I now live with my grandmother at the age of 12.

Wow, I am going to church on a regular basis.

Wow, I get an allowance of $2.50 per week and all you want is some chores done? Done.

During those previous 7 years of hell, I was the only one being sexually abused while only 4 of the 6 kids were beaten for one reason or other.

I don’t know why 2 kids were saved from the abuse. I never could figure that out.

I was just glad I wasn’t being abused anymore now that I live with my grandma.

Maybe my dad and stepmom stopped the beatings. Maybe my dad stopped the sexual abuse when I left the house.

Boy, that would be almost great if you could get something good out of that story.

By the way, it never stopped.

By the way, I was too much of a coward to say a word. Again, I am glad it stopped for me. Maybe I was naive. Maybe I was hopeful.

While I didn’t have a male role model living in my house, God kept sending Godly men my way. Through Bethesda Community Church. Through A/G’s Royal Rangers program. Somehow, God found a way to pour the foundation into my life.

But I kept jacking up the foundation.

Shockingly enough, I was introduced to porn at a really young age. That crap came back to haunt me during my teenage years.

Seriously.

I got to one point in my life where I was trying to get rid of the lust in my heart on my own. I failed. Oh I failed so hard. I was outside washing my car and I just sat and cried right there on my driveway because I knew that lust and porn were going to be a part of my life from here on out. It was the way things were going to be.

Without question, I couldn’t talk to anybody else about this shame and guilt.

Just like the shame and guilt of growing up poorer than poor because my parents were too lazy and drunk to take care of us. That is something I get to carry for the rest of my life.

Just like the shame, guilt, frustration and anger of being sexually and physically abused. That is something I get to carry for the rest of my life.

I figured if I can strive to be normal, then I would get better. I would be better off.

I worked my ass off to be normal. I worked my ass off just to appear as though none of that stuff happened to me as a kid.

When I was 17, I found out that my dad and stepmom continue the abuse onto my 4 remaining half brother and sisters. I found out because I came home from school and my grandmother told me that my dad and stepmom were sitting in jail awaiting trial for child abuse and neglect.

She tells me, “It is all lies. The police got those kids to lie about their parents.”

For the first time in my life, I grew a pair. “No, grandma, they are not lies. I have to share something with you.”

For my last year of high school, I get to have counselors, detectives, cops, therapists, psychologists and sex therapists telling me I am normal and it is a miracle that nothing is wrong with me.

Oh there were plenty things wrong with me. Nothing they could help with or even begin to cure.

My grandmother disbelieved everything that was true. My brother boldly defended the innocence of my dad.

I graduated high school. I was about to enter into the United States Air Force.