Why the idea of having kids terrifies me

Trigger warning: Sexual abuse.

I was feeling extremely bad one day, one of those days where you can’t see a way out, and every thought leads to a panic attack. Those days when you’re already dehydrated from crying too much, but you don’t have enough energy to get out of bed and drink water. Finally, I decided to ask for help from a friend, the one who was closest to me at that time and knew about my struggles. I usually don’t ask for help because I feel terrible about bothering people with my mental issues. But on that day, I thought I should ask for his help, just a phone call to help me feel better. His answer? He was too busy for it, the entire week. He asked if I had someone else to talk to about it. I lied, saying, “Of course, don’t worry.”

That day, my mind embarked on a journey, reminiscing about the many times I felt abandoned, alone, and without perspective, with a strong wish to disappear completely, to dissolve my body into the floor and just decompose until I became something better, something more alive. When I feel that way, I usually start to hurt myself, just to feel my blood running, the color and warmth somehow help me feel calmer and make the physical pain stronger than the emotional one, at least for a while. I won’t go into all the childhood traumas that haunted me that day, but only one in particular.

When I was about 10 years old, I used to spend the entire day at school because both my parents were working. They thought it would be the best way for me to have activities and spend time with friends. I was a rebellious kid, not very good at dealing with rules and spending a lot of time in the classroom. I used to like to explore, run around, and do something more dynamic than staying in a class all day. One day, I decided to escape from school and go to another building two streets behind where I was studying. I don’t know what my intention was or why I decided to do it, but that day had a strong effect on my personality since then.

I was waiting for the start of my taekwondo class, reading a book alone, lying on a mattress on the floor, when two older classmates arrived and came over to me. One of them was choking me and trying to control my movements, while the other was touching my body, underneath my school uniform. I tried to defend myself, but they were bigger and heavier. I don’t know exactly how much time passed, but the teacher entered the court and seeing the situation, pulled them off of me and sent them to the school’s coordination. When we were alone in the court, he told me that I should never tell anyone about this because if my father found out, he would kill the boys and would be arrested, and I would never see him again.

At the time, I took the advice seriously, repressed the memory entirely, and only brought it up again during a therapy session, trying to understand why I felt suffocated whenever I was anxious. Later on, I looked for the teacher on Facebook to confirm this story; he confirmed the memory was real and then blocked me on all social media platforms.

Since I was 10 years old, I had to be there for myself. Nobody understood what I was going through, and I couldn’t tell anyone. I used to hurt myself, punching my belly just to make sure there was no baby there (I had no idea how those things worked, so I thought I could be pregnant). I became emotionally closed off, and nobody knew what I was going through, except my Taekwondo teacher and the guys involved. I used to spend a lot of time alone, trying to manage those feelings or reading to escape from reality, or maybe to find characters who suffered sexual abuse and violence and connect with them somehow.

I’ve tried to support and love myself. I’ve failed many times, but I’ve managed to keep myself alive for the past 20 years, and it has been a daily struggle in my mind. I may have never been able to give real love to that kid, but I’ve tried to help her with logic, with science, trying to understand what was going on and find a logical path to solve it together. I’ve spent days in the library, reading about sexual education to figure out that I couldn’t get pregnant before my first menstruation. I’ve studied physics for three years, trying to find a bigger meaning in life. I’ve graduated as a psychologist for five years, hoping to have mental health. I’ve made a lot of lists and rational decisions. That was the way I found to help this little girl, but love… I don’t think she ever knew what that was.

I was cruel. I always expected her to be strong, to do better, to finally be able to defend herself if she was attacked again, to be smarter, to always be aware and not be so naive, expecting the worst from everyone so that she would always be one step ahead. I molded her to be tough, to make people afraid of her, and not the other way around. I told her to wear dark clothes, walk with a knife, and always pretend to be stronger and more aggressive. But I never taught her how to be kind, how to love, and how to be vulnerable and trust people. I was too afraid of it.

Now I’m 30-something, and this little child inside me is like a violent devil who pushes away everyone who wants to get close to me. I live for her, and she lives for me. We’ve been facing the world together for the past 20 years, and I’ve raised her, and she has raised me. The responsibility of raising a kid, I’ve already done that more or less, and I’m not very happy with the outcome. I know I did my best, the best a 10-year-old kid could do, and we grew together, just like parents are always getting more mature as their kids grow. But I’m tired. I’m not sure if I want that responsibility again. I don’t want to bring someone into the world, knowing all the risks they might face and wondering every day if they went through something similar to what I did.