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A Flicker of Hope

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Chapter One

It is hard to know exactly where to begin this historical account. Is it important to know who I was in order to understand who I've become? How do I help you become a part of my life experiences - to help you understand and feel with me the things that have made me who I am? Try, if you can, to live the words as you read them.

I don't imagine my life began much differently from most. Born in the mid-fifties, I am the second of five children in a moderate-income family. We lived in the country on the outskirts of a small mid-western town. I remember being outdoors a lot, playing make-believe as a very small child. We had ponies, cats, dogs, chickens, a garden, and a yard full of neighborhood kids, most of the time. I had the responsibilities of caring for animals as well as household chores. From as early as six, I can remember standing on a chair in order to wash dishes for our family. I recall being afraid of the "bear" when I went to bed at night. The "bear", no more than a large tree by day, took on the silhouette of a great grizzly with arms outstretched ready for attack as the moon rose behind it at night. Most of my memories of early childhood are of happiness and security. Dad worked hard to make sure we had the things we needed and sometimes even the things we simply wanted. Saturday was a day for movies and popcorn with a neighbor. Sundays were filled with church and Bible school followed by dinner at Gram's: typically fried chicken (better than the Colonel's), green beans, mashed potatoes (no flakes from a box here) topped with home-made gravy, and dinner rolls. I can still smell the kitchen and taste that wonderful food.

A typical routine for the week was: up at six or so, catch the bus for school at seven sharp recounting the events of the weekend with the other kids on the half-hour trip to school. Home from school about three-thirty, homework (if I didn't finish on the bus-ride home), dinner, dishes, feed and tend the animals and ready for bed, all to be repeated again the following morning. Normal life as best I remember.

I had read all my sister's schoolbooks, so was just spending time and filling space as I entered school. I was not particularly unhappy, possibly slightly bored, but definitely not excited like most of the other first graders. In those days there were no special classes for kids who were ahead of schedule, so I just continued to exist and tried to fit in, but never really developed a sense of belonging or any strong friendships.

I don't remember mom "doing" anything special during those early years. I guess the everyday activities involved in raising four young children aren't looked upon as exceptional or special. Mom was not a particularly beautiful woman. She had auburn hair, stood barely five-foot tall and carried just enough extra weight to be left out of the "fit-as-a-fiddle" category. I don't think she ever got over having babies long enough to care much about a picture-perfect figure. She was always healthy though - I don't recall her ever being ill. All the same, mom's image in my mind is one of vagueness: always there but not particularly memorable.

Dad, who had pumpkin orange hair and stood six-foot tall, had a muscular build from all the hard work he did. He was rarely around in my early years because of the two-job work schedule. My most vivid memories of him are the days I would go to the fairgrounds and sit on the training cart as he drove race-horses around the track. I would walk the horses to cool them down while Dad cleaned stalls, filled feed bins and put equipment away. Dad didn't always go to church, but made sure we were there every Sunday, picking us up afterward and taking us to Gram's for Sunday dinner and games in the back yard. My early childhood memories of Dad are of a man who worked hard, always. He had rugged leathery skin covering his hands. I can remember him lying on the floor with his open palms face up, and then stepping onto those big rugged hands and being lifted up into the air as if on a powerful forklift. It was no effort for him to pick all of us up and carry us from one room to another when we were little. Those early images made it easy for me to feel safe and secure, protected by a father who could take care of any "bears" in the night.

The eldest of my siblings is eighteen months my senior. This has been both a blessing and a curse throughout the years. Josie is the only one of us who wasn't crowned with hair that "rusted" during birth, having a non-descript color of hair that has been given very distinctive names like: strawberry blond, light auburn, golden blond and various others. There was a certain unexplained attitude taken with Josie as we grew up. I naturally thought it was because she was the first-born. Her responsibilities never seemed to include all the domestically related activities that I found myself glued to. Watching the younger kids, for instance, was left to me, as was the enormous task of the family laundry. I, a seemingly unending number of laundry baskets and usually the other kids, were left at the Laundromat once a week while Josie accompanied mom on a shopping adventure. Of course this type of discriminatory treatment left me filled with resentment toward my sister. The relationship between us as sisters was therefore strained and that strain has never been relieved. I wasn't getting the usual tidbits of helpful advice to help me over the rough spots in adolescence and into the teen years. Wisdom, which sometimes comes with age, taught me that the "special" treatment Josie received was a mixture of guilt and shame as mom tried to make up for having conceived a child before getting married.

I was too young to remember the actual births of Willie and Annie. Willie arrived just fifteen months after me and then Annie came two years later. With both of them having the same crimson locks of hair on their heads as I had, we were starting to look like a troop of Raggedy Ann's and Andy's. I can't recall any great events or special bonds built with the younger ones. I was playing "second mom" too much to be a big sister. A lot later in our teens we started developing real sibling relationships.

Willie was not a great scholar and started off early receiving a reputation for being a troublemaker. Annie was quiet. She had her own little pocket of friends and was satisfied with them.

With all of us growing and in school, Dad decided to get a place of our own. We moved from the rented farmhouse to one very much like it, only now it was ours. Life was full of change and uncertainty. While getting settled in a new house and meeting new friends, another baby brother arrived. And Mom thought she had all her kids in school! Surprise! Although Alan was not planned, he was definitely an accepted addition to the family. I can remember Dad pulling around the circle drive at the hospital with the four "big" kids piled into the back seat of the Plymouth. Mom got into the car with a little bitty bundle in her arms. He had a big crimson curl on top of his head. I was eight years old and that day began a long and special relationship between Alan and me.

Like many of you reading this, I was brought up in a church-going family. This does not mean that my family was a "born-again" Christian family. It wasn't. However, the teaching I received in those early Sunday Bible classes planted seeds that would sprout and blossom years later. I knew Jesus was someone special.

I know every child needs to feel love and security. I had love from parents, grandparents, aunts, uncles, brothers and sisters. We were not in want of the basic comforts, so we had security in knowing we were warm, fed and clothed. Everything was just like on the new television we had: perfect, or so I thought. My "perfect" world was about to be shattered.

"Behold, children are a gift of the Lord ..." Psalm 127:3

"... but whoever causes one of these little ones who believe in Me to stumble, it is better for him that a heavy millstone be hung around his neck, and that he be drowned in the depths of the sea." Matthew 18:6

Chapter Two

Life at nine was going great. I had a new home, a new baby brother and a new school where I was making new friends. But my vision of a perfect world became marred one day in that wonderful year of new things. On a cold, late autumn day I woke up vomiting and had to stay home from school. A day bed was made for me on the sofa to make it easier for me to reach the bathroom and be taken care of. My regular bed was on the second story where there was no plumbing. While resting on the day bed I was molested by my father. I was horrified to feel his hand inside me. I couldn't believe this man that I had loved and trusted so much could be doing such a repulsive thing. I drew back and covered myself in shame and anger. My withdrawal must have startled Dad because he muttered something about being sorry and didn't touch me again ... for a while.

I no longer knew what to expect out of life. I felt alone and confused. Who was I supposed to trust now? I avoided my father as much as possible. Eventually, I pushed the incident that had horribly scarred my vision of life off into a far corner of my mind as I tried desperately to forget it. I became immersed in the youth group at church and the 4-H clubs at school. These activities distracted me from thinking that I was a witch or some other ugly creature the world must perceive as untouchable. I was sure everyone must know what had happened to me. I was equally sure that I must be a very bad person in order for that to have happened. Did God hate me? I hated Him for abandoning me. I absolutely avoided relationships with boys; they must all do what Dad did! I buried myself in studies and church activities.

Amazingly and almost in spite of myself I was being nurtured in the spirit of God's love and in my understanding of His Power and Grace. My "Lighthouse" was surrounding me with Hope, and I didn't even know it. Sometimes we do not see our Hope when we are in darkness. Often, it is months or even years before we know that something greater than ourselves played a part in guiding us out of the darkness.

Sometimes I find myself remembering glimpses of my childhood. I wonder if they are really memories or just stories that I've heard so many times I believe them to be my own memories. This may seem trivial or unimportant, but when you have very little recall of the things in life that most children call "growing up", you begin to wonder what your life really is. Most of my early childhood memories are shadows of thoughts that come to me from time to time.

I can remember going to my great-grandmother's on Sundays about once a month. I remember the cookie jar that always had homemade cookies in it ready for eager fingers to snatch up. I also remember the wooden blocks of every shape and size you could imagine. We would build castles and forts, letting our imaginations run wild with thoughts of people who surely lived in those far-off places. When it came time to go home putting the blocks away became a game in itself; you see if the blocks didn't go in their storage box right they would not fit. These memories of visits to "Mother Record's" (that's what everyone called her no matter what generation) are made even more special today because I now have the cookie jar. My son has pulled cookies from the same cookie jar used for over three generations and will have it to share with his children who will learn the stories of 'Mother Record', thereby keeping her alive for another generation.

But a fog - a fog of aloneness, uncertainty, and fear clouds most of my childhood memories. That fog of uncertainty looms over so many questions. When was the first time my father 'touched' me? The incident when I was nine is burned in my memory, but what else has been locked out of my mind? How many times had he inappropriately touched me? When he changed my diapers? Gave me a bath? Tucked me into bed at night? When did all this really start? As memories of the assaults are revealed through healing therapy, I discover new memories, but realize that some parts of my childhood will remain shrouded by the fog that covers so much of my life. Nor, perhaps, will I remember all the usual normal childhood things that make up a person's history. A person should know how they lived, played, grew-up and developed in order to understand who they have become. Does not knowing who I was contribute to the confusion of who I am now?

I was a frightened little girl living in a world of make-believe. Make-believe that the things my father did to me weren't real. Make-believe that no one can see the pain, fear or shame in you. Make-believe life was wonderful. Somewhere in the midst of all the make-believe I remember Blue-Raspberry Popsicles, Saturday matinees and riding my horse through the woods. These are my memories. It seems so sad to me as I try to find pieces of my past to share with others that I have so little to offer. I have listened to friends tell endless tales of their childhood adventures and wondered; "Did I ever do anything like that"? I have shadows of memories vaguely recognizable through a dense fog of the childhood I lived. These memories do not answer the questions burning in my heart. Was I ever a normal little girl? Did I play, romp, giggle, have dolls or any of the other delightful things I heard my friends talk about? Who am I? Is there a little girl lost inside of me longing to emerge from the fog? Are there still memories locked away, waiting for a key to unlock them? Do I dare turn the key?

As I searched for answers, my involvement in the youth group led me to a weekend-long witness mission where other youths came to our church to share what God meant in their lives. I was shown that trust and love were not given to us by Jesus on a conditional basis but rather just where we were, for just whom we were. In an activity called a "trust walk", I was led throughout the church and the surrounding area while my eyes were closed. There was no cloth tied over them to keep me from seeing - only my faith and trust in the one leading me held my eyes closed. I found myself wanting that kind of faith and trust to guide me throughout my whole life. At an evening service I knelt at the altar and prayed, "God, forgive me for hating you and thinking you had forgotten me. Forgive me for hating Dad and help me to follow your light as you shine it on the path before me as I travel through life's uncertainties. Help me to have faith to trust you as I trusted Kirk today on our walk of faith. Trust without fear and without question that you will keep me from harm." I cried my eyes out!

One girl that was part of the weekend said she had always wanted a little sister and would I be hers. I cried again and couldn't believe I was so happy and felt so good. It was like I was a brand new person. I felt for the first time that I could shout to the whole world, "I love you and God loves you too!" It was an expression the team used over the weekend. I believe, as much as a teenager is able (I was sixteen by now), God had filled me with His love through His Spirit, and I saw the Light shining on my pathway, and I would follow it to the end of the world.

Until my body began to develop its womanly figure, my father had only played 'finger-games', fondling me whenever he dared. Things changed when my breasts developed and my figure took on a more mature shape. My teenaged world was changed forever shortly after that promise of faith had come to me.

I Timothy 4:1 "... some will fall away from the faith ...'

Chapter Three

I still, to this day don't know the why or how of the events that began taking place in my life. I struggle daily to keep them in the Light of my life and find some peace or comfort.

(Continues...)

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Excerpted from A Flicker of Hope by Lynn Mitchell Copyright © 2010 by Lynn Mitchell. Excerpted by permission.
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