Hi there. I stumbled into your site and read the other males' stories - I don't know if it's OK for me to do this, but I think it's time for me to tell my own. It's the first time I tell the story in full, so bear with me. I'll just introduce myself first. My name is David, I'm 20 and I live in Europe (sorry if I don't get into too much detail).

My memories of the first two years of my life are quite happy. I lived in Europe with my parents and nothing special happened - at least that I can recall. Then my father died in a car accident. I don't remember that time very clearly, I just know that my mother remarried soon after. He - I mean, my step-father - seemed to be a decent enough man (not that I was given much choice in the matter). He had a good, well-paid job which required him to move a lot, and so we soon packed off to North America. I think the abuse started soon after we got there. It started with little things at first. I was two and a half at the time, still learning to cope with a foreign country, far away from all my friends and the rest of my family. Now that I look back, I can realise what kind of man my step-father is... like that character from Stephen King's novel "Misery" - the one played by Kathy Bates in the film - he is *way* out there, if you know what I mean. He could pass from nice to nasty in five m
inutes. And when he got nasty, he really got nasty.

He started abusing me in insidious ways - just put-downs and slaps at first, but things quickly escalated. He abused me emotionally, physically, sexually... you name it. I didn't tell anyone about it, needless to say. I don't know if my mother ever found out... or rather, I think she *did* know about some of it, but not only didn't she do anything to stop it, but she actually *encouraged* it... this is hard for me to write, but I think her idea was that I needed to become a "respectful" child... I think she has a few problems herself and she drinks quite a lot... so as long as her husband was keeping me quiet that would be fine by her. So I couldn't tell anyone. Also, we were always moving around - Atlantic Seaboard, New England, Midwest, British Columbia, etc. - so I wouldn't be able to tell anyone even if I could (hope this makes sense).

When I started school we were living in Northern Canada, in an area that was mainly forest and frozen wasteland. I was probably the most aloof child in class - but how could they know? How could they know about the unspeakable things my upstanding and respected step-father did to me at home? Not even I could make sense of them. It was like living in the eye of a storm. At school I always wore lots of clothes to hide my bruises... I was there before everyone else and left after everyone else. But there was no point in trying to dodge him. He'd always be there at home, waiting for me. 

By the time we moved to Alaska I was a nine year old going on forty... life was nothing but being in pain or expecting pain. I kept wishing I'd never been born. Sometimes I'd fantasize about my father - my real father - how he really was alive and would come to save me. Those moments were the only good things in all those years. There were no friends, no kind teachers, nothing. I just built walls around me. Now that I think about it, I suppose I *could* have told somebody about what was happening to me, but there were very good reasons not to do it. First of all, I felt sure nobody would believe me. Secondly, I didn't trust anyone. Thirdly, he kept telling me terrible things would happen to me if I told anyone. And finally... and this is the hardest part for me to tell, so bear with me... sometimes my step-father would go out of his way to "compensate" me... buying expensive things for me, taking me to the movies or to a carnival. In a way, he made me feel I deserved everything he did to me. That wouldn't diminish the hurt, but... I felt that it was right for him to make me feel worthless and wake me up during the night to do horrible things to my body... I felt it was all my fault... that he treated me well when I was a good boy and treated me bad when I was a bad boy and that was that.

By the time I turned thirteen we had moved four more times. I had no brothers or sisters, fortunately - I felt sure that he would abuse them as well. But it just helped to make me feel more cut off and alone. We had very little contact with my other relatives. There was only one person who kept in touch, and that was my paternal grandmother - she cared about me a lot (I live with her now), but as far as she knew, everything was perfectly normal. I was an aggressive, withdrawn teenager at the time. I didn't look weird or anything, but my hostility always drove people away... it was just a vicious circle. Come to think of it, although my life is still a complete mess and I'm pulling it together bit by bit, I'm surprised I didn't become a complete nut job - there were only two kinds of people for me: those who abused and those who were abused. I was one of the latter and that was that. I let him carry on. I let him humiliate and depredate me, I let him beat me, I let him have forcible sex with me... that was just the way the world worked.

However, as moths went by, something inside of me started to go increasingly tired of putting up with his abuse. I don't know what it was - maybe it was my warped perception of the world: I was tired of being the victim... it was my time to fight back. To be the one in control, the one with power. Or maybe it was just that part of me that was so alive until I was two, that part I thought he had killed, but which was know rearing its head again. I just wanted out. Well, I'd always wanted out, but this time I decided I was going through with it. It had come from "fantasy world" into "planning ahead world". So one day, when I was fifteen and a half, in the summer, I waited for him to go to work, I waited for my mother to go out shopping, I went to my step-father's cabinet, took out all the money, packed some of my stuff and just walked out. I went to the bus-station and bought a ticket to the closest city with an international airport. My plan was to get to my grandmother. I know that as master-plans go, this one was not exactly brilliant - the only thing I had to guide me was an address in a foreign country. But a flickering candle is enough for a world that so far has been completely dark. Little did I know what was going to happen to me.

I arrived in the city, a really big city, and I was all alone and had no idea of what to do next. I wanted to find some place to spend the night and then buy a plane ticket in the morning but I didn't know where to go. I was naive and was probably looking vulnerable as well, so when a man approached me, all smiles and niceness, I readily swallowed his bait. I went with him... I know that was incredibly stupid of me... he got together with four other guys... now this is the most difficult bit to tell... it has been more than four years and I still can't tell the story straight... I couldn't escape or call for help... and they gang-r*ped me. That was hitting rock-bottom for me... going to the full meaning of the word "helpless", which was a word I was very well acquainted with... That thing dragged for hours... I just wanted them to kill me really fast, so that the pain would stop... and the things they said to me... I still can't go into that... Anyway, they hurt me pretty badly, robbed me and then left me in some back-street. I was barely conscious when they left me. Just shame, pain, humiliation, more pain... I just wanted to die. But amazingly, after dragging me through all of the circles of Hell, it seems that whatever mighty entity that had decided of my life, decided that I had had enough and sent a pair of angels to my rescue.

I was found a few hours later by the two kindest, sweetest people alive. I was extraordinarily lucky, although it didn't seem like that at the time. At the time, I didn't even know people could be kind and loving. They took me to hospital (I was needing medical attention pretty badly), where I staid for three weeks... then they took me to their home. They were just trying to help, and I am very sorry and ashamed for having been so rude to them... I went from "numb" to "angry" - actually, I was frightened most of the time and I hadn't even begun to warp my mind around what had happened. But they put up with me. They had a daughter a year younger than me - they were the first people that taught me what parents are supposed to be like. They contacted my grandmother (I asked (begged) them not to contact my parents), arranged everything for me to go to her. They were incredibly generous and kind and will be grateful to them to the day I die.

Well, I came back to Europe. I disclosed most of my abuse to my grandmother, who was surprisingly understanding. I have started studying again... I live with someone who loves me and cares for me, now, and I have started to pull my life together. I'm going really slow... just one minute at a time. I have sank to depths no one is supposed to know... I've just started to return to the surface. I'd just like to thank you all for bearing with me and know that you are not alone.

David