Uniforms

When it comes to men in uniforms, I have no respect. My friends out there who have family members in uniforms please do not take this personally. It is not targeted at the person in the uniform, but it is the uniform.

Men in uniforms are a trigger for me, and it really gets specific to police uniforms primarily. Understanding and remembering this memory really was helpful a few years ago. I have known for a long time that I despised uniforms, and could not even look at a police uniform. But I never knew why, just knew that I carried a lot of anger towards them.

The memory always remains in your brain, but when it is a repressed memory-- then it is not easily accessed, but the trigger still remains very accessible. This can cause some very disturbing and confusing times in your life.

For many years, since high school, I have wanted to beat the crap out of a police officer. Seeing a police officer boiled up inside me all types of rage. It was a very weird feeling and didn't go along with my personality. Let me remind you that I was a very quiet child, and quite the loner. I wasn't the one getting in trouble or breaking the rules, I was the goody-two shoes. So this rage that would boil inside me was so inconsistent with who I was.

My parents saw this reaction a couple of times and were shocked. My parents and I can recall one of those times happening at our home. We lived across the street from an Elementary school and close to a main road in Ada. The school had parking across from us and it was common for police officers to pull offenders over in that parking lot.

One evening this happened, and I saw the lights and I went out on our front porch and was outraged. I started yelling and screaming at the police telling them how stupid they were and all they could do was hurt people and they needed to leave people alone. I was in high school and my parents commanded me to stop, but it was as if I never heard them. Eventually my dad had to physically pull me back in the house and then of course I got the verbal lashing of my life. Of course, I could not explain why I had just done this, but I could verbalize that I hated police officers and that made my parents very angry as well. Now, knowing my memories and story it all makes sense. My parents wish they could have known that then, but none of us did, the memories were hidden.

In college, I spent a lot time just driving around by myself. I was so deep in hurt, but didn't know why. Driving around alone seemed to help, unless I saw a police officer. I would purposely try to make myself look suspicious, I wanted an officer to pull me over and just give me the littlest reason to smack him in the face. I have daydreamed of being able to just kick, beat, and hit an officer until I could not hit anymore.

Now I know some of my memories, while it hasn’t changed my feelings about uniforms, it did change the response at times. Instead of wanting to beat up a uniform, I would go into a sobbing state and beg any officer I came into direct or indirect contact to not hurt me and literally became that scared little 5 year old. Yes, flashbacks really do work that way and it is very difficult to experience. At the same time you are still the adult experiencing every feeling, emotion, and action of the emotion. If it is a flashback that happened when you were 6 months old, then you feel and act like a 6 month old. It is not an empowering experience and I often felt so "crazy" and inept. It also is difficult because you don't know when a flashback is going to happen and most people are not compassionate as you experience one. Therefore you isolate yourself even more trying to avoid having a flashback in the public eye.

It’s all quite sad. Here is a person that has already experienced an enormous amount of abuse and experienced it alone, and now she is experiencing it all over again, and normally alone because the world is very harsh, very unforgiving, very unwilling to understand, very busy, and very demanding. But to find healing, one must walk through the memories, or find healing through death and I totally understand why many chose the latter route instead.

Now that I have already came through many of the dark days of living through the memories and I walk in new light, I can say I'm glad to have walked through those memories for myself, for my daughter, for my family, and for the many others that God may chose to use my experience to encourage them as well. But I must say it has been pure hell, I have paid greatly for things that I didn't cause or ask for. The price has been big!

I may have walked through this memory of uniforms, but I still do not like uniforms. I keep those thoughts to myself and do not share that with my daughter. My daughter loves uniforms. She is the one that wants to run up and hug the uniforms and I have allowed that and endured that for her to have a healthy view. It is not easy, but it is a must, and I have found that I can overcome many things if it involves my daughter--- of course she always has to come first.

My uniform sexually abused me as a little girl at 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7.... years of age. My uniform used his gun and placed it by my head as he abused. My uniform made sure I knew he had all the control and power. My uniform was brazen enough to do the abuse under the same roof with my parents in the house. My uniform bought things for me as forms of control. My uniform is no longer alive and can no longer hurt anyone else. My uniforms punishment has found him in eternity--- He is not mine to punish. Therefore, I have not and will not say my uniforms name, his family does not deserve to be punished.

I still don't like uniforms, they make me feel mad. I still would love to beat up on a uniform for all the hurt it created. I still have to forgive the uniform, but all healing comes in time.