lives.

I would not doubt that you heard about the group letter I wrote to my mothers side of the family.  In that letter I “came out” as it were about being sexually molested.   No one responded.  I wrote another letter.  No one responded.   In part of my healing I changed my name.   

I am a strong person but I could not carry the name of my molester.   Prior to writing the blog I was involved with public speaking for 15 years during the time I was a caregiver for a friend.   I did conservatively 1,200 talks with him at colleges, grade schools, half way homes, nursing homes and convents.  Many about social justice (GLBT issues) and many of the talks were good touch/bad touch issues for the younger crowds. 

I spent the better part of 20 years trying to speak with Alice about addressing this epidemic and the paternal relations involvement in it and she absolutely refused.  I have to step back now.  I want to say that I just don’t care, but that is not true.  Nobody spends 20 years trying to address this serious issue without really caring.   But I have to step back.  I believe I know now why she will not speak of this subject.    I have no doubt that she herself was molested, as was Robert. 

I have done quite a study about this for the last 20 years.  There is a Documentary called, “Incest, A Family Tragedy”.    Notice it is not called “A Personal Tragedy” but from what I have seen there is a very low percentage of “families” willing to step up and really be proactive or supportive in any way.  Quite the contrary.   What usually happens and continues to happen with me is that people will shut me out. 

People will abandon you.  People will change the subject.  People will give you the cold shoulder.  People will stand back and allow the next child go to the slaughter!  Think I am being melodramatic?  I don’t think so.  Take a look at the details of my survival from blog posting titled, “Each Survivors Story Is Different” dated 2/4/10.   There are many who fare worse than me.   Think about your grandchildren before you dismiss me.  *Even if you decide to have nothing to do with me, because of the sexual orientation issue, please be proactive for the sake of your grandchildren.  

I tried to speak with my father on a one on one basis.  All I ever wanted to do was ask what happened to him.  I wanted to just address the issue.  I never called the police and never filed any kind of report.  He refused to speak with me one on one. 

I spoke with your sister, the pastor’s wife about child sexual abuse and she was helpful to begin with and confirmed the name of a man I know to be a sex offender.  Then she abruptly disappeared from my life. 

I saw Jo-Jo at The Renaissance Festival in Minneapolis and I went up to hug her.  I was in position where she did not see who was grabbing her to give her a big loving hug.  When she realized who I was she recoiled in complete iciness. 

I warned my sisters about what our father did to me and that he should not be trusted around young children.  This was around the time they began having children.  They will not have anything to do with me.   They will not answer emails I have sent and will not “friend me” on Facebook. 

I saw my older sister in my home town at a park when we both were there for a former neighbors 70^th birthday party.  I tried to hug her and she poked me in the side and pushed me away.   She has blocked me on Facebook.

I sent an email to the pastor and he did not answer the email.

In every instance that I have reached out to any relative, it has been just a complete waste of time. 

I was sexually molested for the first almost 9 years of my life.  I did not grow up feeling any kind of love on any regular basis as I lived in an unsafe house.   

It’s really sad to say but if I never see my mother or father again it wouldn’t matter too much.  I would morn the loss of ever having the chance to have had a mother or father but nothing more.  To explain in another perspective, it’s like searching for many years trying to find your parents and family (the process of healing you go through) and then when you finally grow into whom you are supposed to be, your parents and entire family reject you.  In all the years I was growing up, other than physically, I really was not there.

I have researched and have a posting about the actual stages of a broken heart.  It is a proven thing and there are precise stages to a broken heart.  I know of those stages as I went through that more than once.   The posting on this blog is dated, December 1, 2011.  It is titled, “Anatomy Of A Heartbreak/Continuing Cycle”. 

I am very angry that I am the one being blamed for my mothers broken heart.  If I am guilty of this, my father/molester is equally guilty.  

Gnostics believe that we choose to come to this earth to experience for God and to test our spirituality, to learn from each other and teach each other.    We sit with our spirit guide and decide all the details of what we need to learn from when we are on this earth that is really HELL!   I have the blessing/curse of knowing this as I remember going through the process.  I remember conversations with my spirit guide before I was incarnated into this life.  So…I cannot use the word “blame”.  I can use the word attribute, as the memories I have had ARE NOT FALSE MEMORIES!   

For a much more in-depth detail of Gnostic beliefs please visit this website.

http://www.novus.org/home/contact.cfm   I am not fishing for recruits. 

One of the first things they always say in the Gnostic Church is, “Take what you want and leave the rest”  There are no pushy tactics with this faith.

There is a saying that I first heard when I was at your lovely home years ago when I was almost a teenager.  It was, “No Blame, No Shame”.  I do not remember what the conversation that I overheard was about but that little saying really struck a cord with me.   I am sure you remember much better than I about what people used to think about cancer.  It was a shameful thing and you Never spoke of it.  It was kept secret.   Wasn’t it the same about alcoholism?  And here we are all very proud of Lee.

Dr. Phil gives the advice to married couples who are thinking of divorce to do everything they can to mend the relationship before they make any hasty decision to actually follow through with a divorce. 

Sister Lucy wrote a letter to me once saying, "You can't divorce your family."  I am not sure that this is true.  The legal divorce I do not know about.  What I can do is walk away from a group of people who refuse to support me.  I can wash my hands of a people who for now want me to jump through hoops but will not tell me what those hoops are.  I am speaking here of the people in Wisconsin who will not answer any of my letters or phone calls.   I can be happy with family or happy if my relatives choose to not be a part of my life.  

This letter I feel may be a last attempt to try to begin some kind of path to reintegrating into the family or I will forever think of you and the rest as "relatives".  So where do we go from here?   I think that a moderator who has some expertise in the field of child sexual abuse would be in order.


One thing I want to make sure you understand about this experience I had in my infancy and young childhood is that I did not grow up without love.    I grew up without FEELING loved.   This was because I grew up in what was for me an unsafe house and I did not trust at all.  That experience is very important to understand because the issue about cause and effect clearly explains how I know what it was like for my mother to go through the horrible time of having a broken heart.  I want through that at a very young age.  My heart always hurt and when I complained about it I was told it was growing pains.

I have the thought that some people in my relation will say, "Oh, he has too much baggage to have anything to do with."  I certainly know that I am not alone with this particular situation.  There are hundreds of thousands of survivors who must edit out their lives in order to be a part of a family where most likely if child sexual abuse is not address will Continue!  And the cycle goes on and on......

Should I contact Dr.Phil for the reintegration?  I am sure he is a busy man but I will do what I can to continue to have some kind of family.

You may have seen that I Did go to a family reunion from my mothers side of the family.   If you take the stance as many on my fathers side have this letter may be a "swan song" as far as me trying to have anything to do with the paternal side of the family.   I WILL have some semblance of a family if you choose to not be a part of my life.

One thing I will pass on to you Aunt and Uncle, from the words that I heard, your brother is in a severe state of depression.  The last step I took to help this man was to contact the family priest  from my youth and ask him to visit him.  I do not know if that visit took place.  I am not aware of any steps that the paternal side of the family is taking to help him.  You might want to check in on him and seek out some professional to get him some meds if needed to help with his depression.


*  This is a letter in progress to an aunt and uncle of mine who told another aunt of mine….the former nun, to have me contact them.  I am sending them a nice card and inviting them to see their letter here.