Tonight I'm not sure what to think about anything. I want to write about something thought provoking, of things that make people sit up and take notice. And then I laugh at myself and wonder why anyone would want to take notice of me? And now I wonder if that thought is because I was once an abused child. All my thoughts go back to that...but other times, the memories are completely out of my mind.

I like to have no bad memories. People actually get upset with me because if I forgive someone, I actually forget what it was I forgave them for. I don't want to keep that hanging around with me. And maybe that's why I'm not more successful than I am...I don't learn from my mistakes because I don't remember them.

I know I deliberately block out half the stuff I should remember. Particularly of the abuse. But I remember the pain...and the hiding...and the secrets...and not being able to to anywhere, not even the bathroom, without him being there. And I remember that pain...

The mind is a funny thing, I think. It protects us as much as it can, but I wonder if it really knows what it should truly protect? Do I know? No. But there are things I think I should remember but can't, and things I can remember but don't want to. The mind is a terrible thing to waste, huh?

I wish I didn't have any of these memories to remember. I wonder what my life would have been like if I had never been abused?

Andrea Yates was found not guily by reason of insanity when tried in a second trial for the crime of killing her five children. She killed five children while in a psychotic state, and she was found guilty in her first trial. However, the supreme court rejected the verdict because an expert witness had testified she may have been influenced by watching a television show wherein a similar crime occurred; unfortunately, that television show never aired and an expert witness' testimony was improperly considered. So, a new trial was ordered, without this testimony, in a state where insanity is almost impossible to be accepted by a jury of peers. Today, justice was served because a woman that no one disputed was mentally ill and believed that she was doing a good thing by killing her children was found not guilty. Justice was served and the woman was not guilty is not a doubt in my mind. Still, difficult for some to understand, and some may think I'm talking out of two sides of my mouth, but this woman will never be innocent and if the jury had been asked to find her "innocent" rather than "not guilty", then I think the result could have been different. And justice would have been more difficult to find.

Andrea Yates believed that she was preventing the children from experiencing a most awful life, an existence that no one should have to suffer, and she wanted the innocent children to never hurt. So she stopped the life of each of them in order to relieve them of what she genuinely perceived as a most horrible life.

Her family knew she was ill, and they tried to get her help. But the help was not enough. She needed something more than the professionals could provide. The mind is a powerful thing, and her logic was not good...and though even she tried to help herself, the illness persisted. It's like someone having a cancer, and no matter how much you try to eliminate it, and you treat it with the help of a professional, but it doesn't improve. It gets worse, and then a new, horrible symptom appears....and this time it's impossible to stop the result. All you can do is live with the cancer, and hope that the symptoms alleviate and maybe disappear, but with what life you have, you know that it is not completely healthy or whole...and you try even harder. Sometimes the effort works to resolve the problems, and sometimes it doesn't. In any case, though, a judge and jury will never be able to cure that cancer or take away the symptoms.

All her life, Andrea Yates will live with this horrible action that most of us cannot fathom. We cannot perceive a mind that truly believes as did she. She will know every minute of every day for the rest of her life that there are five fewer people in this world because she took away their future, and she will need to live with a guilt that will not be proclaimed by a court of law. And, with a mother that loved her children enough to kill them in the face of what she perceived as imminent danger. that potential for such strong emotion will maybe one day turn on her--and I fear that even as she becomes more cognizant of the consequences of her actions, that same kind of strong emotion will devastate her and create another mental impairment that will never allow her to live a happy minute in her life.

As I look to this woman's guilt, then, I have to wonder about the justice of it all. How can such a verdict provide justice in the deaths of five innocent human lives? I don't know that it can. I believe the verdict allows for a future in which mental illness is considered in a light that deserves respect and understanding. And I believe it was right for Andrea Yates to be found not guilty by reason of insanity. But she was not innocent, and I believe that justice demands a response that demonstrates that these five children were important--and that no human life should ever be taken by another human being without that killer providing some kind of balance to justify the act. And there is no balance in law for the killing of children.

These children should be honored and remembered with respect and with grace. Their lives were precious, and they need to stand for something. Children are not only our most precious resource, but they are the most beloved people we can ever come to know. With their deaths, there has come a public curiosity that may engender a more avid interest in helping those amongst us that are mentally ill--to help them before they hurt us, or hurt children. Mental illness is everywhere, and the public needs to better understand it. But these children should not have had to die in order for the world to better understand mentall illness.

Rather, these five children need to be remembered by the world as part of our lives, as part of love and joy and hope and promise. Each of them held a promise for the future, and each of them deserved to life a full and complete life. I believe the best way to honor these children is to love all children, to care for all children, and for each of us to individually consider how precious are our children. Andrea Yates did a horrible thing, and she will need to justify her actions to herself. The public does not need to help her feel better; that is not our job. She needs to find help and I hope one day she finds peace, though I don't think she will. But justice will not be served by helping her, though it is possible that by helping her to feel better, then she can help to explain it all. But, our efforts need to focus on children, on the love that all children should receive, and to help children be raised in families that are good and not bad. To help our children remain innocent to the horrible things of this life, and to help our children grow to be responsible caring adults. Each time we love a child that we had not been able to do before, each such time we help to honor these children that died because a mother didn't love them the way we need to love our children. By making this world a better place for children, these five children will be honored and provided a portion of the respect they deserved...and they will know what good love is.

We need to love children in a way that is right and good. We need them to be respected and honored for their places in this world. And we need to prevent children from being hurt whenever we can, and we need to remember that children are a blessing that should be celebrated.

Two subjects have been on my mind today. Following on from yesterday, and watching a television program today, I thought about children who seduce their parents. My other thought relates to the way reports of abuse are mandated to be acted upon.

If I tell a doctor or a teacher about abuse, that professional is mandated to report my report. That mandated reporter has to repeat my words to a social services department, and then what happens? The social services people investigate. And, depending on the results of their search, that investigation can either rescue a person from pure hell--or it can dump that person right into the fires of hell; wherease, before, that person could feel the heat from the flames but had never allowed themselves to get burnt.

I understand why the law is there, and I appreciate that children benefit from this law every single day. But I also know that there are children who are hurt either because they lie to protect themselves and their way of life--or they lie because they are ashamed. And these children are believable. They know what is at stake, and they will defend their life with all their too-adult-like strength. Others are children that readily report the pain, and yet nothing is done because there is no corroboration...or a little is done at the beginning, and then someone drops the ball. And still others will simply refuse to lie--or to tell the truth. They simply won't talk. And then it leaves a cloud of suspicion everywhere, and we find people who are considered guilty until proven innocent.

There has to be a better way to get children help without further hurting their perceptions of life, with helping them to grow and be happy without further inflicting a lot of perceived pain. I think there needs to be an option for a mandated reporter to opt out of making a report, for that reporter to consider the repercussions and maybe--instead of reporting this to legal eagles---maybe reporting the situation to a professional organization that can contact the child privately and determine the best way to deal with the situation. And, included in this would be a free counseling service for people who are victims, a service that works toward bringing legal repercussions to situations that demand it--but to do so in a way that doesn't traumatize the child. I don't know how that would happen, but there has to be a better way than what is happening now.

And, on that note, what about a parent who is seduced by a teenage child? I know it happens, though not commonly. It has to reported, and the parent has to take responsibility for their actions--but this situation needs a psychological coach more than they need legal action against them. The entire family needs help. But, how can they seek help when their actions must be legally reported? There has to be some route to finding help without fearing a visit to the high court.

Judges are good people that try to make things right. With children, they try to base decisions on promoting the best interests of the child as well as the legal concerns. But some of these situations do not need to be before a judge. They need to be before a very wise counselor--without fear of being judged with a view to prison.

Some people deserve prison and a whole lot more...and in these situations, there is no question that the concern should be reported to legal officials. But I suspect that there is a lot of middle ground before not reporting and reporting the most horrific of crimes. We need to find a healthy way to address personal issues, and we need to be able to talk to people about abuses without fearing that our mental aberrations are going to send us to prison so we never see our loved ones again.

I don't know the answer, and I see both sides. I see many sides. And the world needs to be respectful of the truth and of the consequences...and the respect needes to be meted out with a good sense of justice, but that justice does not need to be housed in a court of law.

I was bothered all day by some words I included in yesterday's blog:

"My nephew has needed help with his anger since childhood--and my sister is convinced this stems from my nephew's biological father raping my nephew as a toddler. I can't understand this kind of behavior, but that is not my concern."

I want to clarify that I am, indeed, concerned about a man raping his nephew. My point, yesterday, was another subject. But it hurts me to think that there are children, babies, that are sexually molested. I cannot even seem to accept this concept. But I am sure that out there somewhere is a twisted mind, and that tisted mind has initiated an action that engenders even more twists in another, unformed mind. I was molested at an older age of about seven or eight (I can't even recall with certainty when it all started, but I know it went on for years) and I don't understand it even thought it happened to me. It is impossible for me to fathom a man doing this to his own child.

Because I cannot fathom this, therefore, I find myself questioning whether it really happened, despite all the evidence to the contrary. And then I wonder whether maybe the reason some people don't understand how this can happen between a respected adult and seemingly-innocent child--well, maybe that's why it's so difficult to demonstrate the reality. It simply isn't believable for those who do not have a concept of the horror.

I add to this how some parents cannot accept that their partner can do this to a child, or even an older child can do this to a younger sibling, or anyone they want to respect doing this horrible thing to a child. Others, like my sister, seem only too willing to accept it--and that's sad, because it makes you wonder what they have experienced that allows them to so readily accept these things.

There are some families where incest is a normal thing, where children are raised with it, and it does not seem to be abnormal to them until they grow older and understand what is happening. And then, I wonder, do they regret their actions as a child if they initiated such a horrible action...because they thought it was normal?

I remember, once, I tried to initiate a game of "slavedriver" with another, younger relative. He refused to play and told his mother--and she made it clear to me that this was not acceptable. I knew it was not acceptable because when it was done to me, I had to keep it a secret, but on that occasion I tried to do it to another child. Luckily, it was stopped and a responsible adult can be proud that she gave me a better understanding of right and wrong.

But what about those other children out there who do it without realizing what they are doing? Or having it happen to them without knowing the repercussions? Will they feel guilty when they grow older and understand--and, by then, will it be so ingrained in them that they will be unable to stop...or unwilling to recognize that they need some kind of professional help?

There are so many angles to this, but the main idea is that famillies perpetuate the act, and then the cycle continues, and it takes some self-recognition to stop that cycle---and truly understand what is happening, and maybe taking responsility for their actions, or maybe simply reacting on a physical level without truly understanding their emotions and their own mental issues. I don't know what will happen in every situation, but I hope that one day there is some kind of public education that doesn't cost a lot of money to stop the abuse, and maybe help others to develop an appreciation for life and good things in that life.

Tomorrow, my sister and her family will begin in-home counseling for her children and herself. She had wanted her son to get counseling long ago, but her son refused. He has not been communicating well with her, and that resulted in the county's involvement. He is a good child, in my opinnion, and I don't think she understands him well--but I think that the communication and counseling issues could have gone much more smoothly if the man that molested me had not convinced her son that her son has no mental problems (and that it is my sister who needs counseling). This man is good at manipulating, and it began a long time ago when he was much younger--and he hasn't forgotten how to do it.

As a child, you are taught not to talk to strangers, and you are certainly taught never to accept candy from strangers. But when these people approach you, it seems so ordinary, so friendly...and even friendlier when is someone you know and you trust. Someone you admire. And then he uses your weaknesses to bribe you, bribe with an intent to exploit ignorance on your part. I certainly did not know what he wanted, and even when he took it, I had no idea what it was that I was giving up.

Now, he has done the same thing to my nephew. He has convinced my nephew that my sister is crazy and that my sister, the boy's mother, needs help. The man combined this with continuously reinforcing an idea, by repeatedly telling my nephew, that my nephew does not need help and that there is no reason that my nephew needs counseling. In my mind, with nothing more solid to go by than by my instincts and my experience, I am convinced that this man knew that my nephew wants to believe he does not need counseling, and so this man bribed by nephew by giving him what he wanted--a strong male figure that assured my nephew that my nephew was not in need of counseling.

My nephew has needed help with his anger since childhood--and my sister is convinced this stems from my nephew's biological father raping my nephew as a toddler. I can't understand this kind of behavior, but that is not my concern. My nephew has had his kindergarten teachers and principal physically restraining him on several occasions--to prevent him from venting his anger through physical aggression against all those around him. Bus drivers have had the same experience. Babysitters had similar problems. And then my nephew had some counseling as a third or fourth grader-and when that particular counseling was completed, the counselor advised my sister (my nephew's mother) that it was probable my nephew would need additional counseling as a teen. As aggressive behaviors escalated, my sister scheduled the counseling--and then my molester, who believes my sister cheated him from receiving his "rightful family inheritance", began to advise my nephew that my nephew was not needing counseling and that my nephew had to understand (as my molester told him) that his mother was ill and needed to be hospitalized to receive proper medication and counseling.

It is amazing to me that he can continue to manipulate people's thoughts like this. I remember that we used to play chess, and he always won--he knew moves in advance what his opponent would do, and he could always plan and execute his plays in a way that has always irritated me. I cannot imagine other people trying to be horrible to people, but he counts on it, and he does everything he can to not only avoid his adversary's move, but he does all he can to conquer his adversary. And he irritates me. And it isn't fair.

Now, for days, my brain will default to this man's duplicity, to his manipulation, and I will hate him more each day. I used to take pride in hating actions, not the people who perform those actions. With this man, whom I used to love as a close family member, I simply do not want to be anywhere near him, and I don't want him anywhere near me or the rest of my family. But he is family, and I can't stop him.

And I just want to knock some sesne into my family's heads, but it won't happen. He probably has anticipated that, and he also figures I won't do it, because he does know me. And he is counting on me not doing anything. But my sister is smarter. She knows her son, and she's working to get him counseling. I hope someone can tell this young man that he is good, and that he needs to remember that life can be good...and he really is a very special young man. I have more faith in him than in my own son, and I think he has the potential to do good or bad...and if he follows this molester, it won't be good. I hope the counseling creates a good, positive environment that helps us all.