Is There Healing For People Like Me?

[ericaboo]

I don't think there is the kind of healing where I'll ever be like someone who didn't go through the abuse, but like grieving, if we can process it somehow so it's not lurking below the surface, waiting to explode, it will just be one of those things that comes up now and then instead of dominating/runing everything we do.

I just keep trying to hold on to the memories instead of stuffing them back down, but I'm not strong enough yet to keep that up on a regular basis - yet...

 

[Innordinate]

So, journaling just isn't a safe thing for me to do right now. You said, "I think we need to work first on grounding, self-care and safety because otherwise we have no tools to cope with and process the feelings when we finally start to connect with them." Yep, I agree.

Yeah, don't journal trauma shit until you have this.

I agree with you though, men are expendable in society. A lot more support for women. Some people still don't believe that men can be sexually abused at ALL. Not even as kids. It just "doesn't happen". I've heard that BS before too.

Could you find a way to move or pretty much you're stuck where you are neh? Not helpful.

There are threads on here that can help you learn how to teach yourself some grounding techniques, how to channel anger differently. Just keep reading around here. Keep working on yourself as much as you can.

Keep on...........

 

[raven123]

Portia, Hey, thanks for the info. Gainesville is a day's drive from here. I said N. Florida (Tallahassee-Pensacola is generally called N. Florida) because I didn't want to give my location online. I think we were posting at the same time this morning so we got crossed up. I have the basics--food and shelter--for now. I've been extremely nice to those organizations and have given money to them. The DV/Rape Crisis said it sucked they have nothing for male survivors. She said male survivors call all the time looking for support and they can't help them. I explained my general situation in an email (sent 2 now I think over last year) to NAMI (only way to contact this person locally) and didn't hear back. That's not unusual I was told by someone. Catholic Social Services has therapy services in some areas. This area is not one of them. They can't find shrinks willing to work with them I've been told. I tried to deal with the state mental health to see a psych in 2010. Well, they violated my confidence, I threatened to sue over that and destroying my records (I had copies so they were screwed) then they refunded the money I paid them. I can't find a therapist if I can't pay them is pretty much the deal where I'm at.

Ericaboo, Thank you. I have no clue how to process that anger. I really don't. I wish I did.

I tried working on the Courage to Heal workbook and it kept asking "how do you feel right now (or then)?" and I couldn't answer it except to say numb and don't know.

Hashi, Thank you.

I found these grounding techniques:

The Anchor
This technique works best outside, if need be you can do it where you are, standing on the ground face east. (When you aren’t sure of where east is just look in the direction the sun rises.) With feet planted firmly on the ground, place your arms and hands at your side. Breathe in slowly. As you breathe in imagine a brilliant blue light filling your being. Let the blue light consume you with every breathe. Imagine the blue light forcing all your negative emotions, disorientation, down through your feet into the ground. When you are filled with the blue light entirely, with one last breath let the blue light flow down through your feet and with it your last feeling of disorientation. Let the light spread into the ground until it vanishes.

A variation on the anchor is to imagine the blue light entering the ground like the roots of a tree. Let the blue light anchor your being to the earth and feed off the energy in the ground. Let it expel negative energy and consume the positive. The idea here is that you become like a tree planted in the earth. The earth consumes all of your negativity and lets you grow.

Pillar of Earth
This technique can be done anywhere and at any time. This is best done in solitude though. Visualize a pillar of red light traveling down through the floors, through the earth, down to the center of it. Feel, the connection between the Earth and yourself is the pillar solid and stable or flexible? If you do not feel like the pillar is firm or solid, dissolve it and start again. Do this until you feel like you have a pillar that cannot be moved.

Once you have your pillar, say your name three times, imagine your name traveling down the pillar fusing with it. This makes the pillar yours, it allows your energies to flow with it. Once, you have done this imagine all of your negativity, upset, disorientation, being draining down the pillar. Watch it flow down like water through a pipe. When ti gets to the center of the earth see it burned up. Imagine new clean energy returning up the pillar from the Earth to you. Try to do this with the inhale and exhale of every breath. When you exhale picture the dark energy flowing out of you. When you inhale imagine you positive energy reborn coming back.

You can do either of these exercises as you feel necessary. The more you do them the easier they get. The purpose of these is not necessarily to provide you with some great spiritual enlightenment. It is to distract you and refocus your attention. Focus your attention on your self and calming, cleansing, stabilizing your being. The visualization is merely a catalyst to accomplish this. Over time you may be able to ground yourself without any visualization. You may be able to do it through your breath alone.

 

[raven123]

I got the flu so I'm off for awhile.

 

[rightkindofme]

My sexual abuse started sometime between one and two. My father and brother were relentless. Obviously I don't have clear memories. It went on for many years. Eventually I was raped by other people as well.

I... am I healed? I don't know. I have a lot of issues. I have a tremendous number of emotional issues. I have no "normal" to return to. My early childhood was full of starvation, homelessness, rape, and emotional abuse.

At this point I am a stay at home mom (I am very blessed in my husband) and I have a two year old and a four year old. A lot of how I stay "normal seeming" is to be very quiet. It's hard.

I will never be normal. I don't think I even know what that would mean.

 

[raven123]

Hashi, Innordinate, Rightkindofme, Loveneverfails,

I'm so sorry you had to go through all that as a little kid. :( I have no idea how people can rape kids that age like us. I don't know if I want to know how and why they do it and live with themselves. And, hate to say it, but society at-large I really don't think cares much either. Maybe because it is so horrible they just can't believe it. If you're a guy and have money, you'll find very few therapists even specialize in male survivors. The closest to me is in Miami I believe. I've lost two really good jobs because of it, too.

Hashi, no offense, but I've been dealing with trying to find healing for this for around 18 years and America society really doesn't care about us adult men and not a whole lot more for adult women with regards to childhood sex abuse. It's an epidemic in America that has been swept under the rug. There is definitely a huge stigma for us men. Like I said, I've lost two really good careers over it. They broke confidence and the employers made it hell on me.

So, I'm at my wit's end figuring out how to deal with the aftermath. Become a total fake seems to be my best option. I'm definitely investigating that direction.

 

[ARPortia]

raven,

I'm very sorry to hear that there are no services in the panhandle. Now that you mention it, I remember some friends talking about that area of Florida as not having very many resources.
Here in Indiana I can't find any local support groups for rape & sexual abuse crimes either. Or if I do, it's about 3 hours drive away and is not free. I get very frustrated sometimes.

Sometimes I get so frustrated and I blame society for a lot of pain that is passed from person to person. Or, media to populace. I feel so much that our own society puts curtains over the truth and makes decisions to not talk about the huge pink elephant in the room. It's almost as if people get to the point where they KNOW that our system is messed up but collectively, I feel because of separate housing and people gravitating too much to what they know keeps them in a state of ignorant bliss that people like us here on this forum do not have the opportunity to enjoy.

Feels like we have a whole platter of information and we seem to wrap our heads around ideas in society that need to be fixed, but because our voices have been torn from us, and our bodies and mind-body connections have been severed, it's a hell of a battle convincing these people that the way in which we do business even day-to-day is limiting. I think we need more community art projects and living spaces for all the creative lost sheep out there and more dance parties that shut down traffic.
Could you imagine if we could get every person who suffers from PTSD, or bipolar, or autism, so on and so on, to come together in a great mass somehow and put a huge monkey wrench in the system for a day? I think we would all benefit. National day of healing if you will. More personal stories on the news about hardships people have been through, hell, interviews with homeless. Real stuff going on that most people would like to ignore.

sorry I know this is kind of off-topic, but I want you to know that I'm pulling you for, and I'm extending some energy in the universe for things to get better for you. I want things to be better for all of us.

 

[rightkindofme]

And, hate to say it, but society at-large I really don't think cares much either. Maybe because it is so horrible they just can't believe it. If you're a guy and have money, you'll find very few therapists even specialize in male survivors. The closest to me is in Miami I believe. I've lost two really good jobs because of it, too.

Hashi, no offense, but I've been dealing with trying to find healing for this for around 18 years and America society really doesn't care about us adult men and not a whole lot more for adult women with regards to childhood sex abuse. It's an epidemic in America that has been swept under the rug. There is definitely a huge stigma for us men. Like I said, I've lost two really good careers over it. They broke confidence and the employers made it hell on me.

So, I'm at my wit's end figuring out how to deal with the aftermath. Become a total fake seems to be my best option. I'm definitely investigating that direction.

I am a big fake in very specific, calculated ways. By that I mean that I am a writer. I write prodigiously (often thousands of words a day) about how I am "really feeling" and I put it on the internet so that I don't feel invisible. And then I go through the rest of the day "acting" how I "know people are supposed to act". It is enormously stressful. I smoke a lot of pot to deal with my hyperarousal. I'm not sure I physically know how to feel calm. It is very hard on my body.

I have been in therapy for 27 years and I've seen 21 therapists. It's not actually easy to find good help if you are female either. I've had therapists try to tell me that I don't have PTSD I have multiple personalities and I'm just making up stories because *they* can't see my anger. !!!!!! ????? WTF?!

I have had to go between therapists who want all the details because they are creepy and skeavy and I think they masturbate thinking about it and therapists who are so f*cking uncomfortable with how much trauma I endured that they interrupt me to change the topic because they feel too bad knowing about my life.

It's not actually easy for women either. :(

The therapist who tried to convince me I have multiple personalities is the head of the rape crisis counseling center for my metro area. She dumped me as a client by email telling me that she couldn't handle working with someone like me.

I read a lot. I know that the books I read are aimed primarily at women but surely there must be some good nuggets of information in there for you. I go through big chunks of The Courage to Heal every few years.

I also like the website bandbacktogether.com because they have a lot of very specific online resources for different problems.

As a man you are going to have a very different healing process than me and that sucks. I am extremely public about all of my abuse. I wrote and published a book and I continue to speak out. I am supported in this. I know that men are not supported as they go through the same process and I don't know how to change that.

I will say that I went out and found my own damn support. I have been blogging for ten years. My audience has *changed*. These days I'm one of the top google hits for "my father raped me" which is uhm a dubious honor. But over time I have been more and more able to speak. At first people shushed me and shamed me. I blew the f*ck up at them. I would go on and on about how in my writing space I AM ALLOWED TO WRITE ANYTHING I WANT AND IF YOU HAVE A PROBLEM WITH IT f*ck OFF. And eventually it became a support-only space. :) It's nice.

You are going to have a fearsomely hard road. I'm not going to lie to you. I don't really like liars much. But it is a path that only you can judge if you can handle. I have reasons to not die. So I have to figure this out. I have extreme motivation. I don't know what you can do that will motivate you in the same way.

I have to feel needed. I really do. *I* have to be the one to provide _______ support because no one else can.

Most of this comes around incest and rape activism for me. I help a lot of other people find their voices. It's good. It is worth doing.

I don't know what you should go find to do.

 

[raven123]

Rightkindofme,

I helped a lot of people, talked a lot of people down from suicide. The problem was I did that to avoid me. If you spend all your time helping others and avoid yourself, you'll find you are in deep hole of emptiness and depression, especially when no one listens to you. I can't do that again. Since I quit doing that, I had no hospitalizations for nervous breakdowns and suicide ideation. It's a game that I no longer can play. I can't give of myself when I have almost nothing. I have to take care of me. I have to be first.

You are brave going public. I lost two careers over that and now have to go bankrupt over it. I won't go public. It ain't worth the scorn for me. As an example, I was in a hospital and shared my CSA during a support group. Nobody said much of anything. A woman shared something very similar and everyone was saying, oh that's so bad, I feel so bad for you, yada, yada, yada. People may think the world of Tyler Perry coming out on Oprah, but this guy has had the resources you and I can't touch. Good for him. Hope it changes opinions about this stuff.

Did you try the Salvation Army DV & Rape Crisis? They have support groups for women with CSA. Anyone can go to it and it's free. Us guys don't have support group options like that except in a few big cities I've found. I was in a generic emotions anonymous support group once and it really became a nightmare. It was how an employer found out, my confidence was violated and they eventually fired me. There is a definite stigma (future pedo the most common) guys face, especially from other guys.

I've told women to read Mike Lew's Victims No Longer. It definitely tells why CSA and emotional abuse causes things. I checked it out at the library. The Courage to Heal is great but I have run into the problem of what was and am I feeling? I can't answer the questions. I don't know. I really don't understand emotions at all. I miss the subtle cues people put out. No idea how to learn that.

I'll right more when I wake up. Flu is hell.

 

[Abstract]

Hi Raven,

Have you thought of moving to somewhere where you can access help? Take a moment and let yourself consider it before answering. This is your life and you deserve help. Sometimes there is no perfect solution that fits all our wants or even needs and we have to compromise and prioritise. Fear and distrust can throw up many obstacles for us too. I have been convinced that my motivations were different to what they really were in the past.

I will also say something that therapists have said to me: that I can actually feel many emotions coming off of you even though you may not be connected to them. Sometimes they are there and it is a process of realising and learning to tune into them.

You are probably closer to feeling emotions than you realise although it is sure to take a lot of hard work.

 

[Sailorgal]

Raven,

It's good that you are determined to get help. I can't think of sources off the top of my head but what you say is sad but true. There is a discrimination against men who have been abused over women. BUT, there is help and more and more men are getting support.

You definitely want to be aware of the triggers. However, journaling is still helpful. You don't need to dig deep - but more if a record keeping. It is helpful to show any T in the future. I don't suggest going over it and analyzing it. Treat it like a mileage log.

It will help in the future as you are in therapy and the repressed memories surface more and more.

Btw, a very good friend of mine was raped by his brother and neighborhood boy at a very young age. He was raped til high school and parents turned a blind eye. He was ritually abused which adds a whole other issue. He is now married to one of my best friends. So yes, it is possible to integrate and live a "normal" life. Lots of work? Yes.

Don't give up.

 

[rightkindofme]

Of *course* you need to take care of you instead of other people.That's the only way to get you taken care of. I'm sorry that helping people was so overwhelming for you.

I didn't come out until I had the privilege of being supported by a husband with a fairly bullet proof career. I understand that it is a luxury not everyone has. :(

My current therapist runs an incest support group but I am nervous about attending. I have had bad experiences with trying to do a group with my private therapist and I don't handle it well when they are no longer on my side. I don't handle being shushed in group therapy and told to wait my turn. Not when I *did* wait two weeks because I was told it would be my turn then but the therapist changed her mind and just wanted me to wait indefinitely until she felt like giving me a turn. Oh no. Can't handle that.

So groups are scary right now.

I also am curious if there are good reasons you can't move? If you are in a black hole for resources, could you go somewhere better? I am spoiled by living in a resource rich environment--I think. The bay area has some kind of support for anything if you are willing to travel up to an hour and a half each way.