Trying to help.

Growing up, I was always on the bigger side. My grandma would try to "help" motivate me to lose weight by saying, "Boys won't think you're pretty if you're fat."

This started when I was five years old.

"Lazy and useless."

My mother, siblings and I were looking over my report card. I had finally gotten all A's and made the high honor roll! I was ecstatic, and I happily told my mom how proud I was of myself. 

Her reply? "Finally. Seems like that's the only thing you're good for."

I told her that I thought I was a pretty good person, and I listed all the things about myself that I was proud of. 

"Yeah, but you still don't pay any bills and you do nothing for the family," she said. "That makes you lazy and useless." 

I was 14 then. I recently graduated from college, and on my graduation day, that was what kept buzzing around in my head. Lazy and useless. I'm the first in my family to graduate from college. But I still feel lazy and useless. 

"You're acting like such a bitch."

A few years ago, my mom and I were fighting yet again. As she stormed out of the room, she said, "You're acting like such a bitch." 

I'd never been called something so hateful in my life, not even jokingly. I was too shocked to cry. The person who I loved more than anything thought I was a bitch. 

Now we're best friends and curse each other out occasionally as a joke, but I will never forget that moment.

"It's rude, inconsiderate, and obnoxious."

"Don't do that. People will judge." - My mom, sparking a lifetime of doubt and anxiety.

"Don't ever invite yourself to people's houses. It's rude, inconsiderate, and obnoxious." - My dad, causing me to constantly be afraid of accidentally inviting myself among friends, and thinking that being obnoxious is the worst social crime I could commit.

"I think you're just bored." - My mom, brushing aside an actually harmful addiction I had in high school, because it might hurt her reputation.

"Hey, I was a jerk before. I just wanted to apologize." - A bully from middle school apologizing to me in high school out of the blue, helping me keep faith that there's always good in humanity.

"You'd be a knockout if you just dropped 25 pounds."

When I was in high school, I was never really skinny or popular. I was a band geek who played the sousaphone, did shot put, and discussed homework. I usually kept to myself and life was good.

I remember being at home just kind of lounging, my homework was done and dinner was being made. My mom, dad, two older brothers and I sat down at the table to eat. I love food, so I went to grab a second helping, but my dad stopped me. He said, "Sweetie, you know, you'd be a knockout if you just dropped 25 pounds."

I wasn't a huge individual, I was around 145 at the time and I was roughly 5'6"-5'7". I thought I was fine, but apparently I wasn't according to my father. 

He isn't a bad dad or person, he just goes about saying things like that the wrong way. I love my dad, but that statement has stuck with me for years. I was about 16-17 when this took place, and I'm now 29.

"Can you blame him?"

I dated a guy in high school for two years. He was manipulative and abusive, but I still stayed. 

Towards the end of the relationship I was pushed and guilt tripped into doing things with him I wasn't completely comfortable with. About two weeks after we broke up after a really nasty altercation in the hallway at school, he begged me to come over so we could talk, so I did. He drugged and raped me. I felt all of it, but I couldn't move. 

Two days later, he and his mom moved away without a trace. Only a few people knew where he had gone. I stayed quiet about it, but finally broke down to a really close guy friend of mine. I will never forget how he looked me dead in the eyes and said, "Well? Can you blame him? I would, too! I've thought about it a few times myself."

"She'll never be as pretty as you."

I was a pretty awkward middle schooler. I was shy, un-athletic, and didn't have many friends, so I mostly pretended to sleep on the hour long bus rides home. One day in 6th grade I had to "sleep" near the back of the bus where the cool boys from my grade were sitting, flirting with my older sister.

They were complimenting her when one said "Your sister is so ugly. She'll never be as pretty as you." The other one emphatically agreed. My sister just sat there.

It's been 18 years and I can count on one hand the number of times I thought I was pretty.

"It is always the woman's fault."

When I was entering puberty, a man brutalized me. When I told my mother, she said that I'd better get used to it, because in our society, "anytime there's a disagreement between a man and a woman, it is always the woman's fault." 

She listed examples like rape and domestic violence, and literally told me, "the faster you get used to it, the better." I argued with her, but she told me to pay attention every time there was a serious issue in people's relationships to see how it turned out. 

I hung on to her words and swore to myself that I'd find a situation in which this wasn't true, and show her that the world isn't that dark.

I'm nearly 30 now. I'm a domestic abuse survivor from an ex, and I've been raped multiple times in my life. Recovering led to me specializing in rape and domestic violence as a health care professional, thus I see a lot of serious cases and am involved in many court battles. 

To this day, I'm still waiting for that one example when it isn't socially deemed the woman's fault so I can tell my mother that she was wrong.

"No big deal."

I've been sexually assaulted multiple times in my life, but I've only come forward one time. The first time. When I was 13.

I was sexually assaulted at a party by a neighbor's friend. I was so afraid to tell anyone, and kept quiet for two months, until I finally wrote to a close friend about it. My friend accidentally dropped the note it in the hallway and it was discovered by the school social worker. 

The social worker called me into her office, confronted me, and called my mom. My mom told my dad, who told my stepmom.

My mother told me that she'd "been through worse" and that it was "no big deal" and that I "could've ruined his life." 

My stepmother told me "it's all right because we all think he's gay" and "he didn't mean anything by it." 

And what did my father say? Absolutely nothing. 

Because of this, I've stopped coming forward. 

I haven't been able to get my parents' words out of my head, and it's been almost a year and a half.

"I hate when people are not happy."

My first serious boyfriend in high school would belittle me any chance he got. He was manipulative and hurtful, and he used me to get what he wanted. He forced me to have my first kiss, and quite a few after that. When I told him I wasn't ready, he told me that I was. 

One day, I told him that I'd had enough, and when he threatened to break up with me, I agreed that maybe we should.

He then told me, "The only reason I agreed to a relationship with you was to make you happy, because I hate when people are not happy." 

Yeah, because being manipulated and used made me so happy.