Deserted Island

Dear parents,

            It took me many years to sit down and write this letter, and hopefully as the words spill from my fingers onto this page you will finally open your eyes and see, just what you have done to me.

            You tried your hardest to protect me from all of the things you didn’t want me to see. I never left the house without my blindfolds, from ages one to fifteen. You made believe that the world was so black vs white, good vs evil, reality vs dream. Everything that you said and did, I was forced to believe. Believe that was the only way, the only right way, anyone with reason would believe. I was deserted on an island, where I was prisoner to the same ones who said they would die for me. Any disagreements, any part from what you wanted was treated as treason. All my friends, anyone who portrayed any type of threat to your “Big Brother” society was immediately kicked off of my island. Fifteen years on this bland, boring, merciless place, I knew I had to start fighting. I fought with every ounce of my being, all of the pain and suffering, I built all fifteen years of it up and it finally set me free.

Once I ripped off my blindfolds, I was blinded by the buckets of color that spilled all over what I believed to be a black and white world. My amazement by the beauty and the taste of fresh air made me feel invincible. What once was this timid, voiceless child became a strong and fearless woman, inside the body a little girl. I will admit that with this new found freedom, I let it get the best of me, and wasn’t what you would call responsible. The years of deceit and this other person that I had to create, to keep you without knowing, to keep you happy, it led me down a scary path. I was deathly afraid of you discovering this new found freedom that I acquired in an untruthful and lying way. “Father can’t know what you’ve been up to,” mother would say. And without fail, my small secretive escape, my rescue boat from my island, it was ripped away.

Being brought home at 4 in the morning, I could see that you, father, were hurt. You took all of your sadness and pain of the betrayal that I have shown, and turned into a monster and I had to live in your Terrible Reign. You threw away all of my clothes, pulled me out of school, chopped off all of my hair. The few small things that I had to live for, were stripped from me, and my already small island grew so puny. All of the things that I had to make me feel good about myself, you took from me.

After that day, my father turned into a cold and distant heart; “We can’t believe you would do this, you tore this family apart.” I’ve lived with the guilt of feeling like I did something wrong for years, “How dare I be curious and want to see the world in its entirety, I’m just a small girl who belongs at home, sitting in her room quietly.” Every day I was treated as a cold stranger, never your daughter, never the one that you supposedly loved. You never forgave me, you never let me move on, now that its ten years later, you know exactly what I ran from.

Ten years, fast forward to the future, you haven’t heard from me and the only way you even know I’m still alive is by Facebook on the computer. I hope that now, after all of this time, you have sat and thought about everything that you have done, and everything that you put me through. Are those beliefs that you held so dear and true, did they stay loyal to you? Was abandoning me on that island, alone and by myself, did it make you feel any more like a parent, or were you afraid to admit that this was brought on by yourself? I've swam away from my own personal hell, that deserted island that was more like a cell. I'm never looking back.

Marissa