The Black Shroud

I was going to write about the rules, the rules I was forced to live by for so long, the rules that still creep up and dictate my life and give me so much fear. Its odd how something as insignificant as a list of rules can cause so much havoc in your mind years and years later. I often find myself saying “Sir” or having my eyes cast down while walking past a man. People don’t realize the depth behind being held and abused. They can’t comprehend how those seemingly insignificant things can and do affect me every single day of my life all of these years later. 

I no longer fear rejection the way I once did. Oh, I still fear it. I still have anxiety about it but for the most part I can and do know when I don’t want you in my life and why and I have no problem with walking away and freeing myself the way I once did. It’s funny how I use the word “free” because I am far from free. Yes I can escape a situation but mentally I am still a terrified 17 year old who is forced to sign slave contracts, threatened to be sold into the sex slave industry and beaten, raped and recorded for anyone to see. I just no longer need to use sex as a means of getting or keeping people in my life. Quite the opposite actually as it has now been five years since I last engaged in sexual activity. I am proud of that. I took myself back, at least the parts I could. 

Lots of me is forever lost, damaged and even shattered never to be replaced or repaired. Wounds don’t heal. Not the mental ones anyway. They are just one upped by another and another until you think you have dealt with them. Then, one day out of the blue a word, a gesture, a touch will slam you back into the place you thought you had escaped all those years before. You realize you are in fact still bound by the chains that once held you so firmly in place. Sometimes, you will even still feel them against your flesh. Especially, when you are exhausted and your mind is allowed to wander. 

You will panic, you will blame and you will be paranoid that the good people in your life are actually out to hurt you or are working for the other team. Life is nothing but a cruel, cruel game that we are all forced to play. 

You will look a man in the eyes and wonder if anyone caught that, if he is insulted, if your Master will find out and punish you. Of course He will because when He asks you to confess you will admit it knowing you are to be punished for breaking the rules. It would be worse to lie. 

Then you realize that you are free, or you think you are. You then begin to wonder if having down cast eyes is noticed by people in the life style and if they can tell you have been trained when you let the word “Sir” slip from your lips while your eyes are down. Being conscious of your every move makes you wonder if everyone else is conscious of it as well. 

Part of me accepts that I am just trained now to be paranoid, to live knowing that I may or may not be taken at any moment by a Master who decides to claim me. Like I am branded with a slave mark that all Masters can see. 

I struggle with figuring this all out. I struggle to know who exactly it is I see in the mirror. Getting dressed is different, being allowed to wear what I want, instead of what is pleasing/required by the person who had held me for so long. I can wear pants!! Although, I must admit I still prefer dresses. I never did before but I do now. However I know each time I put one on that it is MY choice, not His, but mine alone. 

Being sick right now has left me with many thoughts and questions that I doubt will ever have the chance to be answered honestly. Likely because the statute of limitations will never run out and unless my captor is in jail for his crimes against me he will always have to stay quiet to keep from going there. 

I stare out the window at the black of night and wonder if it looks back in at me. Being engulfed in darkness seems to be my forte. Even on the brightest days with the warmest sun I am wearing a shroud of black, covering me from head to toe, hiding who I am really am so well that not even I know who would be revealed if the shroud was lifted. 

“I have no future. Heaven wasn’t made for me” –Manson

I feel like this is true and has been for some time. I am very sad and I am very lost and I am very deep in the darkness, wandering around without a light to guide my way. Searching for other lost souls just so I can feel, just for a moment, like I belong and these feelings are real because someone else has known them too.