Active discussions

Meet the Other Phone. A phone that grows with your child.

Meet the Other Phone.
A phone that grows with your child.

Buy now

Please or to access all these features

Talk
Relationships

Mumsnet has not checked the qualifications of anyone posting here. If you need help urgently or expert advice, please see our domestic violence webguide and/or relationships webguide. Many Mumsnetters experiencing domestic abuse have found this thread helpful: Listen up, everybody

Original poster

Support thread for survivors of childhood sexual abuse.

999 replies

CailinDana · 19/03/2012 12:51

I was severely sexually abused as a child. I have spent the last few years trying to come to terms with it and I'm slowly getting there.

I have found that a huge barrier to dealing with it is the lack of space to talk about it, how I feel and what I think. It's like this horrible painful scar that I have to keep covered for fear of offending other people. It has been a massive source of shame.

I don't really feel like keeping it covered any more. Yes I was abused, in a horrible, horrific way, but I'm still a good person and I'm still capable of being happy.

I'm hoping this thread will be a place for people to open up about things that happened to them. A fantastic, caring poster on MN spent hours yesterday "listening" to me and it has helped me immensely. I would like to do that for other people.

Nothing is taboo. Say as much or as little as you like. Say what you think and feel even if you think it sounds batty. I will bump this thread regularly so even if you're not ready to post now, it will be here for you at a later stage.

OP posts:
MouseyHousey · 22/03/2012 20:05

I havent managed to read through tthis whole thread yet but really wanted o post
I was sexually abused by my grandfather as a young child. my baby sister just told us after christmas that my brother has been abusing her since she was 6. she is now 17. He is currently on bail which ends tomorrow.

dottyspotty2 · 22/03/2012 20:07

I've been dragged out by DH told him about this afternoon he said he thought I was full of confidence told him not anymore, he's suggested going at night but that's not the answer plus I can't get all the fresh stuff that I like or shop at the supermarket that I like. Just wish there was an easy way out. Only time I find it easy is when I have DD2 with me but she has a BF now and spends a lot of time with him which I don't begrudge in anyway.

jasminerice · 22/03/2012 20:08

TT, I understand. Trying to 'feel' again has been the hardest thing ever. It's been a very gradual learning process for me. I almost end up meditating as a way of accessing my feelings. Btw, I was on the Stately Homes thread too, some time ago, under a different name.

dottyspotty2 · 22/03/2012 20:09

Mousey that bail shoukd be continued my brother is on his second lot of bail now until June his first lot finished on the 19th of this month.

TomblibooTrousers · 22/03/2012 20:13

Thank you. i have tried meditating and mindfulness but find that i get frightened if i get too deeply into it. worried about what i will find if i open the box. i have The Courage to Heal under my bed but havent looked at it yet. i become inarticulate when i talk about this.

jasminerice · 22/03/2012 20:36

TT, it's perfectly understandable to feel scared of opening your 'pandora's box'. Mine seemed to be opened without me consciously trying to. Somehow having my DC's caused it to burst open and then I was forced to deal with the contents whether I liked it or not. Had I had a choice in the matter I'm sure I would have hesitated too.

Original poster
CailinDana · 22/03/2012 20:47

I've been holding back from sharing what happened to me. I know it's because of shame. I want to let go of that shame, it's toxic.

I was raped anally, I don't know how many times, by two men who were friends of the family. I was also forced to give oral sex. My sister and I were staying with them while my parents stayed next door with my sister. So were left in the sole care of two paedophiles every night for two weeks.

OP posts:
oikopolis · 22/03/2012 20:55
Sad

you are brave Cailin.
tears in my eyes now, thinking of you going through that. so sorry. just desperately sorry x

they are fuckers, and them and your parents ought to be ashamed.

Original poster
CailinDana · 22/03/2012 21:07

Thank you oikopolis.

OP posts:
jasminerice · 22/03/2012 21:25

CD (((hug))). Well done for saying it 'out loud'. I know just how hard that is. If you feel up to it, I hope might be able to share with your DH and allow him to support and care for you.

Original poster
CailinDana · 22/03/2012 21:30

Thanks jasmine. I don't think I'll talk to him tonight, I'm too tired. But it has helped saying it on here.

OP posts:
ToxicToria · 22/03/2012 21:40

Sorry I haven't been posting I guess I have been taking much more from this than I can give at the moment.

Cailin that was one of the things that happened to me but that must have been so horrendous for you especially as you were so young Sad

Original poster
CailinDana · 22/03/2012 21:47

I was a bit older when that happened, I was 10. The abuse started when I was about 6 with much more minor things and then there was a big gap when we didn't see them for a couple of years.

OP posts:
Original poster
CailinDana · 22/03/2012 21:48

Sorry to hear it happened to you too Toria :(

Don't worry about posting, it's ok if you just read.

OP posts:
bestbesomeoneelse · 22/03/2012 21:54

I posted earlier on in the thread, but what you are all saying - and I completely believe every single one of you - just reinforces all I've heard since I started working with survivors on their stories.

If any of you would like contact details of Scottish support groups, please feel free to message me - I have absolutely no vested interest in these organisations, don't work for them, and only recommend those I know personally. Even if you're not in Scotland, they may stil be able to help or I'm more than happy to act as a conduit (you'd never need to reveal any personal info to me; I'm not asking for that at all).

I won't post specific links or details here as they may act as triggers or it may make people feel I'm suggesting that counselling is the only option and will magically solve everything. That is most certainly not what I'm suggesting in any way, but if I can help with this, please do let me know.

dottyspotty2 · 22/03/2012 21:58

I'm so sorry Cailin I know with me that definatly didn't happen but I do know to put a figure on mine the rape would run into the hundreds as he was home ever other weekend in my early life when I was 4-8 and it would happen sometimes twice a day and at least 3 times when he was home but he can only be charged with one count of rape per year but they will be told the circumstances.I also know that if it hadn't stopped at 12 it would of got so much worse as he performed oral sex on my sister and made her do it to him. But both of them say it's not about them but me because I according to them was not much more than a baby when it started.

MouseyHousey · 22/03/2012 22:00

Hi Dotty, His bail has already been extended, it first ended mid february but got extended as my sister was in a psychiatric unit after trying to take her own life.
Sorry my previous post was so brief, it seemed easier to just gloss over details the first time.
The first person I told about my abuse was my DP on the way to visit my grandparents. I had flashback but wasnt 100% sure about what had happened. I know I was young, between 4 and 8 Im thinking but I still have trouble recollecting exactly what happened. I know my grandad used to make me sit on his lap, touch me innapropriately and make me touch him. When we got to my grandparents house that day my grandfather suffered a heart attack, while my nan was getting his stuff together, ambulance on the way and DP looking after DD my grandad apologised to me, cried and said he didnt know why he did it although he didnt say exactly what he did. Thats all he had the chance to say, he was very short off breath. I had a break down and DP convinced me to tell my mother (this was her father). She told me she couldnt see how that could ever have happened and I must be mistaken. As for his apology it was a result of his old age apparently, he must be getting confused. I havent been able to tell anyone else (until recently when i told my sister) for fear of not being believed. I saw my grandad at a wedding last year and my mother practically dragged me over to say hello to him because it would be rude to ignore him all day.
Im getting married in just over a month and he has had to be invited to save having to tell the whole family, even though everytime I see him I feel sick and dont want him to be there.
My sister only told of my brother abusing her as he announced his girlfriend as pregnant and she didnt want the same happening to this baby. Yet they have since got engaged and are planning to get married before the baby is born in june. I want to go to this girl and shake her ragged and tell her how stupid she is being having a baby with a (hopefully from tomorrow convicted) child abuser.

Im sorry for this huge long post.. just came pouring out now, I still find everything hard to deal with.

ToxicToria · 22/03/2012 22:03

I can't imagine how you and all the others feel after going through all that over such a long period of time. it truly is heartbreaking I really hope you all manage to find some of the happiness you all deserve.

Xales · 22/03/2012 22:05

I have posted parts of my past on other threads before so am not going to rehash most of it on here.

Funny what you forget though and what reading through this has reminded me.

When I was younger we used to share bath water. One would have a bath and then another. My step-father used to wank in the water before I had my bath and I had no choice but to use that bath water and bathe in it. It would have been unacceptable and not understandable for me to empty the bath or not bath.

It was just so fucking humiliating, disgusting and degrading.

It is only a very tiny thing out of all the things he used to do to me but how could I have forgotten/buried it when I remember (well I think I do) everything else?

oikopolis · 22/03/2012 22:09

there are so many tiny degradations that we file away and try not to remember.

sometimes it's those small things, those little cruelties that are the most galling. because they are so senseless, so rotten. the abuser could have so easily NOT done them, but they did. just to be cruel.

very hard to take sometimes.

sending all on this threads hugs and tears.

oikopolis · 22/03/2012 22:12

and you know what

they aren't even tiny.

they seem tiny in light of other, huge, monstrous things.

that's also part of what makes it so cruel. the fact that awful violations and humiliations look small in comparison to the "big" stuff.

Xales · 22/03/2012 22:15

You are right oikopolis. I say it is tiny but really it isn't. It is disgusting, cruel and perverted.

It's just in comparison to being physically and sexually abused in every way shape or form you can imagine it is perceived as tiny.

dottyspotty2 · 22/03/2012 22:16

No there not oikopolis as its forcing a child to take part in something that only consenting adults should do in fact some of these things no adult would consent to. As my aunt told me last night he's had half my life once this is over I am going to make my life my own.

Original poster
CailinDana · 22/03/2012 22:19

That's what I was thinking oik. How fucked up is it that I think having a grown man put his fingers in me while I was in the bath at the age of 6 is "minor" because he later raped me anally?

Thank you for posting Xales. What a nasty, vile, petty thing your stepfather did to you.

OP posts:
Xales · 22/03/2012 22:29

It was your post about fingers and the bath that reminded me. Don't get upset about that!

He also used to pin me to the wall by my throat (while my mum looked on) when I was 5 or so (she has told me I do not remember this). He then started raping me vaginally, orally and anally from when I was around 8 to my mid teens on a regular basis. Weird as it sounds I have vague memories but cannot remember the first times. I do remember getting away from him in a bed much younger than that though.

I don't want to say weekly because it wasn't but sometimes it could be more than once a week and then a few weeks could go by before it happened again. It was certainly extremely frequently. I suppose it was down to opportunity.

Holidays are tainted by memories of him taking me away from the rest of the family for a while and raping me against a wall or anything he could bend me over.

The only holiday I remember with relief where he didn't touch me was when we went to Alton Towers with my cousin (his brother's daughter). I am sure you can guess why he didn't touch me that weekend! Rumour is that her child was his. I can only thank fuck that I was lucky enough that didn't happen to me when I was old enough.

He never even let me remove tampons sometimes when I was on and I would have to try and get them out from where they had been forced up afterwards.

Lots more I could say just that is why the wanking in the bath seems such a silly little thing.