MPD/DID - Memoirs: The Perfect Victim

The Perfect Victim: An Unexpected Side-Effect of Sexual Abuse

One day, early in therapy before she knew much about me, my therapist asked me to imagine that I was turning on a film projector. What I was supposed to see on the screen were the people who had hurt me in the past. I expected to see my father. What I hadn’t expected were all the other faces that spewed forth in my mind...

My grandmother who figured out that my father was sexually abusing me but told me that the sexual abuse was my fault. She did nothing to try to stop it.
An older brother of a friend of mine who sexually abused me during a “truth-or-dare” type of game. During one game he locked me in his room and refused to let me leave until I performed oral sex on him. Later, he and another brother of his forced their younger sister and me to allow them to have sex with us.
The father of one of my best friends, whom he was sexually abusing, discovered I was a good target. He started with simple actions such as refusing any closed door in their home, moved up to coming into the bathroom while one of us would be showering, and one day decided me and his daughter should take a shower together to save time and water. The next time he suggested a joint shower he took the final leap by joining the two of us in the shower and molested us. The abuse continued for two years.
An employee at a summer camp who showed me pornographic pictures and made lewd comments about my body (which was struggling with puberty). Luckily, he never got the chance to be alone with me again.
A guy in middle school who had groped me on several occasions and once forced his hand up my skirt under the lunch table. He molested me while everyone else continued their lunch.
A peeping-tom neighbor who scared me with his comments about his gun collection and camera collection, and with the strange gifts (such as fake jewelry, a garden snake he captured, and feminine napkins) he would try to give me while trying to ask me very personal questions about my body and sexual experiences. He would also sit on his driveway for hours staring at my window, and more than once I caught him standing on our driveway looking in my window.

These were just the people who had abused me whom my father didn’t knowingly allow to hurt me. There were the two friends who enjoyed taking pornographic pictures of very young children when I was four years old. There were more acquaintances whom he allowed to abuse me when I was six through nine years old, some of whom were sadistic and cruel. But did he know he had made me the perfect victim for others? That he had trained me to be submissive, tolerant, passive, and quiet?

There were also different images of my father. His abuse preferences changed as I aged:

The man who seemed to be exploring my body as if it was something he had never seen before, as if he wasn’t even sure it could feel... a scientist experimenting with a new discovery.
The man who enjoyed capturing moments on film and sharing his art, as well as his model, with others... the proud man showing his masterpiece.
The gentle man who slid into bed at night as if he was visiting a mistress, pressing me into his body as if trying to consume me... the lover who wanted closeness and refused to stop until I faked an orgasm.
The man filled with intense rage who would be so forceful that my body would bleed, who seemed to need to see my hot tears... the bull on a rampage.
The man filled with fear that he would be exposed who threw me against the wall and strangled me until I blacked out... the one capable of murder.
The bitter man who had lost control over his marriage and family, who looked at porn magazines and then used my body to complete his mental fantasy... the one who never looked at me during the act because I didn’t exist to him at that moment, in his fantasy of someone else.
The man who came back, as if looking to find old memories and old feelings. The man who was hesitant, afraid, and aware that I was at risk of getting pregnant now that I was older. The one who had difficulty getting and keeping an erection, the one who would leave me feeling the most confused... the one who never knew he had created a pregnancy, both a child and grandchild, who was thankfully but painfully miscarried by his 13 year old daughter.

He trained me well:
I screamed... once; I tried to confide in someone... once; I hoped someone would intervene... once.
I learned to cry quietly; I learned to stop breathing; I learned to fake whatever reaction was expected;
I learned how to leave my body; I learned how to be invisible; I learned how to pretend I was ok.
I was the perfect victim.