Sexual Abuse Support Group
Sexual abuse is a relative cultural term used to describe sexual relations and behavior between two or more parties which are considered criminally and/or morally offensive. Different types of sexual abuse involve: Non-consensual, forced physical sexual behavior such as rape, incest or sexual assault, or psychological forms of abuse, such as verbal sexual behavior or...
I had a post on here awhile ago about how I was nervous when my fiancee bathed our daughter. I didn't truly think he would do anything but the fear was there.
We talked about it, as was advised on my previous thread, and he told me he understood. That I could watch him bathe her for awhile, and that he would listen to what I told him.
I got comfortable enough to let him do it on his own.
Well, here's where it gets weird, for me anyways. When I was an infant I showered with both my mother and my father. Lots of families did it. My father was not my abuser. He never did anything inappropriate.
The other day, my SO was bathing her, and I went in to grab her lotion and brush to prep for her after bath care, and he was in the tub with her. Nothing sexual AT ALL!
But I lost it. I started yelling and crying. I don't know why? He was doing nothing wrong. I have friends who bathe with their kids, as do their husbands.
Now he won't really talk to me, he just looks at me all sad and hurt. And I know I was wrong. But I can't apologize. And all the trust we built in the bathing process is gone.
What do I do?
We talked about it, as was advised on my previous thread, and he told me he understood. That I could watch him bathe her for awhile, and that he would listen to what I told him.
I got comfortable enough to let him do it on his own.
Well, here's where it gets weird, for me anyways. When I was an infant I showered with both my mother and my father. Lots of families did it. My father was not my abuser. He never did anything inappropriate.
The other day, my SO was bathing her, and I went in to grab her lotion and brush to prep for her after bath care, and he was in the tub with her. Nothing sexual AT ALL!
But I lost it. I started yelling and crying. I don't know why? He was doing nothing wrong. I have friends who bathe with their kids, as do their husbands.
Now he won't really talk to me, he just looks at me all sad and hurt. And I know I was wrong. But I can't apologize. And all the trust we built in the bathing process is gone.
What do I do?
...but i really don't know how i'd feel if i were to walk in and find them both in the tub together. cuz, like you, i know that he would NEVER do anything sexual with him in the tub..but i have the same fears.
...it all comes down to trust. and that's the big thing i have an issue with. i can understand your fears...and i think that you reacted on your fears.
...don't apologize if you don't feel you should. but i do encourage you two to discuss what happened. i'm sure he must be somewhat confused to what really was going through your head. i mean, he MOST LIKELY has a clue...but just talk it out.
...he might even have something to say that you may need to hear...who knows? put baby to sleep and talk about it...work on building that trust again.
...keep your head up.
I also used to shower with my parents when I was very young and it was fine but r2rf has a good point and boundaries should be set up while the child is young so they are not confused if someone uses seemingly harmless acts such as bath time to try to abuse them. For example a perverted adult could say they are washing the child's privates when in fact they are molesting them.
Im really sorry
Sure, you may have showered with your parents, and maybe many families do. But that's different, I think, even if I can't fully explain why.
I think PART of it is that showering is usually more businesslike and perfunctory - you get in, do what you need to do, and get out. Whereas bathing is in itself more sensual - you linger, you enjoy it, you soak up the moment. It's different. It just is.
Another PART of it is that there much more touching in bathing. Two people, even two adults, can usually get in a shower without necessarily touching. In a bathtub though, naked bodies are going to be touching. It would be almost impossible not to, even if nothing "sexual' is intended.
I wouldn't be upset by the SO being present during the child's bath, at least up to a certain age, and assuming he's not going out of his way to conjure up reasons to be there. But actually IN the bathtub is a whole different story.
Regardless of how this might all be rationalized away as "nothing sexual" and/or "no big deal", I don't like it.
It says to me that this is someone who wants to push boundaries rather than respect them. That's not a good sign.
His family was raised bathing with thier parents. His sister has four kids, and she bathed with them when they were little as well.
I think it may just be different upbringings. He told me he thought I would be okay with it because I told him I trusted him and stopped watching. I have bathed with her once, when her ear infections were at their worst, because it was teh best way to get her clean and keep her ears dry.
I may have over reacted. I told him as much. And I explained why I lost it. He apologized and said that it would not happen again unless I was present or okay with it.
One of my best friends is european and her family would walk around naked! She eventually stopped because none of her canadian friends families did it, but her parents still do it on occasion.
I believe that you should expose your child to a certain amount of nudity at a young age so that they grow up knowing that the human body is natural and not disgusting. But with today's messed up society there is a thin line and alot of people cross it.
I'm just tired of interperting everything involving my daughter and any male into some giant perversion. My brother has two girls of his own, and im terrified to leave my daughter with him! How ridiculous is that!
if your gut is telling you something is wrong, wouldn't you rather honor that feeling and be wrong than hope to not offend him and risk your child being molestd?
i think if your SO wasn't interested in anything inappropriate, he would willingly give up bathing her, and certainly being in the tub or shower with her personally unclothed, just to ease your difficulty. it is causing you pain and sorrow--it doesn't matter why--it doens't matter if he is doing somethign wrong or not. the fact is, that because of your past experience, or current reaction, this is a trigger of some sort for you--out of love and concern for you, he ought to be willing to lay aside his "right" to bathe her in this way just because he is wanting to be loving to you, no matter of whether he isn't doing anything wrong or not. that's really not even the issue. he could be the purest person on the planet, but if you are still afraid because you have problems (let's pretend that's why/or heck, even assume that's why if he wants to) the right thing to do, the nice and loving thing to do is still to never bath her again that way because that takes care of you. only a person who wants access to her for some untoward reason would make an issue out of this and fight for it, or try to guilt you into it, or make you feel bad for not trusting him. anyone else would say, "im sorry that you're life has set you up to be triggered by this; and since it cuaases you discomfort and fear (even if it's irrational) it's not like i need to do this so bad that i can't just let it go--no big deal...i can wash her hair in the sink, paint her toenails after her jammies are on, braid her hair, or read a bed time story if i want to be a part of the routine or whatever, but if this causes you fear or puts any kiind of tension in the relationship between us, i set it aside out of love for you. i'd never do anything to hurt her; never doinog that is my proof.
now some people will read the next part and write me off as a nut, and i guess that's their perogative. i'd love to prove that i'm not but i suppose whenever you try to do that, you just end up looking more like one than if you'd siad nothing...i'll try to give a quick picture of some things that might speak to the normalacy in my life....then you can take the rest for what it's worth before you read the last part: i've been married for almost 25 years to the same man. graduated valedictorian of my class, lettered in 4 varsity sports, was captain in 3, have been a Christian for 25 years, own a house and have had the same job since 1998, graduated from college and am working on my masters in clinical counseling...i've never been arrested, am not a substance abuser nor do i even use alcohol, or cheated on my spouse...but i do have DID...that said, i always knew about the abuse my adoptive brother dished out, and i thought that was the main reason i left home at 16...but about 8 years ago, some of the blanks in my past started to fill in. Your bathing story connects because when i was in my early 30's i started dealing with depression, though i'd been away from my abusers for over 18 years...and then the flashbacks started, things my brother did, and then pictures of things i hadn't remembered all the way, yet still of familiar places, rooms of the house i grew up in...and eventually, with little girls in the pictures that turned out to be me. i don't tell this part of my life lightly...i just want you to take it seriously--you thought this important enough to write down here at this site because you have that much suspicioun about him.. if in 20 years (or even 10) she comes back to you and you find out you were right, but you ignored this hunch...what will you say to her? and what will you say to yourself? What will you have to do to silence the "i told you so!" inside of you? What will you have to do to get away from the regret and the remorse that you would feel if for one second you realized that you knew inside, even just a little bit, and you let yourself get talked out of it because you what? you didn't want to hurt his feelings? didn't wnat him to think you didn't trust him? does he not care enough about her to be willing to sacrifice whatever "innocent pleasure" he gets out of this to protect her 100%.
this is making me dizzy just writing about it!!!!
i'm not saying he's doing anything, i'm just saying, i'd rather be wrong than have the slightest chance that my child was being harmed and i could have stopped it.
my mom (adoptive family all of them) sent me in to bath iwth my dad when i was a little girl---i now have DID (multiple personality disoder for those of you who don't know what it is) developed to deal with the trauma of what was done to me. the first flashbacks that i had when this started coming up spontaneously for me (i was not seeing a therapist or in counseling of any kind--never had been) I veiwed from above--like i was on the ceiling looking down onto this scene of a second little girl about 5 (another me) sitting on my parents bed, fully clothed, facing the master bathroom door, and that girl was watching another little girl, also me, walk out of the bathroom door after having been in there with my father for a shower with him. i still only have bits and pieces of what happened in that room--they've come out in fragments, phrases and images, moments at a time--removed 3 levels from myself they are so horrible that i can't even look at tehm straight on and think of them as me without going through all of those different levels of removing them from my own reality to consider...i may never know the full extent of what happened, and i don't care if i ever do, i'm not searching for memories, never have, never will, sometimes they just hit me, and i can see where it fits...
I want him to bathe her. I want them to bond like that. He works all the time and he is in bed before we are, so he get's very little bonding time with his daughter.
If I told him that I wanted to do all the bathing he would allow me too. I have had a gut feeling about SA and acted on it before and been right concerning a child I babysat. This isn't the same sort of feeling.
This is a 'is there a monster under my bed' or 'im scared of that itty bitty spider' fear. Irrational at best.
I don't want our daughter growing up thinking only mummy loved her because daddy was not allowed to touch her. It would mess her up immensley. A happy medium is what I need to achieve.
We are a foster home, though we have no foster children at the moment. And we took courses on SA accusations because we took in kids from childrens services, and they were garunteed to have lashing out issues. We were taught what to look for, 'right' and 'wrong' touching, no matter how innocent it seems. I don't see any of these signs in the relationship between my DD and her dad.
Also, he doesn't like to be alone with her for this exact reason. That foster course scared the shit out of him. We had girls when we had kids so he had ot learn more then I did. And he's terrified of false accusations. Rightly so, I would be too if it was boys. I don't want to damage any hope they have of being close based on a 'feeling' that doesn't even make sense in the whole picture of things!
Sorry....I'm not mad, and I don't mean to go off on a tangent. I'm just a bit furusterated with myself and not sure how to let it all out!