The First Time I Tried to Speak Up.

Chapter 1: When I Found My Voice

I was about nine when I started speaking up. Not shouting, just finally telling the truth. I began naming things as they were, not how adults in my life wanted them to sound and I had spent so long holding secrets, protecting people I loved even when they hurt me. But something shifted in me. I couldn’t keep pretending.

That’s when the adults around me, which included my mother, my father, and my stepmother. They decided to “get help” for me. They shuttled me to a brick house with a glass sliding doors as the garage door. The garage had been turned into a counselling room, I remember a short woman welcomed us, and I sat nervously in front of her as my entire fractured family sat down across from her, as well.

This first session was supposed to be about me. But instead, they talked at her, not with concern but with accusation and contempt for me. With performance, that I was the problem. I was unstable, making me out to be a liar. Then came the question: “How are you feeling?”

I told her. I said I didn’t feel safe, that I was always getting hurt. That I felt scared and small.
And in front of the counsellor, I watched them twist my words into poison.

“That’s not true.”
“She always lies.”
“See? This is what we’re dealing with.”

I had opened my heart, and they stomped on it, professionally and calmly, like they were giving evidence in court. That was the moment I realized this wasn’t for me. It was for them to manipulate someone else into seeing me the way they wanted. To protect their secrets, they knew I held on to from coming out.

When I returned to my father and stepmother’s house that day, it got worse. I was punished for speaking. Not only physically, but verbally, emotionally. I was ignored, talked down to, treated like something disgusting. My stepmother’s coldness went nuclear. I was the villain in her story now.

Chapter 2: The Weeks Between Were War Zones

Those therapy sessions weren’t weekly check-ins. They were emotional war zones separated by periods of survival. What followed between the first and second session was torture disguised as normalcy, my stepmother weaponized every moment. She would whisper sharp little things under her breath, call me crazy in front of people, say I was “broken,” that I “needed help.” But never once did she say why. Never once did she take ownership of her part in it the emotional abuse, the manipulation, the fear she had instilled in me over years.

She told anyone who would listen that I was the messed-up one. That I was dangerous. That I was full of lies and needed professional help, i heard her say it and I heard her plant those seeds with other adults, other parents, even family members. She didn’t want healing for me. She wanted to be right about me.

And the thing is she was winning. I started to believe maybe I was broken, and that maybe I was too much so I shrank back down. I stopped sharing, I stopped laughing then I stopped asking questions. Because I learned that honesty meant humiliation and speaking the truth meant punishment.

But it wasn’t just emotional warfare. It was physical, too. The shoves from behind, the sudden grabs, the quiet violence behind closed doors, it was all part of the package. Then came the food control, I was allowed breakfast and dinner and only because it was necessary to survive. Lunch was just for school. No snacks. No extras. No treats like the others in the house. She let the rest of the family eat freely, help themselves, indulge… but not me. It was her silent punishment, her way of reminding me I didn’t belong. That I wasn’t even worth feeding.

I tried so hard to earn kindness, by keeping clear and staying quiet, while trying to be seen. But her message was loud: I wasn’t worth love; I wasn’t even worth a full meal or an extra helping when I was hungry. When someone is that determined to convince the world you’re broken, eventually, you start to believe it.

Chapter 3: The Crumbs of Compassion

It got to the point where I started sneaking food, not because I was defiant but because I was hungry. I would quietly tiptoe into the kitchen when no one was watching, hoping to grab a piece of fruit or a cube of chocolate, or even a mouth full of whip cream to get by, just something to soothe the ache in my stomach. But over time, I got caught and when I did, I wasn’t met with understanding. I was punished loudly, publicly in front of my father and stepbrother. My stepmother berated me like I was a thief, not a child looking for comfort and no one stood up for me. My stepbrother, the boy who had known me since I was a baby, simply closed the door to his room. My father? He poured himself a drink and walked away. That moment stayed with me: the echo of a slamming door, the click of disconnection, the lesson that even hunger didn’t warrant compassion in their eyes.

Chapter 4: The Second and Third Session

Then came the second session and this time, I wasn’t even alone in the room. My stepmother sat just inside the doorway, arms folded, ears sharpened, silently looming over everything I dared to say. I tried to be cautious, to avoid saying anything that might be “used” against me. But in her presence, nothing I said was ever truly safe. When we got home, she didn’t scream or lash out, she simply turned colder, quieter, sharper. Her silence cut deeper than any insult. I knew then that I had slipped even further down the list of people she tolerated and that I wasn’t just unliked, I was unwanted.

By the time the third session rolled around, I understood exactly what was expected of me. Medicare no longer covered the visits, and now it was costing them money, which meant I had to deliver results. So, I performed. I smiled, kept my answers light, and said what I knew they wanted to hear: that things were getting better, that I was okay, I felt safe again at home. That the help had helped, and the counsellor nodded, satisfied, not diving deeper or intrigued where my fight or honesty had gone but just taking the lies about being safe and that she had helped as the truth. The session was shorter. Quieter. Controlled.

Then just like that, it ended. No follow-ups. No referrals. No checking in to see if the smiles were real or rehearsed. The door closed on that chapter, and I was left knowing that “help” could be twisted into something cruel. That therapy, in the wrong hands and wrong settings, could become another way to silence a child.

They didn’t want me healed, they wanted me obedient and silent, they wanted their secrets hidden and the dark actions to stay behind the very doors they behind.

But they underestimated one thing: I remembered everything.

Affirmation

I am no longer silenced by fear.
I was not wrong for speaking up, I was brave.
What was done to me was not my fault.
And I will never allow the same silence to shackle my children.
I am a safe place. I am a protector. I am breaking the cycle.

Prayer

Heavenly Father,
You see every silent wound and every unheard cry.
You were there when I felt alone, when I was punished for telling the truth.
Thank You for giving me the strength to survive what tried to erase me.
Help me raise my children in truth, with love, with safety, and without fear.
Let their voices never be stolen. Let their hearts never be questioned.
Make me the shelter I never had, the anchor they always know is there.
And heal every part of me still grieving what could have been.
Amen.

Closing Reflection

Systematic abuse is not always loud.
Sometimes it comes dressed as therapy, disguised as discipline, or cloaked in silence. But just because others failed to protect you doesn’t mean you have to carry that failure forward. Today, you are not just healing but you are rewriting what safety looks like.

Let your home be a space where truth is welcomed, not punished.
Where children are heard, not hushed.
And where love doesn't come with conditions, but with consistency.

You didn’t have that growing up, but you can be that now.

You are the safe space. You are the cycle-breaker. You are the beginning of something new.