Invisible Girls

by Patti Feuereisen

  At this developmental stage, girls naturally feel confused by their sudden “sex appeal.” They may be pushed hard to start experimenting with sex and to conform their emerging sexuality to cultural expectations. They may start to wear makeup and experiment with dressing in a sexier way, and they may seem to go from girl to woman overnight, but few girls can be said to be “in command” of their sexuality even at fifteen—let alone twelve, thirteen, or fourteen.

  MYTH: Intercourse feels great at this age.

  TRUTH: Intercourse at this age usually hurts and is usually scary. It’s simply not something that most twelve-to fifteen-year-old girls desire at this stage in their physical and emotional development, no matter how much they may want attention from boys. Of course, there are the rare cases when two young people really feel in love and ready for this commitment, but this is very unusual. I can’t tell you how many times girls who have had intercourse too early (by their own reckoning) have told me that they could not understand the point of it. They say things like, “It hurts. You bleed. Sometimes you even have a hard time walking the next day.”

  Any girl brought up in a household where she didn’t feel valued as a person, where she wasn’t supported when she tried to create clear physical boundaries, where she didn’t feel vital or important, where she felt invisible, can be vulnerable to sexual abuse, including acquaintance sexual abuse.

  Remember Coral talking about feeling proud and pretty in her new little outfit? She also said that after being raped by her father she felt dirty. The rape took away all her comfort and pride in her developing body. It’s hard enough just to deal with the feelings that come up during adolescence, but when a girl is sexually assaulted, as Coral was, she’ll tend to close off her feelings. The same kind of thing happened to Amber, whom you’ll meet in a moment, when she was forced into a sexual relationship too early. As Amber moved through all the normal developmental stages of adolescence—wanting to fit in, feeling awkward and uncomfortable with her changing body, feeling confused about her “sex appeal”—she didn’t have a solid base of support at home. She felt at sea with all these new feelings. Along came a good-looking, popular boy, and she succumbed.

  AMBER

  I met Amber one day when I was speaking to a large group of girls at her school. I remember looking at her and seeing a kind of dazed expression on her face. After the talk, she approached me and told me that some things had happened to her that she had never told anyone. We spoke that day for at least an hour.

  Amber told me she was haunted by some weird experiences she’d had with a male counselor at her riding camp a few years earlier. She said he was a really popular guy at camp, and no one knew that he’d molested her. She explained that now she goes out with boys she doesn’t even like and is confused about how much attention she seems to need from them. She knew it had something to do with the boy who molested her. She harbored a lot of resentment toward him but also felt guilty because she hadn’t stopped him. She was obviously in a state of real emotional turmoil.

  Amber described how angry she felt all the time and how she carried her anger into her classes, into her relationship with her parents, and into her relationships with both girls and boys. Although she spoke in a monotone, as do many survivors when they reveal their abuse for the first time, even in that first encounter I could see her body begin to relax.

  Shortly thereafter, Amber started coming to my office, and over the next several sessions she filled in the details of what had happened. The molestation took place over two summers, when she was twelve and thirteen. Her anger was palpable. During sessions she would often clench her fists.

  We started our work together in the spring of Amber’s sophomore year in high school. She was involved with the poetry club at school and was a good student, but she did not derive much joy from her academic success. She had had trouble connecting with boys and with girls and described her quiet and conservative parents as well meaning but incompetent in many ways. Slowly but surely, it became apparent that Amber had a lot of reasons for mistrust.

  As an African American living in a predominantly white neighborhood and as an only child, Amber often felt isolated. She lived with her parents and grandparents, who seemed “pretty clueless” about modern teenagers. Amber’s father had a small dry-cleaning company and was rarely home, so Amber spent a lot of time with her mother and grandmother. There was no real openness in Amber’s home, and, furthermore, there was an expectation of blind respect for elders. It was assumed that Amber would be a “good girl,” which included being kind and thoughtful to her elderly grandmother, a bitter woman who herself had lived through some very rough times during the Depression in the South.

  Amber had no doubt that she was very loved by her family, but she felt that she needed to play a role to please them. If she acted out, she was always quickly reprimanded by her frightened mother, who was still under the thumb of her own mother. She got the message loud and clear: don’t make waves.

  When Amber began her “tweens,” she wanted to fit in but wasn’t at all sure how.

  AMBER’S STORY

  He Told Me I Was Special

  I have been holding in this secret of sexual abuse for years. I have never told my parents or reported this person, but when Dr. Patti came to my school it all came back to me and I had to tell the story of what happened.

  I am African American and an only child. My skin is very light. My grandmother on my father’s side is also very light skinned. This is a positive thing in my family, to be light skinned, but it is very uncomfortable for me because I don’t really fit in anywhere—not with the biracial kids, the black kids, or the white kids.

  I have always known my parents loved me, but I could never really be open with them. We live in Staten Island, New York. This is a community with some very wealthy people and some working-and middle-class people, but it is not very integrated. I am not sure why my parents moved to such a white neighborhood, but they did. My family is middle class; my father owns a small dry-cleaning company.

  When I was twelve years old, I was already pretty physically developed and felt really awkward. Boys started looking at me differently, and men on the street would whistle. People thought I was at least fifteen. My mother and grandmother both have huge breasts, and I had always prayed that I would not turn out like them. I remember I used to slump my shoulders to try to hide my breasts. This was the same year that I discovered riding horses. When I was on a horse, I felt great. I wasn’t self-conscious. I didn’t care what anybody thought. I just had a good time.

  I started going to the stables near my house after school pretty much every day, and finally my parents scraped up the money to pay for some riding lessons and the tuition for the summer camp at the stables. I didn’t have a lot of friends in school, and I noticed at the stables that there was a popular group of girls from my school. There I was with my kinky black hair, different skin, and thick body. All the popular girls seemed to be pretty, skinny, and blonde and rich. Once again, I didn’t fit in.

  That summer at riding camp that same group of blond, pretty, popular girls was also there, but they talked to me very little. There were some black kids there, but they pretty much ignored me, and I felt kind of isolated. Then Tim came along.

  Tim was sixteen and a really good rider. He was also very good-looking, and whenever he could, he showed off his six-pack. He was black and seemed to have crossed the popularity barrier. He was popular with all the kids. Whenever he rode to the stable, all the kids got excited; they thought he was so cool.

  He worked part time at the camp and was friends with all the kids. Because I did gymnastics I was really strong, and Tim noticed. I felt great when he asked me to be on his volleyball team and his team in water tag. This was my ticket to acceptance. All the kids knew that Tim included me on his teams.

  Suddenly, different girls were asking me to their sleepovers. I was really happy. I started to feel really good about myself and accepted by a popular group for
the first time. This was the first time I felt as if I was actually “in” a group. Girls were calling me, and I could feel free to call them. Whenever Tim was around at camp, everyone surrounded him, but he would always talk with me the most.

  One day when we kids were all at the beach, Tim was rubbing sand off my back and touched my chest. I felt kind of weird, but I didn’t say anything. I figured it was a mistake. After that, Tim started paying a lot of attention to me. He would compliment me on how strong I was and constantly praise me during volleyball or water tag games. I felt really special. My parents could see how happy I was, and they were really pleased with all my new friends. Things were good.

  One night there was a campfire at the camp, and, when everyone was sitting close together in the dark, Tim started whispering things to me. He said things like, “Bright Eyes, you know how special you are to me. Here, let’s do something and don’t worry about it. I really like you.”

  Then he put my hand on top of his pants. I felt really weird. I was paralyzed and didn’t know what to do. But he said, “It’s okay, it’s our secret.” And he kept telling me how special I was. I knew it was probably not normal and it felt weird, but I was hoping it would never happen again.

  Things started to escalate with Tim. He would get me alone whenever he could. If I was alone with him in the stables, he would push me down on a haystack and fondle my breasts. Then he’d take my hand forcibly and put it on his crotch. I’m sure I said no, but I’m also sure it was a pretty weak no. Really, I can’t tell you exactly what I was thinking because I would find something to focus on and just check out. After each of our encounters, he was really nice to me. He kept trying to get me alone, and I would try to avoid him. In the meantime, the girls were all being really nice to me, but they were always trying to get me to get Tim to come along to the park or the ice cream truck or something. Tim was clearly more interested in being alone with me, but he would come with the group sometimes. In retrospect, I now see that this was his way of keeping me hooked.

  The summer ended, and I did not see Tim during the school year because he was away at boarding school. He actually wrote me a letter saying how special I was and how sorry he was if he had done anything to make me uncomfortable. He told me he loved me. I wrote back once or twice, but then we lost contact. I spent that year in middle school feeling accepted. I still didn’t like my developing body, but I stayed active in sports and had lots of friends. I had almost blocked out Tim’s weird touches when summer rolled around again—the summer before high school.

  Sure enough, Tim showed up at camp that summer. At that point I was fully developed and very curious about boys. I had a repulsion and fear about Tim but also a strange excitement. My memories are blurry about this, but I have a sense that I actually wanted to be with him sometimes. I had this fantasy that he really loved me and maybe would be nice to me. But, when he got me alone, all he wanted was to put my hand on his crotch. I would do it, and he would touch mine.

  When we were alone together doing all this stuff, I would blank out or think about a movie or anything to get my mind off what was happening. One time he fingered me, and once he forced me to go down on him. I just pretended I was floating above my body, but I felt really awful afterward. Of course, I never told anyone about any of this. I did know I wanted to hold him and kiss him, I wanted him to want to hold my hand and put his arm around me, but I did not want to do the other stuff.

  The sexual stuff with Tim went on for the whole summer. I really can’t explain why I was never able to stop him. It just became expected behavior from me. I was kind of numb, and I kept fantasizing that he really liked me.

  It wasn’t until the end of that summer, at thirteen, that I finally told Tim to stop. Things had gone way too far. Even though I would blank out during the sexual encounters, I started having nightmares, and I also wanted to hurt myself. I cut my arms a couple of times with safety pins, and then I realized that it had to stop. When I told him that I wanted to tell someone, he said, “You know, you’ve let this happen a lot. No one will ever believe you if you say you didn’t like it.” Tim actually realized I meant business and was no longer going to go along with him, and he became really nasty. He either ignored me or was really sarcastic if he said anything to me at all. At times that he got me alone, he was really mean, telling me that I drove him to do those things to me because I wanted it.

  The summer ended and I started high school. I was in a new school with new kids. I felt horrible about myself. When I got really down, I continued to cut my arms with safety pins, and I began to smoke pot. I was repulsed by my own sexuality. I either wanted to feel pain or nothing at all. A part of me felt so guilty and wondered, did I really want Tim to do that stuff to me? I was too ashamed to make new friends. And much of my freshman year was spent inside a shell. I definitely didn’t want to go out with boys. I basically buried myself in schoolwork. I’d come straight home after school or maybe hang out a little with the kids I bought pot from. I was lonely and tormented about what had happened, what I let happen.

  The summer after my freshman year, I took an accelerated writing course. I spent the summer with other kids who loved to write, and I was able to start to see myself in a better light. I was far away from that camp and Tim.

  Then tenth grade started, and I actually started to feel a bit better because I had had a good summer. No one had hurt me. But I was still really shy, insecure, and self-conscious, and I blamed myself for all my sexual encounters with Tim. I was not as self-destructive; at times I wanted to cut my arms, but I smoked pot instead and found myself just feeling angry most of the time. I had never told anyone about that summer, and, even though I felt a bit better about myself, I still felt dirty, guilty, and ashamed.

  Then one day there was an assembly about sexual abuse. I went to that assembly, and it changed my life. That is when I met Dr. Patti and started to get counseling. I also started going to her survivors’ group, and I realized I wasn’t the only girl who’d been sexually abused. Some of the other girls who’d been abused felt the same way I did about boys. I was really afraid. I didn’t want boys to touch me, and I definitely didn’t want a boyfriend. But when I shared my experience and heard from other girls to stop blaming myself, I realized maybe it wasn’t my fault. I knew it was none of the girls in my group’s fault about what happened to them. We all started to forgive ourselves.

  I still have a lot to deal with. But being free to have so much anger at my parents for not being strong also helps me to stop blaming myself. They’re so weak. I am angry that they couldn’t tell I was so depressed during my young adolescence. I’m really upset that I had to find counseling on my own. I would even wear sleeveless shirts that showed my cuts up and down my arm. They never even asked about those marks on my arm, and they never suggested that I get help. I don’t even tell them I go to therapy. Dr. Patti lets me pay ten dollars a session, and it makes me feel like it is my private way to heal and deal with my issues. My family is all about not making waves. They always want everything to be just fine.

  Only now, through my survivors’ group and my sessions with Dr. Patti, am I beginning to realize that I wasn’t to blame and that Tim probably did this to lots of other girls, too. For all I know, Tim may still be molesting girls, but I still don’t feel strong enough to track him down and go to the authorities. One of the best things I’ve done, though, is that I’ve begun writing in a journal. My journal has become my friend. I wrote the following poem to that little twelve-year-old girl who couldn’t stop someone from hurting her:

  Hear the wind rush

  feel the pain

  ignore the chill

  and hide the scars

  count backwards from ten and pretend you’re

  somewhere else

  where all the colors in the world become one.

  Now it’s over

  he’s leaving the room

  I can breathe

  at least until tomorrow…

  Maybe then, t
hough, I’ll let myself see

  that it’s all up to me.

  I’ll clench my fists tightly

  and tell the truth.

  It was his fault, not mine.

  MY THOUGHTS

  This was the first time Amber had told her whole story. She let herself go back to the beginning and track how and when it all started. She was able to share her confusion and shame about not stopping the sexual abuse. She talked about feeling guilty and lost and not knowing how to stop Tim from violating her. She believed her abuser when he told her that she must have liked the sexual fooling around and that she obviously wanted him to do these things to her, but it’s obvious to her now that she did not want to be sexually molested. She did not want to touch this boy’s penis; it did not feel good to her. She was twelve years old. She felt insecure, awkward, and ashamed of her body. With Tim, she was pulled into a pattern, and she did not know how to stop it.

  Because Amber did not have parents or friends she could trust, she didn’t feel safe disclosing what had happened. Amber did what so many girls do: She pretended that she had forgotten. She tried unsuccessfully to suppress the memories of what happened and turned to hurting herself with safety pins. When that did not numb her, she smoked pot.

  Summers were hard for her, with all the associations—the smells, the heat—bringing back memories of what had happened at camp. Through the accelerated English class, Amber was able to feel proud of herself again. She found some inner strength and really applied herself to her schoolwork.

  In order to get through the abuse, Amber, like so many girls, dissociated from her body. She described floating above her body, as if she was not participating in the encounters. There are even some blanks in her memory because she so successfully checked out. (This was mentioned as one of the brilliant things girls do to survive in Chapter 6.)