A man sexually abused me – my mum still let him babysit

She’s never apologised for emotionally abusing my sister and I (Picture: Getty Images)

‘I’m moving in a couple of months. I won’t be contacting you again.’ That was the last text I ever got from my mum. 

No heartfelt goodbye, no declaration of love or even an apology for the hurt she’d caused over the years. But I wasn’t surprised in the slightest.  

Mum has never acknowledged any of her wrongdoing.  

She’s never apologised for emotionally abusing my sister and I, nor for dismissing me when I told her I was sexually abused at the age of eight.

And she’s never shown any guilt over her involvement with the rape of another woman.  

It’s no wonder then that, since I received that text, I’ve not seen or spoken to her. Nor would I want to. 

Mum grew up in a very abusive family situation. Her mum had dementia, which left her stepdad – a mean, violent, alcoholic, who sexually abused her – as her main caregiver. As a result, my mum was in and out of care throughout her teens.   

Then aged 16, my mum had me. She had my sister just 11 months later and we all, including my dad, moved into a council house.  

I always hated going to his house – it was dirty, stank of smoke and he was always drunk (Picture: Getty Images)

For a brief moment we appeared to be your typical nuclear family – but we were far from it. 

Mum and Dad were always breaking up and getting back together. Whenever they had split up Mum would go out to the pub with friends leaving us with her stepdad to babysit us.  

I always hated going to his house – it was dirty, stank of smoke and he was always drunk. Then, when I was around the age of eight, he sexually assaulted me while my sister was in the room.  

Thankfully she was transfixed by the TV, so I’m almost certain she has no idea what happened. I didn’t tell my mum straight away – part of me was scared she would be angry at me for ‘allowing’ it to happen.  

It took a few days but, eventually, I told my auntie – who was a teenager at the time – and she convinced me to tell my mum together: ‘Then we’ll call the police so he can’t do it to any other kids,’ she said.  

However, when we confronted my mum, she told us not to tell the police. 

‘Everyone will know what happened, no-one will want to be friends with you,’ she said. ‘And Dad won’t be able to look at you if he finds out.’  

This was cruel: she knew that I idolised my dad and could think of nothing worse than losing him, so I kept quiet. Despite what had happened, Mum continued to leave us in her stepdad’s ‘care’. If I protested, she’d say: ‘Just tell him no…’ as if it was that easy.  

In the end, to protect both me and my sister, I’d insist on playing hide and seek whenever we were there. We would run and hide and that drunken moron would stagger around the house with his belt unbuckled looking for us.  

I didn’t think things could get much worse (Picture: Getty Images/Westend61)

The only reason that all stopped is because he fell asleep one night with the chip pan on and caused a house fire. We all got out unscathed but Dad forbade us from ever going back there. I was relieved.  

Sadly, things didn’t get better after that. Mum and Dad broke up for good not long after and she started dating a new man – a drug dealer who would hit her regularly before turning his rage on my sister and I.  

When concerned neighbours alerted my dad to what was happening, Mum moved us across town. I felt isolated and hopeless at the thought that I would never see my dad again. 

I didn’t think things could get much worse, but then I witnessed something no one, especially a child, should ever have to: my mum and her boyfriend violently raped my babysitter while I was in the house.  

The morning after, they acted like nothing had ever happened. The police were never called and my babysitter begged me to never tell anyone what had happened – she never wanted her son to find out. 

Her screams and cries for help, mixed with the sound of my mum and her boyfriend’s laughter, is something that haunts me to this day.  

I went to live with my dad after that, I suspect at his insistence – it was common knowledge that my mum had an addiction to alcohol and cocaine and that police were regularly called to the house.  

She told my dad that, if he didn’t send me to my mum’s, she would leave and take the kids (Picture: Getty Images)

For four years, from age 10 to 14, life was happy, stable and felt safe. But, it didn’t last. 

When I was 14 my step-mum kicked me out after finding my diary. There was nothing untowards inside it – just the childish ramblings of a disgruntled teen – but clearly it was enough to rattle her.  

She told my dad that, if he didn’t send me to my mum’s, she would leave and take the kids.  

A couple of weeks later he drove all of my stuff around to my mum’s and wouldn’t look me in the eye. He looked like he was trying not to cry. I rarely saw him after that and he wasn’t allowed to take phone calls from me.

I missed my dad.   

The moment I turned 16, I got a job and moved out.  

I worked in a clothes shop where everything was £10 or less, and I earned £3 an hour. To help support myself, I moved in with friends in a shared flat and at times, I sofa surfed.  

I witnessed something no one, especially a child, should ever have to

Strangely, my mum and I became close to each other when I moved out – I think I had compartmentalised the trauma she caused and just went about life on auto pilot. 

It didn’t occur to me that I could remove her from my life. Whenever I tried to talk to mum about all the trauma I suffered as an adult, she would cry and tell me about her own abusive childhood. I felt sorry for her, and if I’m honest I was – and still am – scared of her. 

It took me years to get to a point where I didn’t feel dutybound and guilty for not wanting to be around my mum.  

When I had my own son at 24, I stopped making excuses for her behaviour. Holding him for the first time, this precious, innocent thing, I knew I’d do whatever it took to protect him. That meant not relying on her for support. 

It was hard at times, especially when he approached the age when something bad happened to me – I would spiral into depression or torment myself by imagining that the same experiences happened to him.  

I knew that wasn’t healthy, but it made me realise that what my mum put me through was unforgivable. 

I started going through counseling this year, after being on the waiting list for over a year, for Complex Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder (C-PTSD) – where a person has problems with managing emotions and relationships as well as typical PTSD symptoms – and have been getting gradually better for my son, who is now 16.   

I’m pleased to say I broke the cycle of abuse in our family and that I have never let him experience anything like I did. But I still have a lot of guilt.  

Last year, I finally sent mum a text confronting her about the attack on the babysitter, saying that was one of the main reasons I was distant and found it difficult to be around her.   

She replied a little while later saying she didn’t know what I was talking about and that’s when she told me I wouldn’t see her again. At least she was right about that last part.  

It’s been more than 12 months since we last spoke and I finally feel like I am really starting to live my life – the life I should have been living all along.  

No doubt she has told everyone she can about how ungrateful her daughters are but I honestly couldn’t care less. 

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