purpleswirled
Silver Member
Hi, I ama CPTSD sufferer who suffered verbal aemotional and physical abuse from my father from age 2 up[ until i left home at 24. i was bullied constantly by my peers as a child and that also was behind my PTSD. Have been in psych treatment with diagnosis of BPD, OCD as well and am battling an ED and self harm. recently had a breakdown and was hospitalised. been a bit weird since then.
I have been through a series of minor sexual assaults in my childhood and teenage years with multiple people. Age 3 was the first but i have no memory of it- i only found out the other week when my sister told me. Today i found out that something that happened when i was 10 was a sexual assault. I had always known about th eone when i was 14. none of this assaults involved actual penetration as such although one came very close to it.
The sexual assaults were all minor- one of them when i was 10 was done by other children the same age and there was a lot of coercion and brutakity with it. i have posted about this in childhood forum under a title Feeling Urge to Talk about Two weird Memories. the one when I was 14 was by a stranger and was in a public place- i felt too embrassaed and frozen to stop it- that would have meant drawing attention to myself and i was 14 and very shy and self conscious. overweight as well.
I have never been scarred or damaged by these assaults long term (distressed but not affected long term) exactly but I have always had a strange reaction to people mentioning their own experiences. like a kind of anger and shaking comes over me and I feel self destructive and bitter for a few days. no fear or intrusive thoughts like the abuse from my dad. Lately though I find myself analysing what happened and becoming obsessed with the idea of myself as a sexual assault survivor. i am ashamed to feel like this- i don't want to have been abused yet my whole life i never felt validated about what my dad did to me- i had it minimised constantly- i never knew who i was. i think i derive a curious sense of validation on hearing that what i went through was actually sexual abuse.
I have had hang ups about sex, smear tests, tampons, anything to do with that part of my body. I clench into spasms if anything comes near my "parts." I have felt dirty and disgusting and shameful my whole life ever since i was a young child and started self harming age 8 .
I didn't feel that the verbal and emotional and occasionally mild physical abuse were taken seriously. the people who dod take it seriously were mental health professionals and i will always be grateful to them. th eonly friend i told believe dme and helped me massively - she had been a trained counsellor- until the day she met my dad and he was so kind about me she decided that he never could have abused ,me as he loved me too much and didn't seem like an abuser.
Now i know the sexual stuff isn't what gave me PTSD or affected me in any way but lately I have been in pieces over it and am wondering whether subconsciously it affected me in some way??? i have a weird need to talk over what happened again and again- i have so much self doubt still over what happened with my dad- even though that was formally diagnosed as severe abuse and backed up by other victims, i still question myself all the time . i feel i am appropriating the whole "sex assaault victim" as a way of coping with what my dad did- does that make sense? i feel disingenuous doing this but ar same time i wonder if aome damage has been done by the CSA???? because i was 2 years old when the violence and verbal abuse started i would never have known what it is to feel normal. i developed anxiety at age 7. i always was afraid of people, being touched etc. so how would i know if i was damaged by it or not? does it matter/ I don't know why it matters I don't like facing it alone. I really need my hand holding- feel very odd right now.....am so sorry if none of this makes sense
I have been through a series of minor sexual assaults in my childhood and teenage years with multiple people. Age 3 was the first but i have no memory of it- i only found out the other week when my sister told me. Today i found out that something that happened when i was 10 was a sexual assault. I had always known about th eone when i was 14. none of this assaults involved actual penetration as such although one came very close to it.
The sexual assaults were all minor- one of them when i was 10 was done by other children the same age and there was a lot of coercion and brutakity with it. i have posted about this in childhood forum under a title Feeling Urge to Talk about Two weird Memories. the one when I was 14 was by a stranger and was in a public place- i felt too embrassaed and frozen to stop it- that would have meant drawing attention to myself and i was 14 and very shy and self conscious. overweight as well.
I have never been scarred or damaged by these assaults long term (distressed but not affected long term) exactly but I have always had a strange reaction to people mentioning their own experiences. like a kind of anger and shaking comes over me and I feel self destructive and bitter for a few days. no fear or intrusive thoughts like the abuse from my dad. Lately though I find myself analysing what happened and becoming obsessed with the idea of myself as a sexual assault survivor. i am ashamed to feel like this- i don't want to have been abused yet my whole life i never felt validated about what my dad did to me- i had it minimised constantly- i never knew who i was. i think i derive a curious sense of validation on hearing that what i went through was actually sexual abuse.
I have had hang ups about sex, smear tests, tampons, anything to do with that part of my body. I clench into spasms if anything comes near my "parts." I have felt dirty and disgusting and shameful my whole life ever since i was a young child and started self harming age 8 .
I didn't feel that the verbal and emotional and occasionally mild physical abuse were taken seriously. the people who dod take it seriously were mental health professionals and i will always be grateful to them. th eonly friend i told believe dme and helped me massively - she had been a trained counsellor- until the day she met my dad and he was so kind about me she decided that he never could have abused ,me as he loved me too much and didn't seem like an abuser.
Now i know the sexual stuff isn't what gave me PTSD or affected me in any way but lately I have been in pieces over it and am wondering whether subconsciously it affected me in some way??? i have a weird need to talk over what happened again and again- i have so much self doubt still over what happened with my dad- even though that was formally diagnosed as severe abuse and backed up by other victims, i still question myself all the time . i feel i am appropriating the whole "sex assaault victim" as a way of coping with what my dad did- does that make sense? i feel disingenuous doing this but ar same time i wonder if aome damage has been done by the CSA???? because i was 2 years old when the violence and verbal abuse started i would never have known what it is to feel normal. i developed anxiety at age 7. i always was afraid of people, being touched etc. so how would i know if i was damaged by it or not? does it matter/ I don't know why it matters I don't like facing it alone. I really need my hand holding- feel very odd right now.....am so sorry if none of this makes sense
