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SURVIVOR STORIES

I Know There is Life Outside of Abuse

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Note: This story mentions self-harm/suicidal ideation. If you or someone you know is struggling, or in crisis, help is available. Call or text 988 to reach the Suicide & Crisis Lifeline. Confidential chat is also available at 988lifeline.org 24 hours a day, 7 days a week.

Growing up in the foster care system, abuse was nothing new to me. I was sexually abused for the first time at the age of five and had a continuous history of it until the age of 19 in my adoptive family home. This abuse led me to feel worthless and unwanted as I was violated in the most intimate of ways by more than one perpetrator. 

I didn’t know what to do with my life and I felt like I was in a continuous loop of abuse. I made an attempt on my life for the third time at the age of 18, and that’s when I knew that I really needed help. So, following that attempt, I spent 2 1/2 months in a residential facility to help with my past traumas and my history of abuse. That seem to work for a little while, until I turned to starving myself in order to cope with everything that happened to me. Following this new development, I decided that it was time for me to seek more long-term help. 

I am far from healed from my past traumas and still struggle to this day with the things that of happened to me. Some days I don’t understand why I grew up with abuse in every form while others have perfect cookie-cutter childhoods. But I know that it’s made me stronger today and that most people cannot have gone through what I went through. 

I also hope that one day I will be able to walk away from all of the abuse and hurt and pain that happened to me in my childhood and not have that define me. It will be hard, and it will take a lot of work, but I know that there is life outside of the tunnel and I hope that I, as well as anybody else who has been abused, find that light as well. 

-Davita, Survivor