Childhood Did I Just Suppress My Emotions About Being Slightly Sexually Abused Or Something Worse Happen That?

[lyratheowl]

So when I was a child (I can't remember how old but I think I think it was sometime around age 7-11 as a very rough guess) I guess I was technically sexually abused but only in a very minor way. I've never thought much of it and it never really bothered me. However, today someone messaged me on another forum saying that my OCD was likely caused by a traumatic sexual experience. I had totally forgot that I had said in a post of mine that I developed extreme OCD due to overhearing a really creepy man having consensual sex with an 18 girl in this horrible accommodation that I was unfortunately (stupidly) staying in just because my boyfriend was staying there and i was in denial and just wanted to please my boyfriend. Anyway, that traumatised me. (Most people who know about don't think it's a big deal though and don't understand why I'd be traumatised by something so trivial like that). But I forgot I had gone into detail on this forum about hearing this creepy man having sex so when this person on the forum messaged me I wasn't sure what they were referring to (they must have looked back through my post history). I know it sounds weird but I just forgot I had mentioned that in a post and I thought I had just said I had been traumatised by living in a horrible place where I felt unsafe but hadn't gone into details about that specific incident which caused to me realise who awful it was there anyway and was traumatising for me. So for some reason it made me think of the possibility they were making assumptions that I could have been sexually abused before to cause my emotional contamination OCD. I don't why but that thought just crossed my mind. And then it made me think of this incident back when I was a child and for the first time I started to think that maybe it did have a effect on me or maybe something else happened that I don't remember.

Basically, what happened when I was a child was my 'mother' (I haven't spoken to her in 4 years I've completely cut contact as she is very toxic for me..) would sometimes take me round her friends house. This friend of hers was a weird old man. I remember being round there a few times and I would always play in the garden. He had all these adventure playground type stuff in the garden like all these rope nets and stuff even though he lived alone and as far as I know has no children in his family... So anyway I remember one time we were getting out of the car to go to his house when my 'mother' tells me that I should put a jumper (sweater) on over my top or something. Basically she thought I was dressed too revealing and I had to change in the car I can't remember if I had to change my bottoms too to something less revealing. Anyway, I asked her 'why?' as she'd never said anything like that to me before (I'm pretty sure this was all before I hit puberty at 12 so I didn't understand really why). And I can't remember what she said but basically she implied that it was because of this weird old man we were visiting. So she obviously knew or at least had her suspicions that he was sexually attracted to child basically. Anyway, so on another visit to his house sometime after that she left me alone with him for the first time. As in it was just me and him in the house while she went out to do something (I don't know what. Maybe she went to buy something from the shop). I have no idea how long she was gone (I'm guessing not longer much than an hour though like it wasn't all day or anything) but I remember it being a thing her leaving me like I remember she seemed a bit worried or something and it wasn't no big deal like it might be with other people she knew. I don't remember anything unusual happening whilst she was gone. I remember distinctly though just after she returned, she was sitting in his house in a chair and me and the man were stood side by side in front of her facing her. I think she asked how it was while she was gone/if we got on okay or something like that and the man said she got on well or had a good time or something and as he was saying it he slid his hand down the back of my underwear a little bit and pinged my underwear against me. And I remember my 'mother' was grinning stupidly (which she often does) at us presumably having no idea what he was doing.

So as I say it was never something which I thought of being traumatic or a big deal for me at all. There are lots of other things about my childhood in general which I hated and think about sometimes and it makes me sad/angry and I don't want to think about it. And things which I think caused me to have contamination OCD (which was always there to a certain extent for a long time but I didn't realise. It was only made noticeable and extreme recently after living in that horrible place with my boyfriend..) But weirdly that incident with the old man when I was a child was never something which really bothered me. It's strange because nowadays I hate strangers touching me and will be very upset over things like a strange man 'hitting on' me or touching me on the arm or something and will take me ages to get over it. I've been more like that more since I lived in that horrible place and overheard the man having sex. but now I'm thinking that maybe that incident when I was child did have an effect me without realising it at all (along with other things in my childhood which I know had an effect on me) but I literally never thought that before today. I don't know if I'm just over thinking it now and working myself into thinking that it had an effect when it actually didn't.

Also, I'm now wondering if maybe something worse happened with that old man when I was a child. I thought it was strange that he only did anything inappropriate once my 'mother' had already returned and he never did anything like that before and didn't do anything when we were left alone together that one time but only after she had returned. It is quite strange really why he chose to do something weird then. But he was obviously sick in the head anyway so who knows why he did it I guess. All I remember from when we were left alone together was being in his bedroom with him and we were just standing there and it wasn't weird as I guess he was getting something from the bedroom. I'm not sure why we were in there but I don't remember feeling scared or bad really and I just remember being in there for not long just so he could get something or something like that and it not being a big deal. But I've just started reading about how people can forget and repress memories of traumatic events so now I'm wondering if something else happened but I don't remember at all. It's strange to think that it could have and I don't remember. But I do remember distinctly him being inappropriate when my 'mother' returned. Like, if I repressed a memory just before that then why didn't I just repress the whole thing?

 

[cat-lady]

I'm not sure whether you repressed your feelings over what you remember or if something worse happened. Either is a possibility. I don't think there is such a thing as slight sexual abuse/ minor sexual abuse / abuse that is no big deal. All sexual abuse is going to have a big impact on the kid experiencing it. I think that what you remember is a big deal in and of itself. If it didn't bother you before I think you did repress some emotion. I'm not a psychologist but it sure sounds connected to symptoms you experienced later. I don't really know if you repressed a memory of what happened while your mom was gone but I agree it is strange if he only did something inappropriate once your mom was back. That would raise my suspicions too. I would suggest running this past a good therapist. I think it's best to have professional support when you're trying to figure out stuff like this.

 

[EveHarrington]

You won't know until another memory surfaces. I suggest talking to your therapist about it. :hug:

 

[lyratheowl]

I'm not sure whether you repressed your feelings over what you remember or if something worse happened...

Thank you for your response. I agree that any sexual abuse is bad and can be traumatic. If someone told me such a story as what I remember for example I would think it was bad and would just empathise with them and i wouldn't think it was minor. I'm sorry if I have offended or invalidated anyone by saying something like that was minor. I don't actually mean it like that and wouldn't think that at all if I heard it happened to someone else.

I guess I just see it as minor because it happened to me and because I didn't feel at all traumatised by it or really bothered by it. And I know people who have abused much worse. Also, usually when something has actually traumatised me or if I'm bothered by anything then the people I know will most likely blame my reaction to it and basically tell me it's nothing and I should just deal with it and my reaction/emotions are wrong or dysfunctional basically. My entire life it has been like that from a lot of different people. So it's difficult for me to not let that affect me even over things that I was actually traumatised by and has caused me years of PTSD symptoms (like living in that accommodation where I felt unsafe and hearing that creepy man having sex - just typing that and thinking about that now is very hard for me and brings it back. but I have no trouble thinking about what happened to me as a child even though I know it's bad too). But I guess I am quite sensitive to certain things in day to day life. And I have contamination OCD as a coping mechanism and obsessive thoughts about certain things too which just makes everything worse and probably more extreme for me. That can also make me more prone to having my feelings invalidated even when I don't think they are dramatic because I actually have a mental disorder and I know I can't always trust my feelings so sometimes it makes me more prone to being invalidated by certain people and not trusting myself at times depending.

With regard to either suppressing my feelings over what happened with that old man when I was a child or repressing other memories, I do get very emotional over hearing about cases of sexual abuse. It seems sexual abuse and also any time an animal is hurt or abused in any way are the only things which have a very strong emotional effect on me without fail regardless of what is currently going on in my life personally. I will be in tears basically every time something like that is described in detail or if it's on tv/film. I don't know what that means. I have heard it could be a sign of having been previously sexually abused but I'm not sure. It may just be that as with abused animals I am just sensitive to such injustices and it doesn't necessarily have to have anything to do with my own experiences...

And yes it does seem strange that the old man didn't do anything when we were alone. Maybe he wanted to but stopped himself and then after that decided to do something afterward but maybe he did it then because he knew it wouldn't go too far because we weren't alone or something and didn't want to go too far. Thinking about his thought process is making me feel a bit sick though. Who knows. There's no point really thinking about it I guess. And I could have told my 'mother' about what he did anyway but I didn't tell anyone. I don't remember going back there though after that but maybe we did and those memories just blurred into all the times we went there before. I definitely don't remember ever being round his house when I was older though as a teenager or anything like that so I don't know why we stopped going. I think I would remember if I had told anyone, though. I remember years later reading in a newsletter of this club that him and my 'mother' were a part of that he had died (this was when I was a teenager) and in the obituary it said that he used to run this rowing club for young boys which was quite disturbing to read. I'm a girl by the way but knowing what I knew about him it is likely he was attracted to these boys.

I guess it doesn't really matter whether I repressed a memory and something else happened and there's probably no way of really knowing unless it just comes to me naturally. I don't want to somehow cultivate some kind of false memory through trying techniques to bring it back as I've heard that can happen? I don't know. It's probably best to just not know anyway and try to stop thinking about it. I would like to know though but I don't think it will be easy to know and I don't want a false memory is all. If I can afford talking therapy again (CBT) and actually find a good therapist who I trust then I might bring it up though at least and talk about it.

 

[cat-lady]

No, you weren't offending or invalidating me or anyone else I think. I was just pointing that out because I had a feeling that maybe you were made to feel like you weren't supposed to make a big deal of it like a lot of us were with this type of abuse. A lot of times we're taught to minimize it if it happened to us. I was concerned maybe that's part of what you were going through. Anyway, I'm glad to hear you are considering therapy if you can find someone good. I tried to go through this stuff alone when I recovered memories and I regret that. It was too much to deal with on my own. That was years ago though and I'm in a better place now. :)