I haven’t spoken to my mother in about two years. I haven’t spoken to my father in over a year. My father has harassed me and my therapist via emails. I have enforced a filter to put his emails somewhere I can access if I want to. They do not catch me unawares. His random pleas for reconnection made me feel like I have no control over my life. Memories flood in. I feel shit. He won’t take no for an answer. Of course. Rapists don’t.
I have cut myself off from everyone as I don’t trust anybody is on my side. I have told my sister. She was shocked and in a kind of denial which is understandable but still not supportive. Just a heads up for anyone who gets news like this from a sister, NEVER ask “Are you sure?”. In fact refrain from asking prying questions. You won’t do any good. No family member ever took my side in the past. They are not going to change now. It had to be a clean cut.
I had my therapist remind me of the time my sister and cousin made sure I could not stay with them in London, making me homeless. It was when I was fucking the guy who was giving me shelter that my memories with my father started coming through. This was 2011. It was unclear what was happening to me. My body felt aroused and nauseous, while also scared and young, so little. I was surprised I had breasts. I saw colours and light. It was 2012 by the time I loosely put it together, when I was in Cyprus making my film ReFraming. I cut off soon after that and only in 2013 did I start having some memories that tied into domestic ‘normalcy’. Things are still coming back to me. I still have stay-in-bed days.
At the moment I can’t deal with any of the past. My aunt followed a blog of mine recently. It really made me feel unstable. It made it feel real somehow. I know this blog is public. I know anyone can access it. The feeling of being responsible for their sordid secret is still hovering over me. The fear that I will have family members desperately asking me questions so they can understand because they are distressed comes over me. I was NEVER a human being to these people. Only some representation of a person. Someone unseen. The more people I meet the more I realise I had no relationship other than a superficial co-existence with these people.