I think I have been abused (sexually) as a child. I just have some faint memory, picture, which came up very recently in my mind. How can I be sure? I am a 20 year old female.
Not raped.
The picture I have is as follows: An 'old' family friend, which I haven't seen for ages, on top of me, asking me to hold his genitals. I would be around 3 4 years.
The picture I have is as follows: An 'old' family friend, which I haven't seen for ages, on top of me, asking me to hold his genitals. I would be around 3 4 years.
6 Answers
In school, I was always the guy the girls could talk to about anything, and they did.. I've had strangers sit down next to me and tell me their stories of being abused in various ways. I'm a Tantric mystic and engage in "trance" work with them helping them through things. Be careful. Don't create damage now just because some people think you ought to because of the "awful truth" whatever it might be. If it doesn't trouble you now, don't make it do so. If it does trouble you in various ways by all means work through it. Be careful of letting somebody talk you into "pursuing" it in whatever ways.
My father had a minor surgery which ended up being malpractice that almost killed him, putting him into the hospital for a couple of months, and cost him a lot physically, never recovering all the way. He went to an attorney who told him he had a good case. Then the attorney asked him an important question. He was nearly 80. The attorney asked him if he wanted to spend the rest of his life pursuing this legal case and have his life dominated by this legal case. He said no and went about living the rest of his life as best he could.
Do you want to make a lot of the rest of your life be about this? That is the risk, despite perhaps already knowing 100% of what occurred. Digging into it deeper and deeper could ruin your life. Genuinely letting go of it may be the best choice. Tolerating limited knowledge and possible unknowns and having a good life might be your best choice. I am speaking from my own life experience as well as observing others.
My father had a minor surgery which ended up being malpractice that almost killed him, putting him into the hospital for a couple of months, and cost him a lot physically, never recovering all the way. He went to an attorney who told him he had a good case. Then the attorney asked him an important question. He was nearly 80. The attorney asked him if he wanted to spend the rest of his life pursuing this legal case and have his life dominated by this legal case. He said no and went about living the rest of his life as best he could.
Do you want to make a lot of the rest of your life be about this? That is the risk, despite perhaps already knowing 100% of what occurred. Digging into it deeper and deeper could ruin your life. Genuinely letting go of it may be the best choice. Tolerating limited knowledge and possible unknowns and having a good life might be your best choice. I am speaking from my own life experience as well as observing others.
Get some therapy, but don't give credence to this faint memory in case it is a false memory. False memories are not uncommon and can be generated by dreams, books or movies. They can also be a displacement: something that happened to someone else bothers you so much that you think it happened to you. Memories are fragile things.
Years ago when my daughters were horse showing, a competitor was jumping a course and her horse's hoof hit the back bar of an oxer and the horse flipped over and broke its neck. The rider, about 12 at the time, broke her collar bone. The horse died there in front of everyone. Fluid came out of the horse's eyes and one little boy said, "He's crying." My daughter was supposed to ride next and she couldn't do it. I have a vivid memory of the whole thing. But I wasn't there. It was told to me by several people and I was so emotionally involved, that I have to hold on to the knowledge that I wasn't there: the pictures in my mind are all my imagination.
Years ago when my daughters were horse showing, a competitor was jumping a course and her horse's hoof hit the back bar of an oxer and the horse flipped over and broke its neck. The rider, about 12 at the time, broke her collar bone. The horse died there in front of everyone. Fluid came out of the horse's eyes and one little boy said, "He's crying." My daughter was supposed to ride next and she couldn't do it. I have a vivid memory of the whole thing. But I wasn't there. It was told to me by several people and I was so emotionally involved, that I have to hold on to the knowledge that I wasn't there: the pictures in my mind are all my imagination.
If the memory only recently started coming back, you could have grounds on which to have the person prosecuted. (It depends on the law where the offense occurred.) Since most children don't start thinking in words until about that age, the fact that it's only a "snapshot" memory is normal.
As for what you can do for yourself, seek out a support group. Only others who have been through what you've been through can help you. Therapy is great </sarcasm> - it's like the Pope giving marriage advice, unless the therapist was sexually abused as a young child. Someone who has started to heal can tell you what helped her, or started her on the road to recovery.
As for what you can do for yourself, seek out a support group. Only others who have been through what you've been through can help you. Therapy is great </sarcasm> - it's like the Pope giving marriage advice, unless the therapist was sexually abused as a young child. Someone who has started to heal can tell you what helped her, or started her on the road to recovery.
