Ashamed

Something happened.
Twenty four years ago, maybe twenty five?  Before I was old enough to know that dates have significance, before I marked the passage of time.
Something happened.
My parents weren't being negligent, they weren't foolish.  They just put their trust in the wrong person.
Something happened.
Darkness came in and left with my innocence.
No one told me to feel shame.  It came the moment his hand touched me.  A shame so powerful that I couldn't even say: Something happened.  I couldn't voice the questions that haunted me.  Why did this happen?  What did I do wrong?
No one told me I was different, that this kind of thing didn't happen to the other kids.  I just knew it.  And so I continued to be silent.
Sometimes it would come to the tip of my tongue, this confession that Something happened.  I wanted to share it.  Would you think less of me?  The shame pushed it back, choked me. 
When I was 18, I fell in love with a boy.  And Something happened...he listened to my story and said he loved me too.  He held me in his arms and comforted me and cared for me and married me.  He made me a mom.  And holding my precious children in my arms after carrying them inside my body, I vowed that Nothing would happen to them.  I am probably a little too overprotective.  I am maybe too suspicious of the adults around us.  But if it means that they get to be children for all the years they are supposed to, if they can always love themselves and never feel shame, then its worth it.  I will have done my job.
A few months ago, I was reading a post by one of my favorite mommy bloggers.  One in which she disclosed that she had been a victim of rape.  I read these words:
"It's time because the shame should not be mine. It should never have been mine."
Something happened.
That long held reservoir of shame broke.  It flowed out of me with my tears.
I repeat those words, and each time, my voice gets a little louder.
Yesterday, I sat in church.  I felt like my pastor was talking directly to me.  Because he spoke of a Savior who says, "Your heart is too precious to carry that shame.  Lay it at my feet and I will take it all away."  I did.
Something happened.
My heart felt peace.