My shadow self

Pieces of me

Ever since I was repeatedly sexually assaulted in my early teens by a man I considered a father figure, I have lived two selves. One that lurks inside, following me, because of what he did to me. The other is one that was supposed to be me, the one who presents to the world. I don’t know which one is which sometimes because they are slithey. In the early years the shadow self was dominant but I’ve tried to move it firmly to the back. They are with me all of the time, moving back and forth, sometimes at their will and sometimes at mine. Jostling.

The first split after my assaults occurred when I stopped trusting. Police, lawyers, men, authority. Men. Nothing will alter that.

I then became hyperaware of my body. I did not do what many young women do, which is to pleasingly show their bodies and reveal that they have breasts, waists, hips, legs; instead, I covered myself. I wore baggy sweaters and overalls many sizes too large. My clothes hung on me. What should have been clothing that fit my frame was traded for items meant for a person twice my size. I wanted to be invisible. My hair became a short thatch of ragged edges. My glasses were huge and masked my face. Already tall, I hunched and clenched.

I next became a slut. I do not use quotation marks around the term — one that Microsoft Word now tells me will be offensive to my reader — because that is how other high school students saw me, and I believed their narrative. What did slut mean then? Whatever those with more social capital wanted it to be. It’s an empty term for a female with loose morals and bad sexual behavior. Any whiff of weakness or vulnerability sets off the pack.

Again, what did it mean to be a slut? I sometimes allowed myself to “go out” with boys who didn’t like me or notice that I had a sharp mind and a nice personality. I sometimes chose boys who saw me as an assemblage of body parts connected by bone and tissue. I tried to find boys who would want to be with me because of who I was not despite who I was — indeed, I’m still friendly with some of them — but that was not what I was noticed for. Today I believe those good boys were braver than the others. They were rare then and they’re rare still.

I also became a recluse. I spent long periods in my room. I would read constantly and listen to the radio quietly, trying not to let anyone know I was home. I would hide in my closet on the floor, under my clothes. I went on bike rides that I marvel at today for the length of time and the dangerous roads I’d maneuver, even steering with no hands around curves. I still would be with friends, I had friends, most especially two girls who I’ve known for decades. But the shadow-me pulled other-me down and into the dark places, literally.

A few years later, after my family had moved from the city of the abuse, I remember looking at the size on a pair of my overalls. They were a size 11. I was 5’9” and weighed 110 pounds. They fit my shadow self but not my other self. In a sign that a shift was occurring, the shadow self was being pushed to the back when I noticed that the overalls, and most of my clothing, were huge and hung slack on my body. I allowed my hair to grow a bit longer, I started wearing clothes that matched my size, and didn’t encase my body in drab.

I likewise became angry. Surly. Sarcastic. When I wasn’t silent, I used my keen imagination to say things that were cutting and sharp. A friend remarked years later on how I’d sit for hours without talking and suddenly out would come something brilliant, absolutely intense, and slashing. Unsurprisingly, I had few friends but the ones I did have have been fiercely protective and loving.

I’m not sure when I became capable of talking without long periods of self-imposed silence but I suppose it had to do with professors who noticed that my writing was good and I was worthy of praise. Thank goodness for professors whose job it was to focus on my mind and not my body. Thank goodness for women professors who nurtured me without knowing what exactly they were doing but they attended to me.

I died inside because I became fearful of sex. No: terrified. So when I finally found myself at eighteen years old, with a beautiful young man who loved me truly-madly-deeply, I latched onto him in the hopes that he would make me normal. We did things that so many teens do and were gleeful in exploring each other’s bodies, minds, and selves. We saw the good in each other and planned a future. We were honey-golden-sweet. I revel in those early days and memories.

Reader, I married him. Then the shadow-self returned and my glorious young marriage and the joy in our salad life turned grey and dank. I’d somehow found in a husband a young man who himself had also been sexually abused and whose shame was greater than mine. We were not equipped to understand or deal with what had happened to us so he became judgmental and I became passive. He expressed love through sex and I ran from it. He learned contempt for me, I saw him as an ogre. All we wanted was to be healthy and free. But we didn’t heal ourselves; how could we possibly heal each other?

After almost eighteen year of marriage and almost twenty-two years of being together, we divorced. He in some ways remains the love of my life as he was the first to see beyond the shadow-self, see the before-me. We tried to remain friends after the divorce — which my lawyer called a “good” one because we tried to be kind, decent, and fair — it was just not possible. I wish I could tell him, I wish I could thank him, but I can’t. So I mourn alone my first marriage and my younger self as well as his younger self; we who might have been different, happy, strong. Together.

We are both remarried, and I hope that the people we have chosen this time know us for who we are, all of our parts — love us because of them, not in spite of them. That is my hope.

The statistics around women and incidents of sexual assault and abuse and harassment during their lifetimes are grim. Therefore, one could argue that I would have been like this regardless, but I never got the chance to know. I wonder about this all of the time and I want to be one self, not two. Someday maybe. That is my hope.