This may be a stupid post but I have some questions about what constitutes sexual abuse and whether I was actually abused. Since I’m having to ask… it probably means that I wasn’t! I get it when stuff is done to a child by an adult but what about when done by older kids?
Here is my background information sorry for the length.
I was raised in a two parent home where the kids were basically sent outside to play until meal time. My parents were generally loving people, totally clueless, and dad was a serious alcoholic. I lived in a lower-middle class neighborhood in the suburbs. My neighborhood was fairly violent and we kids really ran amuck. The best way to describe it is that it was a lot like the island described in the Lord of the Flies book. The only difference was that our particular island had the addition of 2 little girls. I was the youngest age 8 the other girl was 10 and the rest of the kids were all boys ranging in age from 11-15. Needless to say the two of us were endlessly groped, tormented, coerced, manipulated, fondled, …etc. All of the things teenage boys will try to do while unsupervised and left to their own devices. Truth or dare and an advance version of spin the bottle were common games played. We had a fort in the woods where the walls were plastered with playboy centerfolds. Not the kind of place I would want my 8 and 10 yr old boys playing in let alone girls. I was lucky enough not to actually be raped by the older boys, however the other girl was not as lucky. She was a very compliant, quiet, wanted everyone to like her kind of girl who had the added curse of being more physically developed than I was. I on the other hand was a lot more volatile, aggressive, and could get down right nasty and would fight back enough to draw blood. I think the fact that I was unpredictable left the boys a little more cautious of how far they would push me. It is fairly obvious to me now as an adult that two of the older boys had some serious problems. One has been incarcerated for most of his adult life for violent crimes and the other is a drug addict living on the streets somewhere. In addition to the sexual stuff there was a lot of violence: playing chicken with knifes, dousing hands in lighter fluid setting them on fire then seeing who could be the last one to put it out, carving initials in arms, torturing domestic animals, and just daring each other to do various acts of mischief throughout the neighborhood. I was also exposed to drugs at this age. I smoked my first blunt walking to school in the 3rd grade.
Having disclosed all of this… I need to know if what I experienced was in fact sexual abuse or just typical childhood stuff that commonly occurred in the 1970’s? I realize times have changed and that the parents of my generation were basically …absent. Second when writing all this down I really don’t have any strong emotions about this time. I don’t know if I am just in denial or if I just consider it a f*ed up childhood. If it was abuse, why don’t I feel anything? The most I feel is “What in the hell were my parents thinking?” I’m in therapy now for some personal and marital problems. I really haven’t disclosed all of this other than to say that I had an early exposure to sex and violence. I don’t know if it is important to disclose all of this if I really don’t feel much about it.