Molest

"To subject to unwanted or improper sexual activity."

I have been lying to myself and to my loved ones for a very long time. I've been lying about my past, about my problems, and very much about my grief. I hit a very deep and dark low a while back, and I confessed to my family what I thought I would take to my grave.

The truth is: my brother molested me.

When he was still alive, I hated him and feared him and was disgusted by him (and I loved him). But when he died, I started creating narratives in my head: "he just wanted to explore." "He didn't know what he was doing." "He was a child too." I was creating ways by which I could preserve his memory. So that I could grieve him like everyone else; like all he was was a brother lost.

But none of it was true. Whatever his thoughts or intentions, he was older than me. He knew better than me. And it was his job to protect me, and instead he hurt me.

I confessed my dirty little secret to my aunt and brother, and suddenly I could admit to everything that I'd always known was true:

My brother used me for his own gratification. I started self-mutilating because he made me feel worthless. 

I have never stopped hating myself or blaming myself, and I don't know if I'll ever be able to escape those thought processes.

The year before he died, I wished with everything in me that he would kill himself.

When he died, I was immensely relieved.

I do love him, and I do miss him - but I'm glad he's gone. Because now I'm no longer afraid that he might touch me again. Now I'm no longer afraid of what he's thinking when he looks at me. Without that pervasive fear, I am able to actually love him and miss him.

This is the true source of why I always feel so alone and so broken; and I have a lot more to work through surrounding this than I do about losing my parents.


I had never identified as having been 'molested.' When I first spoke it out loud (to my best friend back in high school), I used words like "he made me touch him." As if different words would mean something different. But the morning after I broke down and told my family, I looked the word up. Quite simply, "to subject to unwanted or improper sexual activity." And if that's the definition, I was molested as a child. And my big brother molested me.

My Little Brother?

I turn 23 tomorrow. You were 23 when you died.

You taught me so much. You protected me so often. You always made me laugh - except when you were making me cry. I know how much pride you took in being my big brother - and I hope you know how much pride I've always taken in having you as my big brother.

The thought of you frozen in time at 23 --
The thought that I've just about caught up with you--
It makes me feel ill. Physically ill.
It's wrong.
It was never supposed to be like this.

How can it be that, one day, I'll look in the mirror and see an old woman -- and you'll still, forever, have the face of a young man?

I miss you.

Someday I'm gonna be older than you
I've never thought beyond that time
I've never imagined the pictures of that life
For now I will try to live for you and for me
I will try to live with love, with dreams,
and forever with tears

-Tears, X-Japan

My Big Brother

When I talk about who I've lost, I often say things like 'when my parents died,' or I refer to myself as an 'orphan' - terms that, by their nature, tend to disregard the fact that I've lost a brother as well. A couple of months ago I was talking to a friend who has lost three family members to suicide. She mentioned that while she's been able to come to terms with the loss of two of them, the loss of the third is something that she just cannot face.

I'm honestly not sure if I had had this explicit thought process before I heard those words from her, but I told her that it was easier for me to face the fact that my mother and father are dead than my brother. It is absolutely more painful to me to have lost my parents than my brother (I love you, but I have to be honest), but it is absolutely more unreal that my brother is dead than my parents. I knew that at some point in my life my parents would die, and as they had children late in their lives I even knew that it would probably be earlier in my life than for most of my peers.

But my brother died at 23. That's my surviving brother's age, now. It'll be my age in just over a year. My parents had stories; they had lifetimes. They, unlike certain unnamed teen stars, had plenty from which to write autobiographies. But my big brother? He had nothing but the future. His story was cut off before he had written anything more than his introduction. The significance and consequences of that I am not ready to face.

So I grieve my parents.

I said to my friend about my brother:

That's the nice thing: he's dead. His story has ended. Nothing more will be added on. So whether I manage to begin mourning him tomorrow or in ten years, I won't have missed anything. He's frozen in time, waiting for me to gather the strength to face his death.

I will, eventually. For the time being, though, I do ignore him. Because I have to - the instances in which I do try to face his absence sting far, far too much still. But one day, oniichan, I promise I will mourn you.