Childhood when did you start remembering?

[Dark.Green.Feathers]

this is going to be disjointed but TL:DR; how old were you when you started to remember? (CSA)

bonus for the discussion: were you blindsided or did it come up in a more expected/structured way (if anything like this can even be structured but I mean forewarning/gradual). I know the experience of becoming aware / learning what happened is vastly variable and each one comes with its own challenges of acceptance etc.
how did/do you navigate the minimisation that comes with trauma?


---


I am in a disconcerting place where I have no traumatic memory but everything is screaming at me that I am indeed very sexually traumatised, and subsequently I'm trying to scream back that it isn't possible, while also knowing without/beyond thought or reason that someone did something to me, and it was my dad.
it's like I already know. but I have no memory to say anything, so I know nothing. I'm always going between accepting the feeling and information I do have, and using every point of reason that I can to discount it; things he's said, I would have triggered a memory by now with how much of a theme it is in my mind, I'm too old, relatively okay childhood, what if in accepting the possibility I give myself a false memory, I'm too normal, etc etc. vs the deep, deep dark pit in my brain of something there. just a miasma of sludge always.

the more therapy I do -the more "stuff" is stripped back- the more I see it starting back at me. but nothing's happening so to me it's not real. no trauma.

I have had one incident of CSA in (partial) memory, it's something I know about, my parents knew about, I briefly remembered at some point but didn't keep any episodic memory. COCSA stuff, same age, not particularly intense or long lasting by any means. I feel at peace with it, I'd be able to talk about it now without it upsetting me, I've healed to the point it feels almost meaningless to me (at least in the light of the feeling I have now.) and doesn't carry any weight as a fact, just information. I regret it happened but not enough to want to rewrite history or anything, it's just another event in my life to me now, it doesn't come to mind anymore. I'd say I've processed it, which is good, I should probably carve out some space to be happy/proud/whatever about that.
but there's still miles of traumatic response and dysfunction and disorder ahead of me, that I am mired in. which feels completely idiotic and disingenuous to pin on the above, even in my self-arguing I don't stoop to try and do that because I know it isn't true, and it crumbles immediately as an argument, before one is even made. it's like saying my hand hurts because I stubbed my toe last week.

 

[Movingforward10]

I felt I had this innate knowing of someone had been sexually abused as a young adult, not realising I had.

It came back to me in dreams when I was 24. I think triggered by the breakdown of my long term relationship (I moved in with my then partner when I was 19 and we split up at 24).
Only a couple of memories came back. I then put them aside as "nothing to see here".
Until I was 41. And then started therapy. And more and more came.
All in uncontrollable ways.


I think there is a deep 'knowing' that we have. That becomes more conscious and makes more sense when the memories come to help put the two together

I would say: trust yourself.
Trust your feelings about it.

 

[In the weeds]

I suddenly remembered at the age of 62 some of the things my brothers and I went through. Something happened that brought on a flashback from the age of 15. I was beside myself, if you know what I mean, for two weeks. I've had lots of memories suddenly pop up since then. Sometimes I fall inside myself and can't get out for a couple weeks. I'm there right now since my youngest brother just died suddenly. We never had a chance. I'm soooo angry about it all.

Before that I was so busy raising a family, and a million things that went along with that. My life settled, and long after I thought all was forgiven and forgotten, things that were forgotten came back in truckloads.

 

[Dark.Green.Feathers]

I felt I had this innate knowing of someone had been sexually abused as a young adult, not realising I had.

It came back to me in dreams when I was 24. I think triggered by the breakdown of my long term relationship (I moved in with my then partner when I was 19 and we split up at 24).
Only a couple of memories came back. I then put them aside as "nothing to see here".
Until I was 41. And then started therapy. And more and more came.
All in uncontrollable ways.


I think there is a deep 'knowing' that we have. That becomes more conscious and makes more sense when the memories come to help put the two together

I would say: trust yourself.
Trust your feelings about it.

thank you.

I think my T has said the same, about the knowing. you can know things before you "know". it feels terrible though, as someone who needs 3 factor authentication on everything that I experience. visual evidence + some second opinions, I find it hard to believe anything that comes solely from myself. it's better than it was before, but for this it's raging strong. both feelings are strong, fighting. but the feeling that it's true just keeps getting stronger in the end.

been tearful, opened up to a friend about it today and I feel so sick after the fact. too much that I can't look away from.

Only a couple of memories came back. I then put them aside as "nothing to see here".

relate to this, not really memories but I've felt things before, in moments of fear, all on me. just packed it away and blamed it on myself because I was feeling a lot of touching at the time, but they're less dismissible now even if they're more at the bottom of the "in favour of" pile.

 

[Rose White]

It’s hard to explain. I had the memory of a csa event from when I was two for pretty much my whole life. But I only started talking about it when I was around 20 and I didn’t have the right words because I didn’t understand what was going on—even as an adult, which is weird when I think about it. I finally got the right words when I was around 40 because of training to be a mandatory reporter of child abuse for my job. Then I figured out what exactly had happened in that memory and then my T helped me to have the words and say them. My dad admitted it so that “helped”. My current T (a psychoanalyst) calls that time with old T an intervention” (getting the right words). Then it took me about 3-5 years to accept and identify with the concept. And now my analyst is doing weird stuff with me and my relationship to that idea which is very hard to talk about because it feels like it’s happening on a subconscious level. It’s like we are looking at it from all angles with the purpose of unraveling its hold on my ability to relate to others.

 

[Muttly]

I am in a disconcerting place where I have no traumatic memory but everything is screaming at me that I am indeed very sexually traumatised, and subsequently I'm trying to scream back that it isn't possible, while also knowing without/beyond thought or reason that someone did something to me, and it was my dad.

This is very relatable to me. For me, I was in my mid-thirties when I started to deal with it. I can't fully say I had no memory. I had some memories of being sexualized by my dad. I didn't understand how inappropriate some of his behaviors were, until I'd done work in therapy. And, for some things, I've had to accept I may not have the memory. There are moments that I can recall up to a certain point, and then it's just blank and panic.

how did/do you navigate the minimisation that comes with trauma?

Before I try to answer this, do you mind explaining a bit more what you mean. Are you talking about minimization that you do or others or something else?

 

[Movingforward10]

it feels terrible though, as someone who needs 3 factor authentication on everything that I experience. visual evidence + some second opinions, I find it hard to believe anything that comes solely from myself.

I understand. I had that view too and it took a while in therapy to be ok about the gaps in my memory and to trust myself.
The first rape, it was not being able to remember the precise moment the rape started that I used to beat myself up about and doubt myself. I can remember the moments before, during a bit and the immediate aftermath. But that precise moment it started - nope.
But I think it is our PTSD and disassociative brains making us blame ourselves or find the loop hole to hold ourselves responsible.

It was working through not being able to remember and becoming ok with it, becoming ok with uncertainty.

 

[Dark.Green.Feathers]

This is very relatable to me. For me, I was in my mid-thirties when I started to deal with it. I can't fully say I had no memory. I had some memories of being sexualized by my dad. I didn't understand how inappropriate some of his behaviors were, until I'd done work in therapy. And, for some things, I've had to accept I may not have the memory. There are moments that I can recall up to a certain point, and then it's just blank and panic.

thanks for replying to this, don't know what to say but I appreciate it.

Before I try to answer this, do you mind explaining a bit more what you mean. Are you talking about minimization that you do or others or something else?

from youself. Ive always found it hard to take myself and how I feel seriously. I think I'm still learning how to have balanced perspective on anything like that, or even knowing what that would be.

But I think it is our PTSD and disassociative brains making us blame ourselves or find the loop hole to hold ourselves responsible.

It was working through not being able to remember and becoming ok with it, becoming ok with uncertainty.

yeah, I flip flop around, I think it's also easy to hope that it's not a big deal in real life. which doesnt make it any easier.
Im finding it hard to guage where Im at at the moment, I think I feel less desperate for answers but I don't know if thats because Im leaning near denial again or not. trying to take things as they are though. I guess I have to digest what Ive been newly enlightened on so far, cant rush these things, it has to be enough for me to deal with at once for now anyway. I migjt not be in a refusal phase but instead just putting it on a shelf or something, bit of dissociation to cope with more immediate stuff that's difficult, Im very emotionally strung out. so maybe I am getting there, I don't know.

 

[Movingforward10]

Im finding it hard to guage where Im at at the moment, I think I feel less desperate for answers but I don't know if thats because Im leaning near denial again or not. trying to take things as they are though. I guess I have to digest what Ive been newly enlightened on so far, cant rush these things, it has to be enough for me to deal with at once for now anyway. I migjt not be in a refusal phase but instead just putting it on a shelf or something, bit of dissociation to cope with more immediate stuff that's difficult, Im very emotionally strung out. so maybe I am getting there, I don't know.

This sounds like really good processing. That you're exploring, that you know yourself, that you know when we are processing trauma it has various stages and some are overwhelming and some make us go numb but that it is all shifting it and going through it.
As difficult as it all is.
These feelings and thoughts you describe sound to me like processing.

 

[Quassus]

I relate completely. I had a feeling something happened. I would obsess over watching movies and shows about CSA. It was seeing the victims be heard. I always had weird shame and anxiety around s*x with my husband. One day at 38 I was laying in bef after and my body froze. I couldn't move. I was paralyzed. I had feelings and cloudy memories that didnt seem real. Like I was reliving something on a subconscious level. Its was horrible. My husband was talking to me and nothing. When I finally got out of it I sobbed like a baby and my husband hugged me and I said out loud for the first time that I know something happened. After that the freezing and weird flashbacks kept happening. I finally went to therapy for emdr. I could never be sure what happened or who did it. But I have fragments and I do fear st times they are made up. But I also couldnt make my body react like that soo.. EMDR helped me.work through what I could. There is something deep inside that says it was my dad and something thay screams back no way. So I stopped trying to listen and care,n but sometimes I do.

I was able to work through enough to get the flashbacks and freezing states to end but I was a rough journey! Im traumatized by the journey. EMDR was amazing and not what traumatized me...it was the freezing anf flashbacks out of no where. That traumatized me in a different way. That loss of control. It was a nightmare.

I may never know the details but its more important to deal with the feelings and beliefs then the memory details itself. Thats what stopped my body from panicking when memories come back. You need to deal with the feeling that it happened because with that there is something to heal, regardless of the details.

 

[Mach123]

Great thread. When? It’s “hard to explain” like @Rose White said I lol at that because I have a very strange relationship with my repressed memories. In a very real sense, it happened in my 40s because it was just coming out. It just started to come out. It’s not like I didn’t know it’s more like I knew and I didn’t know at the same time and there was a lot of it.. but then in my 40s you know it started coming out and what that means is I was gonna know I was gonna know for real and more than that. I was gonna have to tell someone. I was horrified and nearly died a few times after from drugs trying to “ put it all away” again. That’s not how it works though. I remember the therapist talking to me about it and saying you can’t just kill part of yourself. I know things happened i really don’t remember and I know I did things and i didn’t remember even while it was happening. Like severe disassociating. Then just try and be normal. Just you know forget about the past . I wish it was funny. I laugh though sometimes.

 

[Rose White]

@Mach123 thanks for validating! I once heard it said, instead of “memory recovered” say “meaning revealed” and that helped a lot. That time when “I was gonna know for real” (as you say) and there was no going back? was like electric jolts to my system.