BEATINGS, INCEST, RAPE, PIMPING & TRAFFICKING"

DAD WHO TRIED TO DESTROY HIS DAUGHTER: BEATINGS, INCEST, RAPE, PIMPING & TRAFFICKING"

Physical abuse started when Layhla* was two, and the fondling by her dad began at seven. Within a year, the man began raping her, nearly nightly, always violently. Sometimes in the bedroom or bathroom, but generally the assaults happened in the darkness of the basement among the spider webs and crickets. Layhla learned early to be waiting at the foot of the stairs so she wouldn't get thrown or pushed down them.

At first, she cried, but that made her abuser even angrier, and he continued with his vile sexual acts even longer. So she learned not to cry, not to feel, not to resist, not to deem herself worthy of anything better. Silence about the sexual assaults was forced on her with the threat that her dad would go after Layla's little sister if she told anyone.

Layhla's mother told her often that she was worthless, and as a little girl, she knew that she had never been wanted by either parent. She had been, after all, the reason the couple got married in the first place in an already bitter relationship . She was despised and hated, and the attitudes of mother and father were played out fully in their actions of cruelty, shame and destruction of the child. Naturally, she saw herself as the embodiment of the barrage of demeaning words and behaviors.

Sixth grade marked a new dynamic in the family secret. Layhla's dad invited other men to join him in the raping of his daughter, and worse yet, money exchanged hands for this perverted "privilege". Even though she didn't know the term for another ten years, this young teenager was now a sex trafficking victim, and her dad was the pimp. These events usually occurred at someone else's home, often with her dad and more than one other man molesting and violating her at once. She thought at first that the presence of someone else would keep her dad away from her, or that the other person would come to her rescue once the abuse began. It was devastating to find that no one ever stood up for her against this evil, but the others willingly joined the assaults.

A girl's thirteenth birthday should be a special time of celebration, but Layhla did not have any hope for happy times. When she saw the family car at home when she returned from school, she knew she was in trouble, but she never expected what happened next. Another man took her to her bedroom and raped her. Then her dad and others joined in. By the end of time, a total of 10 men had violated and abused her without cessation for hours. Each new person who entered the room gave the teen a glimmer of desperate hope that this one would help her, and each one dashed that hope to pieces by being part of the assault.

The question that Layhla has been asking herself for years is haunting:

Where on earth do these conversations happen that a man can get nine others to agree to rape and prostitute his daughter? Is this water cooler conversation at work? Why is no one objecting or reporting these things?

Shame and psychic pain and feelings of despair and abandonment can lead to self-destructive behaviors. Layhla began cutting herself and is still a cutter.

It helps to block out the pain. I can dig into my wrist and feel the physical pain and forget the rest. It also gives me control. I can be the last person to hurt myself and can decide how much hurt to inflict.

In school, Layhla was a good student, involved in softball and ROTC, basically living a double life. This was the only place she felt safe. Only one person knew of the horrifying life at home, and that was a trusted neighbor boy. Tragically, he was accidentally shot and killed by another friend at 17. Layhla thought she had lost everything. A suicide attempt failed, and the young lady gave up hope. Later, she tried drinking and drugs, mainly cocaine, and has overdosed numerous times.

by panache drk side of fme