Death, Sex, and going to hell(12/20/15)

Growing up I only feared 3 things: death, sex, and going to hell. When I was younger I had a dream about the angel of death. Me and my parents walked out of a restaurant and dead bodies decorated the parking lot like cockroaches and rats in New York sewers. I remember this dream so vividly and everywhere I looked the bodies surrounded me. Under the car and on top, a bloody massacre lay before me. All of sudden my parents disappear and a demon begins chasing me. I run swiftly around a foggy pool of mist and death as the demon chases me. I run to a white curtain and climb up hanging for my life and suddenly I awake sweating in my mother's arms.

Within a two year time span after that dream, members of my family died suddenly on holidays with the last death ending Labor Day weekend before the third grade. This one hitting me like a ton of bricks because the last to go was my father. Growing up at inglewood cemetery mortuary, I knew the staff by name and every time someone new died eventually the tears would begin to fall less and less. I was numb.

I never really had the sex talk growing up, but I started masturbating when I was no older than 5. A molested family member taught my cousin who showed me how people touch themselves. After masturbating once no older than 5,  I stopped only to resume again when I was about 9.

A boy a few years older than me tried to drown me when I was younger. He tried to touch my young undeveloped breast and I didn't want him to. I pushed him away and when he tried again in the pool he took my head under water as I struggled to breath. I didn't tell my mama he tried to touch me. I did however, confess about him trying to drown me and she pulled me out of summer day camp so fast I got whiplash. That day the entire Wilson park knew my mama's name.

I never had boyfriends growing up. I was scared for them to touch me because I didn't want to go to hell. That's what they teach you in Sunday school. My list of sins committed had were so short, but so long and some of the affliction I suffered wasn't even self inflicted. However, late at night I'd rub my thighs together enjoying the friction, which soon turned into a pillow being squeezed between them, and eventually it would lead to my middle finger creating symphonies on my clitoris. Making sure never to put my finger in that forbidden hole. I'd rub my body till I fall asleep to stop the nightmares from haunting me.

Everywhere I turned people tried to get me to do stuff with them. My answer was always "No, don't. I don't want to go to hell". My mom's bestfriend's daughter tried to molest me one night when I spent the night. My mom was out of town. Nobody's perfect she coed in my ear. I pushed her away crying no please, don't; I don't want to go to hell. She didn't touch me, but she tried so hard to convince me it was the right thing to do. Maybe my daddy was watching over me that night.

Sex was all around me and I could remember even being at recess in middle school and my principal catching students having sex in the tall grass in the yard as we'd run our laps at gym. My little friends would brag about how older boys gave them head and touched their privacy. Stop gyrating your hips girl. You dance like you been having sex girl. Those were things my mom used to tell me growing up transitioning from adolescents to little womanhood. I would get so emotional and say mommy don't say that about me. I'm not doing nothing I promise I'm still a virgin. She'd giggle and say, "girl you lying. I know you probably doing it".

 I had been going to church before I was born and my parents would sing on the praise team. Late at night is cry at night praying for forgiveness because I didn't want these feelings, but nobody talked to me. A brief conversation about do you know what sex is at 7 years old was my only splash of sex talk. Nobody told me what masturbating was and for me it's always been my lullaby as my world was caving in.

Depression finally hit me in highschool as the many deaths of my childhood came to haunt me. The abuse I suffered from a cousin my mom had taken in started to hit me.

In the 6th grade, my 350plus pound cousin would sit on me and suffocate me while stuffing dirty socks in my mouth. I could never fight back because she was so strong.  One time she picked me up by my neck and choked me against the refrigerator in front of my friends. Luckily for me, I was stirring chili and had the spoon; splattering hot chili in her face, I took off running for dear life to my moms haven. They next day I'd pay and suffocate again. I found a way to cope as the trauma from my childhood hit my later so I'd cut into my skin. Not to deep I'd say because I don't want to go to hell. Constantly being talked about and although I wore a smile during school hours at home the social butterfly would cry. I just wanted the pain to end. The world was so cruel. All my life I felt like everyone was laughing at me. I seemed to only engage in unrequited love.

Sometimes I'd sit in the back of class as my peers would say smart shit and use a paper paper clip to cut into my skin. I stopped being sad and started mean. It was the goofy and sometimes quiet outcast's coping mechanism. I threw chairs across rooms and flipped over tables because I dared a motherfucker to keep fucking with me. I didn't want to be weak anymore. You don't smile enough. You laugh too much. You're too fat. Just leave me the fuck alone and let me be! Growing up heavily in church all my life majority of my feelings were suppressed for the fear of being condemned.

In the 10 grade I had a headache so bad and I just wanted all the pain to stop so I swallowed a handful of pain pills. Soon after realizing what I'd done I was so angry. I was so conflicted because I wanted so badly to die, I was afraid I would go to hell, and I never wanted to cause my mom the pain of burying her only child in her lifetime. I loved Jesus so much, but I went through so much shit I'd often wonder if he had forsaken me. My mom's friend made me drink a large cup of water and stick my fingers down my throat throwing up all the pain pills. My mom made me promise not to fall asleep that night.

After my mom died that summer I'd sometimes lay in the dark and cut into my skin. All I wanted was the family that had been taken from me. Why did the church and bible say if I'd take my own life I'd be condemned to hell? Was it wrong to want your family back because you had no one and people who you thought loved you mentally abused you.

Growing up I only feared 3 things: death, sex, and going to hell. You see the only thing that stopped me from killing myself was the fear of being condemned to hell and I used to fear sex because it was something that wasn't talked about when I was growing up. I envied and secretly praised the girls labeled promiscuous because they found power in their pussy while I feared the power within mine. So this is a letter to my unborn future child. I will try my best to protect you from harm so you'll never feel an ounce of pain I've felt the majority of my life and I will teach you about God, but I won't force my beliefs on you. Most importantly I will teach you and guide you. I'll be here to provide you with every answer you find yourself searching for.