Child Grooming: I Can't Wrap My Head Around It

[Lady of Longbourn]

This is hard to talk about. I talk about it in my diary a bit but I don't understand it.

I was raped many times by a boyfriend when I was 17 to almost 19 years old. I can understand it and even it still hurts but I have been able to move forward to start healing.

But I have never met another person who was online 'groomed' like I was. I have only seen one other person on this forum was was groomed over the internet like I was and they posted once or twice and have never been back.

I can't wrap my head around it. I haven't really been able to move on. So much so...I don't talk about it. My therapist knows but I pretty much refuse to talk about it. Because I feel it was all my fault. All of it. I feel there is no excuse. I brought it on myself. I deserve to feel bad and I did to myself. Maybe I was just a whore...:(

It started when I was about 13 or 14 years old. Very depressed and my best friend had recently died of cancer and I had no friends. My mother was sick or busy and would leave me alone for hours and hours at a time. I don't remember how it started. I think yahoo messenger was installed on the computer already (you know how when you buy a new computer all this junk is installed on it?) I don't remember how I figured it out to go to chatrooms or anything like that or where the thought came from.

But soon I had all sorts of 'friends' to talk too. I remember how it started. It was typical sexual predator and it started out slowly. Soon I was taking pictures of myself almost naked. Using webcams to video myself naked. Stripping for them and...I wont go into details. It makes me feel sick. All to help them get off.

All to have people to talk too. Because no one else bothered to ask me about my day other then these guys. This happened between the ages of 13 or 14 to about 17 years old. All men where 25+. My first predator was about 33 to my 14.

Sometimes it was just one man but there was also groups of men who would watch me. You know those people that get busted and jailed for child pornography? I bet I'm probably in there somewhere on someones computer.

But my parents...well, my father caught me once. And he yelled and pushed me around and called me a whore and a slut. He should have been angry at those men becasue I was about 15 but I was the one being called a slut. And my mother...She actually bought me a webcam for Christmas once. And she even talked to one of them in chat...Some of them were even my 'boyfriends' or so I felt. They would call my house and again, I finally had someone to talk too. My mother knew they were calling, I would talk to her about them.

In all those years there was 10+ guys and that's not including the groups.

I should have known better. But I guess that's all about 'grooming' right?

From Wikipedia:

Child grooming refers to actions deliberately undertaken with the aim of befriending and establishing an emotional connection with a child, to lower the child's inhibitions in preparation for sexual activity with the child...

And then I feel...I wasn't really a 'child'. I was 13 or 14 when I started. I should have known better. I should have told someone...though I am not sure who becasue I was so alone.

I hate talking about this. I hate thinking about it. I don't understand it. I was like a robot with them. Yes, sometimes I cried while stripping for them but I still f*cking did it.

I know how desperate I sound right now. Sorry. :(

Can anyone help me understand?

 

[Marguerite]

Some people are so evil that they would do this to a child without remorse. You have nothing to be ashamed of, but they do. Unfortunately, they likely have no conscience. Hugs to you if you will accept them.

 

[Lady of Longbourn]

Some people are so evil

I guess that's being a predator. They were in the chatrooms for a reason I guess...looking for prey?

a child

Was I a child though? At 13 or 14 shouldn't I have known better?

Hugs to you if you will accept them.

I do. Thank you. :hug:

 

[Marguerite]

Adolescents make mistakes, and need caring adults to guide them, to show interest and care for them. It was not your fault. We all want to feel loved, even if we don't have a good idea of what that should look like. Don't be hard on yourself. You deserve kindness and compassion.

 

[ms spock]

Your mother abandoned you and left you to your own devices and you, unsurprisingly looked for love and attention.

That is a normal human need.

You weren't being loved and cared for in your family home so you looked for it in other places.

To be put in that situation indicates to me that your didn't have good role models of what being loved and cared for was about as you wouldn't have been in that situation if you had been being looked after.

You can't blame yourself for being so young, uncared for, unloved, unsupervised and lacking in guidance and appropriate adult interactions.

How could you know about what you weren't experiencing at that age.

Please be reasonable and kind to yourself. It was not your fault. How could you know if no one demonstrated good models of appropriate adult love and care?

 

[ms spock]

But my parents...well, my father caught me once. And he yelled and pushed me around and called me a whore and a slut. He should have been angry at those men becasue I was about 15 but I was the one being called a slut. And my mother...She actually bought me a webcam for Christmas once. And she even talked to one of them in chat...Some of them were even my 'boyfriends' or so I felt. They would call my house and again, I finally had someone to talk too. My mother knew they were calling, I would talk to her about them.

What was your mother thinking giving you a webcam? OMG! Talk about being set up to be preyed on. How could she not put an end to those men ringing you? And she chatted to them? That doesn't sound like reasonable mothering to me.

And your father instead of punishing you he could have chosen to protect you.

They really didn't protect you at all, did they? But then they left you alone in a situation where you became vulnerable to the predators.

I am sorry but that is not good enough parenting.

 

[ms spock]

It started when I was about 14 years old. Very depressed and my best friend had recently died of cancer and I had no friends. My mother was sick or busy and would leave me alone for hours and hours at a time.

Yes, sometimes I cried while stripping for them but I still f*cking did it.

So you lost your friend to cancer. You were left alone. You had no friends and was desperate for contact with other human beings.

You were left alone in a very vulnerable state.

And you didn't want to lose the little care, contact and companionship you got so you cryed whilst you stripped. That is not someone who knows what they are doing. That is someone vulnerable and needy. A young person who needed her parents, who were not there.

You might need to give your young self a lot of compassion on this one Ayesha.

 

[Pencil]

I was 17 - immature, lost and lonely - feeling bereft most of the time, actually.

The vice principal at school (I went to a girls' school) started paying attention to me, and I thought I had died and gone to heaven. She was attentive and motherly for a while, until she took me to bed - and that incident in itself was fairly traumatic. A few years later I saw the pattern - there was a new girl every year, each as lost and f*cked up as the others. We had little scenarios, such as a girl would come to the classroom and tell the teacher Ms B wanted to see me in her office (which made it seem as though I was in big trouble). I'd go to her office, and she'd go into SS mode: 'Lock the door!' 'Take off your clothes! She remained fully clothed during it all. She thought it was all very sexy. Not. Afterwards I'd return to class, like a normal school girl.

I was 17 Ayesha, not 13, but I was a needy child. And there was no way I could have stopped it or ended it, as it was also the only attention, physical contact, warmth, whatever, I ever received.

 

[maddog]

Oh Ayesha, I want to implore you, with utmost gentleness but greatest sincerity, to be compassionate with yourself about this, because whatever guilt and blame and self-loathing and responsibility you carry are not yours to bear, and just because those who deserve to bear them don't and won't ever have the decency or humanity to do so, does not sentence you to having to bear them instead.

Being a child in this instance is both a matter of reality/legality, and developmental and emotional status. Legally you were a child, end of story. The law is clear and unrelenting as well it should be.

Emotionally and developmentally, it is clear that you were at an age of vulnerability and without any semblance of safe secure attachment and role modelling that would have equipped you to recognize and resist such advances. You have painfully outlined the appalling responses of your parents to this situation, and such responses would not have come from people who were able and willing to nurture and support you appropriately in the first place.

I know, from much personal experience, that knowing and understanding you were not at fault are not the same as feeling those things, and even knowing and understanding are hard enough on their own. Sometimes, the best and only thing we can do is to reach out to those who are safe and honest in our worlds and to try to slowly internalise what those safe people tell us. And that's what you've done here, and I hope that even if you don't believe them yet, you can take on board the things we are all saying as legitimate alternatives to your own beliefs, and at the very least, know that we all have your best interests at heart and are being honest with you, unlike those who should have protected you at the time.

When I was 18, and so technically an adult, I fell completely under the spell of a predatory 40-something year old man who ruled my world and controlled every aspect of it for almost 3 years. It was terrifying and torturous, but it was all I had, and I convinced myself that he loved me, that I loved him, and that he was the best thing in my world. And maybe he was, but all that really said was that my world was not a good place. Emotionally I was every bit a vulnerable child, and while knowing that isn't the same as believing it, i'm working really hard, and slowly, and with as much self-compassion as possible, to turn that knowledge into belief.

Careful, gentle hugs to you.

Maddog

 

[Pencil]

Oh, and I forgot to add - this is the 'soggy crisp' syndrome - which basically argues that any child would love fresh crisps, but if they only have soggy crisps available to them, they would settle for that.

One thing I experienced repeatedly in my life is that people are NOT interested in caring for another human being - unless there is something in it for them, and this 'something' is usually sex. So, we set out looking for crisps, found none, and then settled for bartering for soggy crisps, with the only currency we had available - our sexuality.

Humans need connection so badly, that they will do virtually anything for it.

 

[cherryblossom]

I was 13 or 14 when I started. I should have known better.

Why should you have known better? Despite what you might think you were still a child. It is those men who where mature enough, who should have known better. I know kids grow up quickly these days, but that still doesn't change the facts you were a child, and they were adults. Human brains don't actually reach full maturity until about 22-25 (I can't fully remember the facts off hand). But one of the areas that is least developed is the area of the brain that senses danger. That is why so many young adults die in RTC's, not because they are inexperienced but because they don't perceive the danger in driving fast or erratically. It also explains why we love fairground rides, and rollercoaster when we are young, but begin to fear them as we get older.

I'm getting a bit off the point, but the fact remains that however mature you think you were, you weren't. You were still a child, and that is why the laws are in place to protect children. Children simply aren't mature enough to make those decisions, which is why the laws and society expect adults to make the right choices.

Those men know exactly what to say to a young girl to get her attention. They know exactly what to say to flatter her, and give her the attention she craves. And there is absolutely nothing wrong with being a young girl of 13, 14, 15 etc and craving attention, when hormones are all over the place, and your body and thinking patterns are changing. At that age, male or female, you are vulnerable, because of those changes. You want to feel accepted in the world, despite or because of all those changes.

Those men (I use that term lightly, because I can think of better descriptions) completely take advantage of young peoples vulnerabilities at a transitional period of their life. Don't let them or anyone else fool you into thinking you should have known better. They know exactly what they are doing - they are using and abusing children. They know they are breaking every morality and legality, yet they still continue. How can their knowledge and choice of behavior ever compare to that of a 13 year old child?

Any shame over your situation lies entirely with them. You were not at fault. They should be feeling guilty, not you.

 

[Anna]

These men were sick predators. At the age of 13 & 14 you are still a child.

It makes me sad that your parents neglegt led to this happening. It is really terrible.

We live in a bad world, and children should have the support of their parents. Especially if a child is using the internet parents should set up safety filters so they cannot access certain sites, they should check what their children are doing, they should also sit down and warn their children of the dangers of the internet. Especially if the child uses a chat.

It is like talking to strangers, it is drummed into our heads not to talk to them when we are younger, the same is applied to the internet. Noone knows who is behind the face.

What your dad did was wrong in so many ways. He should have helped and supported you. Reported these vile people and protected you.

It makes me sick that these sick people always manage to make the victim feel guilty as well, it is wrong in so many ways.