When I was twelve I was care free, enthusiastic and full of life just as a twelve year old should be but my life at thirteen took a very different turn for the worse.

We lived on a farm some way from the nearest village so when I was at home I didn't really see my school friends, I spent most of my time doing chores around the house and garden or out playing with my sister and the boys who I grew up, we had such fun, roaming around the fields and in the near by woods. It was safer in those days and so long as we told mum where we were going we were free to come and go, within reason.

One day I was happy playing cricket, football, tennis, hide and seek in the woods and making camps in the hay rick, the next I was confined to the house and only allowed out to go to school. I couldn't believe my life could change so quickly and I would become so unhappy, isolated and frightened.

I never forget the first time he touched me, it was the summer after I turned thirteen, I was at home alone.

He started to talk to me in almost a slow whisper; he put his hand on my knee, I was too afraid to move, I just prayed mum would come back soon or he would get up and go back to work, what was going on here.

As I sat pushing my bottom deep into the chair I could hardly breathe, he started to say things to me which were not suitable for a father daughter converstaion. This was my dad, he wasn't meant to say things like to me, why didn't he just ignore me as he always did. I knew he didn't love me, I had known that for years so why was he acting like this now, why did he want to be close to me, why did he want to touch me in my most intimate place.

It was the worst day of my life, as he pulled me out of the chair and started rubbing himself on me, he tried to get inside of me, I squirmed and tried to pull away but his grip was too tight and he bent me over the chair and tried to enter me again. I screamed in pain but he didn't stop, he pushed inside me, I thought I was going to die how I didn't faint I have no idea.

The next thing I knew he was saying this was our secret and not to tell mum. He said that if I did tell she would never believe me and then I would be taken away and would never see her again.

As I wandered around that afternoon I just couldn't think what to do, should I tell mum, I was so scared, what if he was right and she didn't believe me, what if I was taken away, I didn't want to lose my mum and my sisters.

Eventually I decided to keep quiet, my life was ruined, or so I thought back then, I was imprisoned by my state of mind, just where he wanted me to be!

The abuse lasted for eleven years; how I never killed myself I will never know.

I hate that man but I have managed to put my life back together, it hasn't been easy but with professional help and understanding I made it and so can you.

You are not on your own the statistics are much higher than you might realise; one in four girls is abused before she is fourteen and one in six boys before they are sixteen.

Be a survivor like me and countless others please don't let abuse ruin the rest of your life.