Pieces of Me: Embracing My Inner Beauty Pt. 2

I can still feel his hands -- cold and rigid against my soft, warm skin.

I can still feel the hotness of his breath creeping down the nape of my neck as he eased his body close to mine.

I would curl up into the fetal position and pretend to be asleep whenever I heard him coming or saw the shadow of his feet at the door. I always hoped that it'd make him change his mind about bothering me. My hopes never worked.

It was the same thing every time, yet the horror of it all worsened with each touch.  Although young, innocent, and uninformed about all things sex-related, I knew something about our encounters with one another wasn't right.

Groping. Fondling. Grinding. Digital penetration.

And then he'd perform the most disgusting act and release himself on me.  As a little girl, I was totally oblivious to what that warm, wet sensation and the moaning that accompanied it meant.

Then, he'd clean me up using the roll of tissue he kept stashed under my bed and exit the room, always sure to remind me that this was "our little special secret" and "no one could ever know."

I wasn't so sure that that was the kind of secret a 6-year old and a much older man should share, but I was afraid to expose it. I mean, I didn't have that kind of secret with any of my other cousins. Still, I never told anyone.

I remember him telling me once that letting him do those things to me made him feel good.

As I got older, those words never left the recesses of my mind, and I honestly believed that I was supposed to allow boys or men to do nasty, degrading things to me, as long as it made them feel good. I thought it was all that I was good for -- a good time.

Every time I let a guy to touch my body, I was replicating the behavior taught to me by my abuser. I didn't realize it then, but I had allowed him to shape my identity. I had accepted being the person he told me I was, and given him the power to determine my worth.

The enemy at work through my abuser had stolen my true identity and given me a false perception of who I was based on the things he did to me.

It took me years to break free from the bondage of that falsehood, forgive myself for believing the lie that I was only purposed to be some man's sex slave and for acting as such, and to discover my true identity in Christ.

I had to learn, through much prayer and studying God's word, that I was not a tainted woman because of the filth forced upon me by my abuser.  In spite of what happened to me, it did not at all change who I was or how God saw me.

Though my mind was twisted in the way I perceived myself and I struggled greatly with disassociating my worth and identity from the molestation I suffered, it was God's grace and His transforming power that cleansed and renewed me - mind, body, spirit and soul.

I am so eternally grateful for God's unconditional love, His mercy, and His grace.

Today, I understand that I am not what happened to me, but I am what God created me to be -- beautiful, valuable, worthy, whole, redeemed, and treasured. That's an identity no one could ever take away from me.

I embrace the beauty of me.

Be Beautiful!
xoxo