Please Don't Hurt Me

Please don’t hurt me.

Those words repeated over and over again in my head.

Please don’t.

Please don’t.

Please.

I grew up in a home of fear. Behind every corner lurked another danger. Sometimes it was my brother. His OCD had gotten bad again and seeing his panic would snap me back to the times when I was little and I would accidentally touch something I wasn’t supposed to, and he would scream and scream and scream at me. Other times it was my dad. He’d be boiling over with the rage he kept holed up inside of him until he exploded, ready to lay on me all my faults and shortcomings. Most of the time it was my mom. Her expectations, guilt trips, and scalding tone would send me reeling back into a childlike state where all I could think were those four words.

Don’t hurt me. Please don’t hurt me.

None of them had ever physically touched me. But I had learned, through personal experience, that the emotional hurt much more than the physical ever would.

It stays.

It lingers.

It burns.

Don’t hurt me. Please don’t hurt me.

Those words echo in my head today, right now, as I write on my phone, sitting in my grandparents’ living room.

My brother had been here. My grandmother kept touching the trash and not washing her hands afterward, and my brother was getting more and more visibly upset. His OCD had gotten bad again and I was on edge, tense in my chair, wide-eyed, glancing at him continuously to check on him, out of both care and fear. So when he asked my grandma to wash her hands before touching the chicken and she reacted angrily, shocked that he would think she wouldn’t do that, I reverted back to that state of terror.

My body went cold and all I could feel was the ice in my blood and the pounding of my heart. I stared at one spot, half dissociated, unable to think, to process, to cope. My ears rung with the tone of her voice and my breathing grew shallow. But I was quiet.

I couldn’t draw attention to myself.

I wasn’t the target of her wrath. Not this time.

I had to be still. I had to be quiet.

Don’t say a word.

You can’t stand up for him. You can’t help him. You can’t protect him.

Please don’t.

Please don’t.

Please don’t hurt me.

I can’t shake those words. Even now, over 10 minutes past the event, and it's all I can do to stay calm. My stomach is twisted in knots and I tense every time she comes back into the room.

But I hide it. I talk normally. I keep my facial expression casual every time she looks over. I’m quiet.

But my head is loud.

Don’t hurt me.

Please don’t hurt me.

But why?

Why do little things like this affect me so much?

Why does one miscommunication send me spiraling nearly into a panic attack?

Why do I fall down a hole I struggle to crawl back out of?

The answer, it’s awfully simple.

I’ve been hurt.

I’ve been abused.

I’ve been broken.

But not physically.

Instead, they tore into me with words, beat me with the tone of their voice, and buried knives of guilt deep in my chest. They broke me down until I bent to their whims. They ripped me apart and put my pieces back together in a way that suited them.

They destroyed me.

And I still haven’t recovered.

Whatever you want to call it, emotion, mental, psychological, that kind of abuse leaves deep scars in your mind. It burrows into your bones and leaves eggs of fear in your marrow. It latches onto your heart and rips out a part of you when you try to tear it off.

I have PTSD.

I’m in therapy.

I’m healing.

But I am not healed.

And a part of this will always stay with me.

Please don’t hurt me.

Please don’t.

Please.