To be very concerned that this woman has children (trigger C.S.Abuse)

[Thechangednameoftheday]

Name changed for this for obvious reasons.

When I was twelve years old I made a friend, through a mutual friend, who was sixteen coming on 17 at the time.

No obvious problems at home and she came from a good family, supportive parents etc. Relatively nice life. I mention this incase anybody wonders whether she was vulnerable.

I however came from a single parent family, absent father and poor motherly parenting provisions. I was a bit of a lost soul. Damaged if you will.

The 16 year old (I'll call her J) would often go around with older guys (20-30) and would encourage me to tag along, drink and take drugs. It was commonplace for her to sleep with the men, often at her initiation. I firmly believe there was no grooming involved, she knew what she was doing and didn't receive payment or any incentive to go these things. She pursued these people for a 'good time' and enjoyed the lifestyle.

I looked up to her and began imitating her behaviour, drugs, drinking and having sex with older males. J encouraged this.

J would tell some of the men I was older (15) and tell me to do the same, but for the most part they knew how old I was.

As I got older I distanced myself from J because I felt increasingly extremely uncomfortable about the lifestyle, still just a child myself I was aware enough to know it was wrong. I developed other, healthier friendships.

I was friends with J from 12 years until almost 15 years old.

Now as an adult I reflect on this period of my life with sadness, shame and disgust. I stumbled across J on social media today by accident, she came up in our mutual friends, and I'm left with alot of conflicting emotions including anger toward her and confusion as to why she would have encouraged those things when I was just a little girl.

I couldn't fathom replicating her behaviour, when i was 16 I looked at a 12 year old as a young child and despite my own past would have reported anything of the sort to the police, not encouraged it.

My DM knew about some of this, useless as she is she didn't encourage me to report it. She is what people would call 'slow' and just didn't seem to get that you need to protect your daughter from things like this. I think she thought it was all my choice, which it was, but I was caving to peer pressure and at such a young age don't have the capacity to give righteous consent in the first place.

J now has children of her own, as do i. I feel uncomfortable about somebody with her attitude toward underage sex (which I now acknowledge as child abuse) having children.

I feel it's too late to do anything about all of this, it was years ago and I have no proof but I'm left with scars that pop up every now and then like today.

AIBU to feel this way towards her? At 16-17 can she be excused as just knowing no better? Is my anger misplaced? fwiw I am angry at the males too, but she was my friend.

Nonetheless so very well done for pulling yourself away - I did too and was one of the best choices I ever made.
Please seek some help for all of this, you really can’t/won’t be able to untangle this yourself without help of a professional. I’ve been stuck in therapy for 5 years straight and still going. It’s very complex. Sexual exploitation, abuse, power, assault, grooming. There are so many things to unpick.

If you want to dm please feel free.
I don’t understand what your experience was like, but I can relate on some level. X

Blame her for pushing me into sex at 12 and encouraging said rapes - absolutely i do

Blame her for the fact the men chose to rape me - clearly not

What you said math, all day long.

Thank you very much mum2 x

I’m so sorry about your experience. Those men are rapists. That’s the right word for them.
Your friend was acting to please them, she took pleasing men, using sex, to the ultimate degree - pimping out her underage friend. That is wrong. You are right and justified to be so so angry.
I would be worried about her and her children too. BUT. I do see her as damaged. Nothing that you’ve described are the actions of a well rounded individual with a clear eyed idea about sexuality and relationships.

Its not that clear, if you feel she bears most of the responsibility for what happened, that implies you do blame her for the rape to some extent.

Also, in the gentlest way possible, your level of shame about what happened shows that you have reversed victim and perpetrator in your mind to some degree. Why is it you and she that should feel ashamed? Shouldn't the rapists?

Changed has already said she is just starting to unravel this.

J was the person who Changed had a relationship with.
J should have cared for her.
J 's betrayal of her friend created the opportunity for the abuse.
Perfectly good reasons to hate her.

I agree she is likely very damaged, if she wasn't before then she probably is now.

I couldn't look myself in the mirror if I did what she did, no matter what I had been through.

Though my suspicion that she may be damaged by the whole thing is at odds with the fact she keeps one of my rapists on Facebook, even now in her 30s with a young daughter herself.

If she exposed her own daughter to that man now, now that she's in her 30s, can she still be forgiven for putting a child at risk.

Because if the fact she's in touch with the rapist is anything to go by, she hasn't learned a thing.

For me that is adding insult to injury.

As a good mother surely the need to extricate a known rapist from your life trumps your (for whatever reason) desire to stay friends with that person?

Unfortunately I think any sympathy I may have gone on to develop for her after therapy has been well and truly stopped in it's tracks after seeing she's still in touch with a child rapist.

Not that I owe her forgiveness regardless, but I'm sensible enough to see that it would do me good to get to a place whereby I no longer feel anger towards her.

I had a friend at school who hung on to every word her boyfriend said, idolised him and was having sex with him at 15. He manipulated her into having sex with someone else saying they were going to kill him as he owed them money and the only thing that would stop them was if she had sex with them. She fearing for his safety did so then after it was over he laughed and said it was all just a big joke. He did this to her because he could, because he wanted to see just what she would do for him and because some people, even at 16, are just evil bastards.

^ perfect example of how some teenagers can just be horrible in their own right.

Not every act of malice is a result of underlying abuse.

So sorry op. You must have loads of processing to do. That was an awful set of circumstances you should have been protected from.

If I were to take an educated guess. She was traumatised from abuse herself. The behaviour she exhibited are symptoms of trauma. You don't really become an adult until your late 20's. Taking younger children into the fold is one of the biggest risks associated with vulnerable children and grooming gangs. The bastard fuckpigs who abused vulnerable young girls deserve jail.

I think I would report the fact that she is in touch with this man to ... the authorities. Police? It could be a piece of the puzzle to safeguard her children. I appreciate that isn’t easy and you would have to feel strong and ready to do that.

It's understandable and even healthy that you have anger towards her and what she was doing wasn't right. She is just the completely wrong person to heap most of the blame on. It's possible that even today she is in denial about the situation when she was younger. Or maybe she is just a bit of a shit. These things run deep as you know.
However, don't any of these men have kids? Much more concerning.

When I was 16 I was J. I was lonely and being beaten at home and watching mum being beaten as well. I used to actively go back to grown mens houses because anything was better than going home. I was very naive even though I appeared street wise.
My friend of 25 years only recently found out why I was the way I was. I couldn't speak about it I was absolutely traumatised.
I knew these men were using me. Sometimes the men hurt me but I never spoke about that. I just didn't want to go home.
I think you should just leave J alone and not blame her and get on with your life now or have therapy to see if you can help how you feel.
I turned my life around and went back to get an education and am now a well paid professional. No one would know and I also know I will never let my dc suffer the way I did if I can ever help it.

I want people to understand and be clear on the fact I'm not holding her responsible for my rapes, not even mostly responsible.

The people I hold most responsible are of course the men. Held in a similar degree of contempt is my mother.

However. I do have alot of anger towards J too. I'm angry at her because she incited everything, pushed me into it and encouraged it to happen. That is what I'm angry at her for.

This thread is about how I feel towards her which is why everything seems to be directed at her. If I started my OP talking about how I felt my DM failed me then all of my subsequent posts would be about my DM.

I've been triggered today by seeing J pop up, this brought to the surface my feelings about her and what part she played in it.

I'm well aware she's not responsible for the men's decision to sexually abuse me.

But, she's responsible for the part she played.

As are the men. As is my DM. As is social services (who were involved and missed all the blatant signs whilst I was on a child protection plan)

In moving forward, if I thought I stood a fraction of a chance of getting justice for what the men did to me I would summon every ounce of strength I could and fight for it, unfortunately the only one who can corroborate my stories is her and there's more chance of hell freezing over than her risking implicating herself to help me.

What I could do is raise a red flag about the fact shes still in touch with at least one of my rapists and has children now herself, but I wouldn't know where to begin to do that or how to go about it in a way that causes the least fallout for her DC.

Despite everything, I wouldn't wish any disruption to her life in the shape of SS - without being absolutely sure she had a relationship with this man in person now and not just on Facebook.

Gah it's all so messy and horrible

I'm sorry for what you went through fluffycushionista, although i dont think you sound anything like J (unless you were pushing 12yr olds into sex aswell) so I don't think you should compare yourself to this person.

Leave her alone? I haven't said a word to her.

Wow, what a thread.. I'm with you, OP! I perfectly understand why you would feel angry with J and I think it's perfectly normal to feel this way. So she might have been a victim herself. SO WHAT? That doesn't make the things she did to you ok, and her herself blameless. And it doesn't mean that you're supposed to be somehow sorry for her now.

I'm myself a victim of abuse. Abuse at home, vicious violence, no love, no sympathy, multiple issues. Drinking, drugs, self harming, attempted suicides, sex with older men from young age. All I was looking for, was love and attention, oh well, a cliche. Multiple men used me, multiple abused me. I was also raped and beaten, ended up in hospital for a long time. Lots of dark shit happened.

On the surface, I was a 'cool' girl. A wild girl, lots of parties and dangerous behaviour, rebellious teen, just wow. Many younger girls looked up to me, wanted to be like me and go out with me. Yet I always refused. Because I always knew that everything I did, I did because of the deep sadness, lack of love, no help and not knowing WHAT to do. But there wasn't a moment that I thought that my lifestyle was truly good and enjoyable, even though it may have looked like that for younger girls. I fully well knew it was bad. And under no circumstances I would have wished all that on another girl. 12 year old kid? No chance. I hated myself, hated my life and my family, hated everything, but I still had a moral compass and some fucked up boundaries. Not for myself, I didn't care what was happening to me, but I couldn't have lived with myself if I had dragged another young girl into all that.

If you're a victim of abuse, it doesn't mean that you're so completely fucked up, that you don't understand that what's happening is wrong and wish it on another person.

J from OPs post. She's still friends with at least one man who she had sex with and who raped OP. She's a grown woman now. With kids. If she's friends with said man, she must think he did nothing wrong, they just 'partied' together. And she has daughter(s). I fully understand now that these older men in my life were not my 'buddies' to party with, they were sleazy pervs, preying upon vulnerable. If I'd meet one of them now, I'd claw his eyes out or at least spit in his face, not be friends with him.

Stay strong OP. If you don't want to understand her - don't. You're perfectly entitled not to. If you don't want to feel sorry for her - don't. Blame her too, together with all these rapists and your mother, if that makes it easier for you. Don't let yourself be guilt tripped into all this shit 'ooh, she must have been abused too, poor girl, just a kid she was' - that's NOT YOUR responsibility at all. An almost 17 year old dragging a kid to drug fuelled sex parties is not ok and there's no chance in hell she didn't understand that. 17 is not a child. 12 is.

I'm so sorry this happened to you OP. You can feel however you feel towards J- blame her, hate her, whatever you feel. She groomed you and bullied you. Whether she was- and we have no idea she was- a victim herself is no reason for you to excuse her or feel sympathy. She hurt you, betrayed your trust, you can feel how you want.

Consider counselling and telling your husband the truth. Given J is still in contact with at least one child rapist, possibly more, i would be concerned about her boundaries and her ability to safeguard her own daughter. Speak to the NSPCC. Consider reporting the rapists.

Your mother failed you completely and totally, she is to blame for much and i would consider nc if you aren't already. I certainly wouldn't trust her around your dc.

I can't belive the hard time you, a survivor of rape and sexual abuse when you were a child, have been getting. I had sex when I was 15 because (shock horror) I liked it. Based on what you have said there is no way to say if your "friend" was groomed or not - she might just have enjoyed having sex with a range of people.

What she did to you is awful - I really hope you get some help with this.

I can't believe the way you've been treated on here. I suspect J doesn't see things the same way you do. For what's it's worth, I think you were groomed by her and I totally understand why you would be angry at the way she treated you. Off course the men are to blame but she encouraged/enabled this behaviour when you were twelve. She sounds horrific, I have a 16 year old daughter and I can tell you without any doubt she would know it's wrong to encourage a 12 year old to have sex with grown men. I do think you have to try and heel yourself though, talk it through with a therapist and try to let go of the anger, for your sake.

Thank you from the bottom of my heart for the kind and supportive replies. I'm developing a thicker skin to the harsher ones as the evening goes on.

I've decided for certain I will be arranging counselling for myself, a large part of my decision to do so has been a result of the pushes I've had from the thread. I appreciate that.

Brilliant, well done, I'm glad the thread has had a positive effect and that you're not as upset. You are obviously a really strong woman with a great sense of self. Youou deserve to give yourself the time and space to work through it with an experienced professional x

Just to echo what others have said, feel free to shop around until you find a counsellor you click with. You don't need to take the first one if it doesn't feel right. It's an important relationship so it needs to feel comfortable. and make sure you get someone who is experienced in this area.

Lots of love xxx

She didn’t suddenly start this behaviour age 16. She was no doubt encouraged / coerced by someone when she was 12 too.

Rather than blaming her for this situation, can you instead congratulate yourself for being strong enough to break the circle of abuse/coersion?

I am sorry you went through that. Something was triggering her behaviour. She might not have told you what was happening at home or what happened to her when she was younger.