Precaryous, my last abuse was when I was an older teenager. Part of my difficulty in getting past that abuse was that feeling that because I was older, I should have done things differently. I made the choice to live in my abuser's home (for other reasons), but again, I played that game with myself that I perhaps put myself in that situation willingly. I had a couple of teachers at the time who recognized something wasn't right during that time and asked me pretty directly if something was wrong, but I remained silent. Maybe if I had spoken up . . . . A few years later, my abuser actually said to my therapist, "Well, there was a baseball bat by the door the whole time . . ." and my therapist jumped all over him for trying to make me responsible for controlling his abusive behavior.

I think I somewhat understand those conflicting messages you say to yourself. It takes a long time to stop internally debating all the "what ifs" with yourself. Having that therapist very unambiguously refuse to accept excuses from my abuser was helpful, but even that wasn't enough to get ME to stop accepting any justifications in my own head. I did get there, but it took a long time. I guess I just want you to know someone sort of understands what is going through your mind about this.