Sexual Assault How Can You Come To Terms With Your Past Abuse When You Don't Know The Half Of It?

[Lucycat]

As well as any seven year olds, look at streetwise 7 year olds. The know-it-alls. See just how immature they really are even though they feel all grown up!

 

[GWhizz]

I guess a huge part of it was that everyone else turned a blind eye to it - my upper class relatives, my school, my immediate family (4 siblings and my parents - it's like it was easier for them to join in with him than risk being his next victim. I stupidly thought I was somehow saving/protecting my mum from it), the hospital who vilified me for 'doing this to my poor worried parents' when I attempted suicide aged 14.

Lol @shell my classmates used to ask me if I was adopted. I am so happy now to have a little boy of my own who I can finally relate to in terms of looks, character, temperament etc.

@ghotiff I agree, I would never blame a 6/7 year old or my own son, he falls over and I blame myself! I think actually going watching young kids play may be a good exercise and experience thanks for the tip.

@Nyssa yes that is exactly my point! I feel so so guilty because I cannot remember. When you're singled out by your entire family and muted in a way that leads to bullying in school etc also, you look at yourself as the common denominator. On top of that, I cannot recall how exactly it started and huge events are only coming back. Really horrendous torturous punishments that were covered up as 'accidents' to the school etc. Deep down I knew there were other unexplained injuries yet I played along. So I guess I feel I played my part in it in doing this alone.

I really really appreciate all the kind supportive comments. I am in no way looking for anyone's sympathy. I just want to know why people could be so cruel to their own child/sister unless I was the depraved one. Even now I feel horribly guilty for breaking a promise to not tell anyone. And on the flipside, I'm super annoyed with myself that I didn't/couldn't speak up when it mattered. My father had a major motorcycle accident when I was 15 which left him paralyzed. I got away and began speaking again building up my confidence and a life of my own. I wonder would I have never left otherwise. It sickens me that I wasn't strong enough to do it sooner. I literally wiped/blocked the parts I did remember, burying them with the rest. At that time I know it was my only way to move on. I'm just having a shitty time trying to now come to terms with the lasting effects it's having on me 12 years later with scary events coming back to haunt me that I never knew took place.

 

[RussH]

The question to ask yourself when an abuser ask you to keep this secret: which one of their actions toward me merits my keeping their secret? The answer is none, so don't feel guilty about talking about it.

 

[Nyssa]

I just want to know why people could be so cruel to their own child/sister unless I was the depraved one.

Because they were depraved. Unspeakably cruel and depraved.

 

[ghotiff]

"muted in a way that leads to bullying in school etc also, you look at yourself as the common denominator."

I so understand this thought process.

My second abuser was in no way connected to the first, so the only common denominator was me.

Then you add to this that abuse from such an early age makes you different to your peer group (eg different priorities and experiences) and it makes you (well, this is what happened to me at least) not fit in and have difficulties with friendships. This all barrel rolls as you don't learnt the rules of friendships at the age you are meant to learn them.

A bit long winded but my point is, once you have been abused the only common denominator is that you were abused. There is nothing "wrong" with "you".

 

[GWhizz]

Yes @ghotiff it definitely separates you from your peers. In fact I feel it still does (that's why I find this site so helpful as people can actually relate which is probably an awful way to look at it when you wouldn't wish our traumas on your worst enemy).

I also feel like I lost out on those years when a child gains their own identity through adolescence etc. Whist my classmates (who would bully me for being no fun, upright/serious, smart, or having no school lunch), were out at night going to parties, sleepovers and experimenting with boys (calling me a fridid etc), where was I? Either being tormented at home or sold out to my father's alcohol friend who in turn sold me out to his friends (unknown to my father), or being used by my brother and his friend.

To get back to my original post, the reason I'm struggling so hard trying to come to terms with it all is that I just don't know what happened from age 6/7-11. Does anyone else have partial recollections? Like I know fully what happened from age 11, though before that it's all a blur and I'm not sure what's real or not. Confused.com

 

[JEKBreatheandBelieve]

Does anyone else have partial recollections?

My situation is a little different. I remember some things from my past that are trauma related, but I don't as my core self remember any of being abused. I have DID and those parts are slowly opening up about all of that. I wasn't ready before to know what went on and deal with it. It's been a slow process getting the stories out even now that I know about my parts because I still am not quite ready to know and accept that this all happened. I constantly ask myself and my therapist how I know it was real. She's great at pointing out how it rings true, but I guess you just have to trust your inner core to know what was real. I am sorry I don't have a clearer answer.

 

[ghotiff]

I have very few memories and no idea how either abuser started.

My memories are like photographs of what happened. Mostly only one photograph per incident. I also have some vague sense of additional times, I get the feeling there were many more incidents but I only have limited number of "photographs".

I can disassociate to the point of losing time so i think I wasn't "there" most times. For this I am grateful. I don't want more images than what I have.

I don't think I have helped you any with this information. But maybe sharing might help.

 

[RussH]

@ghotiff Sometimes just sharing our experiences helps others, at least it lets them know they are not alone in what they have suffered, and what they are suffering, and sometimes just knowing you are not alone helps.

 

[GWhizz]

Yes @RussH you are all helping. Simply by feeling able to write some of this stuff out and be heard and not feel judged is in itself helpful. I have actually written more on this thread than I've even told my T in the course of 8 months and that says a lot to me. I don't expect any definitive answers. I guess I just wanted to try to understand a little better maybe why I dissociated in the 1st place back than and that I wasn't alone in doing so. It's just so confusing when you vividly recall certain things, yet know nothing of other things but just know it happened.

I really am so grateful to all who have listened and shared your opinion or experience. And I'm also so sorry you all went through traumas of your own.

Not saying childhood trauma is any worse than adult. Though I think the biggest message I've gotten from the responses here, is that, the younger we are, the harder it can be to process and the heavier the shame/blame can be, as we really don't have as much capabilities of understanding as we do when older (yes, no matter how mature I felt, I acknowledge I was stronger mentally at 12 than 6 of course). Maybe this helps me in someway feel I wasn't purposely repressing it to get out of accountability, my brain just couldn't face it just then.

And maybe people are right when they say they don't actually wish to know more than they already do. I'm not at that point yet as I wanted a fuller picture so that I could know if I had done something to draw the abuse upon me. But I agree it's not healthy to think this way.

I do feel a lot better today and my thinking a bit clearer. Which is good as I have a psych appt this afternoon and need to try to feel okay - I have felt tonnes worse the previous 2 meetings and having just completed another week of nights, I'm very easily triggered into a state of self-harm/thoughts of suicide when I'm so sleep deprived.

Again, thank you all for your support. It means a lot

 

[Whirlwind]

Maybe this helps me in someway feel I wasn't purposely repressing it to get out of accountability

I had a close friend whose daughter was basically my niece. She looked like a magical little elf to me, beautiful girl. I remember her following me around the kitchen "helping" :)

It suddenly hit me what I saw, she was 7! I remember something very specific at 7. Here I was looking at this little angel and it was truly horrifying to think of something happening to her. Like it had me.

I was the family scapegoat too, my brother eventually "joined" them truth is they stopped hitting me long before he did, they encouraged him, especially since they had to be careful since I "could tell now". He was still attacking me and threatening to kill me through 19ish when I basically disappeared and he left the country. Haven't seen him since.

I could have run away, many of my friends did. I didn't. I saw what happened to them, it wasn't much better than our homes in the end. I stayed until I could escape, until I had work, school and a safe place, I feared becoming an addict or prostituting. My father always said women were all prostitutes in waiting, I was just like them. I even had to come home very briefly once, I was so desperate. That's when my father tried to get me to sign a "contract" to remain in the home until the age of 30 and pay off the "bill" I owed him for raising me.

Can you believe I thought if I signed it, it might have to stay, and that I owed him? I remember actually going through the bill and trying to get him to take off the stuff he mixed up with my brother, I didn't want to pay for my brother's part. I figured it would take years to pay the bill. Oh, and I always wondered why my brother never got a bill.

It took time and I had to tolerate things, I used to count years in my head. I think I started planning around 12. I remember sporadically before that only. I base most of what happened on those few memories and teenage years which I do remember the events.

Best, Whirlwind