Why I thought I’m incapable of being faithful

Do you have a movie that you are scared to watch, is there a place you would never want to go – have you read the book “The Road”? Would you read it again, would you go again into that cellar where people were locked up, to be eaten? How would you feel standing in front of the door into that place, knowing that no matter how scary it is inside, you have to go in? That’s how I feel each time when I go into a therapy session. A new memory usually pops into my mind, and it’s like I’m there again, in real time. It scares the hell out of me, but I know that after processing each memory – I get rid of it, it comes out of my body and my mind, and it shriveles under the light, until it is very very small. It never fades completely, and I will always remember it, but it is no longer holding its destructive power over me.

For several months the image of a rabbit haunted me. Today I had the courage to face it. I drew one rabbit, then two, then remembered my uncle Sasha (grandma's second husband, our neighbor at the dacha). He had adorable rabbits in brown wooden boxes. He was also a butcher and he ate those rabbits, but I didn’t know that. I liked to pet them. He liked to watch me pet them, until one day he came from behind and stopped a few inches short. The electricity that came off from his body washed over my back and I instantly knew what was about to happen. I was 8, by then I've been abused by my father for about 3 years (roughly several times a year - on the holidays). As I was giving another carrot to the rabbit, uncle Sasha reached out and stroked my buttocks with his sweaty palm. I froze. Trained by my father, I didn’t even have the thought to turn away, scream, run, kick him – I simply obeyed. He guided my hand to his crotch, unzipped his pants, and thrust his penis into my palm. It was my left hand – and it was convulsing today in therapy – but not as strongly as usual. He wasn’t violent like my father – he was “gentle” – in the perverted sense of this word. I knew what I had to do – I never looked at him, I kept looking at the rabbits. He never said anything, only breathed. In the corner of my mind I wondered whether or not my father has abused me at the dacha and whether uncle Sasha spied on us – I wonder how he got the idea to use me, but I also realize I must have been exhibiting inviting behavior – like all sexual abuse victims do. For example, I simply did what he wanted, I didn't resist.

I also remembered uncle Sasha’s mother – she flashed briefly in the doorway of the house (the rabbits were outside, on the grass) – and then disappeared. Like all women in my childhood – she didn’t protect me, she didn’t say anything, she chose to ignore what she saw. And I hate her for that.

When I drew the whole scene in therapy today, I was astounded (again) at how brilliant our mind is in giving us clues about what happened, and how often we overlook it. Just like in this video – watch it first, and then read what it says in the end – you will be astounded at what you didn’t see - when you weren't looking for it. Back to my drawing - I started with the rabbit in the middle of the page, and I ended up with me being cut in half – only my right half was on the page. I had to use another page to tape it together and draw another half of the picture – my left half and uncle Sasha, with his pants unzipped. In the past, I drew pictures where my head wouldn’t fit on the page – it would be cut off. It was always a clear indicator of how I felt at the time of the abuse - disassociated from my body.

Today I understood why I always had the fear of being unfaithful to my husband – when feeding those rabbits and masturbating my uncle, I concluded that I have betrayed my father. I took the blame, I have decided I will never be capable of being faithful – ever again. Today, I freed myself from this – it is not true. I have been simply used as an emotional waste basket by two men in my life – my father and my step-grandfather (or uncle Sasha, that’s how I called him). They simply wiped their fears, insecurities, hate, rage, and weaknesses all over my body, as if it was a disposable towel, to be thrown away and forgotten. I survived, and I washed off these feelings from my soul – they were never mine to begin with.