Pouring Light Into Wounds

Golden light illuminating an open notebook and pen laying on a blanket. We can see the shadow behind.

By. Aileen Denfield

Content Warning: Sexual Abuse + Interpersonal Violence

I was never taught that my body was mine.

I remember being taught to hide it, to compress it in tight clothes, to keep my legs closed when wearing a dress- but nobody ever told me that I belonged only to myself. And it is with that critical piece of information missing from my database that I reached puberty.

I remember how delighted my mum was to buy me a bra for the first time... and how badly lace hurt my too sensitive skin, causing a rash that would last weeks. I remember the smell of cream, and how weird it felt that it was my dad rubbing it on my breasts. I remember detaching myself from that part of my body.

I remember the first boy who groped me, how vulnerable and unsafe, tiny and insignificant it made me feel- even knowing that I was tall and strong and could have fought him if he’d try to force me. I remember my dad asking me to remove my shirt because hugs were better skin to skin, and how impossible it felt to just say “no”.

I remember trying to put cream on my own sunburns and how my dad walked into the bathroom like he had every right to be there to rub the cream into my skin himself, all the while saying he loved me and would never hurt me. I remember the day I came back from school saying it was too hot, and how he asked me to completely undress so he could cover me in cream and watch me as I lied on the cold kitchen tiles.

I remember the shame, the guilt, the fear, the disgust. I hated my own femininity for bringing doom upon me, for turning my dad into a monster. So I buried the memories, all the memories, and only disgust stayed behind, as a cruel reminder that my own body was responsible for the dull ache of silence in my throat.

“People make bad choices when they’re mad or scared or stressed”, was a lesson that Frozen came too late to teach me, and maybe I wouldn’t have ended up with a Hans if I’d known. Or maybe I would have anyway, because of the way I was wired at the time. Still, I found my “Hans” and followed him far away from home, far from the verbal, psychological and physical abuse.

Or so I thought.

How could I have been raised to believe that I belonged to my dad until my ownership was transferred to any man who decided he wanted me? How could I have known that not owning myself would lead to further abuse?

I should have ran the first time we had sex, when I had to ask him to wear a condom and he got mad because it made him lose his focus and erection. I should have ran the first time he broke a chair in anger because his game crashed. I should have ran when he started complaining that we couldn’t have sex on my period and I should blow him to compensate for it. I should have ran when he threw the cat through the room because he was angry that he was loosing at a game. I should have ran when, after trying for months for a baby while battling grief and depression, I got my period for 42 days and he still wouldn’t let me take my birth control pills again.

It took six years of abuse, months of therapy, a handful of new friends and a list of criteria for manipulation for me to acknowledge that I was in an abusive relationship and that I needed to get the hell out of there. It took me 25 years to shout “NO MORE!” and actually become my own property, labeled “polyamorous” and “pansexual” despite what others thought or wanted.

So I ran. I packed discreetly for two days, booked a cab, found a place to run to, and waited for the only opportunity I’d have. Since “Hans” never left the house, I had never managed to leave before, because manipulators are just too good at keeping you where they want you to be. So I waited for him to be out for a check up, packed the obvious things I couldn’t pack before, and ran.

I cried during the whole process of leaving the house and during the entire month that followed. I cried because I was still in love with him, because despite the fact that I’d left for the best reasons, a lot of people around me were making me feel like the bad guy for destroying such a nice man. I cried because “Hans” wrote to my best friends telling them that I left him so I could have orgies. I cried because living with my mum and brothers again was not easy, because they didn’t know what I’d been through with my dad and they were too busy forgetting he was abusive because he had killed himself half a year before.

When I was done crying, I hugged my mum and left, found a new place and a new job in a new city, and I finally got to live alone with myself for the first time. I learned a lot during that time. That I hated being alone with myself, but that I loved silence. That I was blaming myself for letting bad things happen to me, when it was really the people being awful to me that were to blame. That I had the right to love and miss my dad for the moments he was a real dad, and hate him for what he did to me. That I didn’t have to forgive my abusers and find excuses for them like I was raised to believe.

And when I was done learning, I started fighting.

I told my mum about the abuse. I told people about “Hans” and that sexual abuse existed even between partners. I started drawing about polyamory, pansexuality, abuse and depression and wrote poems about it as well. I was a teacher, and I decided to be as open as possible, I got teenagers to come out of the closet, and others to tell me about their abusive fathers. I got students asking me to read their suicide note and find them help, and others who cried in my arms. I got showed slit wrists and Pride pictures, dead embryos and love poems.

Drawing by Florence- A black human figure holds a red heart, with yellow light surrounding it. The title of the piece “Pouring Light Into Wounds” is written at the top.

And I helped. I know I helped. I burned out from the amount of papers I had to grade and the bad administration of the school system, but I helped until I collapsed. And I tried to keep helping by posting poetry and drawings on Instagram because I knew that out there there was someone, maybe you, who needed to know that they’re not alone, and that this too, shall pass.

And thus, through fighting, I started healing.

Healing is a process. It’s long, it’s messy, but you don’t have to do it alone. I didn’t. I got out of hell because friends came to the rescue, because I tried therapy and it worked for me, because coworkers told me my relationship was not normal, and one of them actually offered to come pick me up if I needed to get out. And the most important lesson I learned from my bumpy road is that the moment you start talking about what you went through is the moment you start healing.

It might not be actual talk. It might be writing, painting, creating music, dancing, making plush monsters, who knows what works for you, but the hurt needs a breach to get out so you can heal. You went through hell and survived, you’re a warrior, and you deserve to give yourself that breach in your armor so you can shine light into the wounds.

You are an amazing person for making it this far. Always remember that your story, like your body,  is yours, and that you are the only one who can tell it. Get it out there, and roar.

As a child, Florence discovered that words could be swords or feathers. She grew up cherishing words, sentences and rhymes and became a poet, a writer, and an illustrator. Nowadays, she mostly communicates through shapes and colors. @lumi_aile