Hmm...it is your experience. I don't get to judge it for you.

It's sort of like you were able to see the fantasy world you were living in as the nightmare it really was and get free of it?

Yes. What happened to me was terrible, but some good came out of it.

If I didn't sometimes focus on the good that came of being a survivor, I don't know that I'd make it.

I'm incredibly intuitive. I can look at people and practically feel what they are feeing. That comes from always knowing where the abuser in my house was and how he was feeling and whether I was in danger or not. This makes me an excellent employee.

I like to think I'm intuitive, but sometimes I'm just wrong about people. My family only taught me magical thinking and that the other person is always wrong for "rejecting" you. That is how they seem to relate to the world. It's so hard to break out of their thinking sometimes. They see themselves as victims, but probably aren't seen that way by others.

If something good came of it, so much the better. It doesn't mean it was okay that this happened to you or that you wanted it to happen.

For me, it is very important to find meaning in whatever suffering I have been through. Part of the meaning is the things I have learned. I think it's good for us to find positives in our experiences so we don't think of ourselves exclusively as victims.

Maybe I will see things differently someday, but lately all I see about my abuse is lost opportunities and unhappiness.

Right now the only positive thing I can see is a deep distrust of other human beings. Some would call that a minus, I see it as a really big plus. I've been in countless situations in life where being circumspect and distrustful saved me from really bad outcomes.

Sometimes I wish there could be a way to round up all the child abusers, strip away their masks of phony benevolence , and treat them as the criminals they really are. And most important of all, see to it that they never have any opportunities to interact with children for the rest of their lives.

If you look at it objectively, that doesn't seem like too much to ask of society. It wouldn't be easy, of course. These people are often well protected behind their priestly cassocks, nun's habits, and positions of power and influence in government.

Didn't mean to distract from your post, Donna. I'm feeling a little testy today. I think a lot about how children are suffering in so many ways from human arrogance and power struggles...and how much it's damaging them. And I think about how few people seem to care as they wallow in their self-interest and greed.

It is so hard to stay positive. The world would be better without any sexual abuse, of course, and any adult who willfully hurts a child is vile.

life isn't perfect for anyone. I think old TV shows like the Brady Bunch give us an ideal of the "perfect" childhood. Watching reruns of "The Brady Bunch" gets sickening. There is no serious conflict, everyone is healthy and beautiful and thin. Do we really want the Brady Bunch world, or wouldn't that be sort of hellish in its own way? I'm trying to make myself feel better, too. I hope for Hope and meaning and for God.

While I didn't watch The Brady Bunch, I was raised in the 1950's and watched Father Knows Best and Leave it to Beaver. It was a "magical" time, both in a positive and negative sense. The worst negative was that I saw a sane, loving, respectful father in Ward Cleaver and was devastated that I rarely saw those traits in my own father. I thought if he loved me he would behave like Ward Cleaver. The "magical" family life of Leave it to Beaver of course doesn't exist. No real mother and father can keep it all together like Ward and June. Only two people had perfect parents and they were Wally and the Beaver! Who of course WEREN'T REAL. But being a glutton for punishment and a sucker for sentimentality, I still watch the re-runs!!!

I just want to say that one of the positives I identify in having been abused was in what I learned. I learned compassion and respect for the sufferers in this world, and I acquired a strong aversion to the abuse of power in any form. In my own personal belief system, these lessons have accrued to my soul and represent more lasting accomplishments than worldly success. Not that I don't mourn the lost opportunities for worldly success that abuse has cost me.

Have you ever seen the music video paramore did the one my profile pic was taken from? Your post made me think of it. I believe the horror I went through caused me to have a great imagination and artistic ability though I would love to take it all back right now.

I don't know which video you mean, mamoth, but if you tell me which one I'd like to watch it.

Granted after I was abused the first time, it messed me up... Then I mostly forgot about it (I was 5) but the violence with me was bad.. The physical abuse from others... Then I was raped.. And other stuff happened too... But because of all this that happened ... Yes bad things did happen from what happened to me, but good things did come from it too...
I can understand and help others as best as I can... I know my 'other' self probably never would had been on this site... That happens to OTHER people, not me... I know I never would had married my wife if I wasn't abused... And I would've been very judgmental if not...
I wasn't the best of ppl before.... (Partly cause I was abused, but didn't remember it... )
But once I started remembering it... I felt so bad about the way I had treated others, including other victims...
I started going around to others telling them sorry... But I was also careful not to say what happened to me...
Then I started opening up about that.. I've had other victims tell me thank you for saying sorry, but it wasn't my fault either way (what happened to them, or to myself) but I felt bad cause I didn't help...

I don't think abuse is a necessary part of the learning process. There are some things that just don't need to be experienced. I feel in and of itself, abuse is exclusively a wounding experience- nothing more.

It just brought to the surface a strength I already had, and the compassion I already had. Abuse gave me more awareness of those qualities for the sole reason that they were greatly challenged.

Didn't mean to be such a buzz-kill :-(

I was thinking some more about this and actually came up with a positive. My *motivation* to use the better qualities I only recognized were within me because of abuse, gives me the drive and empathy help other people ( if I can).

dsf95

I, personally, do not think you are insane to "feel there were positive aspects to /your/ experiences."

Life experiences, impact us whether we want them to or not. I believe the pain and suffering of my own experiences of incest, sexual abuse and rape forced me to dig deep within to discover my Self--apart from the abuse--and to find the gifts and strengths I came into the world with. I can't say if I would have found my deep Self otherwise. Suffering can be a powerful motivator to self-discovery.

I think of the concentration camp survivors and how their experiences impacted them. Some killed themselves because the torture and trauma were more than they could bear. Others fought back and it turns out that those who were able to find a reason to live--perhaps through helping others or wanting to return to their families--were more likely to survive. (See Man's Search for Meaning - Viktor E. Frankl)

If I were to believe that abuse was an "...exclusively wounding experience and nothing more..." I fear I would live my life as a perpetual victim. I must remind myself constantly that though I may not be able to control all the experiences that happen in my life I can control my response to them and thus influence the outcome.

I believe it requires a walk on the razor's edge to find the light in the dark side of life while not discounting our own pain and suffering as we work to heal. So, I will continue to look for the positive outcomes, as whistleblower discovered, that happened because of the trauma.

xx
SuzA