the "Restoring Self Pride After Molestation" article

[Darkness]

http://www.mentalhelp.net/poc/view_doc.php?type=doc&id=45038&cn=2

Something struck me as odd about this article, but I can't figure out what. Does anyone have any thoughts on the article?

[Darkness]

Perhaps.

Though I may of been thrown off by the picture. I have found often that articles on mental health issues, cutting for example, can show very triggering pictures of scars or people's bloody arms and that really doesnt help with the intent of the article.

In a way the picture of the distressed girl was like that for me, it threw me off some because it sends me a confusing sexual message to me because of how I can relate to the article but also at the same time I found the girl sexually attractive due to not just her looks, but demeanor in the picture.

There is a trope for this... broken bird.http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/BrokenBird

In real life I am attracted this personality type, probably because it is relatable.

My brother once told me that I would probably be attracted most to the girls with the same kind of problems as me, and it's true. So then it creates this weird sexual dynamic for me in my mind if they were molested or raped.

Its like my thoughts go:

1)hey, she was molested, i can relate to that

2) omg i find her sexually attractive

3) wait, I come off as creepy because im into power play, possibly because I myself was molested.

4) gr! now stuck in a weird thought pattern between flirting, trying to get them to open up, and not seem creepy but at the same time i do creepy thjings because it gets me off. wtf!

I can only give ONE example where this is not so, but then again the gal in that example is like 15 right now and so im not attracted to her sexually.

Does that sound weird? probably just me. the dynamic doesnt cause me me any angst really, its just confusing,

[Darkness]

i wouldnt dare try to prod a sexual crime victim into playing one of my rape fantasies unless they explicitly wanted ME to

its not like "vanilla" sex doesn't satisfy me.

though ya, the picture, a lot of articles on self harm, molestation and other stuff have pictures like that. its really dumb imo that so many sites do it; its as if they think "oh, no one who actually suffers from this will find our disturbing picture triggering!"

its as if some sites think that only people who do not have the problem will look it up. Though tbh it is probably done out of ignorance or not noticing.

I mean the picture on the article I gave here isnt really at all that bad, but for me it threw me off some when I opened the page.

[Guest ASchwartz]

Hi,

I wrote the article and am interested in your reactions. You are right in that my mentioning males did not really fit. It was not an after thought. I just didn't know how to integrate men into it and should have reserved it for a separate article.

The self pride issue, "restoring" self pride has to do with the fact that many of the women who were raped and molested did suffer a loss of self pride, whether this happened during child or adulthood. It is a crime that damages one's sense of dignity because it violates boundaries.

The use of the word, "victim" is always controversial and that is why "survivor" is now more commonly used. But, my point is that these people were "attacked" and victimized because they had no control over what happened to them. Children are helpless in front of this kind of thing and wish they could have and should have done more. However, in the few cases where they tell parents they are blamed or rejected. For adults, it is often the sense of shame that causes them to keep it secret. In fact, these crimes happen much more than is reported to the police.

The choice is meant to provoke, to startle. These things happen to normal and attractive people whose very attractiveness is used by predators to justify their abhorent actions.

Remember, this not about sexual fantasies. This is about real crimes. It's is hoped that the people who survived this kind of thing will feel less alone and go and find help. The loneliness that they feel with this thing is terrible.

In one way I'm kind of pleases you found the article and picture unsettling. At the same time I do not want to send the wrong message and that is why I need and appreciate this kind of feedback. In no way do I want you to believe that I am not open to criticism.

I hope this helps a little and tell me how I can do better in the future.

Allan

The choice of photo was based on the many patients I worked with over the years.

[Athena]

.................................

[Guest ASchwartz]

agood discussion.

You see, my experience has consistently been that they already feel guilty no matter how it happened and without anyone saying any thing, especially those who harbor it as a secret for years and years. A secret that torments them. This, whether it was an uncle during childhood or someone who held a knife to their throat. I have also worked with those who had a knife held to their throat when they were kids.

In my mind it has always seemed to me that all of these were attacks, all violent, in the way that there was no choice, child or adult. I say this because of the damage I have seen done to their dignity and self esteem. Always my npoint is that they can and will come to feel better and no longer damaged.

I don't see how the picture can discourage survivors when this is what they feel. But, there is always projection. Yes, some might see the picture as someone cowering. I chose it becausw I saw someone covering up a sense of shame, a shame that is terrible for the survivor to feel when they did nothing to feel ashamed about. However, so many of the survivors feel defiled and dirty. I can't help it but that they should feel these things is not right.

Athena, many of those who were attacked in the way you were felt awful when and if they could not fight off the perps.

Anyhow,, everyone is invited to put in their "two cents" and I value it way more than two cents. I need your help with all of these things. That is why I have to admit that a better picture should have been chosen I will try to findd a much better one and will edit to include the word "men" throughout.

Allan.

[Athena]

Athena, many of those who were attacked in the way you were felt awful when and if they could not fight off the perps.

I can totally get that and I try to avoid thinking about that 'what if' scenario. Reflecting on this, I have a feeling my post may be a little upsetting to some people here so I'll delete it.

[IrmaJean]

I'm being very gentle here, pseud, and am wanting to be supportive of you.

The choices you made were made with the mind of a young boy, though, and a 10 year old doesn't have the emotional capacity that an adult does. At that age, you don't always know what is best for you. You trust the adults in your life.

I kind of felt like I'd given that up willingly earlier in the game.

Being in a vulnerable position does not then make it okay for someone more powerful to use that power...

From a physical standpoint, maybe what happened wasn't violent, but it did cause emotional injury and trauma.

I think you find what is most healing for you. You have been working hard to do that.

[IrmaJean]

You're doing great work and, as I've said before, you are an inspiration to others as well, Pseudome. Change can happen and things can improve.

[Athena]

Choice is such a poorly defined word here...I can look at my past and see that I had choices. I chose not to tell my dad. I chose to do what my mother and uncle told me. I chose to let my uncle into the house when I was home alone....I could make a big long list of all of the choices I made. True, that as a result of those choices I eventually ended up in situations without choice, but I kind of felt like I'd given that up willingly earlier in the game. I can see too that certain threats played a big role in earlier stuff. But I still feel like using the words "attacked" and "violent" do not entirely fit and leave me with the gut reaction of feeling guilt over what I perceive to ultimately have been my choices.

OK, you had choice. But choice based on the poor programming you had received from those 'trusted' adults around you. Programming that didn't teach you appropriate boundaries, programming that may have even taught you that you deserved whatever bad things happened to you, programming that made it hard for you to distinguish honest love and caring with inappropriate sexual behaviour towards you. Programming that couldn't go away on its own and therefore lasts to this day. Would you blame a computer that said 2+2 = 5 if that's what it was programmed to believe? If the computer could feel and discovered later that 2 + 2 actually equals 4, it may feel pretty upset and ashamed that it couldn't get that basic equation right, especially given that solving problems is a big part of what it makes it a computer. But it shouldn't be upset at all. It was the PROGRAMMER's fault, not its own. The only solution is to simply work on fixing the program. Of course, in the human world it's not so simple, especially after so many years have gone by and so many more messes have got created while waiting for the needed help. Anyway, to me, 'reprogramming' one's beliefs is one of the biggest jobs of therapy. It's not easy. It feels like my therapist is trying to tell me the sky is yellow when I know it's blue. Sometimes, the best I can come up with is "I wish that were true", or "It's possible for others but not me" or "I'd truly like to believe you" or "I'll just pretend that's true and see how that works for me".

[Athena]

I think maybe I’m projecting or reading this wrong, but I keep viewing this comment:

As saying something to the effect of “even the ones who were attacked feel guilty and they REALLY weren’t to blame in those cases.” Like it’s a separate case. The ones who were attacked and the ones who weren’t. I kind of think something similar is what inspired Athena to delete her post (correct me if I’m wrong, Athena). The line ...

Can be interpreted as suggesting that what happened to her wasn’t so bad that she should complain about it because it could have been worse. This is how harping on “attacked” and “violent” is making me feel as well. I keep feeling like it must not have been so bad then because my uncle never pulled a knife on me. Really I had plenty of choice. I could have not done the things he told me to do. He didn’t attack me. He was not violent.

I think it’s too easy to view one’s own personal situation as fundamentally different from everyone else’s. I think this is where a lot of the self blame comes from. And I think alienating word choice contributes to this.

I really, really get where you are coming from on this, Pseud. I deleted my post because it is unfair for me to suggest how a person who has been attacked (in the sense of physical force/weapon/threatening life) and not being able/willing to fend off the attacker would feel. I see your position because it is closer to my own recent experiences. I think that Allan was simply trying to point out that both situations are bad. I, like you, feel like the shame is far far worse when one 'lets' something happen which part of them knows they shouldn't let happen. And people around me only rub in that sense of guilt. I started SI within a week of my marital lawyer saying to me "Suck it up, it's your own fault, take some responsibility for it, nobody held a gun to your head". Or my ongoing favourite (NOT!) "Why the hell did you 'let' him do that to you?" These are so damaging precisely because they simply seem to confirm what I already believe. But they are flawed statements. I 'let' him do what he did because I don't know how to defend my boundaries. In most things, I don't put up much of a fight when people walk all over me. I tell them I don't like it, they ignore my comment and keep doing it anyway. Then I simply find a way to justify their behaviour and rationalize how I deserve it. I think you can see how insane that is. But perhaps you can also see that I don't have any control over it. I have been programmed to act in this manner and although at a 'thinking' brain level I see how self destructive it is, I simply cannot change it. My therapist thinks he can. Well, if I've got to have faith in somebody, it may as well be him - at least he's trying to help.

BTW, I'm glad you like the "programming" analogy. I find it helps me quite a bit. And if you read up on neuroplasticity and psychoanalysis, you will find that it is not simply an analogy, it is actually a physical reality of our brains. The book "The Brain that Changes Itself" gave me a lot of hope - it basically deals with this concept, and oddly enough - was written by a Psychoanalyst.

[Guest ASchwartz]

I really want to suggest that no one is wrong here. each human being comes to these things with different experiences, ways of thinking, perceptions and feelings and that is why no one is wrong. What is great about a discussion like this and why it is so valuable is that all of us can learn from one another.......Me TOO.

I wonder what would happen if this discussion took place under the comments section after the article. Do you think it might invite more people, oudside of the community to join the discussion?

Please understand, this was merely a question of mine and I am fine with contining here, in our community.

allan

[Athena]

Allan, I think it would invite more discussion if it was in both places. If you had to pick one, I would think you'd get more feedback within the community, at least until the discussion peters out here. Then maybe it would make sense to move it under your article. But then again, this is not my thread so please don't base any decisions solely on what I say:o.

[Guest ASchwartz]

Hi Athena,

I agree. We will keep it here and I hope there will be some responses outside the community.

Allan

[Guest]

The thing that is odd really is the fact that their is no restoring one's pride after ... happens to someone.

[Athena]

The thing that is odd really is the fact that their is no restoring one's pride after ... happens to someone.

Sedsed, I wish I could be more helpful here. Many of us here are struggling trying to get over things that happened in our childhood - some stories worse than others. So on this particular site, I don't see a lot of happy people, and I don't think the answers lie here. But I do read about many women who have suffered horrendous sexual abuse and gotten over it to live happy and fulfilled lives. Then there are those who do not. What did the happy ones do differently than the others?

[Guest]

What's your definition of a fulfilled life? and y do u believe it even matters?

[Athena]

What's your definition of a fulfilled life? and y do u believe it even matters?

Unlocking the potential within oneself and doing something meaningful with it. It matters because that's what I believe gives us the drive to get up in the morning. It makes us alive as opposed to robotically sleepwalking through life, reacting to everything that gets thrown at us. Unfortunately I can't say I've experienced 'fulfillment' myself. I was the robotic sleepwalker until several crises hit and I'm just now in the painful 'waking up' stage. The robot's having a little trouble turning into a human.

[Guest]

I would rather be the robot with no emotions ... :cool: nough said

[Athena]

I understand how you feel. Hang in there. You are doing so many things right, so I have a feeling you will be what some of us with 'mental health issues' are called - high functioning. It will probably mean you will earn a decent living. Then when you can afford it I hope you will get help so you neither have to suffer the extreme negative emotions nor the emptiness of a robotic trance.

[Guest]

Why are you so nice and encouraging I don't get it.

[Athena]

Why are you so nice and encouraging I don't get it.

Because there are things I see in you that I don't think you appreciate. In spite of the atrocious family life you have had to endure (mine was Disneyland compared to yours): You consider your education very important and are working hard at it. You express yourself very well. You are caring and empathetic to others - your family, in spite of how they have treated you as well as others here at MHN. You appreciate the fruitlessness of smoking, drugs and alcoholism as coping mechanisms. So you have an ED and maybe SI (perhaps you are over that now?) Many, many young women (including myself:() have/had an ED (also Princess Diana!) - which I blame on image marketing. SI - can be a relatively benign form of coping as long as you are careful, recognize it as coping, don't overdramatize it and keep it quiet from those who would use it against you. Don't get me wrong, I don't think it's a great idea - but I think others who don't understand get WAYYYY too freaked out over it and often make the situation worse.

I didn't deal with my emotional issues at age 17 (was on suicide watch and weighed about 100 lbs) and was too busy to try again until the past couple of years. But I could have avoided the biggest mistake of my life (marrying an abusive man) if I had dealt with my emotional issues before I got married. So I guess I am hoping I can help you avoid the same mistakes by encouraging you to get help (a good therapist or support group) as soon as you can afford it.

[Guest]

Funny, I actually put alcohol in every drink I have drunk today... And I have not SI of Purged in a long while or at least what seems like a while.

I think I keep hoping someone would just conferm I am worthless like I know I am, maybe to simply give me a reason to ... But I still stand by what I said I don't believe I will ever get over any of it.

[Athena]

Funny, I actually put alcohol in every drink I have drunk today... And I have not SI of Purged in a long while or at least what seems like a while.

I think I keep hoping someone would just conferm I am worthless like I know I am, maybe to simply give me a reason to ... But I still stand by what I said I don't believe I will ever get over any of it.

I doubt the alcohol will stick - you get too many headaches - I find that's a rather large deterrent. And I don't think you'd like the brain fog for long either. Congrats on getting over the other stuff! That's progress.

OK, I can see that you may be looking for an excuse to 'check out'. But I think that maybe a stronger part of you is hoping for the opposite - somebody to confirm that you are NOT worthless. Or that you matter. I'm hoping my prior post dispelled the 'worthless' notion. As far as you 'mattering', everybody has an impact on others in so many ways. The fact that you shared your story certainly makes it impossible for me to think about giving up on my daughters. It has a huge impact. I don't think that I've told you that before. Or that if we are not in communication, I still wonder how you are doing.

Regarding the 'restoring self-pride', I've let myself get abused as an adult more times than I care to remember, including in marriage. But I am who I am now, not who I was - because I have decided to change that pattern. As long as I decide to protect my boundaries now, I can have some self-pride in the here and now. Molestation is at the extreme end of abuse. But abuse is abuse. So I'm hoping that some of this can apply to your situation, even though I was never molested and I don't even pretend to fathom the pain that would cause. Coerced, manipulated, attacked yes - molested no.

Changing the past is not an option. I think that learning from it and changing recurring patterns is how we get over it. Then the actual 'event(s)' can take up less and less brain-space and have less power over us so we get more and more of our life back as each day passes.