Of course I can, anyone can given time. You can adjust to anything. 

I proved to myself that holiday that I could cope, that I didn't need to cry every five minutes. 

I stopped feeling like I should give up. I realized that after fighting for so long it wasn't worth it. I had come so far that I might as well go the rest of the way. 

I had got somewhere, and I wasn't going back. 

I felt more in control of me, and of my life. 

I no longer felt like I needed someone to hold my hand. I felt my own person. I felt stronger. I felt able to COPE. 

They were falling apart, and I didn't know what to do. They couldn't speak to each other, well, not about IT. My Mum and Brother were tearing each other apart. And they hurt the other quite considerably sometimes. With one or other crying at the end of it. They argued over everything, and I do mean everything. Admittedly, things aren't great now, they still argue a lot. But well, that my brother really, a typical teenager. I just had to stand there and watch. Watch helplessly. Seeing how what HE had done was tearing us apart. 

But there was one good thing that month, (August 2010) was that my Mum thought I was improving. She thought I was on a 'more even keel'. But my personal opinion was that the only thing I was improving were my acting skills!! 

I did hide a lot from my family, and from some of my friends. Shut myself off because I didn't want to hear the truth, or know how to feel. I preferred the nothingness of being numb, I was protected from the pain of knowing. And that way I survived. 

It would be a while before I learnt to open up. Before I learnt what being me really meant. 

Yet I knew one day I would meet Katerina Matthews, I wasn't sure when, but I knew it wouldn't be until I was ready to. 

I wished that I could walk away from my life, walk away from my family, walk away from my pain, walk away from my memories. I wished that I could leave everything behind, and never come back. I wished I never had to see anyone, or anything associated with my life again. Yes, there would be people and things that I would miss, but it would be worth it for the new start that would come with it. Yea, I would be heaven. But that wasn't possible, however much I may have hoped for it. 

But I wasn't really thinking straight at the time, I was simply consumed with hate...consumed with fear, and unspoken feelings. I was trapped, in chains, and hating every second of it. 

One day, I told myself, I will walk out of this house that is no longer home, and never return. I won't, I told myself, see any of these people again, I won't speak to them again. They aren't my family. They haven't been for a long time. Or so I told myself. Reading this makes my really upset, because I can't imagine hating them like this, I can't imagine leaving them, or my home. It does make me cry. But thats how I felt, so thats why I'm saying this. 

I was so alone. I didn't feel like I had a family, I didn't feel like I had a life. But what little of a life I did have I didn't want to share. 

So I fought, I had a dream, and I was trying so hard to make it come true. I was sure that I was going to be a surgeon. (I don't think so, that dream died a long time ago! It was never going to happen. Not clever enough!) 

But I held on...

Kat x

I wanted it all to end...life was stupid, upsetting and so very frustrating. I couldn't cope with feeling, feeling anything. Being numb was so much easier. 

I didn't want my family, I didn't want my friends, I didn't want school, I didn't want to learn, I didn't want any of it, I didn't want to live. Yet I know I couldn't die. So what was I meant to do? 

There was no escape. I had no freedom. My Mum was always there. There was no way out of it. I didn't want to see people. Yet I didn't want Mum following me everywhere. 

I just feel so useless, like I wasn't wanted. And maybe I wasn't, I never did anything right, and I really didn't try, I was just like a spare part. Not really a part of anything. Just there.

Nothing made me feel better, and so I retreated more and more into myself, living inside my head. In a world only I knew existed. A world that is still with me. A World that helps me through each and every day, good or bad. 

I knew what I needed though. I needed a friend. A friend who knew me better than I knew myself. I needed a friend to love me, who I could turn to when I was feeling down, who would hug me, and love me and tell me it was going to be okay. In short what I needed was a Connie...(I'll explain another time).

There was a point were I did consider it. When I did think that I would be better off dead. Where I thought that no one would really notice if I died. Where I thought that no one cared so I might as well die and save myself the pain of living. Thank God I had people there to talk sense into me! It wasn't my Mum though, she never knew that I was that bad. She never knew that I felt like dying sometimes. 

I guess I never seriously considered it, because surely if I really wanted to die I would have just killed myself right? But anyway, I told Sara that I felt like dying, and well she just told me not to, and after an hour long talk I left the room and never considered killing myself again. She told me that I wouldn't be better off dead, that I had so much to live for. That she would notice, and care if I died, as would my family, she told me to consider my Mum's feelings. And so I knew that I couldn't kill myself. 

Because as bad as it was for me, surely it would be worse for those around me, knowing that I didn't feel that they were enough, knowing that they should have helped me. So I didn't die, because I didn't want them to  hurt. And that is what you have to consider right? Because you are not the only one hurting, yes, you may be hurting the most. But those around you will be hurting so badly if you die, probably hurting more than you did. 

So take a moment, and consider the bigger picture. And don't do it. 

It was August then. And I was up the city with my cousin, Helena, and my best friend, Shanie. I bought quite a lot of stuff, which for me, was a miracle, well back then it was. Not now!! How people change! 

Well anyway, I mentioned the fact that my Father had taken my birthday present to the solicitors, just before my actual birthday. I didn't know whether I should have got it or not. Anyway, all my mates thought that I should. But I just wasn't sure. And so Shanie, and Helena kept telling me I should, and to be honest I was really curious. 

Yea, and so we rang up my Mum, and though my connection was bad, and I couldn't really hear, I knew that she didn't want me to go, but anyway we couldn't, because we would have needed an appointment. 

The second I came off the phone I knew that I shouldn't have done it. That she would be upset, that I should have spoken to her about it. 

Yet, when I came home, not a word was mentioned, no argument, no nothing. I was on tender kooks for days. But nothing was EVER said. 

But all things pass, and over two years later, I don't really think about that day anymore. 

Nor do I think about my Father much now. Simply because I can't feel anything for him. Why should I waste emotions on a man like that? But it wasn't always like that...I wasn't always indifferent to the sexual abuse. I wasn't always able to cope...

Kat xx

We were 5 months down the line...5 months since I had disclosed...5 months since I had last seen my father...5 months since I had last seen my abuser...5 months since I had lived in constant fear...5 months since my world had been turned upside down...

It was weird really...I no longer thought about him...it was like I had packed him into a box and didn't think about him unless I had to. There were no unwanted memories...no unwanted thoughts...no flashbacks...no sleepless nights...there was nothing there...he was gone from my life, from my head, from my memories...he didn't exist in my life. 

I was numb...I wasn't thinking, feeling or anything...I was like a robot...and I didn't care....

But you should care...I should have tried. I just wanted the pain to disappear so I let myself become numb. Which was the worst thing I could have done. Not feeling meant that there was no happiness..no joy, no excitement. There was nothing there. I stopped hoping, I didn't see past that day. I was barely living. All I wished for was for everything to end...everything to stop, because I couldn't cope. I needed so much more time than I actually had. 

So shut the memories away, shut all the bad into a box, but keep the pain, because as hard as it is, it keeps you alive. And believe me, dying is not something you want to do. Because that just hurts you, and those around you all the more. 

Kat xx

I once had a really weird dream, that has stayed with me for a long time. 

I dreamt that my Mum kicked me out of the house, which is NOT going to happen, but anyway. I got in this car that was waiting outside, I don't know who was driving, all I know is that we drove off. They dropped me off somewhere and I just started to walk. A little while later I cam across this track, and there was Sara walking down it with someone else, they were walking away from me, but I called out and as she turned the space between us was suddenly gone, and there she was hugging me. 

I know that we carried on walking, and then we reached what I guess was Sara's house. She let me live with her. 

It was a good dream, but I know that it will never happen. 

And I guess that you have to accept reality for what it is...as much as I would love to live my dream life, I know that it cannot happen. So I have to focus on reality, and living it to the full. I know that I can't suddenly become 5ft 5" and 8 stone. I know that I can't suddenly be a Commander in the Army, running an Academy in the midlands. I know that I can't be a surgeon working in Queen Elizabeths Hospital. I can't do these things. But I can get good enough A Levels to allow me to study History at University. I know that I can write a book about these things though...

All it takes is belief...xx

Kat xx

As you know seeing people was hard for me...I preferred to be by myself, where there was no risk of disappointing anyone but me...were I couldn't hurt anyone but me...everyone annoyed me...and I didn't understand it...all I knew was that it was safer for me to be by myself. 

Over the summer we repainted my bedroom. I think that helped things, because there was no getting away from my family then, I had to talk, I had to be nice and polite, I had to cope. So maybe that helped me, I don't know. All I know is that it was good that we did repaint my room, because it helped wash away the memories that those walls contained. 

I often wondered whether Sara thought of me over the summer like I did her. I didn't really think about the future...or whether I would continue to see her, or stuff like that. I just thought about what she had said to me, conversations we had had during the year, that kind of stuff...because it helped....

Kat xx

Take what you need...but never forget those that helped you...xx

I often spent a lot of time thinking about Sara. She was an important part of my life. She was the one person who made me feel like I was actually worth someone. She was the one person who made me feel. She was the one person who I felt no shame in caring about. She deserved emotion. 

Sara once told me that she can not lie. And so I spent a lot of time thinking about everything thing that she had said to me. Did that mean that she cared? That she thought of me as a friend? That she thought that I was wonderful? 

If that was true, then maybe I am special, simply because I am me? 

I kept thinking about it. I kept hoping that it was true. But at the same time, that was so much to come to terms with, I wasn't sure I could cope if that was true...

Oh, how scared I was...nowaday, I can accept that, because I love her...more than she will ever know. I care about her so much that it hurts. So much more than I ever thought was possible. She is my surrogate mother. And I LOVE HER...

And I know she cares about me. And I am proud to be her friend. It took me a long time to accept that she cares, but I have. And you just need to have a bit of faith, a bit of courage, and you will learn that not everyone out there is going to hurt you.

Kat xxx