SHANNON

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I need to be clear that this is not something I have ever been open about.

Everything MH’s cause is very important to me and I feel it’s worth whatever happens as a result.

 

It started when I was young, about four or five years old. I lived with and around pedophiles. I have always been proud of fashion, meaning I’d wear cute dresses and outfits. My mom wasn’t around so often so they’d take advantage, and when she was there, she’d call me a whore. The guys told me to, “Shake my ass” and showed me pornography and my mom repeatedly reminded me that all I could aspire to be was a slut. Instead of sheltering me from them when I told her I was afraid, she would punish me on behalf of their actions, as if it was my fault.

I grew up feeling like I was expecting/expected to have large breasts and the body of a 25 year-old (flat belly, nice butt, sexy) at a very young age, which led me to trying to have sex at an alarmingly young age.

Eventually, I got caught in elementary school for being “inappropriately affectionate” with other kids. Nobody knew about my homelife because it was so hidden. My parents knew how to hide it and I didn’t share it.

During middle school, when I was starting to physically develop, I learned about prostitution, which naturally sparked my curiosity. At the same time, I started to sleep with other girls my age (who also had trouble in their homelives). Mind you, because of the environment I was in, nobody had taught me what safe sex means. That’s when I started to realize the only time I really felt close to loved and acknowledged was during sex. At this age, I was using masturbation as a vice because when people upset or angered me I could use this similar feeling of sex to remember feeling loved.

Then high school happened, which is when I started to prostitute. I learned what the term Sugar Daddy means and started to have “relationships” with men three-times my age. If other boys at school wanted to do something sexual, I decided to charge them ($20 for something less invasive). As that went on, adults in my area started to take notice in me as well and I wouldn’t turn down an opportunity for a profit. Finally, I had a consistent means to feel cared for, despite how uncomfortable they made me feel. These years were particularly troubling because sex became the typical topic of conversation for me, being a big reasons I lost a lot of close friends. I had no issue letting my boyfriends sleep with me, as if they only cared about me because I was promiscuous.

It wasn’t until I went into foster care that I learned my actions were inappropriate and the difference between right and wrong. I learned that it was not okay for me, a minor, to be seduced by an adult because he had money and resources that I wanted and never had.

I met my ex-boyfriend (ex-cocaine buddy) two years ago, quickly falling in love with him, but we didn’t get together for about year. In the beginning he would sweet-talk me, until about three weeks in. At that point, his red fags were starting to show. He started telling me it was my role to support him financially, he’d get jealous if I went somewhere without him (even if that place was work), and he was paranoid enough to accuse me of cheating on him because I wouldn’t text him back for an hour (the irony being he was cheating on me). This lead to him completely taking control. I wasn’t allowed to use my phone at all, unless I was with him. He told me I wasn’t allowed to talk to boys because they were threats, and soon after stopped letting me talk to girls for the same reason. He made me quit my job and work with him so he could keep an eye on me (after already shaming me into moving in with him). When we were having sex, he’d call me a whore (still sleeping with his ex-girlfriend because she gave him free drugs). He had his own insecurities, so he would stop during sex and took it out on me by accusing me of thinking of other men and telling me I’m the worst he’s been with. I would try to call him out, but I quickly learned it would get me thrown into walls or hit and reminded that I, “Deserve to be beat”.

My whole life I have been hit on by people I didn’t know. Their comments and looks made me question my own self-worth. Do I attract those kinds of people? Is that what I’m worth? Is that what people see me as? Their actions threw me into through a pretty serious, lasting depression. I felt like they were the only kind of person I would be with, intimately or otherwise and it reassured my beliefs that I was only cared for when the context was sexual. This lead to the more recent few years in which I only slept with and dated people who viewed me in a demeaning, objectifying way… Until my most recent assault.

When I broke up with my ex, I wanted to sleep around again. I wanted to mimic his actions as a way of taking some control back. I asked a friend if he knew anyone who might be willing to fuck me, and he introduced to me a guy who was equally wild. We had sex almost immediately. I still have some contact with him, so skipping a few details, I wanted to use a condom because he’s polygamous. He tried to convince me to have sex without it, and one night we got together for a hookup. Instead of talking to each other normally, we jumped right into it. He turned me around and started, without telling me he didn’t have a condom. He normally comes somewhere I could feel and this time he didn’t. I asked if he couldn’t finish, and instead of saying anything, he smiled. I looked down, there was no protection, and I felt something start to drip. I was terrified and asked him directly if he finished inside me and got a proud, “Uh huh”. I felt powerless all over again. He immediately bought me a Plan B, feeling badly for what had just happened.

I’ve always tolerated these experiences because aside from the gifts and seducements, I felt like I deserved the punishment.

I’m happy to say I’m working on accepting and moving passed these sexual, verbal, emotional, and physical traumas, but it needs to be acknowledged that they have defined me to a significant extent.