Using the 'A' word (no, not that one...)

I had a coffee today with a friend and talked to her a bit about my history with my brother. She knew I had some history of trauma but didn't know what it was. As I was talking I used the 'a' word - abuse. (I had to stress that it was not sexual abuse, because sadly it is so prevalent that people tend to assume that's the only thing 'abuse' can mean.) We chatted for a bit and my friend asked questions like, "Did your parents have any idea?" and "How long did it continue?" I said it went on pretty much until I left home at age 20, when my brother was 26. My friend said, "He was 26? Oh, well that's abuse."

This made me pause. Hadn't I just said it was abuse? It's not a word I use lightly and it's one I took a long time to accept. I danced around it for ages, calling it teasing, bullying, being picked on - anything but abuse. Abuse is for real and it's serious. Teasing can be forgotten; abuse requires healing. It's a big deal. I know it's a big deal and that's exactly why I don't use the word lightly. I was therefore surprised that my friend didn't see it as abuse until it met some criterion in her head. My brother was still doing what he did when he was in his twenties and that, according to her, is what makes it abuse. So does that mean it wasn’t abuse when he was 13 and gave me a black eye? Was it abuse when he was 17 and told me I was fat and ugly? When he was 12 and stole my colouring book so he could draw a thick black line through every page except the one with the picture of a witch, which he meticulously coloured in and then labelled with my name... was that abuse? Was it abuse when he was 12 and 14 and 17 and 19 and made me cry, then mocked me for days afterwards because I cried?

I have agonised over this. I spent weeks with my counsellor questioning whether abuse was too strong a word, and weeks later I went through it all again, and I may well go through it again at some point in the future. One of the reasons I have hesitated is because I know there are people who’ve suffered terrible abuses that make my experiences look like a Sunday treat. While I have struggled there are others who have decided the struggle is too hard and they don’t want to continue. I don’t compare myself with those people... and yet at the same time I do. Our experiences are vastly different but the result of our experiences is the same. My reactions, my fears, my thought processes, my insecurities, my recovery process – they are all typical of someone who has been abused. Not someone who has experienced X-level of abuse; just someone who has been abused.

I should not have to explain why my experience counts as ‘real’ abuse. Yes, abuse is a big word. I cannot tell you how much I wish I never had to use it – but when I do, please don’t make me feel like I have to defend myself. It WAS abuse even if it doesn't fit your idea of what abuse looks like.

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