Letter To My 10 Year Old Self

I plan to write a great deal more but let me share these thoughts as a beginning of our dialogue together.

I hope you are alright.  You’ve experienced something nobody should ever have to experience.  What happened to you was rape. It’s something that those two men should have never done to you. You feel confusion and shame, but you’ll be okay.

First I’d like to talk how awful you feel about yourself.  You did nothing wrong.  You are a victim of this evil act, so you truly have nothing to feel shame about.  Men do these things out of anger and self-hatred.  You didn’t ask for this and didn’t deserve it.

When something goes wrong, a first impulse is often to try to figure out whose fault it is. Human nature wants to find someone to point a finger at and often they’ll stop there, as if that alone solves the problem.  You have stopped the healing of the problem, because you blame yourself and will live a long time in a world of shame.

The truth is, not only does blaming yourself for this terrible incidence not solve anything, but many problems have no human culprit. When searching for the cause of a problem, don’t make the mistake of many and assume it must be your fault.

But, how is a 10 year old supposed to know that.

It’s somewhat noble that you blame yourself for what happened, because we can only correct ourselves in this life, but please know that you are not at fault for what happened to you. You never asked to be raped.

You are certainly confused about what happened.  You don’t realize it yet, but one day you will enjoy being intimate in such a way with a man.  The circumstances will be dramatically different as you will welcome the intimacy rather than having a man force himself on you.  You will choose to not follow that path and marry a beautiful woman, but it’s okay that you are who you are.  I don’t expect you to understand, but you are gay and that is a beautiful thing.

You have made some decisions that will affect you for a long time.  You can’t possibly know what will happen due to the decisions you’ve made, but keeping this secret will be difficult for you when you are older, because secrets like this hurt of from the inside.  You are protecting yourself and that is understandable.  I only wish you felt comfortable in your own house to share with your Dad.  You should know that he was ashamed that he couldn’t protect you.  I say that, because you will finally one day tell another about this terrible event.  You will tell your pastor and then your wife.  You will tell your kids and then your parents.  You will tell the story to Christian groups and actually become a pastor yourself and teach others to love themselves, because we are all (gay, straight, queer) made in God’s image.

Everyone who hears your story loves you.  Everyone who hears your story hurts as you hurt now, because they love you.

You are a strong kid.  You are a very wise kid.  Your life will one day unfold and you will live your life with pride.  I know, because I am writing you from that later time in your life.

I’m you and I love you. That’s all I can write for now as you and I still hurt. I’m still hurt, but I’m no longer confused. Hang in there, you have a lot of love ahead of you.