Tag Archives: Nonfiction

“You don’t actually think you can change the law, right? I

mean, you’re really naive if you do.” I have certainly had my

share of adversity, but this comment hit me harshly, as it

was coming from a woman who proclaimed herself to be a feminist and

women’s rights advocate, serving as the director of the city government’s

office for women where I lived. And her deflating yet inflammatory

comment came on the heels of my very first time speaking out at a

human trafficking awareness conference at a local university. During

this speech, I filleted my veins wide open, recollecting my own personal

experience of being married off at sixteen years of age to a man in his

early thirties, the same man who I met at a time when he was in a

position of authority over me at the behavioral health facility I had

been admitted to only two years earlier. In this speech, I also disclosed

publicly for the first time the exploitation I suffered as result of this

marriage. Yet somehow this woman had the audacity to proclaim that

this fire burning so brightly inside of me to fight the laws that allowed

and perpetuated these actions, nearly destroying me in the process, was

culpable of naivety.

I wish I could share with you that I had some clever quip back, but

I did not at the time. The only thing I could do was bite my tongue, quite

literally, and allow the hot flush that engulfed my pale skin to happen, as

there was no controlling it. I knew better than to listen to — much less

give energy to — those who would have me believe I was incapable in

any manner. I had already proven so many people wrong, as statistically

I should have been an addict, chronically living in poverty, or some combination

of the two. This is what childhood trauma does to people. This

is what child marriage does to people. This is what sexual exploitation

does to people. And having survived it all, I was determined to stop it.

My ultimate goal in 2016, the divinely guided purpose of my life’s

mission during that season of my life, was to change the state laws that

allowed child marriage to occur through parental consent or judicial

exception. In my own experience, my mother’s consent to me marrying

this much older man who she allowed me to begin dating when I was

just fourteen opened the door to my entrapment in an extremely abusive

and coercive relationship for the years to follow. Yes, with the stroke

of a pen, the man I married at sixteen — who I now refer to as my

perpetrator — was granted a literal license to continue sexually abusing

me, an act that without this signature and the laws that allowed it could

have been prosecuted as statutory rape.

Laws that perpetuate the cycles of sexual abuse, oftentimes

multi-generational cycles, are ultimately perversely immoral. And so it

is to starkly attempt to shut down the efforts of survivor leaders in the

fight to protect upcoming and future generations from the darkness we

blindly crawled our way through to break these cycles once and for all.

Those who abused us sought to silence us. Those who mock our efforts

to make this world a safer place are seeking to do the same. For me,

and many other survivor leaders I know, this adds fuel to our fire, and

we will not smolder to ash without putting up a fight with every bit of

resilience our minds and bodies can muster. I had to do this for nearly

the first twenty years of my life to survive. And I will continue to bring

this forth when necessary now. The stakes are too high to be stagnant

and complacent.

Speaking out for the first time at that conference was a catalyst for

so much to follow that would have me visiting multiple state capitals,

giving testimony to legislative bodies, providing multiple interviews

with local, national, and even international reporters, and even appearing

in a documentary highlighting the problematic prevalence of child

marriage today. My story shines a light on the uncommonly understood

fact that child marriage itself is a form of human trafficking. In my case

specifically, being married to a pedophile positioned him to be able to

traffic me in strip clubs and exploit me through other means. Yet I could

not prosecute him in my early thirties when I first found the strength to

do so, as the state laws in Indiana, where my abuse by this perpetrator

initiated, held a statute of limitations that too much time had passed.

At every turn, instead of the laws being geared to protect me as

a child, the loopholes within them ultimately protected a sociopathic

pedophile from prosecution. This individual does not deserve to have

his name spoken or known, as in doing so he would be granted a sense

of the undeserved illusion of power and prestige. This is how his abusive

and perverse mind operates and I refuse to indulge that in any capacity

any longer. Therefore, throughout this text you will find I use three terms

to acknowledge him: my perpetrator, the pedophile, and the parasite.

He was my perpetrator as he groomed my underage mind and body,

the pedophile that abused me in heinous ways, and the parasite whose

imprint I can never fully escape despite having been away from his toxicity

for years now, as the impact of trauma he imposed upon my life is

a ghostly stain I can never fully shake. These hideous terms are the only

ones befitting of him.

I write this memoir with the intention to form a coalition of

survivor leaders working together with arms linked as we deepen our

healing through community with each other and work toward ending

the laws and other systemic failures that perpetuate crimes against those

vulnerable to abuse and exploitation. There are so many opportunities

for change within our society. Legislation governing underage marriage

laws and state level statutes of limitations that place burden on the victim

of atrocious crimes to come forth before it is psychologically safe enough

to do so must be addressed. Exploitation within mental health institutions

and other helping professions must be more thoroughly researched

and acknowledged, with perpetrators held accountable. Systemic change

across these focus areas is critical for traumatic cycles to have opportunity

to cease within families and communities as a whole. Everything is

interconnected with mental health and trauma recovery residing at the

core of the issues at hand.

It is my belief that when we survive atrocities, we have a responsibility

to find purpose in the events that changed us — or perhaps

molded us if the abuse began very early on in our lives. The duration of

this lifetime on Earth is so very limited, but we must be mindful and

focused on the legacy we choose to leave for generations to come. The

imprint we make on this world will be experienced long after our last

breath, meaning we can plant seeds for trees we may never enjoy shade

from, gratefully knowing our descendants will. For me, these trees are

the ability to create a life one does not have to spend years recovering

from, as I have.

One thing is for certain. Regardless of those who would have me

dilute my voice, I will continue my efforts to bring an end to the antiquated

laws that perpetuate crimes against children.