Even on the day of my First Holy Communion, this pervert abused me

[Published: Monday 14, May 2007 - 08:59]

By Sarah Brett

Like most little girls making their First Holy Communion around this time of year, Kelly Curran wore a long white dress on her special day.

The symbol of purity is worn because, in the eyes of the Catholic Church, it is the day children enter 'the age of reason' and become capable of moral responsibility.

For Kelly, the day of her First Holy Communion 20 years ago was far from just a symbolic end of innocence. It was an ugly reality.

"We were out for dinner in Donegal after Mass and there were swings outside in the hotel garden," she recalls.

"I finished and went outside to them. I remember my long white dress. I didn't want to get it dirty, so I stood up on the swing. He came up behind me, pretending to push me on the swing and put his hand up the dress.

"I just remember saying: 'Not today ? please not today'."

It is impossible to read the impact of five years of systematic abuse from her great-uncle Curley on Kelly Curran's calm face. Forcing her emotions deep inside has been a daily practice.

The mum-of-two has few memories of early childhood. She believes this may have been a defence mechanism, a subconscious bid to keep thoughts of her attacker at bay.

"It must have happened before that day when I was seven, but I just didn't remember it. I thought I hid my feelings towards him pretty well as a child but my mother has since told me that I hated him from very early on. Even that day of my first Holy Communion she said I was shouting 'It's my day, it's my day'."

The cycle of abuse which followed was depressingly repetitive.

"I mind him always phoning for me to see could I go down the shops for him. It happened weekly. I wouldn't go but then he'd ring my mammy and she'd say 'get you up the shop'. She didn't realise. She has to live with that now. I told her it wasn't her fault. She has Multiple Sclerosis and it got very bad around that time.

"He would always say you can't tell your mammy, it would upset her too much and she could die.

"It happened mainly in his living room. Every week he made me get undressed and he got on top of me. I just knew not to say anything.

"He had me that mentally tortured I just knew, don't say anything and it'll all be over soon. I would have loved to tell somebody."

But she remained silent, despite becoming increasingly aware that she was harbouring a black secret.

"I always knew it was bad because my mother always said to me 'Kelly, nobody is allowed to touch you'. She kept us very aware of that and would always ask me, 'You would tell me wouldn't you if somebody did something to you?' And I would say 'Yes Mammy of course I would'. But I knew that I just couldn't.

"He had me thinking, right up until going to counselling, that telling my mother would kill her.

"I remember the last time it happened, I must have been 11 or 12, I had my school uniform on and he said when he was finished: 'You don't have to do this anymore. You're a big girl now. Remember it's our wee secret and if you tell anybody they won't believe you anyway. You're as much to blame'."

The weekly ordeal that had spanned almost five years of Kelly's life was over. But the true effect on her would not emerge until much later, when she became a mother herself.

"I remember how it felt when he told me it was over. I was free. I thought, this is it. It was pure freedom. Then I blocked it out for so many years. But it just started to come back and start eating at me.

"When I had my wee girl at 18 it really started to get to me. Thinking about somebody doing it to her. Dear God, it's just not right. I was dealing with it all the time after that, constantly.

"I had my second child about two years later and then it was just too much.

"Maybe it was the pressure of having two children so close together, but I became very depressed. I just let myself go. I could have sat in the same clothes for days. I'd never been like that before.

"I was suffering from pain in my arms and legs since I was about 14 and was running to the doctors all the time and they were testing me for everything.

"After I told my doctor what had happened to me they said the pains were psychosomatic of that mental trauma.

"A few months later, I started counselling at Nexus. We were supposed to do 52 weeks but didn't get there, I stopped at the barrier of telling my Mammy and Daddy.

"When I did eventually tell them, my Daddy said 'We should do something about this, because he could be doing it to another child right now'."

Kelly went to the PSNI's Care Unit. From that moment on, it was her word against Curley's. Three different juries each heard at least part of the case.

"Many a time I thought about giving up. My husband, Gerard, and my children have kept me going through it all, always. If it hadn't been for them, I don't know if I'd have made it."

Kelly was given special measures for the hearings and gave her evidence by video instead of having to face her attacker in court.

But, when it came to it, the jury took less than an hour to convict Curley unanimously.

"I couldn't believe it. Six weeks later he was sentenced. My Daddy rang me and told me he'd been given the maximum sentence and it was more than I could have hoped for. I just kept thinking that's it, he won't be able to get at any more children.

"It was hell and back but it was totally worth it. As an adult, I think you just have to be brave and think about protecting other children. You only get one childhood. I lost mine.

"My mother says I'm like a different person now. There is such a weight off me. When he was sentenced it was just like the day he said it doesn't have to happen to you anymore ? pure freedom."