My Mother closes the curtains as soon as the sun starts setting. She is terrified of someone looking into the window. I like to wring out every bit of daylight I can. It’s not that I am afraid of the dark, and it’s not that my Mother is either. Everyone processes childhood trauma differently.
Generations of sexual abuse
I come from at least three generations, counting me, of child sexual abuse. I only know a fraction of what happened to my Grandmother as a child, as far as sexual abuse goes. A foster brother sexually abused her. She told me he would hide under her bed. A week before she fell from her front steps and broke her neck after having a stroke, she admitted to me that she still looked under the bed before getting under the covers.
I suspect far more happened to her; there were multiple perpetrators. She told me as a teenager a man tried to rape her. I think he didn't try but succeeded in raping her. She couldn’t talk about it in full. Her pain was buried deep within for survival. She coped by cooking for and taking care of her family, including my Sister and me who lived next door. I always sensed a well of deep-seated pain within her, a pain I couldn’t and wouldn’t reach. Perhaps that is why when I first told her that her son sexually abused me as a child, she accepted it and said something had been off with him. A few weeks later she tried to retreat in denial, telling me it didn’t happen. I told her it did and I refuse to deny it. She accepted it.
Why did I tell her? A therapist told me that if I didn’t, incest would continue in our family. I had to be the light bearer, the one who shone a light on the darkest regions of our family history. When I would feel guilty after she died for telling her, I reminded myself that speaking the truth brought light to my own life and my family. Somehow I didn’t carry the guilt around. My desire for the light became greater than any guilt I carried for a while.
Real and false light
Some animals need light so much that they emit their own. The sea is awash in creatures emitting light. One of those animals is the anglerfish, a bioluminescent fish with a small light at the tip of its antenna and above its jaws. It uses its light to draw prey close enough so that it can quickly eat them. Far too many of us have experienced the false light that human predators emit. Learn to distinguish between real and false light before another predator tries swallowing you up.
The lanternfish uses bioluminescence to avoid its predators. Everything can be prey for something bigger, stronger. The lanternfish is so plentiful in the ocean that it comprises 550 million to 660 million metric tons of biomass. Prey species like the lanternfish use their light to appear invisible to predators which tend to attack their prey from the bottom of the ocean, looking for food among the dark shapes that appear against the lighter surface. The lanternfish, and others like it that want to avoid being food, use their light to camouflage themselves from those who seek to chomp them up. How many times in our childhood did we try to appear invisible so no one would prey on us ever again?
Unlike fish, some of us use light not to avoid current predators but to heal from the predators of our childhood. We seek every bit of light, whether it’s by keeping the curtains open until the last bit of sunlight is gone, or closing the curtains before sunlight goes. Whether we crave natural or artificial light cast by lightbulbs, we seek the light. And whether it is by writing down what happened to us as children or by telling someone or both, we seek the light.
Seek the light where you can find it.
Prayer
Did this trigger you? Did something resonate with you? Pray this simple prayer:
Oh Lord, You are the light of the world. Please, shine on the dark parts of me. Give me discernment to discern when someone or something is toxic.