The abuse started when I was six years old. When it started, I had no idea that it was wrong. I thought it as if it were normal, that every parent treated their kids that way. Even after an incident that ended with my dad screaming at one of my friends and I and my mom apologizing for his behavior, I still didn't think anything was wrong or out of the ordinary.
Then everything changed.
It was a day in my 4th grade class. They rolled in the TV on a cart and we all got excited because that meant we were going to be able to watch a movie in class. I had no idea what was coming next. The video started and it was a video on the different types of abuse. It went through all types: physical, emotional, sexual and neglect. As I watched the video, a realization came to me. I was being abused and I had no idea that what was happening at home was, literally on the screen in front of me. Things started making sense and I started thinking about everything I was living with at home and it scared me.
At the end of the video, we were given blank sheets of paper and asked to answer three questions. I don't remember the first two questions but the third question was whether or not we wanted to talk to someone about what we had seen in the video. I remember being surrounded by my classmates, all who were telling me to answer yes to that question. I was conflicted and scared of what putting yes on that paper would do, knowing of the potential removal from my home into foster care. Eventually, I decided on putting yes on the paper.
A few days later, as the abuse continued to happen, there was one incident with my brother that scared me enough to reach out to my teacher and tell her that I wanted to talk to her about what had been put on that sheet. She asked me if I had answered yes to the third question and I said yes. So she arranged a meeting with me, her (my teacher), and the school counselor.
When I met with them, they asked me what was going on and I tried to tell them everything I could in the best way that a 4th grader could explain it. They asked me questions about it and took notes. As the meeting came to an end, they told me that if it happens again to tell them. This indicated to me that what I had done had been for nothing. They weren't taking me seriously. There was no point in telling anyone because they would do nothing.
From there, I refused to trust adults in my life with what was going on in my house. I didn't tell any adults about my home life and didn't let people in. It wasn't until I reached high school that I started talking about the abuse in my home and only because I was old enough to now understand the ramifications of what was going on in my house. I didn't talk to a school counselor until I was a sophomore in high school and that was the first time in my life that the abuse was reported. That was when I found out that the adults from my elementary school had failed me. They left me in an abusive home for years. I was left to suffer and even after it was reported they couldn't do anything about it because the physical abuse had stopped and all that was left was emotional abuse and they can't prove that so they can't remove a child from a home *just* for emotional abuse.
The system failed me. My teachers failed me. School counselors failed me. I was failed.
