John’s Story

My processing was a labyrinthian filtration system born of horror: I could not protect the closest person I have to a sister from being raped by my uncle. In an instinctive act she shared her secret with me. With his malevolence no longer hidden, the stranglehold of silence around her shattered and the first chapter of my heartbreaks began after that brutal introduction to human sexuality. A new mantra loomed, “all boys are born weapons”. The concept that the male anatomy could be weaponized and worse, used to harm those we hold dearest, was devastating. Her act to tell specifically me, countered compounded toxicity that I was born bad, or worse, born unloved as reinforced by my rage-aholic father’s beatings. What he failed to beat out of me was the degree of light and love my cousin showered into my eight-year-old world. Gashes and wounds weren’t as bad knowing she had it much worse. Never abandoning the spirit of my cousin’s strength, I carry the experience of the most stunningly resilient exemplar of God’s true love.