You are Not Alone Now What?

I am a survivor I will repeat that a million times in this series. I am here to help you learn to say that and live your life. You know you are not alone so now what do you do? The answer is simple find the others, the other victims and survivors. I know everyone tells you this but I am not telling you this I am begging you to do this. You see it was 25 years before I got the real help I needed. I don’t want you suffering the way I did or making the mistakes I did. You are not fine. You can not deal with it on your own and this goes deeper then just getting over the initial event If you get hit by a car you can get better by letting you body heal but you have suffered more then physical injury. In the case of child sexual assault no matter how long ago it was you still have the emotional trauma that was caused.

In my case I was abused repeatedly by family members. First by a male cousin then others. I was hurt physically and emotionally by the very people who were supposed to protect me, my own family. I was made to afraid to tell anyone else in my family because a short time later in my life other family members were involved so who could I trust? Not to mention I was still afraid of having my head smashed in the apple press. I was just a kid. Every victim of sexual assault has their head flooded with questions like why me? what did I do wrong? why didn’t I stop it? why didn’t I tell? Most of us just want to block it out and pretend it never happened. This is the wrong road to take trust me.

I knew the first time I was molested it was wrong as young as I was. I just felt it. I didn’t get help and the I didn’t tell and as time went on even though I knew it was wrong it became normal. This may sound strange to you but to someone who has been victimized more then a few times you understand. That is why counseling is so important. This can lead to many problems in life not just relationship issues but it can also lead to issues with trust in general, feelings that all your good for is sex, and with out counseling you can even become the abuser. 

I was first abused when I was very young right on up until I was about 13 years old maybe 14 I am not sure it was then something changed. Since I had no counseling the cycle continued with me and I started playing the same games with my younger cousins. Without a thought, without even a care, as if I were playing any other game I became the abuser. This is why writing this now is so important to my someone has to break the cycle. It took me 25 yrs to get the help I really needed. Yes after I got caught I was ordered to go to psycho sexual counseling that was 19 years ago. I can say I have no re-offended since. I don’t really care what you think of me as a person over this revelation because it does not change my intention. That is to help others. 

In my upcoming articles I will be writing more about what I have learned about the answers to all the questions that I come to mind when you become a victim. I will also tell you what I learned about why I became the abuser and how I stopped it. Being a survivor for me is more then surviving the abuse it also means for me being able to control the urge to abuse again.