Survivor Story #1: Finding the Sun in the Clouds

Anonymous | 16 April 2023 | WWYW Survivor Stories

My perception of love was skewed from a young age. I mean, how could it not have been when my one of my first memories was of a chair being thrown across the room. Tears. Raised voices. And bike chains around necks in anger. 

I knew from the age of 2 that love was complicated. But, it was always something I feared and never truely embraced. It was something to flee. Never to trust. Never to let in. 

As I grew into my adolescence, and watched those around me get into relationships, I could never understand how someone could be vulnerable with another. How they could put trust in their partner, let them in and know their deepest, darkest secrets. I watched on from the sideline, happy in my bubble. By myself. But apart of me always envied them. How I craved one of those perfect fairytale relationships. 

And so, I let my guard down. Just a little, enough to let another know every part of me, my deepest, darkest secrets. I was 17 - only a baby when I think about it. It was at a party when I got so drunk that I blacked out - the first and only time that I’d ever let this happen. One minute I’m talking to my friends, looking over at the guy that I liked, the next, I’m waking up by myself in a bed that I’d never been in. My clothes on the floor. Pain, shooting through my body. And I didn’t remember one thing.

Despite the boy being in my year at school… the one I thought liked me…. Never spoke to me again. Not even a gaze in my direction during class. And the only think I could think of? What was wrong with me! 

Years passed, and my guard stayed high. Never would I ever let someone in again, to be that vulnerable. To me, love was pain. Love was dangerous. And love was something that I didn’t think I was deserving of. 

The people I would let into my life were temporary. As much as I craved it to be more, my mind told me it would never happen, and I didn’t want to enter that level of vulnerability ever again. 

Until I did. Love came to me out of nowhere. Tearing my barricade that I’d worked so hard to build up over the years, and showing me the beauty of the ruins of myself. Love nurtured me back like a wilted flower, showing me care, acknowledging my thorns and opening me up to the beauty of the world. For the first time in my life, Love was no longer something I steered away from, something I flinched at in fear that the bruises, and the pain would once again appear. 

Love left as quickly as it appeared in my life, but something changed within me. 

For the first time in my life I saw hope. Love taught me that I am deserving of it. That I deserve it and I don’t need to run from it. I see glimpses of it sometimes, and I’m reminded of what could be.  Love changed everything.