Childhood sex abuse

[hop]

I’m going through a really hard time at the moment. I was doing trauma therapy because of my ex and now I’ve got to the root of it. I knew that my upbringing wasn’t normal but I didn’t think for a minute I was sexually abused. A few weeks ago someone on here pointed out that it was. I feel ridiculous that I didn’t know… Again. As an adult it’s only reflecting on the standards I have for all other children, but especially my own, that I can see how wrong it was. I just thought because he never touched me or had sex with me it wasn’t that. I don’t know how I thought an adult trying to put himself in a child’s mouth (no matter how unsuccessfully) and trapping a child with his naked body on a bed, or against the wall wasn’t exactly as it sounds.
I have a problem I know it happened but I can only think about it in the 3rd person. I can accept it happened to little girl but I’m finding it hard accepting we’re the same. It’s like I’m breaking in half. I can feel the split when I try yo commune the two. I’m finding it hard to keep going

[KIP.]

Hey I was abused by my husband for decades. Awful sexual abuse and mental abuse and I didn’t know it was abuse. Now that I’ve stepped back and spoken out I understand that what he did was dreadful abuse but I minimised it because it never occurred to me that the person I most trusted in the world was deliberately trying to destroy me. Why would we think such things when society tells us our husbands and our parents are our protectors. You don’t have to accept your the same person. A little girl has no understanding of abuse and that for me was true in adulthood. How would I know. I had nothing to compare it to. I can tell you I would definitely recognise it now. It’s something that happened to me but I won’t let it define me x

[hop]

It was the same way with my ex. I didn’t know then either. But like you said I had no frame of reference…..the one I did have was pretty s**t! Thanks kip x

[Anonymous]

I was the victim of sexual abuse as well starting at age (detail removed by moderator). Other abuse happened as well. It was hell on earth. I liken it to being like a prisoner of war and it really was. I am glad you have gotten to the root and that you have someone helping you. So very very important for you. And it does set us up to be drawn to abusive people in our adult life. I’ve seen it in my own history. A child’s brain just isn’t developed yet to think logically and rationally when they are young. That happens in their 20’s. And of course not knowing what normal is, they might think well, I guess this is normal, even though it makes me feel absolutely horrible. So many people share their stories now and they all say the same things. You’re not alone or weird about any of the things you are feeling. Not at all.

And when it’s someone you trust and especially a parent or family member, even worse. You were trapped, I was. Children usually can’t even verbalize to anyone what’s going on, can’t find the words. That’s why art is used, and playing with toys when helping abused kids because that is more of a language that they can communicate with. They can’t talk but they could draw a picture or show you something with dolls…

We learn how to compartmentalize too. We put things in rooms because we don’t know what else to do with what’s happening. Here’s my good daddy or good mommy in this room. Here’s my bad daddy or bad mommy in this other room. Here’s my bad girl in this room, my bad girl in another room. This is my daytime self and over there is my nighttime self. This is the me that goes to school, this is the me I have to be at home and on it goes. We become fragmented. We learn how to disassociate from the trauma, even going away from our bodies when it is going on, a means of escape for us. We might even learn to hate our bodies because of it and it becomes a stranger to us, like it’s something tied to us and we drag it around behind us but we’re not really connecting with.

Then when the abuse was always about the perpetrator doing what they wanted and how we were didn’t matter, then the stage is set for us to be very codependent in our life. Caring more about the other person, their needs, their wants/desires above our own. It’s like they imprint this on our psyche and we have no idea why we’re doing this as adult. Comes naturally when actually it’s very unnatural to us and makes us feel miserable on alot of levels but again, we don’t know why this is.

When something traumatic happens to a child, since they can’t possibly reason it out, all they know to do is say to themselves, what did I do? I am bad then. That conclusion is just instant. No mulling it around, it just sticks like glue. We believe it. We immediately take on the guilt and shame of what “they” did. Even if we don’t understand what or why, our bodies and our whole being has been traumatized and invaded so regardless of whether or not our brain can figure it out, our bodies “know”. That’s why alot of times we will have “body memory” where your body remembers and reacts to something in the present.

I had a body memory one time that related to me being put in a crawl space underneath the house when “I was bad” and I was in my late 30’s going into a hot greenhouse exhibition and I started hyperventilating and ran out, was shaking and just terrified. But it was just then that I remembered, because of my body memory of the hot, damp environment that this happened to me. I was young then at that house, around (detail removed by moderator). So smells, situations, body memories, all kinds of triggers can break loose the trauma and the memory.

We store things in our bodies. Massage healing work for sexual abuse victims is very very helpful. Ask your therapist if they can recommend someone. I know with me, and is true of alot of us – you don’t go near my belly and especially not my lower abdomen!! But that’s where I’ve stored the sexual abuse, it’s there. I always hold a pillow to my tummy when sitting and feel very weird if I don’t have one. Imagine me sitting in a corporate setting without it! It was hard for me. I felt naked, exposed but I managed. The more healing I got the better. The other thing with me is do not ever ever sneak up on me and just lightly touch me. People have done that and almost gotten hurt for it. I have this thing about my back as well, if someone barely touches my back when I am sleeping or trying to, same thing. I immediately go to hit someone.

Our backs store alot as well because it’s like a shield. Our shoulders and whole back area is like a turtle shell so it gets really really tight and sore. I have always had to have work done on my back with massages and chiropractic adjustments.

So tender loving care is something you really need to give yourself because this is a journey and it is necessary but at your own pace sweetheart. It all looks so very gloomy at first, it does. But it’s actually the breaking of the sunlight into your world. Things that are hidden are now exposed to the light and to truth. It hurts and heals at the same time. Nothing hurts worse than lies and poison being left in us to tear us to bits in the darkness.

We can have a happy childhood at any time in life, regardless of how old you are. We can rebuild what was broken and know that the grafted branches of a tree are actually the strongest. Sometimes when we’ve just had enough of the abusive man in our life, our own inner self somehow brings us to the point of really getting to the bottom of what’s going on here and then like you are seeing here, it wasn’t your fault at all. The not knowing, it happening in the first place, the guilt and shame, none of it. Then well of course we are going to go towards what is familiar in our adulthood. That’s a no brainer. But now is an Ah Ha moment for you. Now you have gotten right down to that first seed lie in your being where this all started. Now you can pull that sucker out by the roots and guess what? All the vines and root systems attached to everything in you – they all have to die. And they do.

I have to go do something right now but I will be back with a list of things that might help you, books, videos, organizations that specialize in this, etc. I don’t want you to feel lost or alone here because you’re not. You are at the threshold of something very very good in your life, so steady your legs and your heart. We are here for you. I have dedicated my life to helping sexual abuse victims so I deeply understand where you are….. Big Big Hug to you!! I’ll be back in a bit. X*X

[hop]

Thank you so much for your reply braelynn 💖
Everything you’ve said is what’s happening to me now and worse of all we still have a relationship. It’s something I’m doing for myself coming to terms with this. It feels terrible to admit but I’m not saying anything to anyone in my family. I reckon one of my elder siblings got it much worse than me now reflecting on reactions and things I had to watch and it’s not down to me to bring anything up for other people.
I’m triggered terribly by smells and audio and the change of spring to summer does something to me. Every year.

[Anonymous]

Okay, I’m back here. Look up youtubes on Marilyn van Derbur. She has a very interesting story and is a powerful woman who helps others. “Miss America by Day” is her book. Darkness to Light is the name to look up, too.

If you look up a site called “Mind” in the UK, they have some really good sites on there for incest and all kinds of abuse actually. Also check out “Local Minds”. They support England and Wales. Then there is “Women Support Project”.

The Courage to Heal: A Guide for Women Survivors of Child Sexual Abuse by Ellen Bass and Laura Davis

Homecoming: Reclaiming and Championing Your Inner Child Paperback by John Bradshaw

Repair Your Life Workbook: Supporting A Program Of Recovery From Incest & Childhood Sexual Abuse – is a good workbook for you.

Very good site here……Gift From Within- PTSD Resources

A Ted talk you might find interesting as well in your present situation and can be looked up by this…..Why I stayed, Why I left | Mada Tsagia-Papadakou

I don’t want to overwhelm you here but thought this information is a good place to start. Just please try and see yourself as someone who is healing and breaking free here. It’s weird for us because we have been in our shackles for so long until we are able to be free so prison sometimes feels like home and we’re afraid to leave it. But there should be more fear attached to staying a prisoner…. So feelings will come and go, just stay on track and committed to your own wellbeing and I can also say here that some of the strongest women I know, the most powerful in this world – came from such abuse as a child and said and felt all the things you do at some point. But interestingly enough that fire that one would think might destroy everything, actually forged some steel and taught them that it’s not the big oak tree that survives in bad storms…….it is the willow because it bends. Oaks can come tumbling down. We are not broken, just a little bent.

[Anonymous]

I posted before reading your last post. Anyways, you’re very welcome!! And no, it’s not your responsibility to bring it up to your family. I would advise against that, really would. They are all on their own journey and the last person they would probably listen to or validate is most likely you. So that might be you entering into a hornet’s nest. I remember that one. LOL! Oh what fun that was! But I’m a little rounder so it just made me dig my heels in more and fire right back at em. Wasted energy? Probably but it felt good doing it let me tell you. I don’t advise it for everyone however.

The validation you need is going to come – from “you”. Your little girl inside is up in the attic asking – can I please, please come out now???? She doesn’t know what to do. So you have to help her with that one. I suggest an exercise here that might help. I know when it was suggested to me, I laughed and said – yeah, right, whatever. I did it and was blown away!! You write to your little girl with your writing hand, ask her whatever you want to, talk to her and then let her write back to you with your non-writing hand. Oh my, my…what my little girl said to me. Broke my heart but I needed to hear it. And I did. I listened. I replied back and kept the communication going until she finally felt safe enough to walk out of the attic I had locked her up in because – she was bad.

Speaking about the family here…..I have known sooo many people who remember that – the abusive parent would actually make sure the siblings were separated from each other one way or the other, that there was seeds of mistrust, competition, etc. going on and always secrecy about what they were doing to them. One grown woman told me that it was just a rule at night for all us girls to have our doors closed and we couldn’t even go to the bathroom without permission. Of course they were coerced, threatened by the perp to not tell or something bad would happen, or you’re special to me or whatever but anything to divide the siblings so they don’t talk to each other and bond with one another. Extremely common.

Also just want to add that we also don’t know what to do with “Mommie” because afterall she’s a female and she should have known, should have stopped it, protected us. But she didn’t. Or, she acted like she didn’t know, professed it but she knew alright. Then we get that all tangled up with who we are as women and we wonder why we end up tippy toes upside down in the flower patch? Oh I dunno, take a wild guess as to why? Geessh!

Many a man and many a woman have actually more anger and resentment towards their mother who did nothing and oftentimes if we told her – she wouldn’t listen, tell us we were lying or something else ridiculous. It’s fascinating to see how much we can direct to the mother who did nothing and to the point of it being more so than towards the perpetrator.

But who she was does not define “you”. You define you. Your perpetrator’s abuse does not define you either. It affects us but hey now, just watch how we make all that into a beautiful garden because my thinking is…soooo, you think or assume that the abuse you sent in my direction and the lack of protection from anyone is going to destroy me?? LOL!!! Oh, oh, and oh my, then you got another thing coming because I am an offense fighter. I spent a good deal of my life playing defense but got news for everyone, offense is the name of the game. I made it my mission to get us as much healing under my belt as I could and then to turn right around and go into the jungle and bring out a victim at a time. I’m not taking my abuse laying down and I absolutely will go in after my sisters. I will do it for my brothers as well. That way, my perps don’t win. I do. Wounded Warriors are the absolute best people to go back into that jungle and let me tell you if I’ve heard it once, I’ve heard it a million times – people who say, I won’t listen to someone who has not been through it. I didn’t. I’d laugh when a 30 something therapist gives me weak knee’d advice and was actually shaking in her boots because she knew I knew more than she did. Uh…nooo… you can’t help me. So I helped myself, read like crazy, researched and just became my own medicine woman because you actually do know how to heal yourself. If you listen to your intuition it will guide you. I am a firm believer in the saying of – when a student is ready a teacher will appear.

I’m on here with so many women who are abused by men but I do have to say that I absolutely love and adore good men. Good strong men, with character, who are gentle men, good fathers, have honor and dignity, who respect women. They are out there. But we have to draw them to us by who we are. I have to laugh because most of my best friends have been men, not women. That is largely because of what society on planet earth has collectively done to women. Here on this site……I see what women can be to each other and it makes me feel so very good because I love my ladies, my sisters, my children, I very much do. But we have had generational abuse for a long long time now and it’s getting old. I’m tired of it, how about you? I see that fire in your belly……can’t hide it from me. 🙂 You just write your little heart out here because this is a safe place for you. Thank goodness it’s here, right? I know when I was going through everything, since I am over 50 now, I had no resources at all, no support, nothing. But, I was determined that they would not win out over me. The best revenge is to live well, it really is. I faced them all, was the only one who stood up to my father in my late teens. I’ve told them all what’s what though down through the years. Felt really yummie! LOL! Yep, I can be a brat. I love that about me though! I just stomp my mary janes around like I own the place and when it comes to my life – I own the place!

[hop]

I was the only one who stood up against him, ha, for all the good it did me.
Thank you for those resources I’ll take a look at them.
I have written letters and letters between me and thus b****y child. That’s how this stuff started coming up. At the moment I can admit it happened to her but I’m p****d off that I can’t silence it! I brought up how I might feel about my mother because I spent a long time hating her for the stuff I know she saw. I don’t want to hate her. I’m a mother now and I’ve done terrible things to my children. My mother was f*****g demented, being abused horrendously herself. She pays her penance every day from when she realised we weren’t making things up. It was far too late but she found out a lot and did the right thing.
I really need to do something because I hate this stupid inner thing. I know it’s because no matter how much I reason with myself and say his changed and forgive him how on earth can I tell an 8yr old girl or even a 15 year old girl I can forgive the person who did all those things and I love that person but I hate you and wish you were dead? I’m getting little glimpses of the hatred I used to feel for him. It feels like another things I have to come to terms with. I was just pretending…..or was I?
Me and one of my siblings were made to viciously fight each other. Winner allowed back to their room.
I see all this and feel angry that there’s something stopping me from admitting it’s me. I get the worst feelings in my groin when I try and think I’m that stupid f*****g child!

[Anonymous]

Ohhh sweetheart………please please oh please don’t hate her……because when you do that, your abuser wins. Those who didn’t help you win. It’s not your guilt or shame to bear and it was never ever your fault. so you hating that little girl is keeping you from being whole and healed, it really is. It wasn’t her. She’s wounded, very wounded and of course she is angry. And with me about my abusers, I’m a little weird I guess but my way of forgiveness isn’t everyone else’s. Mine is this…….I refuse, absolutely refuse to punish myself for what You did to me!! Not happening. And I refuse to give you anymore of My precious energy either. Not happening and you’re not worth it but I am.

I get your whole mother thing. Times were different back then and when she had her own abuse, very tragic indeed. But like with me, I had horrible abuse but way in heck would I allow that to happen to my child!! But we have to leave them to it, whatever way they work it out, learn things themselves or whatever. That’s my forgiveness is to let them “go”. Everytime I tried to interact it was just horrible. She or he would twist and turn everything around to me and I’m like eh No. You do your life, I’ll do mine.

But and your little girl inside is a whole different matter because she is a part of you. You can hate the abuse but not hate her because it wasn’t her, right? She didn’t do the abuse. It wasn’t “you”. You have to really really strain to see that one clearly because it wasn’t you being a stupid child. If you wear that then what you really hate, that happened to you is just all your fault and I do know you know different, right? Look at any little girl that age, maybe your own child and think would I really think that it was “her fault” if this happened to “her”? Would you? We don’t have to repeat history here because alot of mothers who were abused get locked into this. And the abuse just keeps getting passed down.

I remember my stepmother saying to me, why should you have a happy childhood, I didn’t? So we have to break away from all this. And the very first step for you here is being so very kind to your little one because she was the victim here. She did absolutely nothing to deserve the abuse. Do you have any pictures of yourself being little around the age it started? If so, maybe look at them and really see that beautiful wonderful innocent child who deserved none of this……..it happened To her, not because of her and trust me, it would have happened to any child in that position so it was never about it being just you. Never is. In fact, most of the time sexual perps have many others that they do it to and not always within the family either. You didn’t make him do it. He did.

[Anonymous]

Sooo you’re talking about how your father has changed? Yeah I remember that one myself. He became an instant christian after doing something insanely horrible and got caught. He didn’t change, just changed his disguise. Of course he was the town’s spiritual hero and guru then. Vomit!!! He never said sorry to me btw. Guess his christianity didn’t require of that him. Oh wait a minute, whoops it does! He snowed everyone and they all loved it. People like being sold to. Nope, didn’t have to love him, never did, still don’t. He’s dead now. Didn’t have to forgive him in the traditional sense either. Forget that! All I told him was what I thought of him, and demanded he say what he did to me, which he did do, I think he was afraid of me actually which wasn’t a bad thing, and then told him this is my line in the sand, don’t ever cross it. You live your life, I will live mine. That’s My forgiveness for – you. I did whatever “for me” not for him. I wasn’t expecting it to do any good because oh wow, he suddenly grows a conscience because that wasn’t happening and I knew that. But I wanted him to see a grown, healthy and very determined woman staring back at him now, not a child who will and can clean his clock in a few ways should he ever dream that he can cross the line with me or anyone else that I know of.

So first and foremost here is that you do not hold you as a small child responsible for what he did to you. So far, that’s what’s happening. I see it very clearly. Ever put her in the box like she’s on trial and be the prosecutor and the defense attorney? You’ll find out very quickly which side you’re on. And right now, it’s not her side……..you are the prosecutor. Does she really deserve this??? What in the world could she have done to deserve that?

When you are with an abusive partner then guess what? She’s going to get even more angry because she’s being abused again and doesn’t feel safe. You can’t heal without her, won’t happen. She……..is actually Your saving grace. She is what will save you. Her anger and rage is actually what will give you life and the courage to heal properly. So please don’t hate her. Integration of her with you is of the utmost importance and it’s a process, it really is. You’ll see that if you do the work. We were forced into this. it wasn’t like oh wow, got an invitation in the mail for horrific abuse and oh yes, I’m up for that, will be there with bells on!! Uh no, that’s not what happened. It’s like smacking a child upside the head with a ballbat for being tied to the steering wheel and the gas peddle pushed and then off they go into a tree wrecking the car and we blame them!

She’s all smashed up here, wounds everywhere, bleeding, bruised, cuts and she’s not been attended to all these years. Angry? Uh, yes indeed. I would be. I was!! But that part of you only really wants to be accepted and loved and held – by you. You want her to stop being bratty, then bring her into your arms and mean it. If you can’t mean it now then works towards that. Me and mine limped towards each other, both pretty beaten up but we finally integrated and I love her! Love love her! She has saved my life numerous times because I am still a child at heart. When things get so very nasty in life it’s “her” that saves me more than anything else. She steals me away to go “play with her” and I do. You are missing out on probably the most important part of yourself and because she is angry shows you that she is Very very alive!!! Anger is good sometimes because it blows out the pipes. Busts things loose, makes us hear ourselves shout and stomp. That can turn into a dance. Maybe not a ballet but I will settle for crazy dancing around the fire like a wild woman. I actually do that. LOL! Not a bad thing.

[Anonymous]

One thing I might add here is an analogy, word picture……..when we are that child we build a defense system that’s actually quite mighty. We build it to house “the lie” to keep it safe. The one that says – it’s all our fault. We must guard it because our true self of course, knows it’s a lie….but that other part of ourself says no, no, this is the truth and I hold you hostage to it. And the walls get built, the fortress, the moat, the snares, the canons, the archers, the catapults. All built by a child. Interesting but it happens. Thing is a child doesn’t really build a defense system all that well. They think they do but it only lasts so long. It’s nasty and works for a season but then it all starts falling apart at some point.

What you have to know however is that when you go up against this bratty little child, you’re going up against a defense system that was actually built by “you”. About the only way you’re going get a victory out of this is to know that you are about destroying the seed lie which was the reason this whole defense system had to be built in the first place. Putting paint on the pig is a very time consuming and necessary thing when you have a lie going on. Drains the life right outa ya.

Once you pull that root out it all comes tumbling down. It was going to crumble anyways but might as well get it over with. And then you have this open space. I don’t know about you but never favored the walls of a prison over an open space. Funny how us abuse victims seem to favor the prison sometimes. It helps then to go out into wide open spaces and physically ‘sit’ …. look out long and far.

As a child we have very close in spatial awareness. Look that one up. At whatever certain age – what is the spatial awareness for that age? I have known alot of grown women who were addressing their abuse as a child and they couldn’t even drive a car, freaked out in traffic big time. I had to work with them to get them to improve their spatial awareness from that of a child to that of an adult. That’s one reason why adult abuse victims can be easy targets on the streets for violence because they don’t see past or notice past a certain range sometimes. I was actually hyper alert and hyper vigilant so I had the awareness of a bat. Drove me crazy and everyone else around me but I could feel a train coming for miles away. Now we have cell phones that put us in the child category of awareness even if there is no abuse. Our radar is turned completely off because we’re not aware of our surroundings at all.

So it’s good to maybe study up on what a child is like at the age the abuse began. Because that’s where you got stunted in your emotional growth. With me, I was a very spunky little kid, tomboy, very outspoken and after the abuse I was withdrawn, shy, total introvert, wouldn’t talk to anyone about anything. The complete opposite of what I was. When I did an inner child workshop I was floored at what happened to me in that weekend. I was there for someone else, LOL! right, right. I never cried so much. My eyes were swollen shut by the end. But he led us from birth to age 18 and through all the different years of life, what we were like, our development at that stage, we were on the floor playing with toys, etc. It brought things up for All of us. We were “there”. That’s where I first did the handwriting exercise. It was the John Bradshaw inner child workshop that I did. Extremely healing for me personally.

Oh and btw, I am back to my spunky self. I’m sure you didn’t notice! Been there for a long time now. Just had to circle back and pick her up. She was getting pretty annoyed that I left her on the side of the road for so long. I got cussed at but survived. 🙂

[hop]

It’s like I’ve got these little, shiny, black boxes inside me. I asked myself what it would really mean to not self harm and one opened up. Now it’s like I can feel them inside me but I’m afraid to open them up.
I used my left hand to say things I was good at and liked when I was that age. Then I did a doodle which led to me writing some pretty messed up stuff. This is getting so hard. In some ways I’m so glad that the quarantine means I don’t have to face any of these people but I’m finding doing the therapy over the Internet bad sometimes because I’m just on my own without her physically there.

[HopeLifeJoy]

Can you count how many boxes there are?
To give you an idea of how much work lays ahead…at least you’re set.

Can you imagine, write or draw a protective figure, a safety blanket of some sorts in any form or shape that would make you feel safe and protected? Then take this protective figure in your quest of opening up these boxes. And only open one at a time. Process each one through with your therapist.

When i confronted my (lighter) nightmares, I developed magic hands, that could freeze anything or anyone when I was frightened. I just had to stretch out my hand and say No! This person would freeze immediately and dissolve into thousands of glitter and the wind would come and sweep it into the air far away. My magic hands empowered me.

You’re so brave you know. You’re facing your past with such courage. I have great respect for you. Continue step by step. And breathe. Always breathe.
I’ve found guided relaxing exercises very calming and effective.

[hop]

Lo it’s like a nest of them I can see at least 12 on the top layer. I wish I could just prise them open or get them out but it’s like they’re protecting all the negative beliefs I hold about myself.
Thanks for your kind words hlj 💖 I use characters I loved as a child to protect me and help me get away. At this stage I will do anything, no matter how silly it sounds. Talking to a child nobody can see that’s inside me was hard to get to grips with but it works so well for me that I’ll give everything a go now. Those hands sound good. I was searching pretty deep when I came across these “pods” and I’ve only got there once. It’s a wee bit scary to think I’ve compartmentalised so much of my life without knowing.

[Anonymous]

How are you?

[hop]

Thanks braelynn
I’m not so good. I did a load of stuff to help my inner child and I feel like it was quite fortunate because I came into contact with an abuser today and started getting sexual feelings myself. I feel like a disgusting freak

[Anonymous]

You’re quite normal actually. Nothing freak about it. Why did you say you were fortunate today because you came into contact with an abuser and had sexual feelings? That’s an interesting statement. For one, it’s not unusual at all for your body to respond in this way. It’s actually one of the things that adults really really struggle with if they were abused as children, is the body’s reaction to sexual stimuli. Your body doesn’t have a right and wrong button when it comes to this. It just responds/reacts. Predators know this. And they know you will feel disgusted by it. It’s a physical reaction, nothing more, nothing less. Then when our mind comes into it and we’re like morally, Omg, what happened? And my body responded and I am sooo guilty and sooo bad, etc., etc. Not at all. Your body is designed to respond. Doesn’t make you bad, doesn’t make your body bad. But you also know that you were invaded at some point. If it’s a trusted person then it might take longer for you to fully realize what happened but on some level you do know something was at the very least kinda odd. But if we’re not taught what’s what and we’re young and know nothing else, we just think it’s normal maybe.

So at this point in your healing all kinds of things like this are going to hit you. Old feeling rearing up, little dark creatures running across your screen accusing you, old blah blah voices, fears, all of it. Smoke and mirrors. I got to where I kinda sat with the carnival gun in front of the ducks going by and just took shots at them. Next! Pull! It was almost boring to be honest. Very predictable. The lingering poison of all the abuse.

You have to capture your thoughts and your feelings. Lovingly but just pull them out, set them on the counter and say So Now………what have we here?? Because all in all here, your logical reasoning mind is the one who can dictate what’s what. We can have our feelings blow up and go bonkers and all that but our logical side does rule the roost as far as power is concerned. And we should allow the feelings and all that. But we do not need to allow those feelings “to rule us”. Once we know what they are about, once we realize that feelings like this are quite naturall really and doesn’t mean we are disgusting because of it. It’s what we do with those feelings – that’s important. Make sense?

[hop]

It wasn’t like that he came to help me and idle chat led to these unnatural feelings. I said I was fortunate that I had done so much work on the inner child the previous day because otherwise I’d have caved in today and I haven’t caved in. I told someone in the real world…everything…theres a lot to it. I’m in a really vulnerable position know and I feel sick in my stomach. I’ve never in my life been so exposed in this way. It feels like a lot of trust to put in someone after all this time. The abuser had no idea. I love them and this feels like another god d****d bolt out of the f*****g blue. I feel repulsed

[Anonymous]

So, just to be clear, someone who had abused you in the past was who you ran into, had sexual feelings about and who you shared – what you have been doing in regards to work on yourself/inner child work?

If so, why do you think that you wanted to open yourself up to him if he had abused you? We do do that but there comes a time when we have to examine – why we did that? Then we are basically doing self-sabotage and might not even realize it at all.

We have to confront what we just do on impulse, by brainwashing actually, when we do it and that’s not to say you beat yourself for it at all. No, no, just to “understand” why you go there and trust them “again”. Alot of it is actually “Stockholm Syndrome”. We bond/identify with our perps, we do. I did. Even when I stood up to him, had it out with him and all that, years later, I would still falter sometimes because I’d go right back to, ohhhh, I should feel sorry for him, this and that. I’d catch myself but that familiar little pattern in me was there. It got gutted once and for all but hey….those roots are strong and you have to go after them.

Why do you think you love your abuser? What does love look like to you, feel like?

Alot of trust to put in someone after all this time……..who are you talking about? Your therapist?

I hope you are doing as much self care as possible because all this is taxing, it really is. So you do a bit of work on yourself and then you do something good for yourself. Ok?

[Author]

Posts