“As long as you keep secrets and suppress information you are fundamentally at war with yourself.”
Bessel A. van der Kolk, The Body Keeps the Score
I grew up with secrets. Most adult survivors admit that, I think. Secrets are a basic tenet of child abuse. Naturally they weren’t my secrets but keeping them became my responsibility.
Don’t Tell
The secrets started with my mother and usually began with the words, “Don’t tell.” “Don’t tell Daddy I . . .”
“. . . took you to a bar today.”
“. . . locked you in a box . . . or a trunk . . . or a closet.”
“. . . burned you with the iron.”
And oh, so many more. Loud, furious threats followed her “Don’t Tells”, threats of what she would do to me if I did tell. Even as a toddler I quickly learned to take her threats very seriously. Eventually she changed her secrecy demand to a more general command. “Don’t tell anyone anything about our family – ever.”
My father added to the secrets when I got a bit older. Using me to cover a visit to other women was a different, more hurtful kind of secret to keep. But he didn’t need threats with his “Don’t tell.” His temper was legendary in our family. Sadly, I had already learned to be cautious around him.
A new nightmare entered my life at age 9. That’s when my sister married a guy I had long disliked. I quickly learned why. My new brother-in-law’s “Don’t tells” included numerous rapes, sodomies, beatings and even murder. I took his threats very, very seriously . . . yet I told anyway. But telling failed. It failed me repeatedly. My mother just laughed. His mother didn’t respond at all. And even when my whole family knew something was happening to me I still heard, “Don’t tell.”
Eventually my sister added to the secrets I carried – but hers I kept willingly.
Consequences
Secrets have a way of piling up and I now know that I kept the worst of my secrets hidden even from myself. They were inside me, though, and affecting how I lived. I had heard “Don’t tell” so much that by the time I was a teenager I could hardly speak to another person. The extreme stress affected my health to such a degree that I finished high school in a homebound program where the teachers came to me. But that meant that I became even more isolated. As an adult I was extremely uncomfortable in social settings and if conversations ever turned to childhood events I would absolutely freeze. So, after I accepted that my childhood had not been as normal as I had assumed I swore that nothing in my life would ever be a secret again.
But saying that and actually doing that are two different things. As an adult I determined to always live open and honest so that there would never be a need to hide anything more than a birthday present. But that motto reflects my adult life. The childhood stuff? I’ve declared that it is no longer secret either, yet I still don’t talk about it much.
There are a number of reasons/excuses –
The topic just really doesn’t come up.
I don’t want to make others feel uncomfortable.
They simply won’t believe me – who could possibly survive all that?
But the real reason I stayed silent time after time? I did not want to beseen as broken or damaged. Plus, it just plain scared me. I think those “Don’t tells” were still echoing in my head.
