BROKEN BUT UNDETERRED
When I was 12 years my parents took me to a place. It was supposed to be a prayer camp but I found out later we weren’t going on a spiritual retreat. The host and his wife welcomed us and gave my parents water. I was given a drink. That was the last thing I remember when I woke up at dawn. Dave, I didn’t know how or when I fell asleep. My parents weren’t in the room I found myself in. It was so dark all around me. I started screaming and crying and calling my parents when I realized the door was locked. No one was there. Minutes later, someone turned on a light outside the room. I saw a shadow and his familiar voice. It was the host. He asked me to keep quiet. He wouldn’t tell me about where my parents had gone. They fed me, gave me water to drink and bath. I was bathing in the presence of two men. I was accompanied by two men whenever I needed to use the toilet. That was my routine for three years. My parents didn’t visit me. My brother and sisters didn’t know where I had been taken to.
At age 15, the host forced himself on me. He raped me three different times. He explained that I needed to know what I could be missing if I continued in my sinful ways. Dave, I am a lesbian and I knew at an early age that I was different. I liked pictures of girls in magazines. Maybe I left so many clues for my mom to catch up because I received beatings anytime I was close to girls. I wasn’t allowed to play with my friends who were girls in the neighborhood till I was sent to that camp. What my parents didn’t know was that when I turned 15, the host made me strip naked at dawn for his intercession visits. I learnt how to kneel before a man at 15. I learnt how to suck a man’s dick at 15. I lost my virginity to an older man at 15. I learnt how to survive at 15. My dad came for me three weeks after my 15th birthday. I have not told my parents about what went down when they left me with their spiritual father.
I am 26 years old now and my mom is fixing me with her friend’s son in marriage. She gave my number to him without telling me. He lives and works in Canada. I know the guy. He’s cool and doing very well for himself. But I like girls. He is in Ghana for 5 months and he wants to return to Canada with his wife, me. Do I tell him the truth so he backs off? Everybody is telling me he’s the right man for me. I unsubscribe to the idea that people who refuse to listen to and respect me, people who have never met or known me can tell me who I am or what I should be.
Image Credit: Kritsada Seekham
