Childhood Is Body Shaming A Form Of Grooming?

[Fadeaway]

I have been doing EMDR with a lot of success in my last session, however, I am thinking of taking a week off. Well, that's beside the point.

At my last session, a lot of guilt came out for wanting and enjoying the attention my abuser gave me at first. My therapist said some of the most meaningful words anyone has ever said to me. " She said, "You were a lonely child and he was grooming you." It is one thing to hear that it wasn't your fault, and logically I know because I was only 11 years old, it wasn't, I don't know...I guess it was just the way it was worded.

I can't even put it into wordsI have just felt different since then. The other day I actually checked myself out in the mirror, which I avoid. I noticed two things; I looked less ragged and worn out, which no matter how many times I looked in the mirror the last few years I always felt shocked at how worn out and miserable I looked even if I didn't feel it. The other was that I meantal thought to myself, "I like my butt."

Never in my life has that thought ever entered my head before. Then again it was my abuser who always called me pancake butt. He would be walking behind me and tell me how flat my butt looked, or tell me how my jeans sagged in the butt because I didn't have one.

He also criticized my feet I would be asleep and that was how it would wake me, he woud grab my feet and called me flintstone feet. It's funny because I have also felt super confused over my feet because I get told how tiny and cute my feet are and I can squeeze into a child's size if needed. Yet I feel hideously ashamed of my feet. I will never wear opened toes shoes or sandals, and the thought of painting my toe
nails fills me with disgust.

He would also put my body down in other ways, like telling me I wiggled my butt too much when I walked or how stubby my legs were.

He said things to me that no one else ever said or teased me about, so I would never have had those insecurities if it wasn't for him. I am just wondering if this is a type of grooming too, to make the victim feel bad about themselves?

 

[ghotiff]

It sounds like a tactic. The intended message may have been "no one would love you, I'm the only one who would love you". Horrible.

 

[Meh]

Yes. I think it is a grooming tactic also. My abuser did that to me. Used to criticize my hair, and tell me to get a new haircut, and then tell me the new haircut was awful. He would criticize my dress sense, then tell me to wear certain things and tell me I still looked bad. He told me I looked too young and it embarrassed him. Lots of criticism and knew that I would try harder and harder to please him. But nothing ever did. He always said nobody else would have me and that if I left him it wouldn't change anything.

So yes, I think definitely grooming and abusive behaviour.

Sorry you had to go through it :(

 

[Casey_03]

Yes, it's a subtle way of gaining control over you. They put you down just enough so you have these insecurities and will feel grateful for them "loving" you, so you'll think no one else would ever want you. I think it can go both ways -- there are those abusers who groom by creating insecurities, and those who groom by preying on insecurities they pick up on that you may have already had. I'm glad that you've had this revelation and are now starting to see things differently!

 

[Lionheart]

My abuse perps made fun of my body when I was still a young and pre-pubescent boy.

They made me feel very ashamed of my body so that at 55 years old, I am still a very modest man. However, I do recognize the shaming as a tactic to keep me under their control and locked into victim mode.

What my abuse perps did was to tell me that my body was not enough to love and that I would never be able to sexually satify or hold the faithful love of a woman.

It was not only mean and cruel, it was evil! It is called psychological torture and I do believe that body-shaming is a part of grooming.

Thank you for starting this thread because this has been a very difficult subject for me to talk about!

 

[corvidae]

i've never thought of the body shaming that happened to me from my abusers in that light, either. this opens up a new facet of context to explore and channel for healing. thank you.

 

[EveHarrington]

Yes.

They tell you how horribly hideous you are.

You start to believe the lies.

You then think you must be ugly.

You then think "but my abuser still gives me attention so I must not be that bad in his eyes"

It keeps you hooked to the abuser due to shame, etc.

Sick, huh?

This pattern is also seen in adults who are abusive.

 

[shimmerz]

I see healing as an 'externa/internal' thing. If I am looking for external validation then I know that I have more work to do in that particular area. It sounds to me like you are finally able to start forming your own opinions based on internal thought patterns, rather than guessing what others (external) thoughts are about you and projecting them as being hostile.

This is huge! Way to go Fadeaway! Congratulations!

 

[hodge]

Everyone here has made so many excellent points about this insidious phenomenon. I, too, had a molester when in my teens. He did groom me in lots of positive ways - i.e., teaching me games, buying us food, doing work around the house, and made it clear to me that he was doing it all for me. He put down his own sons and also teased my poor brother. The only thing he teased me about was the size of a certain body part which I had no control over. Also, one time he told me I wasn't fully developed yet. That moment haunts me. Now, I'm like, so why did a 36-year-old man want to be with someone who wasn't fully developed? Ack, I don't want to understand.

 

[Sideways]

I'm another one!

Making me ashamed of my body, even taken ownership of my lady bits to relieve me of the 'burden' was something my abuser mixed into the mix. But like all of the negative beliefs he tried to instill in me, it came in the context of the of what was mostly your stock-standard totally positive grooming techniques, so that I was grateful he saw me as special and wanted to help me with my special burden.

Messed up. But once you begin to understand how complex the mind games were, I think it's a bit easier to ease up on ourselves for how we coped as a child, not running away from the abuse or reporting it. It would be pretty tough to expect an 11 year old to understand that's what was going on, you know?

 

[shimmerz]

Is it any doubt that children don't understand at all what is happening to them? It takes even adults who do not, by nature, have a predator type mind to even start to understand this type of behaviour and attitude.

 

[Sideways]

@shimmerz - totally. And the really sinister part of it is that even as adults, it's not just the mammoth task of understanding how the damage was caused, there's the 'repairing that damage' task on top of that, you know?

Like, @Fadeaway - honest question here, have you made peace with your feet? Can you see them as a normal, beautiful fragile part of your beautiful body now? I'm thinking that it might feel somewhat liberating if you could get to the point where you could go and get a full pedicure, foot massage treatment and enjoy pampering that lart of your body, as a way of showing yourself "I can love myself, all of myself, now...despite what my abusere taught me."