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This post has been edited by guest567: 20 August 2010 - 07:30 PM
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for those who didn't call it rape what would have changed if you had?
#77
- What does not kill me makes me stronger.
- Group: Member
- Posts: 164
- Joined: 29-May 08
Posted 27 August 2010 - 12:20 AM
I think if I had called it rape to his face he would have hurt me worse. I also think if I had realized how bad things were and attempted escape I might have gotten hurt worse. Stockholm Syndrome develops for a reason. Mine was meant to protect me.
#78 Guest_Hutchy_*
Posted 28 August 2010 - 01:50 AM
If I had acknowledged it sooner, I think it would have been better. I would not have spent so many nights in tears without knowing WHY I was feeling so awful. I would not have felt guilty without knowing why, or fallen deep into depression very suddenly. I would not have spent two years blaming myself for all these things, or thinking I was somehow crazy or defective because I couldn't figure out what the reason was for all those horrible things I was feeling. And maybe I wouldn't have developed PTSD, and maybe I would have been able to pursue recovery before my denial of the event damaged me so much. Maybe I could have confronted him before I cut contact with him, too. I don't know if that would have accomplished anything, but I still wonder about it sometimes.
I think that I could have saved myself a lot of pain if I knew that what happened to me was indeed rape, and if I called it that from the beginning instead of waiting for two years to acknowledge it. Instead of lying in bed at night, crying, thinking "Why am I so upset? Nothing bad has happened to me" I would have been concentrating on healing and moving forward. But at the same time I think I might not have grown in the same ways that I have. It's a lot of work to undo those two years of denial and backwards thinking, but I'm learning a lot about myself and growing as a person now that I finally have the courage to call it what it is: rape.
I think that I could have saved myself a lot of pain if I knew that what happened to me was indeed rape, and if I called it that from the beginning instead of waiting for two years to acknowledge it. Instead of lying in bed at night, crying, thinking "Why am I so upset? Nothing bad has happened to me" I would have been concentrating on healing and moving forward. But at the same time I think I might not have grown in the same ways that I have. It's a lot of work to undo those two years of denial and backwards thinking, but I'm learning a lot about myself and growing as a person now that I finally have the courage to call it what it is: rape.
#79
Posted 21 September 2010 - 09:18 PM
if I said it out loud i would have to own it,so I shut my mouth for a long time
#80
Posted 05 October 2010 - 07:52 AM
When it happens in a marriage and it's a "marital duty" and it's supposed to be a wonderful perfect family in a perfect one-ano-only right religious way on earth and I can't say no or I am suppressed into "you are becoming too independent, you need to be obedient and submissive", one doesn't call it rape. Now that I am out of that marriage and out of that religious group, I realize what it was. I admit it now. I am not wanting therapy for it tho because as I read about therapies it's like having to relive it...and I don't want to face it. This summer I started having panic attacks when courts ordered me in the same room as ex for parenting conference, and I couldn't do it. So because of the timing it looks like I am possibly "faking it." I hope I have found a safe place to let this out it...
#81
- survivor
- Group: Member
- Posts: 116
- Joined: 21-November 09
Posted 22 October 2010 - 09:36 PM
I didn't want to call it rape. I didn't what to admit it to myself. I tried to forget it. Then that it was just that I regretted it. He only pressured me not forced me. I guess it didn't help that I was drugged.
Even now I prefer to be numb.
~Angel
Even now I prefer to be numb.
~Angel
#82
Posted 29 October 2010 - 07:44 PM
It took me two years to admit that maybe the incident was rape. I'm in counseling now and am continuously told that it was rape but I still have a hard time accepting that it wasn't my fault and hopefully in time I'll be able to. If I had labeled it as rape from the beginning I think I would have spent a lot less time hating myself, denying it, and confused by my angry emotions. Because I thought it wasn't rape and I was told it wasn't, I didn't believe I deserved to heal from it because after all "I brought it on myself."
Sometimes it's really hazy whether or not the incident can be labeled "rape." But what I'm realizing is that, regardless of the definition, if we feel traumatized by it and are experiencing serious emotional distress because of it then it was rape. Because if we had consented and wanted it then it wouldn't be bothering us and we wouldn't feel this pain. That's just my thought, but either way, we deserve to heal and we deserve to know and for those around us to know that it takes time.
Stay strong!
Jane
Sometimes it's really hazy whether or not the incident can be labeled "rape." But what I'm realizing is that, regardless of the definition, if we feel traumatized by it and are experiencing serious emotional distress because of it then it was rape. Because if we had consented and wanted it then it wouldn't be bothering us and we wouldn't feel this pain. That's just my thought, but either way, we deserve to heal and we deserve to know and for those around us to know that it takes time.
Stay strong!
Jane
#83
Posted 22 November 2011 - 08:21 AM
I can't bring myself to use that term. When I think of that word, I think of strangers taking advantage of a jogger. I think of someone who is battered and bruised, left to die. I think of people on tv shows. I think of someone who is not real.
It's weird to say it happened to me, even after all this time. I'm not some girl you hear about in the news, and yet it still hapened to me. I think I'll always have a hard time using that word describe what happened.
It's weird to say it happened to me, even after all this time. I'm not some girl you hear about in the news, and yet it still hapened to me. I think I'll always have a hard time using that word describe what happened.
#84
Posted 07 February 2013 - 02:52 PM
' timestamp=, on 05 May 2003 - 01:57 PM, said:
TR***<p>
In my case it was during my teen years till I was over 17 and there was no violence so I was so majorly Brain-washed that it was only when he threatened my life that made me tell - I was like so stupid...saying "I had an incestuous relationship with my dad "(it was over more than 4 years time period)....no one knew that I really was not understanding or registering the idea of this "relationship" like they did....I had been convinced by him that since he never"forced" or "made" me do any of it that I had made choices that it took me so many years to realize that he had really given me No choice...he knew I might be able to be under his control-he did not realize my fear of being abandoned by him again (he abondoned me and my mother and my brother when I was 4 and after that my mother got married to an alcoholic controlling wife hitter who SA my little brother -she did leave him and he then he died - a couple of yars later dad showed up wanting to see us 7 1/2 years since he had any contact) That was what was making me do everything I could to keep him in my life - to the best of my ability (because at one point he told me he wasn't sure if I would be "too old" for him to do it when he was considering his approaching me - bleck....I was"too old" under normal circumstances.....but was not because of "fear"......) Anyway it took me 5 years -after it was over- to Really really realize it was not a "relationship" and so far I have not come as far in my recovery because I never went thru with therapy because I do not trust my RL support system(ie my hubby) to help me if things get rough for me in painful parts of my counseling (this weekend I was honest with him about this ).....I never blocked or "forgot" the abuse so recovering memories is not something I need(unless I was abused before he left and I don't know it-something I never really thought about till I joined Pandy's )....Anyhow for my own good "they" should have helped me to really realize if they could...(he always told me they would mess up my head and make me see "our realtionship" as wrong and that the reaction of the "do good church types" is really what makes people get tramatized so "they" would have had to break that idiotic gem into pieces before I would begin to have a clue on connecting it all mentally).....
Anyhow....yes....more help...sooner.....Therapy before I was 4 kids 3 serious relationships(on second (final!)marriage),plenty of self-help and numerous "errors in judgement" 20 years out from the "end of the abuse"...... Am not currently in T but should be and Pandy's ya'll gonna be part of my support system when I do because I have been sitting here for 3 years...with only 1 attempt at therapy during that time peried and 2 very short p/t jobs....uhg....those are my choices get a job(what hubby "needs" me to do) - get therapy(what I "should" do) or sit here and wish that everyone would just "leave me alone" (what I hav been up to)....good topic....ty
In my case it was during my teen years till I was over 17 and there was no violence so I was so majorly Brain-washed that it was only when he threatened my life that made me tell - I was like so stupid...saying "I had an incestuous relationship with my dad "(it was over more than 4 years time period)....no one knew that I really was not understanding or registering the idea of this "relationship" like they did....I had been convinced by him that since he never"forced" or "made" me do any of it that I had made choices that it took me so many years to realize that he had really given me No choice...he knew I might be able to be under his control-he did not realize my fear of being abandoned by him again (he abondoned me and my mother and my brother when I was 4 and after that my mother got married to an alcoholic controlling wife hitter who SA my little brother -she did leave him and he then he died - a couple of yars later dad showed up wanting to see us 7 1/2 years since he had any contact) That was what was making me do everything I could to keep him in my life - to the best of my ability (because at one point he told me he wasn't sure if I would be "too old" for him to do it when he was considering his approaching me - bleck....I was"too old" under normal circumstances.....but was not because of "fear"......) Anyway it took me 5 years -after it was over- to Really really realize it was not a "relationship" and so far I have not come as far in my recovery because I never went thru with therapy because I do not trust my RL support system(ie my hubby) to help me if things get rough for me in painful parts of my counseling (this weekend I was honest with him about this ).....I never blocked or "forgot" the abuse so recovering memories is not something I need(unless I was abused before he left and I don't know it-something I never really thought about till I joined Pandy's )....Anyhow for my own good "they" should have helped me to really realize if they could...(he always told me they would mess up my head and make me see "our realtionship" as wrong and that the reaction of the "do good church types" is really what makes people get tramatized so "they" would have had to break that idiotic gem into pieces before I would begin to have a clue on connecting it all mentally).....
Anyhow....yes....more help...sooner.....Therapy before I was 4 kids 3 serious relationships(on second (final!)marriage),plenty of self-help and numerous "errors in judgement" 20 years out from the "end of the abuse"...... Am not currently in T but should be and Pandy's ya'll gonna be part of my support system when I do because I have been sitting here for 3 years...with only 1 attempt at therapy during that time peried and 2 very short p/t jobs....uhg....those are my choices get a job(what hubby "needs" me to do) - get therapy(what I "should" do) or sit here and wish that everyone would just "leave me alone" (what I hav been up to)....good topic....ty
Happened to me too with my dad. He never used force just threatened me that would tell if I didn't do it. Then he said if I'd tell he'd tell about something bad I'd done once to my mom. He held that against me, and tried pressuring and talking me into sex from time I was 16-17 to time I was 20.
