Thoughts About Healing From Sexual Abuse

Survivors of sexual trauma get asked all the time, “why didn’t you tell sooner”. I would like to address that in a small way. I say small because there are MANY reasons victims of sexual abuse do not disclose. It took me 31 years to begin to tell anyone what happened to me. It took me another 20 some years to get help to heal from it. As a child, I tried once to tell and was told I was a liar and afterwards shunned by the people whom I told. That hurt. But I find that these days, I feel that hurt much more deeply than I did back then. Here is why.

I have long since told the world what happened to me – I published a memoir detailing my abuse. It was costly. There is only one member of my family of origin that still speaks to me. The rest of my living siblings have disowned me and called me a liar. That isn’t what hurts the most. I expected that. It wasn’t a surprise. What hurts the most is that even in the RECOVERY community where I have sought help (and in a lot of ways, received help) – sexual abuse is a taboo subject. The conversations steer towards the “symptoms” of sexual abuse – addiction, eating disorders, alcoholism and the topic of sexual abuse still gets buried. God forbid, we should talk about the actual abuse that caused the addiction, and all the other ways victims disconnect from themselves.

This hurts. I carried so much toxic shame for so many years about what happened to me. To STILL, even in recovery, have to experience what I can only describe as an inability to talk about SEXUAL ABUSE head on, without stigma, perpetuates the shame that we survivors feel. I thought I was making a difference. I want to help others heal. The only way to heal is to reduce the shame and be authentic. But I come up against brick walls when it comes to getting this message out there. Doors shut in my face by the very recovery community that told me the shame wasn’t mine.

I will continue to try and bring awareness to one of the huge reasons so many victims turn to addictions to medicate the pain: sexual abuse. Survivors feel that pain deeply. They have had not only their physical bodies, but their very souls violated. In the meantime, shame on you. I am heartsick.