I also forgot to add that confrontation is not necessary for a person to heal. I know many survivors in fact when I was doing my public speaking engagements I met many many survivors th at had decided not to do the confrontations. their decision was made on many foactors - the type of relationship they now have with or without their abusers in their lives, the amount of years that have gone by, the fact that after so many years prosecution was not possible for them, their abuser lives miles away from them or is dead so confrontation is not possible, or it is just too dangerious physically because of threats of harm and death to the survivor, and also based on the fact that confrontation with the abuser is not necessary to heal. a person can take care of their depression, and other mental problems with out standing in front of their abuser and saying you did this this and this to me and I want this this and this (pay my therapy costs, abuser to enter therapy, not have unsupervised contact with children under 18 and so on from the abuser.

Before a person confronts they need to decide why they are going to confront and what they want out of the confrontation. There is always a reason behind the confrontation be it they wanted the abuser to know they are not going to hide the abuse anymore, they want the abuser to appologize, they want the abuser to enter therapy, they want the abuser to pay for the therapy the survivor needs, the abuser has contact with other children so they want others to know what the abuser did so that the children in contact with the abuser will be protected.

There are therapeutic approaches to confrontation that will achieve the same result that a face to face confrontation would or could possibly give for example-

role playing with a therapist where the therapist takes on the role of the abuser and during therapy the survivor "confronts the abuser" by telling the therapist who is role playing as the abuser what the abuser did to the person and how it made the survivor feel and what the survivor wants from the abuser.

Writing a letter to an abuser and giving it to the therapist.

imagining a chair is the abuser and the survivor tells the chair (abuser) what they did to them and how it made them feel and what they want from the abuser. The therapist speaks for the chair (abuser) sometimes which makes it even more real.

Confronting under normal circumstances is hard but I found that it was even harder for me because I am DID. most of my memories were separated and stored unconsciously so unless I was dissociated I pretty much could not tell my abuser what I experienced and felt. At the time I had confronted I had only two memories and they were relatively recent with in a few years of my confrontation so I knew if my abuser pushed it into my having to prosecute him I could sit in a court room witness stand and talk about those two situations from the point of view of I knew they happened but not from the point of view of feeling it and experiencing it. It was this type of situation why most DID's that I know did not confront - in order to confront they had to be dissociated in order to tell what had happened to them so they figured why tell if they could not experience the telling and the feelings afterwards of relief that they told and so on.

It was not impossible for me to confront my abuser but with out dissociating I only had limited knowledge of what I could tell, and even that resulted in my self injury problems escalating because I have an audio memory that replays saying things like "shut up" "don't tell" and if I go against that vioce the urge to hurt myself gets very strong. I can now after 20 plus year of therapy go against that voice but back when I confronted it lead to my being hospitalized at least once that I remember.

So if anyone is DID and are considering confronting they should most definately work on before, during and after care with their therapists so that safety precautions can be put in place and so on.