I am a grown adult and have issues. I need to know something about sexual abuse and I have looked on the Internet for answers but some are a little clowdy.
Please tell me if I was molested as a child from the ages 8-12 by another child (the exact age as me) was I really molested? I remember all of it and I remember how he'd call me mean names and tell me bad things if I didn't do what he said to do. He also said everyone else does it and if I dont do it im not normal. :confused:
It only went on for about 4 years or so. When it stopped I grew up with a sense of guilt and shame. I am now dealing with the issues that came of it.
I've been diagnosed with depression, anxiety, ptsd, ocd, and get terrible nightmares and reminders/flashbacks of what happened. I don't feel safe. It's hard for me to accept that someone could possibly like me. I also get nervous if someone wanted to hug me or touch me.
I'm a recovering drug addict as well but when I get these feelings it makes me want to start using drugs again and I don't want to.
If, when we're children, fooling around and experimenting is so "normal" then why did I feel so guilty. I often wonder if any of my problems (depression, ocd) are because of it. I think a lot of how I should have just said no and ran somewhere but I didn't. I could have stopped it but I didn't.
So was i molested or not?
Thnx
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Forgot to add this in.
Am I a molester if when I was a kid, during the time that I was being sexually molested (?), because I told another friend what I was doing with another friend and me and the second friend started doing stuff too?
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[COLOR="Navy"]I agree with fjp999, professional help would be the best in this situation. Any good therapist, psychiatrist, or psychologist would be able to help you make sense of what happened to you and how to move past it.
I wish you lots of luck on your journey.
And if you ever need someone to talk to me or anyone else on this forum would be more than willing to be your sounding board. [/COLOR]
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This sounds like a terrible burden to have to carry and I agree that counselling can be a helpful way forward. However, sometimes having labels and not quite knowing where to hang them can be difficult too.
Few of us grow up without having done something we think the adults around us would perceive as "bad". It sounds as though you were bullied into these sexual acts and did them against your will, whether or not it was by someone your own age.
Had such a "friend" smacked you in the face you would still have had the bruises at the time. It sounds as though you may also be carrying scars into your present life. I wish you the best in getting help for relieving yourself of this guilt, which should not be your burden to carry.
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I agree with all the above.If you gave your consent of your own free will (without pressure) then you were not molested. It does seem (from what you say), however, that you were pressurized into doing stuff when you were 8 to 12 years old. The experiences you had with your other friend are a separate issue: if he was happy to enjoy whatever you did together, then there is no question of abuse or molestation in this case. If you pressurized him, then that is different but I would say that it is the degree of pressure that counts. In any case these things presumably happened a long time ago and what is important is to get them into perspective, so that you can move on. I am sorry that have been affected you so badly by all this. I hope that you will find it possible to come to terms with these experiences soon. I also hope that you will be able to free yourself of any feelings of guilt: the feeling of guilt is not a rational thing and often has more to do with the way we were brought up as children. What counts is what we do now. It is good that you do not want to resort to drugs any more. I also hope that you have found (or will soon find) a good professional who can help you.
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Everyone makes good points but the best is.....get help. If you have feelings of guilt or shame then you need to talk to a professional about them. Feelings are very complex and it takes someone who understands them to help. I was molested when I was very young and to this day I don't remember the assult. However I do not define myself by what happened to me. I eventually overcame my negative feelings about sex and my sexual orientation. I know you will to. Good Luck and Stay Strong.
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I was pressured into doing stuff. I was told that if I don't do it, he'd tell everyone that I was a fag (and he even told everyone in middle and high school) that I was a fag so he broke his promise so I had people being mean to me in ms and hs calling me fag and cock sucker that was hard to deal with.
he said that im a chicken if i dont do what he said, that everyone else is doing it and a lot more. he just had that pull over me with his words. I was already being yelled/hit by my dad so i thought that i better do what he told me
i do know that after a while i did like it and thats all i wanted was sex and i th ought it was normal. one of my other friends used to do mean things to me and tie me up and my cousin did something to me
i dont know if i had a big sign on me that said come on and abuse me i like it, well one time i did have a kick me sign on in 6th gr that was mean and someone put a pin under my seat i was litterally tourtered.
i didn't like how i was tricked into doing things with him, i dont want to get into too many more detains but to this day it still hurts.
i am workking with a shrink and counselor about all this and yeah they relate my issues today to what happened and they just call it trauma
if i could stop the pain i would but it doesn't go away but im trying to find a way to make it leave me. its like i have a hurt child stuck in me who wants attention and is making a lot of noise it sucks but i know im not t he only one who deals with athis and won't be the last
im just saying that if you have kids, watch what they're doing, because i don't want people to grow up like this. Only one time was it done to me by an adult or maybe twice, it was with one of the kids who used to do something to me so i suspect (i never put it together till now) that when he was my age that he was getting molested by that guy and then he started doing what was done to himi to me
i am still trying to put to rest that my cousin had me do something to him, that makes me feel like im an inscest person but i dont want to be but i guess if i blew someone in my family then i guess it is but who really knows all i know is that i want to live a happy life and i can't right now
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Often times when children abuse other children they have also been victims of sexual abuse. Children do not have the cognitive capacity to comprehend the sexual issues, so when they are exposed to experience at a early age they do not adaptively process the situation. In response the child becomes sexual reactive and will perpetrate other children. There is a physiological component to sexual abuse and the victim will often try to replicate the feeling, because they are uncertain what do.
Nonetheless, your experience is abuse and it has affected you in a negative manner. What you need to remember is that you are a survivor and stopped the vicious cycle of abuse.
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