Quote:
Originally Posted by earthmamma
I use to be worried that I had been SA'ed, spent quite a few yrs drinking on that "memory" and telling people when drunk that this relative or that relative had done this or that to me. I was never sure
I know now that sexual abuse is a solid thing, its something that can be understood as abuse if and when remembered, but emotional abuse is fluid, its hard to believe, its easier to feel as if it must be made up, but for me the SA never happened, it was my way of trying to understand and also deny that my mother could have been so emotionally abusive to me.
My inner world used "male" figures sexually abusing me the child as a way to define the power my mother had over me, whilst my consiousness struggled to understand my life story. If I had been sexually abused at least I would have an explaination, something to pin all my despair on, but emotional abuse is more covert, it gets covered up with the "Normality" that existed as well.
I was slightly disappointed at first when I'd talked enought and worked through enought of the memorys to find them just metaphors for something else that was more difficult to comprehend.
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Hi Earthmama,
It's interesting that your mind associated SA with emotional abuse. I suffered what feels to me like a lot of emotional abuse from my dad. But then, i have always been very sensitive, and probably felt hurt and traumatized by things that other kids would have just let roll of their back. So I am not sure if what my dad did was that bad. I just know that he picked at me and made fun of my feelings, sometimes until i cried and he would sometimes laugh about it. And he yelled at me alot for not doing things just right. But I'm fairly certain that I'm not using SA as a symbol for emotional abuse, although i totally can see how that happens sometimes.
About the partial memories of SA of my sister, which i think i overheard happening, I just really, really do not want to probe my mind about "who" it was, if it indeed happened. I do have a fear it was a certain person, but my h has put that into my mind because that's what he thinks. So this may be influencing me into thinking it was that person. I also have partial memories about SA of me involving a neighbor, which i absolutely know did happen, but I can't recall all of the details. I'm sorry that you suffered emotional abuse. It is hard to pin down. You can see a broken bone, but you can't see broken feelings.
I'm a person who likes to understand things and have definite answers, so it's very anxiety producing and frustrating for me NOT to be able to put 2+2 together!!! I really believe it is standing in the way of me healing from it. How do you heal from something that you only partly remember?