Childhood Confused On How To Feel

[James McGregor]

Hi all

Well recently here and with my T ive started to open up about an incident from my childhood. For those who havent seen my previous posts:

When i was around 7 or 8, a boy friend of mine who was about 10 started being sexual with me. Now at the time i assume for him it was a kind of game, i didnt really know what it was all about to be honest so just went along with it. I remember afterwards knowing that noone should ever know about it. As the years passed it was always on my mind, a feeling of shame, embaressment and confusion - its something that i wish had never happened. While telling my T she named it as abuse - which made me feel really uncomfortable, because i did nothing at the time to stop it, because he was a child too - a little older but still a child - i keep telling myself i should be able to just forget about it. Its affected me my whole life, i think a lot about it, my attitude to sex is one of dislike and i feel threatened all the time if i do it - i just dont know if im making too much of it?

 

[Rumors]

I'm not here to minimize your experience...it was something that has stuck with you and is obviously painful. I have a concern with the therapists quick labeling of it as abuse. I feel like you need for the experience to be labeled as abuse so that perhaps you can justify why it feels so bad? Or, because you didn't say "stop?" Bad experiences happen. If you were 8 and the other boy was 10, it is likely he learned that from someone and perhaps was abused himself. It is unlikely he understood what he was doing was harmful to you which would be a key component in knowing how to label it. What happened to you was shitty, awful, and it has likely bothered you for a long time. It doesn't have to be abuse to leave a mark. You feel some responsibility because you didn't say no? You shouldn't!! You were too young to know what was going on. It was likely your first experience and everything was new and unknown. You have nothing to be ashamed over and you did the best you could. It was an experience that has shaped the way you feel about yourself for many reasons. Know that you aren't alone in that feeling. Sit with that and don't get caught up in labeling the experience other than it sucked. You were too young. You did nothing wrong even if you found some pleasure in what occurred. Your body has automatic responses to stimulus. You aren't bad and you did the best you could. Hang in there...

 

[James McGregor]

I'm not here to minimize your experience...it was something that has stuck with you and is obviously pai...

Thanks for the reply. Well my therapist listened to me, and had been for some time, it took some time to bring this up. Ive always tried over the years but just never could do it. She could tell it was difficult and i found it very hard, and from her point of view and from what ive later found is that abuse isnt linked to the age of the perpetrator - or even their own reasons for doing it, its how the result of it is felt. So i wouldnt say she was especially quick in saying it was abuse, taking my life and how ive been for many years along with that experience, i guess from her viewpoint thats what it was, so i guess she felt she had to say what she thought - thats why i pay her after all lol

yeah your right, i do feel responsible for just going along with it, but thats from my adult perspective, at the time it would never have occurred to me, even though i knew it wasnt "normal", i just went along with it. Ive been sitting with it for an awful lot of years, and been trying to just let it go, but i just cant, it feels like its seeped into everything

 

[Intrepid]

It felt like abuse. The shame, embarrassment and confusion are the same. That's how your therapist has to treat it. Maybe in the future there will be a better way of defining your specific situation. I don't think it matters. The tools your therapist learned to treat abuse should be up to the task of dealing with your situation.

 

[The Albatross]

I think that looking at the situation with your adult perspective and recognizing that the way you have felt about this situation and how it has affected your life... didn't improve by feeling responsible. Maybe work through allowing yourself to roll with the adult perception?

 

[Justmehere]

How you feel is how you feel, and that's ok. There isn't a right or wrong way to feel about this. That being said, feelings are not always facts.

It's possible he was acting out abuse he was going through and acted out things with you, and you picked up on his shame which might actually belong to whatever adult sent the message to him that this is ok. There are other possible reasons why he acted out, and some sexual play is normal, but this went much further than usual and is indicative he was possibly exposed to more than he should have been somewhere along the way.

Kids under 16-17 can't consent to sexual activity because they developmentally can't know what is and isn't right and thus legally can't consent. So yes, it was abuse.

The fact that the perp was a kid as well who may not have known right from wrong about sex mitigates what should have been done for him to help him learn this wasn't ok, and what should have been done about it at the time... but because the response to him should be different because of his age, that doesn't mean what you went through was ok. The fact that you were so young affects the impact on you, because you couldn't have developmentally known to say yes or no.

It makes sense that this really impacted you -- that's why we have such strong laws against sex with kids even if they do go along with it. It is abusive and often affects how they develop sexually.

You are dealing with a normal reaction to abnormal events at a young age.

It's great you are talking about it in therapy now and I hope that over time you can find some healing and relief from the way this incident affected you.

 

[James McGregor]

How you feel is how you feel, and that's ok. There isn't a right or wrong way to feel about this. Th...

thanks a lot for your reply. In a lot of ways i do feel for him too, but thats kind of conflicting because i hate what happened and that he did what he did, so i dont want to let my pity for him take away from the impact its had on my whole life and i dont really know what to do about that. therapy im hoping can help me....do something, what i dont know. not so long ago someone who lives in the area that this happened asked if i knew this person, they actually said his name! i nearly vomited in shock, couldnt believe it - totally bowled me over