656This is my dear old friend Simon Roberts, who I used to knock around with as a teenager. He wrote: “As a nine year old boy I experienced what I will simply call a childhood trauma. I carried the guilt and suffering of that time silently, without telling a soul, not even to those closest to me for a quarter of a century.

"In 2005, those experiences, along with a host of other of personal difficulties had finally culminated to a point where I was no longer able to cope emotionally, the effects of which impacted every area of my existence to the point where I chose the drastic option of ending my life.

"Methods for whatever reason failed me, but did enable me the recognition and gaining of professional help. After almost a year into my treatment, I finally owned up to and told someone what had happened to me as that nine year old boy.

"It was Jackie, my occupational therapist whom during that violently painful emotional confession managed to reach the nine year old through all of the anguish, guilt, hate and pain that was flooding out of the man approaching his mid thirties that sat before her. Her word's, 'You are not the victim anymore!' somehow broke through and I shall never forget the moment she looked deep into my eyes and told me as one of the most defining of my life.

"It was only from that time forth that my own personal healing process would be allowed to begin. Perhaps this SOTM isn't the most uplifting of stories to some, but for me personally it actually is uplifting, as it reminds me that all I have to be in this world is what I choose to be.

"Taken at home, Shelby Township in Michigan, USA.”