I forgave by working through my feelings on the abuse first, the forgiveness came later. I don't view forgiveness as saying what happened was ok tho. It was clearly not ok. I dealt with a lot of the emotions in therapy, and outside of it. It does take some amount of acceptance to forgive, however the acceptance is not of the actions, not at all. It is the acceptance that it did happen, that you did not have the choice, that you are not responsible.

Like I said the offender need not even know about it, it doesn't affect them. it does affect you. So it is worth exploring. I am pretty sure the idea of forgiveness as a gift to the other person, forgive and forget.. I think these ideas stem from religion, which I am not putting down, however religion has been known to get ideas a bit misinterpreted.

Hate can be hard to let go of, but hate is pretty toxic. Hate destroys happiness, not theirs but yours. Letting go of these things does not mean you like the person, are ok with what they did, or condone it any way. It just means you are ready and want to let it stay in the past, where it belongs. This is now, not then, it is over. You have the power to leave it in the past, or keep it alive in your now and future. I guess I finally decided I had enough suffering and no longer needed to take part in abusing myself either. Which is how I see holding onto these feelings and thoughts, like self torture.

I just want content and peace in my life, hate and anguish, resentment, don't bring either of those things, they are not the right side kicks for that job.

Of course this is just my opinion.

I hope you can find your way through it, so that you can find the peace within yourself that you deserve.