Dear Susan,

For the first time in nearly a year another trigger started today, which wasn't particularly pleasant and it brought me to your page. Which has made me laugh and cry and at least not feel on my own.

I was brought up in a Christian home, where my father was the minister of the church. As a result myself and my brother would be left to our own devices on a home group night because we were too young to be involved in the group. My brother is only two years older than me, which has meant over the years I have found it very hard to lay any blame on him and have aimed my anger more at my parents and towards God, and most of it at myself.

Whilst my parents would be praying and worshipping God downstairs, my brother would be abusing me upstairs. I was only 10 years old when it started and my brother was only 12. I guess he had reached the age when he wanted to know about the female form, and instead of being like most normal teenagers and reading a book, he decided to experiment on me. I still have feelings of guilt even today, in that I let him. I think I feel more guilty knowing that he was a child too, than if I had been abused by an adult. It's almost like the responsibility was shared in a funny sort of way. Even so, I know he knew it was wrong because he made me keep it a secret from my parents. My brother was a better achiever at school than I, and because he was older, he would boss me about and tell me that I would have to do what he wanted me to do because he was the oldest. Whether it be the abuse or even the washing up, he always made me feel trapped and that I couldn't say no. When I started school, his friends were my friends and I looked up to him as though he was something special.

I always felt that he was the favourite of my parents. They would always talk about how good he was at things, they wouldn't notice if visitors by passed me in their converstation, and most of the time I would be mistaken for a boy anyway. Both myself and my brother were always being told to go to our bedrooms if church members were coming round, and even to this day, I still feel that where my parents are concerned, I come second place to the church. They only come and see me when they are on a sabatical from church and are more interested in how many times I have been to church in a year than anything else. I feel like my whole self worth is judged on how much time I spend talking about God rather than about who I am.

In those days when my brother would abuse me, he knew that we would never be disturbed until 9pm when the group finished. Sometimes he would undress me then tell me that I was disgusting. I felt guilty and dirty and wished it would all stop, but somehow it never would. I longed for my parents to catch him in the act. But then so scared that with him being the favourite that they would accept some excuse on his behalf and take his word over mine. I always felt that in their eyes he could do no wrong. I was also trapped by the pressure of being a ministers daughter. The reputation of my parents would have been tarnished forever and my father would possibly have lost his position in the church and I love my parents far too much for their reputations to be put in the gutter.

The abuse went on for over a year. I always promised myself that it would stop when I started my periods. I don't know whether subconciously I thought that, that would make me a woman rather than a little girl and give me more authority to say no, or whether it was just the sheer embarrasment of my brother trying to declothe me at that time of the month. But sure enough, somewhere inside of me I said no. I remember him becoming angry with me. He was 14 years old by that time, I remember him chasing me round my parents bedroom trying to find out if I had started my periods. I was so scared. I just didn't know what he would do with me if he caught me.

My brother was always compared to me and always faired better than me in the comparisons. I remember even at the age of 12 or 13 suffering from wanting to kill myself but never quite having enough courage to do it, then when I turned 16 my first boyfriend finished with me for someone else, telling me that I was too fat and lying to me that he had lukemia which he did not have. Following that rejection also. I stopped eating for months and became very depressed. I did start eating again before full blown anorexia set in. I longed for my parents to notice that something was wrong, but they never seemed to notice and never asked me what was wrong, that was the beginning of my concious crys for help, the past was beginning to dramatically effect my teenage behaviour.

In 1996 I then entered into another abusive relationship with a young lad who I was going to marry. He was very pleasant when I first met him and then became mentally and verbally abusive. He would pin me down on the bed and tell me what a bitch I was, he would swear at me, tell me to F--- off, he demolished what was left of my self esteem and left me a gibbering wreck for another girl the day before our wedding in 1998. At that time, I never saw the fact that it was a reoccurring cycle of abuse, probably instigated by my brothers abuse when I was just a child.

I never talked about the abuse ever, until last year. I became a police officer in 1999, not realising the implications that it would have on my locked pain and memories. Last year I took what turned out to be a false report of indecent assault, but I didn't know it was false when I took the report. Everything the lady told me had so many similarities to what had happened to me. As I took her statement from her. It was like it was happening to me again, there and then in that room. I could almost physically feel the abuse. I composed myself for the actual statement taking and remained very professional, but the following days and months were not a very pretty sight.

I found myself sitting on my kitchen floor on my own, just wanting to die, not just wanting attention, but really and truthfully wanting to die. I just did not know what to do and just didn't want to be me anymore. This then led into weeks of counselling and 6 weeks off work with depression, which really knocked my confidence and made me petrified that I would not be able to continue to be a police officer any more. I was having so many flashbacks the pain was unbearable and I spent most of my time in the bath trying to wash away the pictures in my mind as the memories started flooding back thick and fast. I was even more scared that my family would find out that I was off work or that I was ill, and even to this day, I still have not confronted my brother over the issue and my parents are still non the wiser. I know if they knew the truth then it would break their hearts and I think there are already enough hearts broken. Mine is one too many. I do still wonder if by not talking, I am prolonging another child's pain as my brother is a teacher working with children all the time and has moved jobs very frequently in the last few years. But I convince myself that I am only suspicious because I am a police officer and police officers are meant to be suspicious. I would probably never forgive myself if I found out that he was still doing the same thing to children in his school.

My counselling helped me pick myself up and see that maybe I was worth a little more than I thought I was. I still have very low self esteem, I still blame God from time to time, I still feel that my parents aren't their for me and the child inside that I grieve for, always comes out when I am lonely or ill. Sometimes I desperately want my mum to be there just to give me a hug and tell me that I will be all right and buy me a bottle of lucozade. I find it frustrating that I can't be like a child and run up to my dad and ask him to sit me on his shoulders or to sit on his knee and just be a child. I still feel guilty that I let these things happen to me from time to time, but I am also very proud of myself that it was me that stopped it in the end. I still have an obsession with tidyness and cleanliness and still often feel dirty.

But no longer do I live each day an hour at a time. I started smoking when I started suffering from depression last year, and haven't managed to give up. But that was my way of getting through it, and all be it not a healthy way of getting through it, I found a way of making it through my 29th year on this earth without being buried in the ground with a sign saying RIP over the top of me. In some ways those things that happened to me all those years ago has made my job easier, and my job has made my pain easier as I am able to tell people snippets of my story in my every day work, just to let them know that they are not on their own, and the more you talk, the easier it gets.

I have taken the decision never to prosecute my brother. I see every day what victims of rape and indecent assault have to go through to bring about a conviction, and I know that, that route is not for me. I am not as brave as they. But that doesn't mean to say I never thought about it. I always long for the day when I could tell my parents what had happened but even at nearly 29 years old, I still feel that they would never believe me and that is what scares me more than anything. Not being believed by those closest to me.

I still have a tendancy to etch towards abusive relationships, but I see the warning signs a lot earlier than I ever did before which is a further protection. Although trusting men, certainly isn't one of my strong points and many a relationship has broken up over just a few weeks because I don't have it in me to trust my boyfriend and the effort to bring about trust wears me out. I know however, one day it will happen. I don't know how long it will take. But one day it will happen. I know it.

It's another bad relationship breaking up that has brought me to this web site today. I felt used as if I were a common prostitute and it just triggered off all those other things that never quite go away. But I came to the web site because I knew that I did not want to go through the pain on my own, laying in my bed just waiting to see if tomorrow is any better. Being able to write all this down to you has been brilliant.

If you decide to put my e mail on your web site please don't use my real name. But thank you for caring enough for everyone else to put your web site on. It has been brilliant just to be able to talk.