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...
Hi guys. i hope everyone is well.
i chose to do my school paper (graduation requirement) on the psychological effects of child sexual abuse. i wanted to relate to what i was writting about. last year i wrote about bipolar disorder before i was diagnosed and related to it so much and it made it easier to write. anyways, i thought i was good. this isnt suppose to be happening...im suppose to be better. writting about this topic, brings back so many memories. i feel so dirty. i hear him. i hear him asking me if he can have sex with me and i see me almost letting him and last minute wen i felt him touch me i pushed him away. i see him putting his hand up my dress after the funeral wen all the adult werent home. i can feel him doing oral on me. these are the current flashbacks....i thought i was finally ok.
my therapist told me not to push myself with this paper that if it too hard for me to let her know and she'll write me a note and i can change the topic...but i dont wanna do that cuz im already weeks into this paper and i dont wanna be behind. ive been working with my therapist on the sexual abuse since May 2010. i should be fine now..but im not....i have come a long wat though..i use to have flashbacks everyday mutiple times a day and now i get them wen im triggered.
im 18 now and was abused from 9-12 and kept it secret til i was 15. ..thats enough time to forget right?? :/
i chose to do my school paper (graduation requirement) on the psychological effects of child sexual abuse. i wanted to relate to what i was writting about. last year i wrote about bipolar disorder before i was diagnosed and related to it so much and it made it easier to write. anyways, i thought i was good. this isnt suppose to be happening...im suppose to be better. writting about this topic, brings back so many memories. i feel so dirty. i hear him. i hear him asking me if he can have sex with me and i see me almost letting him and last minute wen i felt him touch me i pushed him away. i see him putting his hand up my dress after the funeral wen all the adult werent home. i can feel him doing oral on me. these are the current flashbacks....i thought i was finally ok.
my therapist told me not to push myself with this paper that if it too hard for me to let her know and she'll write me a note and i can change the topic...but i dont wanna do that cuz im already weeks into this paper and i dont wanna be behind. ive been working with my therapist on the sexual abuse since May 2010. i should be fine now..but im not....i have come a long wat though..i use to have flashbacks everyday mutiple times a day and now i get them wen im triggered.
im 18 now and was abused from 9-12 and kept it secret til i was 15. ..thats enough time to forget right?? :/
You'll never be old enough to forget. However with age comes more opportunity to work through, which it seems you have laready applied yourself to. So, bravo to you for that. This is hard work...appreciate yourself for the "small" steps of progress you have made.
No matter how much progress is made and healing has occured, I believe there are always potential triggers out there. So, don't be alarmed when one strikes you. It doesn't mean you aren't healed or haven't made progress...it's just another layer on a different circumstance.
I understand the triggering of your papar. I am in grad school and in a crisis intervention class. Oh my, if I would have known at the beginning of the semester I would have chosen to wait...but I didn't. It has triggerd much as I realized most of what was talked about brought pieces of my life up and I was the crisis prone individual I had to write about. Since I cannot drop the class, I have been able to adjust the topic of my major paper. I am in the process of selecting a new topic bc this class has me all spent and I need what's going to be easiest on my heart, as I am still working through sexual abuse and rape.
So, I'd just take a moment and look at yourself and the wise counsel you're recieving in counseling. Do you think you can stick this topic out and work through the triggering aspects with your therapist? Or do you think it would be wise to select another topic and allow yourself some breathing room? Only you can decide and know what your heart is feeling...
Hope you get some relief and a little breathing room. It sounds like you've done much work to get to where you are...give yourself some credit for that!
I wrote a similar paper in college and was badly triggered by it...and also by my professor's reaction after I turned it in. I wrote it from a survivors perspective...I was very open about having been victimized. He actually shared it with the entire class and even told who wrote it! I felt completely exposed and revictimized. It reopened the wound I thought had healed years earlier....I was so wrong. The wound had never healed...it just scabbed over and was festering below the surface. Therapy has helped greatly to clean out that nasty infection.
As far as "forgetting it".....I was abused from 2-15...that is when I told, too. I thought surely at 18 that I had it all together and could move on and be "normal"...but...I hate to tell you that I am now 36 and still dealing with the abuse and how it affected my life. I don't think there will ever be a time when I will not be dealing with it in some way. It is part of me....like a scar. I can never escape it. All I can do now is to deal with it and learn from it and hopefully help others who are dealing with the same thing I went through.
You may not feel it now.....but eventually you will be a stronger person because of your struggles. You will go on to do great things....but, honey....you will never forget what happened to you. I'm sorry.
You've been in therapy for almost a year. Good for you. But why do you think you "should be fine now"? Try not to put yourself in a place of high expectation. Let your body release the trauma in its own time.
I found that bodywork in conjunction with therapy helped my body release the trauma stored there. And that support from a 12-step group for incest survivors helped me cope with whatever came up.
And though people are right when they say you'll never forget, what is often left out is that while you'll never forget it is possible to reach a place in your healing where those unforgotten memories no longer cause you emotional pain.
The memories may not go away, but your reaction to them fade.
Keep on keeping on.
xx
SuzA
I am close to my 30s now and its still with me. Some days are better than others. But there is a future ahead for you