Once Upon a Time in My Oceania

  I dreaded my wedding day when I imagined it as a child. I dreaded the prospects of marriage but dreaded the lack of prospects as well. When I grew up, lots of girls got married. I chose that word—girls—for a reason. Most girls I witnessed get married were, in fact, that. Some were very young. I knew two who married underage. Outside of that, I recall the lack of understanding, experience, and information provided to the young women who made them anything but prepared for marriage. It was all about the marriage bed. About that first night where you were to lose your virginity and keep giving your body sexually to your Christian husband from there on. Then, there was how to “keep home” and raise children. As a victim of abuse, I knew more of what to expect or at least that’s what they liked to tell me. The fact that they would say to a survivor of child sexual molestation that I knew more about sex is very telling to me... sexual abuse and sex are not the same thing, but I guess in t