I Was An Emotional Prostitute Part 6

Trigger Warning: Beating
I was about 14 when I met one of the most memorable guys I ever dated. I was in Everett visiting mother’s second husband, Don. He had asked me to help him build a sandbox for his stepson, Timmy. As I bent over to do something, this young man walked up and started talking to Don. I kept trying to get a look at him without being obvious about it. The young man kept looking at me as well. After a few minutes Don introduced us. His name was Andrew.

We were instantly attracted to each other. We started a dating relationship, which we tried to keep going long distance once I got back home to Seattle. As it turns out, neither of us was mature enough to keep such a relationship going so I broke it off. We remained friends despite all this.

Because Don was still a father to me in my eyes, despite everything he’d done to me in the past I’d ride the bus three hours one way to visit him and his second wife, Donna. I think part of that was because for the most part, he allowed me to dress as I pleased. I could wear tube tops or halter tops and short shorts, things mother wouldn’t allow me to wear. In general he allowed me a lot of freedom to learn about myself in ways that mother never did.

However, there were some bad times for me then, too. There were a couple of times when Don beat my bare butt with a belt. I don’t remember what his reason was the first time and I have never understood why on the second occasion. Don had me lower my pants, including my panties, then bend over a chair he’d put in the middle of the living room. I was in tears before the first hit landed. The only reason I didn’t scream was because Timmy, his stepson, was asleep on the couch a few feet away.

The second time it happened, Don, Donna and I had been discussing my desire to become an actress. Don had been telling me what to expect in the job interviews a potential actress must go through. We even play acted some potential scenarios. I went along with that because at the time, I had a strong desire to become an actress.

I couldn’t believe my ears when he told me I was in trouble for going along with the scenarios and that unless I could give Donna a good reason, he was going to spank me. Of course I couldn’t come up with a good reason, so he beat me with the belt again. This time he took me into a bedroom because everyone was awake. Again, I had to take down my pants including my panties. Only instead of a chair to bend over, I had to grab my ankles. Because no one was asleep, I screamed.

At one point, he paused for a moment to tell me to stop screaming. He said that because I’d held it in the last time, I could hold it in this time. I didn’t stop. I wasn’t disturbing anyone’s sleep, so I wasn’t going to stop screaming just because he wanted me to. It was a long time before I realized that no matter what I’d done, I didn’t deserve that kind of punishment.

There is one more thing about the second beating that has always bothered me. Given the fact that this occurred in a mobile home park in the late 70's, I have often wondered why no one responded to my screams. Mobile homes were not well insulated against sound and the nearest neighbor couldn’t have been more than ten feet away. The only reason I can come up with is that Timmy was probably known for being a screamer so the neighbors probably assumed it was he or they weren’t home that evening.

Don’s wife, Donna and I discussed the beatings several days later. She told me she thought he might have done it because he read in his girly magazines that being beaten turns some women on.

Several years later, just before his father died, Andrew moved to Seattle. We started dating again. It was a rocky relationship from the start. We made plans to get married and even attended several pre-engagement counseling sessions, which our church required.

As for why we broke up, there were several reasons for that. The majority of them had to do with his tendency to not listen to what I wanted and needed, yet he expected me to accommodate his wants and needs. For instance, he didn’t like my hair to be any shorter than below my shoulders, as it wasn’t feminine enough. He didn’t like me to wear jeans for the same reason.

Andrew bought me a couple of purses when we dated as mine wore out. When we went shopping for my new purse, he insisted it have several pockets so I could be organized. If I found one I liked that didn’t have enough pockets or compartments to suit him, he would insist I put it back.

One year for my birthday, Andrew bought me a couple of antique dolls. I never understood why as I had never shown any real interest in dolls. I think he thought that because I’m a woman, I would like such things. I’ll admit I have a few dolls now, but they are ones that I chose and there had to be something about them that said, “Take me home, please!”

Only once did he ever truly buy me something I liked. On that occasion he took me to a little shop he’d found and let me wander around to choose what I wanted.

Even when shopping for an engagement ring together, Andrew made the final choice. Not based on money, but based on what he liked. The ring had a round diamond solitaire with a gold leaf extending out to cover the wedding ring. Andrew insisted that he thought it was the perfect ring as it would represent my “turning over a new leaf” when I married him or words to that effect. I agreed it was a nice ring, but couldn’t make him see that it didn’t fit my personal sense of style.

He would frequently reach over in public and tickle my butt. When I asked him not to do it, he asked me why, then told me I laughed about it. Well, yes, I laughed, it was a natural reaction to being tickled. I just didn’t think it was appropriate behavior in public.

I Was An Emotional Prostitute Part 5

Things seemed better in junior high. To some extent, I thought I was putting the social problems of the past behind me as I wasn’t being teased so much. We had a ten-minute break between second and third periods during which, the majority of the students could be found hanging out in the cafeteria for the extra few minutes.

I was standing in the cafeteria during one of these breaks, when I sensed an excitement in the air I couldn’t explain, but made me uncomfortable. I started to leave. A girl I thought of as a friend, told me to stay. I agreed, but still wasn’t completely comfortable and a minute or so later, tried to leave again. The same girl told me to stay. I did, partly because there was a crowd and I would have to elbow my way through. Shortly after that a roar went up. Then I saw someone coming towards me with a piece of paper in front of his face. I backed up as far as I could and still he came towards me. In the end, I was bent backwards over a table in an effort to get away, only to be “kissed” through the paper. The moment he backed off, I broke free then ran out of the cafeteria. That was the most humiliating moment of my life.

It turned out that the perpetrator was none other than the Associated Student Body president, Frank, one of the most popular guys in school. I later learned that he’d been bet somewhere in the vicinity of $100 that he wouldn’t kiss me. That may not seem like much money now, but back then it was a considerable sum; especially for someone in the ninth grade, as Frank was.

The school authorities made him give his winnings back and pay for a table, which his fellow students had broken in all the excitement, not to mention nearly losing his position as A.S. B. president.

Shortly after this, the school district took matters into their own hands and asked me if I’d like to transfer to a different school. I said, “Yes.”

I was transferred to a school where I knew no one. I was also put into a special education class, where one of the things they did was to help me learn to cope with the social situations that could come up in school. Here for the first time, I felt like I had a fighting chance to be accepted socially in school and that people were truly on my side.

It was at my new school that I met my first “serious” boyfriend. His name was Howie. I’d gone to a school dance one afternoon and when it was over, I hung around in the gym while waiting for my bus. I was watching the band pack up to go, when the lead singer looked at me, smiled, and said, “Hi!”

I said, “Hi.”

We struck up a conversation towards the end of which he gave me his phone number. I was in seventh heaven. An older man from the band had noticed me! I’d had crushes on other guys before, but at that time I thought Howie was the one I wanted to spend the rest of my life with.

Our relationship started out normal enough. We’d get together and go to the mall or just hang out somewhere. I’m not sure when, but at some point we started having sex whenever we could find some privacy. I was reluctant at first, but soon wanted it too. He became the first in a long line of men that I would have sex with.

It would be easy to say that they all used me, but that’s only one side of things. While I have no doubt that some men only went out with me so that they could get in my pants, I was using sex as a way to feel loved. I didn’t realize it at the time, but I was so emotionally hungry, starving in fact, that I would do almost anything to feel loved. At times I even convinced myself that I was love in with some of the men. There were very few men who didn’t want or expect sex from me.

One of these was a boy named Danny. I met Danny through his brother whom I met on the public bus. Danny was sweet, thoughtful, and probably one of the nicest guys I ever dated. When we first started going out, I thought I might be pregnant by another guy. Wanting to be honest, I told Danny. He immediately turned to his brother and asked him how much it cost to get married. Fortunately for both of us it was a false alarm. Unfortunately, by the time our relationship had ended, I had cheated on Danny with a cousin of his. In fact, I’d say that’s the reason our relationship ended.

I know now that the way I handled myself in my relationship with Danny had a lot to do with the way I’d been treated in the past. I wish I could tell Danny how sorry I am. That I truly regret my actions and how they affected him. I know now that we weren’t meant to be together, but I do wish I’d handled our relationship better.

I Was An Emotional Prostitute Part 4

Trigger Warning: Rape Scene

Mother took us to a Presbyterian church when we were young. I remember the Sunday school teacher talking about Jesus and how He was the only way to get into heaven. She even talked about the rapture and how Jesus was going to take his believers into heaven before the great tribulation hit. The thing that really impressed me though, was when someone gave me the impression that becoming born again was like having a second birthday. It was a few weeks away from my eighth birthday when I heard this. I decided that if becoming born again meant having a second birthday, then I wasn’t going to miss out on this. I also thought it meant having a second birthday party with gifts and the whole works. When I think about that now, I smile at how innocent I was. I have never regretted giving my life to the Lord - even though doing so didn’t get me the second birthday party I thought it would.

A few years later mother started taking us to a non-denominational church. At first, I hated it. These people didn’t use hymnals and they made a joyful noise when they worshiped. How did people learn the words to the songs without hymnals? Then to make matters worse in my eyes at the time, these people prayed out loud - and in different tongues! As far as I was concerned at the time, this was too much. I wanted to go back to our old church. We stayed because as I would learn years later, mother felt as if God called her to that church.

As I looked around at the people during services, I eventually realized that they had something I didn’t. It’s called the infilling of the Holy Spirit with evidence of speaking in tongues. It’s in the book of Acts, if you want to look it up.

While mother and Don were still married, they became friends with a couple who had a nephew, Dennis, on whom I developed a crush. I thought he was cute and very nice, even though he was five years older than me. At some point, he realized I had a crush on him. He was very nice about it. He sat me down to explain that he was too old for me; that he needed someone his own age.

One night, a couple of years later, mother had him babysit the three of us kids so she could go out with Bill, the man who became her next husband. While she was gone that evening, Dennis and I started kissing when my brothers were out of sight. At one point he asked me to put on a different shirt as the one I had on was rather high in the neck and he wanted to kiss my neck. I liked the idea, so I did as he requested. A little while later, we went into mother’s bedroom and lay on her bed, necking. Pretty soon though, he wanted more. 

Dennis asked me to take off my pants and have sex with him. I said “no.”

He persisted. I said I was afraid of getting pregnant. He said I was too young to get pregnant. I still said “no.”

Eventually I reluctantly agreed because he wouldn’t take “no” for an answer. I don’t know what he got out of it; I just know that for me it hurt; physically and emotionally. I was so ashamed about what we’d done when it was over as I had been told that sex without marriage was wrong. Because I had just had sex with this young man, I felt very guilty. I didn’t realize it then, but I had just been raped. I did not at that point in my life fully understand what it was that I had “consented” to. Not only that, but my “consent” was given under pressure, not out of any real desire to participate.

The day after my 11^th birthday, mother married her third husband, Bill. He was a nice enough guy in his own way, but too much a little boy emotionally. He also didn’t have enough understanding about growing young children, girls in particular. He often told me that I cried too easily. When I told mother what Bill had said, she agreed with him. Because of that I learned not to cry easily. When I did cry, I was often ashamed of my tears, even at times of genuine grief, such as breaking up with a boyfriend or when my great grandma died. In fact, when great grandma died, I went to the school counselor to talk to him about her death. I told him how felt like crying a lot. He told me it was normal.

Bill never really got involved with us as kids beyond bringing home a paycheck or if we woke him up. He slept days, worked nights, then spent most of his weekends pursuing his own interests or sleeping.

When I was in the sixth grade, I tripped and fell down a couple of stairs, breaking one of my front teeth in half diagonally. Mother took me to the dentist that night when she got home from work. He put a temporary cap on my tooth then told mother that I needed a new crown. I didn’t think anything of it at the time, as we were there after hours and what he put on my tooth was supposed to be temporary. Several weeks later, I went to mother and asked her about getting my tooth fixed.

She said we didn’t have the money, as it would cost one of Bill’s whole paychecks to fix my tooth. That was her response every time I brought it up. This was very hard for me as it made me feel like I wasn’t worth the money. To make matters worse, the temporary cap was turning yellow. I hated to smile and show that tooth. Mother used to tell me to smile big for pictures; she never realized how embarrassing that yellow cap was. I came to hate having my picture taken.

When I ran the preview for this blog, I noticed spacing issues in the last two paragraphs. I'm sorry, but I have been unable to fix those issues.

I Was an Emotional Prostitute Part 3

Trigger Warnings: Verbal abuse; bullying, suicide thoughts

During the divorce, Don moved out of the house. A couple of years later he remarried and moved to a city north of us. Despite the abuse, I still thought of him as my father. After all, I didn’t really have a good father figure in my life.

On occasion I would take the bus to see him, which was a three hour trip, one way. One time I accidently got off at the wrong stop. I’d been reading a book, looked up, thought it I was almost too late for my stop, and pulled the bell. I borrowed a phone to call him to come get me. He had to drive 14 miles or so to pick me up because it would be at least another hour before the next bus. He was so angry with me that he chewed me out the whole way to his house. Told me if I hadn’t really wanted to come, I should have told him so. He couldn’t understand that I’d made an honest mistake.

Another time he wanted me to come see him at Christmas time. I didn’t want to, so he told me that if I didn’t come see him, he would withhold the present his mother had sent to his house for me. I refused anyway, even though I really wanted what his mother had sent. She had a knack for choosing just the right gift. I have often wondered what he did with it and what, if any explanation he gave her.

The abuse Don did to me wasn’t the only thing about him that caused misery and shame. His last name, which became mine when he adopted me, was Gass. I took a lot of teasing over that. Children in elementary school would see me coming and say things like, “Oh, no! It’s Gasser. She stinks!”

Then they would run away from me. Or worse yet, they would threaten to beat me up for simply walking by or through the area in which they were playing. Telling the playground monitors didn’t do me any good. They simply told me to stay away from the kids. Telling mother didn’t do any good either. She told me to ignore them.

The other kids also told me I was ugly. Adults would tell me that I was going to be very pretty when I grew up. I know they meant well, but it made me feel a bit like the ugly duckling. Only my question was, when would I be grown up enough to become the lovely swan?

To make matters worse, I was bullied on a couple of occasions when walking home. Once when I was a couple of blocks from school a group of kids quickly surrounded me as I walked. A boy named Jimmy was on his bicycle. He held up his front tire in front of my face while telling me to kiss it. I refused, but he kept insisting. When I realized I was pinned against the fence surrounding our babysitter’s house I screamed as loud as I could. The babysitter’s mother came out to see what was wrong. The kids quickly scattered. I thanked her for coming to my rescue, then told her what had been happening.

The other time, I was walking across the playground after school one day, when a couple of older boys started chasing me. One of them threw a rock at me and hit me in the temple causing a cut, which required attention. I went to the school office where I was taken care of by the school secretary, Letty. Several days later, I went to the school office for some reason and happened to notice a framed picture of a boy on Letty’s desk. It was one of the boys who had chased me that day. When I told Letty this, she said, “Keith? Oh, no, he’s a nice boy. He wouldn’t do that.”

Until then I had thought Letty was an adult I could trust. I never felt safe or comfortable with her afterwards.

Another time when I was walking home, I saw a couple of boys up ahead hiding behind some trees. Because I’d seen them, I didn’t think there was anything to worry about. As I walked past their hiding spot, I heard a thud. Then one of the boys said something about a branch blocking it. Only then did I realize that one of them had a large rock in his hands that he’d tried to throw at my head. The tree branch saved me from serious injury.

            The last time I was bullied, I was riding mother’s bike up and down the street in front of our house. Some girls I knew from school walked by on their way to the airport. We all started talking then one of them lit up a cigarette and wanted me to take a drag. I didn’t want to do any such thing, but she insisted. I clamped my mouth shut and refused. Pretty soon I realized she wasn’t going to give up. We happened to be in front of the next door neighbor’s house, so I thought if I screamed loud enough, mother would hear and come running. I screamed; and sure enough, mother came running. The girls ran. I told mother what had happened and that I thought I knew where one of the girls lived. She drove me to her house and we talked to her parents. They came by later with her in their car to ask if she was the one. I said she was and never heard another word about it, but from the expressions on their faces, I am sure she hadn’t heard the end of it.

There were times even at this young age when I was so depressed that I wanted to kill myself.  I literally hated my life because of the abuse I’d suffered. I felt life wasn’t worth living. The biggest reason I didn’t was that I could not figure out how to do it in a relatively painless manner. The act of killing myself scared me more than the idea of dying. I am thankful I didn’t.

I did however, try to run away a couple of times with a friend and my brother, Mike. The first attempt we did in broad daylight. A neighbor lady saw us and figured out what we were doing. A few minutes later, she pulled up beside us in her car and ordered us to get in. She then drove us home and told our parents what had happened. Mike and I were grounded for a week or so. The next time we tried it; we had agreed to meet after going to bed. That time Don, mother’s second husband, saw the packed suitcase sitting in my closet. He proceeded to open it up and dump the contents onto the floor of my room. I never did have the courage to tell him that he was the biggest reason I wanted to run away from home.