It begins. I adjust my chair height, pull up a blank word document, turn on Enya, and hesitate at the name my page is given; Untitled 2. It is apt for a girl who lived in the shadows afraid of being discovered, afraid of being named. It is also apt for the woman at last in charge of her own narrative.

Who will I be? I have been named many things; Liar, Crazy, Lazy, Taker, Hater, Loony. I am accused of many things also and I am here to clear my name. In the end I will name me a name befitting a woman who has endured a lifetime of abuse on mere threads of hope that faded and fled my grasp only to reappear as the dawn of a new day or the spring greening of a landscape or a moment of defiance at those who laid me low.

I am not alone. For many years I thought I was alone in my plight and to think it is to live it, Cloaked in my silent nightmare of pain and shame and guilt and fear I walked on the edge of insanity never imagining there were millions who walked parallel paths to my own. Also alone, we crossed paths many times without seeing, or feeling a kinship between us.

How could so many be silenced so thoroughly? Entrenched in silent shame our selves buried in the debris of childhood abuses never to feel the bright light of truth shine down on us we buried our baggage deep inside only to feel it regurgitate like a bitter pill to be swallowed again and again lest someone discover our darkness.

A virtual army of victims and survivors, those who lost and those who healed, and those who died unable to hold the thread of hope that runs through all of us. How many times did I say “Don’t let the Bastards win,” in a moment of darkness of which there were many.

I do not have an easy answer for why or how I have lived. It is a mystery with years of suicidal thoughts haunting my journey. So I will tell my story in the hopes that others will find an answer and I will finally know who I am.