Survivors' Story

My abuse started, as far as I can remember, on my 4th birthday. My father had always been physically abusive to my 2 half-brothers, my mum and myself but that was normal as far as I was concerned the kicks and punches and being starved were a part of every day and very normal life so nothing was ever said in protest.

On my 4th birthday my life changed forever. I had been out playing with my brothers and we'd come home covered head to toe in mud and dirt. My father told my mum to take my brothers to my nan’s house and he'd deal with me. I was dragged through the house, breaking one rib and ending up covered in bruises. I was told to run a bath for him and get into the water after him. I'll spare everyone all of the details as they're still too difficult for me to write about but this bath signified the first time I was raped and humiliated by my father.

My brothers and mum never knew about the abuse which started that day and continued almost on a daily basis much along the same line as the first time. They only found out a few months ago when I felt ready to talk.

My parents divorced when I was 7 years old and I thought this was great as my father move d out so I thought that he wouldn't be able to touch me again, but instead it was the beginning of something much much worse. He had custody of me every weekend to give my mum a break, so he knew that he had access to me for at least 2 days a week and he made full use of me. I had to wait on him hand and foot, wash him in the bath and keep quite when he raped me at least once a day.

He took me on holidays to wonderful places like America, Sweden, Canada and Tunisia and I always went home full on stories of things we'd done and seen but in reality those things we did occurred on perhaps 2 days out of 10, all of the other days I was locked in the hotel room and treated like a slave in every way.

When I was 10 years old my father bought his own house and things escalated yet again. It started with him inviting one friend over to watch me being humiliated, then over time this friend started to join in and eventually my father left us alone for him to abuse me. This then started the trend of more friends coming over every weekend and sometimes an evening during the week when my mum was busy. Over the following 6 -7 months I had 8 'men' at my father’s house all abusing me sexually. As if this couldn't get worse I witnessed them giving my father handfuls of cash on a number of occasions before I was given a cold drink which I later discovered was laced with Rohipnol and other sedative drugs and then they would all gather around me and take turns to rape me as I was either tied to my fathers bed or so heavily drugged that I was unable to move a muscle.

When I was 11 I became pregnant for the first time as a result of the abuse but soon after my father found out I miscarried. This pregnancy was followed by 5 other which was either miscarried or aborted at the cost of the 'men' who were abusing me. I became pregnant again at the age of 13 but by this time I had heard someone saying that they were paying me father to let them have sex with me and get me pregnant, either for the thrill of making this happen just to watch me go through the pain of a miscarriage or aborting, or to make me have a baby so that they could abuse my child from birth. I was not going to let this happen. Somehow I kept my pregnancy a secret from my father until I was 4 months along when I started to show and I managed to convince my mum to make excuses for me not to see him until after my daughter was born. He never found out about her.

My abuse abruptly ended on my 16th birthday when I was starting to stand up for myself and he beat me severely breaking 2 of my ribs. He drove me in silence to a hospital, pushed me out of the car and told me that my 'services were no longer required'. I didn't see him from that day until I was 21 and I never speak to him now.

I'm 27 now, my daughter passed away just over a year ago but I kept her safe and loved to the best of my abilities. I'm in a good job and although I still have physical problems and regular flash backs and panic attacks, I am determined to never let him rule my life again. I've still got a way to go but I will get there.

I know there are people out there with stories much worse than mine, but I hope that by opening up about my childhood I can show that you can survive and you're not alone.

Rachel