Never Broken: Songs Are Only Half the Story by Jewel

front of me as I was sitting on my bed, with tears in his eyes. He held an article in his hands that he had cut out from the paper. It said that the photographer had been arrested on suspicion of child pornography and molestation. Apparently hehad also been taking nude photographs of children. My dad said that from now on he would always trust my instincts, that he would never doubt me again. To his credit, he kept his word, in a way. He always trusted me to take care of myself when it came to men in the bars where we sang, though I wouldn’t have needed to if he’d done his part in scaring the guys off.
    By fourteen I was considered fair game in that town, and the attention was flattering but a lot to handle. It did teach me to be very clear with my own sexual energy, to never be ambiguous, and to shut down advances in a way that kept the man’s ego (and temper) intact. Again, a skill that would serve me greatly in my future work in the music business.
    My dad and I bumbled our way through my youth. On one hand, I was a very precocious, self-sufficient young woman; and on the other, when it came to my most intimate relationships, my parents’ influence made me doubt my instincts and myself. It wasn’t something they set out to do. It was collateral damage.
    I remember being alarmed and scared because a sense of fullness and a sense of peace in my life began to really be lost. I was deeply unhappy. A wet and heavy fog settled over me that I could not shake. The joy was seeping out of life. And I began to show troubling behavior. I began to steal in fifth grade. Small things—a Popsicle from the cafeteria. I was trying to fill something inside, trying to find power in my powerless life. I also began to try to build myself up by exaggerating. I tried to make myself seem better than I was to people around me. Whatever I had actually done was not good enough—it had to be fantastic. If I was so lovable, then why did those closest to me seem to see fit to treat me so badly? I didn’t consciously draw these conclusions—it’s just the way a child internalizes abuse. I felt like the colors in my cathedral were fading. I felt lost. Like my compass was disappearing. In trying to regain that compass, I made a pact with myself when I was about nine that I would always tellthe truth when I wrote in my journal, because I had begun lying to other people. I began to split in two at that time in my life, and I didn’t know how to stop it. But thankfully, some part of me was wise enough to create a safe and sacred place, which became my writing. I allowed it to always be an honest reflection of myself, flaws and all. So while I was lying and exaggerating and shoplifting, I was at least able to watch myself do these things. That may not sound like a great gift, but it kept the lights from going out completely. And it allowed me to witness myself, to have an experience of myself outside of my bad behavior. Even though I was frightened and confused and sad and lonely and behaving in ways I wasn’t proud of, I could see myself do it. And if you can see yourself do something, if you can witness your behavior, that means you are something other than your behavior. And if you can see your behavior, there is hope for change. We can’t fix what we aren’t willing to see. I had no idea how to change. I didn’t even understand what was happening to me. For now all I could do was be willing to see.
    I made another pact with myself around this time to abstain from drink and drugs, and in fact never touched alcohol until my mid-thirties. I was aware from watching drunks in barrooms that drinking further numbed and detached you from yourself, and I knew that if I tuned out my fear completely I would be in great peril, and that I couldn’t afford to put myself any more in harm’s way. These pacts didn’t keep me entirely safe. They didn’t keep me from making mistakes. They didn’t protect me from tremendous trauma and turmoil in my life,