I had been told all during my childhood that I would be bad if I told secrets about "the family." In that house, everything was a “secret:” the beatings, starvation, molestation, isolation were to be left unsaid. I have found myself even now, 20 years after I left his house, leaving out important information, not talking about it in order to be safe. If I don’t tell all of it, nothing bad will happen and she will love me, stop hurting me, and take care of me. I need to go back and tell the rest of what I left out. (Yes, it’s worse than I said and it gets worse from here.)