[Uplift]

My most unforgetable character was my junior basketball coach. I had dreams of playing in the Olympics, and practised every chance, day and night (my poor neighbours). When I turned fourteen I moved into the top junior coach in Australia's team. Our club was the top in the country, and our head senior coach was famous Australian Olympic coach Kieth Miller, who was a brilliant man, and who used to fill my head with Olympic dreams.

It was like a dream come true when the junior coach took me under his wing and began to work with me privately, grooming me for the Olympics. However the guy was a paedophile, and I was his target. I'll never forget one day when he absolutely blasted me in private, telling me I was too soft, weak, had to become a man, and was I gay, as I was never with girls. He then wanted to know if I had 'the balls' to make it, and said he would 'teach' me about girls, make me a man, always pushing the 'if you've got the guts' angle. And away he went. That first time is completely, horrifically unexplainable, but the mind and body can do amasing things to protect you. I was a perfect target, as my mother abused my brother, sister and I repeatedly, and sometimes my father would join in to get her off his back. I knew never to talk back to adults, and never to question them, plus I had effectively had no parents to turn to. However, as I had been kicked, punched, bitten, choked, stomped, knocked out, bounced of walls, doors, table corners, chairs, you name it, I already had the skill of disassociating, or stepping outside of your body, feeling nothing. So in a way it was easy for me to be under him, but gone at the same time. Eventually I devised a way out, and constantly surrounded myself with girls so he couldn't easily get me alone, but I finally had to quit the team. Before that, even during my parents stuff, I was a top student, and came Dux of my primary school. I got top marks in my first year at high school, but next thing was bottom, and considered trouble, and lazy. I became really violent and aggressive, which was a good thing in sport. I didn't trust anyone and became extremely cynical. It used to dumbfound me, and still does, how this guy was held up as the pillar of society, he was a bank manager as well, and won awards and accolades left, right and centre.

I actually owe the guy a lot, as I learned about me. What I was really made of. Because of him I took up weight training, to get big and strong enough to make sure nothing ever happened again. My teenage years were radical, I had, and loved fights. Real fighting was easy for me, as I had been trained in the real thing since a baby. However I soon found myself sitting in jail cells, and I decided that my life had to be better, different, and that I was a good person, and had to act like one. So I began a total change, and launched into personal development, and transformation. Now I have an incredible life, and want only the best for everyone. Thanks to that coach, I truly know that when the chips are down, I make it, I thrive. I remind myself sometimes, in a positive way, that I was once a skinny, little, terrified kid, totally alone, trapped under a slobbering animal who had society in his back pocket, and I chose to be a good person, the best I can be. I also thank that coach, as because of him, I have developed a powerful sense of empathy, and understanding towards anyone who is being abused, and know that the slightest sense of help means so much to them.
I am writing this because its the truth, and in our society, we often don't really deal with the reality of life, preferring to sweep it under the table. I could lie, to please people, and make up some story, but that wasn't the case for me, and I had and have to learn to never compromise myself to please anyone.