The Gray Drab Room

I've stewed about how to write this half of the blog.  This half details the 3 year epic journey through the legal system.  So many dates, so many notes, so many emails.....it's all overwhelming.  The dates I will be using need to be confirmed but the story is the same.

June 4, 2007

It's Monday morning so that means my usual weekly therapy session at 9am.  This one is going to be a doozy because on Saturday I had my confrontation with my abuser that my therapist organized and monitored.  In that meeting I read my letter to my abuser and at the end he flippantly apologized for what he had done.  He admited it! In front of my therapist!  But oh what a shallow, hollow, meaningless insincere "apology" it was.  I kinda think he was looking to save his ass and thought that his words would make it all go away.  Well they didn't.  I cried all day Sunday out of frustration and decided to take the next step.

Into Fred's office I go and I have barely sat down and said hello when I blurted out the words......I want to go to the police.  Holy dinah!  To know that 1 year before that he had advised me that there is no Statute of Limitations on these types of abuse and suggested going to the police.  My reaction that day was one of intense fear - I had been groomed for years to never say anything or bad things would happen and there was no way in hell that I was going to the police.

Fred, in a very calm manner, asked me what had changed my mind.  Simple answer: He had admitted his guilt in front of a 3rd party and he had zero remorse.  I'm sure Fred was the proverbial duck at that moment - calm and collected on the surface but swimming frantically under the water!!  We talked about the legal issues and potential liabilities/civil law suits and I decided that I needed to get some legal advice before I went to the police.  Fred called my lawyer and explained the situation and why I needed to see him and the appointment was set for the next day.

June 5, 2007

I think the world of my lawyer.  He is a lovely devoted family man who has numerous photos of his children and grandchildren in his office and loves to point out the newest addition whenever he can.  To know that I was going to walk into his office and cause him hurt and embarrasement by disclosing my situation was very hard.  He gave me a big hug and asked me a few questions and told me that I had nothing to worry about from a civil suit perspective and told me he was proud of the way I was taking a stand. That went well!

June11, 2007

It's Monday again and here I am back in Fred's office.  We said our good mornings and I swallowed hard and said......I'm ready to go to the police.  Fred works closely with the police in their troubled youth division so thankfully he knows his way around the detachment. Usual circumstances would dictate that I would have to enter at the front counter and tell my story to whichever officer on General Duty was available and that office would then pass the file over to Serious Crimes and from there an officer would be assigned to my file.  All of which could take days if not weeks.  Fred excused himself and phoned the Superintendent of the entire detachment ( a very lovely lady I might add!) and she personally handpicked a constable to handle my file.  I found out later that this did not sit well with the female corporal head of Serious Crimes! The meeting was set for the next day at 1pm at the detachment. I had absolutely no idea what I was about to walk into. 

I'm sitting on the bench in the waiting area with Fred.  I have a water bottle in my hands that I was twisting so hard in my hands I rubbed the ink off of the bottle. I am sitting right by the door.  In a nanosecond I could be up off that bench and out the door. That thought crossed my mind a thousand times in those few minutes. Everywhere around me officers are chatting and going about their day - it is after all just another day at the office for them.  For me.......I feel like I am about to sent to the chamber of doom.

The door opens and a tall dark haired female officer steps out and nods to Fred.  This is it.......I am about to walk thru that secured door by myself and I will not come back out the same person that went in. The tension in the air is palbable as Fred rises to his feet and looks at me, waiting for me to do the same.  I want to throw up but I can't because I can't breathe.  He takes me by the arm - gently but firmly - and steers me in the direction of the "door".  The officer introduces herself - her name is Michelle - well now at least we have something to make small talk about as we go up to the next floor in the elevator. The door opens and all I can see are rows of desks and I hear the sounds of officers talking.  Interior decorating is not in the budget of the RCMP but apparently they get a smokin' rate on drab green/gray paint because it is everywhere.  I follow Michelle down a short hall and she opens the door to a room and motions for me to enter.  Now, how dumb am I - I think we are going into a private office like a doctor's office so that we can talk in private.  Well think again!  This room is a grey box.  There is no window.  There is a table with 2 chairs.  There is a camera mounted above the table aimed directly at the chair I will sit in.  There is no clock on the wall.  Nothing. The door shuts with a loud bang and scares the hell out of me. I am directed to sit in the far chair. I am in the "hard" interview room I will come to learn.

And so it begins.  The most humiliating, terrifying, gut wrenching, embarrassing, soul splitting experience. Out onto the table goes a tape recorder and the officer hits the play button.  She reads aloud the date and time and her name and mine.  She turns to me and advises me that this interview will be both audio and videotaped.  I nod my head.  Lesson 1 - all answers have to be spoken so that the tape can record it.  " Yes" I say, "I understand and agree".  And with that......the 2 1/2 hour regurgitation of 20 years of my life begins. I am very proud of the fact that I never cried once during those 2 1/2 hours. I gave all of the information in as much detail as I could.  At the end of the interview the tape is turned off and I feel absolute exhaustion. The officer turns to me and tells me that she is going to have him arrested but that I can make the choice of how he appears at the detachment.  She will send a marked car over to his house, arrest him and bring him for questioning or she can call him and ask him to appear at the detachment on his own within the next 24 hours.  I chose to take the high road and asked her to call him and allow him to present himself.  Oh how I wish I could take that choice back.  We are done, she and I, and she opens the door and the cool fresh air conditioning hits my face and I am suddenly aware of how hot I am and how flushed I feel. She leads me to the elevator and walks me out of the detachment.  I cannot look at her.  She knows so much horrible stuff about me know.  She walks a bit further down the side of the outside wall, out of range of the security camera and gives me a big hug and tells me how sorry she is that we met under these circumstances.  She promised she would do her absolute best to see that the charges she is going to recommend to the Crown Counsel will be approved.  I thanked her for her kindness and understanding and went home at 3:30pm and went to bed for the rest of the day blissfully unaware of how the next 3 years were going to be an emotional battle that would bring me to my knees more than once.

A Huge Mistake

I've been spending time organizing my emails, etc. that I have saved/received/sent during the time from when my file was opened with the RCMP until the day that I slammed it closed on May 25, 2009 - the result of a phone call that blew my world into a million little pieces.  I made the mistake of rereading the letter of complaint that I sent to the Superintendent of the Detachment at that time.  A big mistake.  A huge mistake.  I thought that I had neatly packaged all of that up but what I discovered in the past few weeks is that the cruel words of that phone call are still very near the surface. 

This has not been a good thing.  I have stirred up emotions and feelings that should have been left alone. The black is coming back and I am fighting to breathe and rise above it once again.  I am trying hard to push through this on my own, to not burden my friends with my neediness, to focus on the good as much as I can.  I am fighting with that need to not be alone but to be by myself - if that makes any sense. This is where Esme is my lifesaver.  Her needs will always come before mine.  Without her, I don't think life would be worth the fight.

Take Me As I Am..........

I've been sorting and organizing all of my emails, notes, official papers, etc. that pertain to my adventure with the "justice" system.  First thing anyone must learn and embrace when dealing with the courts is this:  It is a LEGAl system not a JUSTICE system.  Until you can embrace that and prepare yourself to be disappointed more than you ever have before do not go to the police.  It is not the police officers' fault - it is our stupid, antiquainted, out moded, "accused has all the rights" system that we in Canada are stuck with. 

When you go to the police and have your statement taken there are many steps to be followed which I will share with you in future posts.  Here is the lesson that I learned the hard and painful way and I had to wait until I was knee deep in pain, humiliation, embarassement and frustration to be educated. The first step is that the police recommend whatever charges they can to Crown Counsel - who let's all understand this one fact - are there to defend the victim of the crime.  Step one at Crown is that the file goes to a "gatekeeping" committee who reiviews the file and makes the decision as to whether to press charges and forward the file to the appopriate prosecutor or to bounce the file back to the police.  Here is the criteria that the file must meet to be accepted:

1. Is this a winnable case?  Reason: It is the public's money that is being spent at Crown so they only take on cases that they are sure they can win.  LOVELY.
2. Will the victim be a credible witness in a court room?  And they can tell this from a bunch of paper?  They must be pyschic.

There are 3 more criteria that are just as meaningless to a victim.  My RCMP officer actually took my file to the Court House and met with the prosecutor who handles all of the sex crime files and from what I was told he felt the file was worthy of taking to court but even he can't over ride the committee at the front door. That hurt me right to the core.  I know for a fact that my abuser would have folded like a cheap tent the first time he even parked in the parking lot at the Court House.  I know that he would have either had to plead guilty or hire some lawyer to defend him and then the prosecutor would have had the chance to rip him to shreds on the stand.  I know that I was cheated out of the opportunity to be able to write and read a Victim's Impact Statement.  It felt like being abused all over again.  I grieved deeply for a year as I tried to accept the fact that I would never be able to have justice.  I still grieve for that loss and I probably will for the rest of HIS life.

So.........before I sit down and piece together 3 years of RCMP interviews,etc. let me leave you with this:


I might not be someone's first choice, However, I am a great choice.
I don't pretend to be someone I'm not, because I'm good at being me.
I might not be proud of some of the things I've done in the past, however, I'm proud of who I am today.
I may not be perfect, however, I don't need to be.
Take me as I am, or watch me as I walk away.

The Letter

Please - before you read any further I need you to know that there are some hard truths in the following post that may be uncomfortable for you to read. 

June 2, 2007 - One of those life altering moments......afte a year of therapy I had finally reached the place where I was ready to confront my abuser in the presence of my therapist.  What did I hope to gain?  I wanted to see him in a very vulnerable position - something he had done to me for 20 years. I wanted him to be face to face with me and have to look me and either admit that he had done this to me or watch him try to lie his way out of the reality.  I wanted him to hurt to the core although I now know that he is a sociopath and they tend to have no remorse or guilt for any action.  I wanted him to see that I was no longer under his influence of fear and that he now needed to be fearful of me and what further action I might take.  I wanted him to know that he was now a marked man.

My therapist arranged for this meeting.  I was to wait in the parking lot until Fred came out to get me. All the way up in the elevator I was trying to breathe and be strong but the minute the door opened I turned against the wall and tried to go back onto the elevator.  Fred put his arm around my shoulder and literally took me into his office - I had to walk past my uncle who was sitting in the waiting area.  I had some time alone with Fred to pull myself together and then he was invited in and sat on the other side of the office with Fred on a chair beside me.  I started to read my letter and the tears began to drop onto the paper blurring the ink.  I never made eye contact with him once.  I finished reading my letter and I am not sure what really happened next but I do remember him saying that he knew exactly how I felt because he had been abused by 2 of his sisters.  The lamest most pathetic statement : he knew how I felt?  A bit more babbling on his part and then he finally said the words that I wanted to hear " Well if it's an apology that you want, you've got it." He said it very flippantly in an almost mocking tone of voice. But - he admitted to his actions.  Surely this would be the statement that could be used against him......  I still had not raised my head to look at him and finally Fred sent him on his way and then worked with me for awhile so that I could go home.  I still have that letter - blurred ink where my tears fell - and I have placed it in my memory box.  The events of that afternoon led to a very pivotal point in my journey.  I soon became file #07-20901 with the Langley RCMP Serious Crimes.

The letter:

I want to thank you for coming here today.  When I heard that you had been very agreeable to this meeting I wondered if you had any idea why you have been asked here.  Today is the day that my existing life is over and I begin working on building a brand new life.  A life that is going to be filled with joy, love, peace, confidence, happiness and a sense of being safe.  For 30 years I have not experienced these feelings and I grieve for a life not lived.

In 1976 your actions towards me sent me down a path of life that has done nothing but cause me pain and sorrow.  I missed out on having the life that I dreamt about.  I have never had a normal relationship with a man, I never married and had the children that I so badly wanted to have and I have never had the partner in life that I deserve and desire. My heart hurts inside for the life that I lost and I wonder if I will have the time, opportunity and courage to ever have that life.   All because you chose to prey on and seduce me.  I know that I wasn’t your first choice.  I know that you made a move on my sister but she was strong enough to rebuff you and despises you to this day.  But it didn’t take you long to realize that I would be easier prey.  I was the chubby child who had tried unsuccessfully to be good enough for her father and who was repeatedly told how much she reminded her mother of her father, a man she hated.

I had never really known you when I was a child and first met you when I was about 17 years old in the summer of 1976.  Growing up in a very dysfunctional family I had had no father/daughter relationship and you were the first male to really pay attention to me.  My mother was extremely distracted at the time – she had just fled a dangerous situation with my dad, she was in a new relationship with a man that was as equally dysfunctional as my father and she was dealing with a lot of hostility from Allison.  My mother also really adored you and she looked up to you.  You were her saviour when she arrived in Coquitlam.  And when I flew in to have a visit with my mother before leaving for school I, a young, shy teenager, met you – and I was mesmerized.  You paid so much attention to me, you treated me like an adult, you flirted with me – in front of your girlfriend Barb - and my mother missed every inappropriate action.  I saw you again at Christmas time.  Do you remember the trip to Princeton to see the new store?  Do you remember asking me to sit beside you in the car? 

The summer of 1977 you did something so inappropriate, that today, 30 years later, I still cry whenever I think of that night.  You attempted to seduce me in front of your fireplace and later crawled into bed with me and ran your hand up my leg. I was so inexperienced and naïve.  I knew that something was wrong but I didn’t know how to stop you.  Saying “no” to my father had always resulted in either being yelled at or hit, so I had learned at an early age that “no” didn’t work for me.  You bragged to me so many times how many women you had slept with – that you couldn’t even remember the number.  I was clearly way out of my league here and you took complete advantage of me.  There was no one to talk to, no one to save me from your intentions.  I got on a plane and went back to school with a horrible secret that scared me and embarrassed me. 

Christmas 1977 - my mother invited you and Tony to spend Christmas with our family in Princeton. It was arranged that you would pick me up at the airport in Vancouver and take me with you to Princeton. I had so hoped that you had either forgotten about what had happened or had realized how inappropriate it was.  The house was full of family and I thought that I would be safe there.  I was sleeping on the couch and woke up to find you on your knees beside me with your hand under the quilt on my thigh.  You begged me not to say anything to my mother. I cannot to this day believe that you were that bold as to pull a stunt like that with 5 other people sleeping within yards of that couch. How I wish now that you had been caught or that I had told my mother.  But, that would have ruined Christmas for everyone, so I said nothing.  That summer my mother, once again completely distracted by yet another dysfunctional relationship called upon you for help and you were only too happy to head down to Princeton to save her again. You were my Mother’s favorite brother and I think you took advantage of that. That night you took me to the Princeton Hotel bar – even though I was underage – and you treated me like a “date” not a niece.    My mother was fighting with everyone in the house and it was “suggested” that I come down to Langley to work with you and Phil in the store.  It took you a few days but you finally managed to finish what you had started the summer before.

Over the next 20 years you gave me diseases, you used me as your own private whore, you dragged me into your stupid little game of espionage to try to catch Marilyn in her affair and you even suggested once that you wanted to have another woman in bed with me at the same time.  Do you remember asking me if it would be ok if you found another guy so that you could hide in the closet and watch?  When I think of some of the things you said and did I am physically ill.  I cry every day for the life that was stolen from me, for the things that you did to me, for the shame that I feel, for the guilt I carry that I did not find the courage to stand up for myself against you. You will never ever know how you ruined my life.  You are a sexual predator and a sexual deviant - you are exactly like your own father.   The 3 adults in my life that I should have been able to rely on either abandoned me or used me when I needed them the most.  My father emotionally and physically abused me, my mother was so distracted by all of the dysfunctional men in her life and trying to raise Louise on her own that she wasn’t emotionally available and you – You saw the weakness in me and you preyed on that. You could have been my “hero”, a mentor, someone that I could rely upon and trust, especially after my parents died when I was only 25 and 28 years old.   

 You stole from me my innocence, so many first experiences that should have been shared with someone who loved me and that I would be able to remember with tenderness and fondness, not embarrassment and disgust.  You single-handedly destroyed my life for your own simple pleasure. To this day I feel like damaged goods, it takes me forever to trust someone,  I feel starved for love and affection and would love nothing more than to be hugged but I am frightened beyond belief to have anyone touch me in an intimate way.  I struggle to feel safe even in my own home and I have worked hard at overcoming my anxiety about leaving my home.  I have many days when I do not want to live but yet I also do not want to die.  I am so envious of the solid family lives that I see around me, knowing I will never have that and that hurts me to the core. No one will ever call me “Mom or Grandma”.  I worry that I will die all alone.

 It is my hope that you can find it in your heart to show me some remorse, to apologize for the destruction you caused. I don’t know if I will be able to forgive you but that is one of my next tasks I will work on.  For 30 years I have carried a lot of pain in my heart and I know that you don’t have 30 years left to live, but I hope that every day that you do have left you think about what you did to me and feel just some of the pain that I have lived with and continue to live with to this day.

 Again, thank you for coming here and allowing me to read this letter to you as part of my journey of healing.  I would ask that you never contact me again.

The Crash

Okey Dokey.........been a wild ride for that past few weeks.........anyone who has ever suffered from PTSD/Anxiety/Depression knows that every once in awhile, out of nowhere, when you least expect it...........kaboom..........you are hit with a "crash".  Sometimes these events are a day long, maybe a week........or sometimes they last for a long time and take you to the very depths of your soul.  Sometimes they are triggered by past events and sometimes they are triggered by numerous current events all piled one on top of the other.  Sometimes they are medication issues that need to be adjusted.  Whatever the cause of the "crash" the result is a dark, scary, heart broken place that you wonder if you even want to try to recover from.  When you open your eyes in the morning and your first thought is " oh crap....I can't do this another day" and you are in tears before you have even got out of bed, when you know that most people just don't "get it" and that this will be another day that you have to paste on some sort of phoney smile or better yet......just stay home, close the blinds to keep the world out and try very hard not to put your burden onto anyone else.........at a time when you most need these people it is very hard to make it all work. It's hard to find a reason to even want to make it all work.

That's where I've been for the past 6 weeks.  Some days were very very dark and other days were manageable.  There was the day I went to the doctor's in my pajamas and cried and said " I cannot do this another day".  There was the day that I fell apart in a total heap of rubble on the running trail because I was scared out of my wits when a man stepped out in front of me ( quite innocent on his part) but triggered the most frightening piece of my memories and before I could get a grip on my world I slowly fell apart to the point that my friend Laurel had to come and get me from the trail and I fell to my knees and sobbed.  There was the day I rec'd a few texts from a very dear friend that were rec'd by me in a very painful way - I thought my heart was truly breaking into pieces - if I put my hand on my heart I felt it cracking and breaking.  I've been to the doctor, the lab, the pharmacy, my therapist and then repeated that cycle.  I've had some medication changes, the most annoying apt with the Pyschiatrist that I have to see once a year to sign off on my meds - the woman is a complete ass in my opinion. 

So........now that I feel that I coming back into the land of the living and working hard at making my days meaningful I am ready to carry on with my story - just not today!

There are imprints in your brain that no matter how hard you try to work past them they are there forever stained and marked.  They don't go away.  They are part of your soul.  You don't just "get over it" as some people would like to believe.  You "get around it" the best way that you know how.  You have to find your voice and your words and quietly and gracefully take care of yourself first. 

But........thankfully I can pull it out of my butt when I need to because in the midst of all of this darkness I had my full on, face to face 2 hour interview with a retired RCMP officer who is working on my enhanced security clearance!  I tell you, I was at my best that morning!  I might lose a few battles along the way but I am going to win the war!!!

Good to be back............:-))

Lyin' Eyes ( by the Eagles)

It's the summer of 1977!  I've finished my first year of University and took the train back to Vancouver with all of my "stuff" to spend the summer with my mom in her new store in Princeton.  It was the May long weekend and I took to the bus from Princeton to Vancouver to spend the weekend with my aunt and uncle in North Vancouver. My uncle offered to pick me up at the bus station and deliver me up to North Vancouver.  He took me out for dinner first - The Spaghetti Factory down in Gastown - and I am quite sure that anyone around us would have thought that we were out on a dinner date judging by how he acted. He was laughing and making balloon animals and just generally trying to "impress" me. There was that "weird" feeling inside again but I had no words to explain it.  On one hand it was very nice to be taken out to dinner and doted on but on the other hand it did not feel right in my gut.  Lesson learned - always trust your gut feelings - your gut is your second brain.

After dinner we proceeded to drive over to North Vancouver.  I know that he knew where he was supposed to be going - he'd lived in Vancouver for probably 20 years at that point.  How hard is it to find a street that is one block off of Mountain Highway for heaven's sake?  I know that now,  but at the time I had no clue where we were or where we were supposed to be going.  It was quite dark out by that time and he was making a big fuss over not being able to find the street - driving around and around the dark subdivisions of the North Shore area making turn after turn.  By that point I was really getting scared - I've never been the person who finds getting lost just part of the whole adventure!  I suggested that we stop and ask for directions at a gas station and it was clear to him that I was not at all comfortable.  Amazingly, within about 5 minutes - presto - there we were at Pierard Drive!  There is no doubt in my mind that he was driving in circles for the sole purpose of trying to find an opportunity or the guts to make a move on me. Sunday afternoon my aunt and uncle dropped me off at an open house you were having for you to take me to dinner at then over to catch my bus home. 

And all the time that we were driving around.........he had a cassette tape of the Eagles playing.......a black car with burgundy interior.........some things you just never forget.

Horse Drawn Sleigh Rides.........

Seventeen years old........in 1976 when I was 17 I was more like today`s 14 year old.  I was not a social butterfly in high school, I was not at all the important parties on the weekend, I never came to school on Monday with a low cut shirt and a neckful of hickies to show everyone - my big claim to fame was that I frequented the indoor smoking area - wow! I babysat for most of the local RCMP families, I taught piano and theory lessons during the week and practiced my own piano studies for my exams, I worked weekends at a local drugstore.  In hindsight - my mom had it pretty easy with me!  When I graduated from high school I knew 1 thing - I was going to the University of Sask. enrolled in the College of Education.  Not because I had always dreamed of being a teacher and going away to school......because my dad said I was going to university and there would be no discussion.  Why the College of Education - because I had no idea what choices I might have had, my Grandmother had taught school forever ( even in the little one room school house) and because somehow I won the local Teacher`s Scholarship for a first year Education student. My life was planned out except for one thing.........I didn`t plan it.  I was homesick, I didn`t want to be there, I was so socially and emotionally delayed - I was the proverbial fish out of water.

Needless to say I was one happy person to board a plane out of Saskatoon in December of 1976 to go to Coquitlam and be with my family for a month.  I had rec`d letters from my mom every week sharing with me her plan to buy a store in Princeton  - a gift and grocery store - the big city of Coquitlam was not for her and my uncle, being a real estate agent, had found the perfect place for her in Princeton.  We made a trip up there during my stay that Christmas and oddly enough the one very vivid memory of that trip that I have - my uncle got into the back seat and specifically asked me to sit beside him.  Weird but very complimentary in a back handed way. We all had Christmas dinner together and as a family spent more time together thru out that month.  After I flew back to Saskatoon and settled in for the second half of my first year a strange letter came in the mail one day.  My uncle wrote to me that he was envious of all of the boys at University who would be the ones to sit beside me during the long cold winter evenings and go on horse drawn sleigh rides with me.  Hello, I was in Saskatoon going to school - not filming an episode of Little House on the Prairie.  And....how weird is it that your uncle is envious of boys being around his niece.........at the time I had no clue just how weird this was........I was being groomed and I had this person who was only 12 years older than me writing to me at university.  Oh God how I wish I could turn the clock back 35 years. 

Stalking his prey, tiptoeing around in the forest, carefully covering his tracks and camoflauging his true existance,  tossing out bits of tempting treats to lure his prey out into the open and away from the safety of the herd.....always adjusting his view in the sights of his rifle....the hunter waits patiently in silence for that one perfect shot..............