'But We Took You to Stately Homes'...a thread for adult children of abusive families

[therealsmithfield]

Welcome to the Stately Homes Thread.

This is a long running thread which was originally started up by 'pages' see original thread here

So this thread originates from that thread and has become a safe haven for Adult children of abusive families.

One thing you will never hear on this thread is that your abuse or experience was not that bad. You will never have your feelings minimised the way they were when you were a child, or now that you are an adult. To coin the phrase of a much respected past poster Ally90;

'Nobody can judge how sad your childhood made you, even if you wrote a novel on it, only you know that. I can well imagine any of us saying some of the seemingly trivial things our parents/siblings did to us to many of our real life acquaintances and them not understanding why we were upset/angry/hurt etc. And that is why this thread is here. It's a safe place to vent our true feelings, validate our childhood/lifetime experiences of being hurt/angry etc by our parent?s behaviour and to get support for dealing with family in the here and now.'

Most new posters generally start off their posts by saying; but it wasn't that bad for me or my experience wasn't as awful as x,y or z's.

Some on here have been emotional abused and/or physically abused. Some are not sure what category (there doesnt have to be any) they fall into.

NONE of that matters. What matters is how 'YOU' felt growing how 'YOU' feel now and a chance to talk about how and why those childhood experiences and/or current parental contact has left you feeling damaged falling apart from the inside out and stumbling around trying to find your sense of self worth.

You might also find the following links and information useful if you have come this far and are still not sure wether you belong here or not.

'Toxic Parents' by Susan Forward

I started with this book and found it really useful.

Here are some excerpts;.

"Once you get going, most toxic parents will counterattack. After all, if they had the capacity to listen, to hear, to be reasonable, to respect you feelings, and to promote your independence, they wouldn't be toxic parents. They will probably perceive your words as treacherous personal assaults. They will tend to fall back on the same tactics and defenses that they have always used, only more so.

Remember, the important thing is not their reaction but your response. If you can stand fast in the face of your parents' fury, accusations, threats and guilt-peddling, you will experience your finest hour.

Here are some typical parental reactions to confrontation:

"It never happened". Parents who have used denial to avoid their own feelings of inadequacy or anxiety will undoubtedly us it during confrontation to promote their version of reality. They'll insist that your allegations never happened, or that you're exaggerating. They won't remember, or they will accuse you of lying.

YOUR RESPONSE: Just because you don't remember, doesn't mean it didn't happen".

"It was your fault." Toxic parents are almost never willing to accept responsibility for their destructive behavior. Instead, they will blame you. They will say that you were bad, or that you were difficult. They will claim that they did the best that they could but that you always created problems for them. They will say that you drove them crazy. They will offer as proof the fact that everybody in the family knew what a problem you were. They will offer up a laundry list of your alleged offenses against them.

YOUR RESPONSE: "You can keep trying to make this my fault, but I'm not going to accept the responsibility for what you did to me when I was a child".

"I said I was sorry what more do you want?" Some parents may acknowledge a few of the things that you say but be unwilling to do anything about it.

YOUR RESPONSE: "I appreciate your apology, but that is just a beginning. If you're truly sorry, you'll work through this with me to make a better relationship."

"We did the best we could." Some parents will remind you of how tough they had it while you were growing up and how hard they struggled. They will say such things as "You'll never understand what I was going through," or "I did the best I could". This particular style of response will often stir up a lot of sympathy and compassion for your parents. This is understandable, but it makes it difficult for you to remain focused on what you need to say in your confrontation. The temptation is for you once again to put their needs ahead of your own. It is important that you be able to acknowledge their difficulties without invalidating your own.

YOUR RESPONSE: "I understand that you had a hard time, and I'm sure that you didn't hurt me on purpose, but I need you to understand that the way you dealt with your problems really did hurt me"

"Look what we did for you." Many parents will attempt to counter your assertions by recalling the wonderful times you had as a child and the loving moments you and they shared. By focusing on the good things, they can avoid looking at the darker side of their behavior. Parents will typically remind you of gifts they gave you, places they took you, sacrifices they made for you, and thoughtful things they did. They will say things like, "this is the thanks we get," or "nothing was ever enough for you."

YOUR RESPONSE: I appreciate those things very much, but they didn't make up for ....

"How can you do this to me?" Some parents act like martyrs. They'll collapse into tears, wring their hands, and express shock and disbelief at your "cruelty". They will act as if your confrontation has victimized them. They will accuse you of hurting them, or disappointing them. They will complain that they don't need this, they have enough problems. They will tell you that they are not strong enough or healthy enough to take this, that the heartache will kill them. Some of their sadness will, of course, be genuine. It is sad for parents to face their own shortcomings, to realize that they have caused their children significant pain. But their sadness can also be manipulative and controlling. It is their way of using guilt to try to make you back down from the confrontation.

YOUR RESPONSE: I'm sorry you're upset. I'm sorry you're hurt. But I'm not willing to give up on this. I've been hurting for a long time, too."

Helpful Websites

Alice Miller

Personality Disorders definition

follow up to pages first thread

Im sure the other posters will be along shortly to add anything they feel I have left out grin. I personally dont claim to be sorted but I will say my head has become a helluva lot straighter since I started posting here. You will recieve a lot of wisdom but above all else the insights and advice given will 'always' be delivered with warmth and support.

Happy Posting (smithfield posting as therealsmithfield)

Hello Attila, good to see you on here. Yes, these toxic people do mad things. Like your FIL writing your DH a letter out of the blue. Once you can 'see' them though, it is like water off a duck's back? And I imagine it's like that for you?

Yes it is like water off a duck's back. They are truly an abject lesson in how not to behave.

Thank you exotictraveller.

I can see now that the last few months have been quite significant. From towards the end of last year, was feeling quite depressed. Sometimes very low, other times a bit better, but in hindsight I can now see that I was depressed for a number of months.

In the last few days I feel I have stepped out of the darkness. There had been a slow, gradual and steady build up of pressure and whilst I had had a couple of 'blow outs' at DH during the depressive phase, the final 'blow out' came a few days ago, again at DH.

During the whole depressive phase, I felt extremely discontented with my life and particularly with DH. I have had problems with DH in the past, but this time I was really feeling like we had really and truly reached the end of the road. I had completely emotionally switched off and detached from him and wouldn't have been at all bothered if he had walked away. I wouldn't have batted an eyelid.

But, I can see now, that I was processing another big, thick layer of my onion. And all my discontent with DH was because I was not seeing him at all, I was using him as a projection screen onto which all my feelings about my dad were being focussed. I felt real hatred and dislike towards DH and the feelings were so authentic, I honestly believed that it was DH who I hated. But all along, all my feelings were feelings towards my dad, feelings that I had kept locked away since childhood.

Processing and releasing all those locked up feelings seems to have unlocked something inside me. I can suddenly, almost overnight, express and show the affection and love I have inside for DH. I can give him a spontaneous hug without feeling awkward and uncomfortable, I can speak to him softly and gently without any hidden hostility and resentment and anger in my voice and body language.

My eczema got considerably worse in the last week or so but is already getting better again and the improvement, judging by past experience, is likely to be a couple of steps ahead of where I was before it got worse again, thus extremely accurately reflecting my emotional progress.

Another book arrived today, called "Haunted Marriage - Overcoming the ghosts of your spouse's childhood abuse" and I've only read the first few pages and already I know it will be key to repairing the damage done to my marriage over the years. And whilst explaining to DH what I have been going through, I think the book will also explain it to me which probably sounds strange. It's not a book aimed at helping you to heal and recover which have been the type of books I have mainly read so far, it is written from a different perspective and I am excited about reading it and moving a few steps forward in my journey.

I have also got John Bradshaw's Homecoming which I am also looking forward to reading.

I feel I am 'moving' again, which feels good. A while back I felt I had come to a bit of a standstill and yet I knew I still had a way to go ahead of me. I feel I have somehow been 'jolted' forward again, been kicked into motion again and I am glad about that. I think inadvertently putting myself into a vulnerable situation with the group I mentioned was in hindsight a good thing. It was not nice at the time, but I think the experience triggered a lot of things and gave me the jolt forward that I needed.

Atilla, you're welcome. Am glad the letter hasn't thrown you off balance. It is a good feeling when these things happen and don't send you into a tailspin or fill you with that horrible feeling of anxiety and worry. As I said, like water off a duck's back, which is the phrase used by a therapist I saw years ago about how he felt when he received letters from his parents full of their mad ramblings as you say.

I have tears running down my face, I have had such a change of life since the ex lieft, it is like it has all fallen apart, and everything has been exposed for what it is, and I can't be in my bubble of everyone is nice and I have to see that everyone is horrible, and hates me, and uses and abuses me, and no one is there for me, or likes me.

I wonder if the counselling needs to be stoped and if I would be better off just returning to my old life and letting people hurt me it is better than this life.

Mummiehunnie, can you tell us more about why you are so distressed.

calvados, I have done another thread, can I have some tlc please, I am wondering if the counselling is too much for me, I don't think it has actually helped me, I have felt really down the past two weeks, it is like the counselling is concentrating the thoughts, also there is the feeling that I don't know how to make good friends, as I have never had many good friends, and there is also that feeling of no support, and wanting a break from being leaned on as a mum and no break and no one to lean on myself, counselling for less than one hour a week is not enough, but one more session and then I am with the kids away for two weeks alone, I really hope that time away will help, I am really looking forward to it but scared that the youngest child will not want to take over again, she goes through spells of wanting to be in charge of the family and she is obstructive and causes trouble in any way shame or form, I know it is insecurity and her anger about no one wanting her but me and her sister, and the more trouble she caues in my life the more I want to run away from her, I have not yet, but I have explained that the trouble she causes makes me unhappy etc... it is like she is scapegoating me for her dad and other stuff and i am sick to the back teeth of it all, I want a break, I want to be loved for me by adults, not poor kids who have no choice because no one else wants them, they won't love me when they are older, they will find partners and have children and that is what I want for them, and that is ok, I just want them to be happy.

MH, you poor thing. I know it's a long shot but where are you? I'm in London, if you're anywhere nearby we could meet up?

I have recently had a big realisation. I realise that I was sexually abused by my father. It was just the once but it happened. I have always geniunely thought I was only psychologically and emotionally abuse by him. But one particular memory, or a fragment of a memory that came back to me when all my stuff surfaced a few years ago, never seemed to make much sense. But it does now, along with some other stuff that also never made sense at the time.

At the moment it is just an intellectual realisation. I'm not feeling anything about it. Am sure that will happen when I'm ready.

exotic I am sorry to hear that, do you want to talk about it?

thanks for the offer of a meetup, I am not far from london, where in london are you?

MH, thanks, not really, not at the moment anyway. It's still sinking in I think.

I don't want to say exactly where on here. You could mail me at pinklemonade03 @ gmail com and we could see if we are within striking distance of each other?

i will sort out email later, i understand you don't want the whole of mn knowing where you live lol x

Just got home to read your latest Mummie and Exotic and was a bit shocked to read your posts and also sad.
Mummie you really need a break by the sounds of it. When you are in the thick of it with little ones you can get easily drained especially when there isn't an adult around that you can trust. This is when family are supposed to step in but I guess for most of us on this thread our mums will not appear to scoop the screaming children into their arms and take them to the zoo for the day, pigs might fly!
May be a break from your therapist might help or even a change. Therapy can open up so many wounds and leave you feeling so raw. A good therapist must ground you before you leave and be aware if you are very vulnerable.
Mummie, have you ever thought about having some healing done? It is normally free and you can donate whatever you want. A good healer will help you release your pain and enable you to move on. The London College of Pyschic studies has regular sessions that you can book your self in for. I found it helpful and you have nothing to lose.
I am sending you a virtual hug with loads of kisses and love and light. I have also asked my angels to be with you tonight and for as long as you need them. Trust me they will be there looking over you.

Exotic when you are ready you will deal with the realisation you have had. Is it coming through like flashbacks or is it just something that has clicked? I wish you well. X

Mummie - sorry to hear that you're feeling so down. I think that your kids acting out on you is so normal for breakups or bad situations - they need to lash out at someone they can trust and they don't always have the language to explain themselves.

My niece is just 7 and although her parents have been divorced for a year she still struggles to deal with her time away from her mum. She can be rude and violent at times and she knows something is wrong but can't explain it. She's getting gradually better though. I wonder if family counselling could help your DD to express her feelings?

I know my H's counselling has made him feel worse, as he's shut away his feelings for so long and doesn't want to deal with them. I wonder if it just takes time. I haven't started my face to face counselling (tomorrow!) but email counselling did help me - I felt torn up while I was reading/writing but felt like I was starting to let things out / let things go once the emotions had faded.

As for me, I've been having more ups and downs with H - but a lot more ups now he's gone. I've also been taking some time when he's had DS to read the toxic parents book. Every chapter seemed to have a revelation for me and I've now realised just how much I was controlling our lives together - because I felt so out of control when I was younger. I'm trying to be less controlling about him with DS, letting him get on with things (although I do worry about what he feeds him sometimes!). I am hoping my counsellor will help me to learn how to let go of that need to control everything.

Exotic - I hope that when the feelings about your father come out that they're not too overwhelming. Must be a horrible realisation

I have asked the other tread to be deleted, I am still not in a good place right now, I have read your repsonse guys, I wish I was in a good space to respond to you about your issues, i wish you all well, will post again.

Hello, thanks calavados and chairmum for your kind words, they mean a lot. I am strangely feeling completely 'ok' about my recent realisation.

Calvados, it has come through not as a flashback as such. When all my 'stuff' started surfacing about 3 years ago, this particular memory was one of the memories that came back to me. But unlike the other memories which were obviously times when my dad had been verbally or emotionally abusive, this particular memory was not like that. I don't really want to go into the details of it, but it was just not very clear to me why this memory had come back to me, it did not involve my dad shouting and raging and screaming at me like most of my other memories.

I must have been at a point where my body 'knew' I was ready to cope with this particular memory and what it meant and the meaning of the memory suddenly became clear in the last few days. And lots of other little things that had puzzled me which all seemed unrelated until now suddenly seemed to make sense and all the pieces fitted together and suddenly I had a clear picture of what had happened.

As well as this particular realisation I have also realised that contrary to what I had been 'comforting' myself with all this time, my dad was not a good, kind and loving father until he had his mental breakdown when i was 10 and turned into an obviously abusive dad, that in fact he had been an abusive dad from the very start. It makes much more sense as how could such a damaged individual ever have managed to be a good enough parent? It's an impossibility. The truth is he was never able to be a good enough parent, even during my first 10 years when I thought he had been able to give me what I needed as a child. I can see that I have been 'comforting' myself with this thought because I already knew my mother had rejected me from the start and I wasn't ready to face the fact that my dad had been abusive from the start. I needed to believe that I had had at least one genuinely loving parent. But it simply is not true. Both parents in their different ways abused and neglected and exploited me, completely breached and invaded my boundaries. Not because I was bad or undeserving or did something wrong, but purely and simply because they were two extremely damaged individuals who were completely and totally incapable of giving me as a child what I needed. Before I was even born their relationship was highly dysfunctional and even before they got together they both came from families which were highly dysfunctional. I didn't stand a chance really. I was born into a dysfunctional, warped, twisted, co-dependent relationship which went on to become a totally dysfunctional family. I have no doubt now at all that my sisters will have been damaged also by it all. Even when my dad was being 'nice' I can see now that it was still abusive and damaging. In fact the switching from nice to nasty is I think more damaging for a child than consistently being nasty.

Sorry for the ramble, have to go now, back later.

Exotic wow, what a lot to take in and the way you have explained it and rationalised it seems that you are ready to deal with it in a balanced way but above all with a highly intelligent perspective. I think you're right about your body and mind repressing incidents/memories until you are ready to process and cope with them.

Will you discuss it with your therapist or are you going to wait and see how you cope with this memory?
It's heart wrenching when we realise that our romantic notion of our parents being good enough is just a fallacy and that a parent was bad from the start. But that realisation is the start of our processing of childhood and adult issues and we become stronger for it. Those who still live in denial are setting themselves up for further falls so it is good you have reached this stage.
When I accepted my DM is a damaged person, but chose not to break the cycle of emotional abuse and jealousy, I moved on in huge leaps. Also finding out about NPD however ugly made me realise that I had been making excuses for my DM like, she was like that because she wasn't happily married or she had a very cold and rigid upbringing. Now I can see it for what it is and that she will never change and that my silly romantic notions of having a wonderful mummy with whom I can go shopping and have girly chats with is all pie in the sky!
And I agree, that the Jekyll and Hyde syndrome is so damaging. My DM would something good with her right hand and then do something nasty with the left leaving me to think that I was imagining it all. It also makes you so distrustful of the parent, something I have carried over to friendships. It is a coping and survival mechanism learnt from your experience. I tend to gravitate to much older people than me as I trust them more. I don't think they will judge me the way my age group would.

Also, I find women are so easily jealous which I cannot cope with. Jealousy is a big thing for me. I don't think people realise just how toxic and damaging it is and I am very quick to cut those off who display an inkling of it as they have demonstrated that they themselves are insecure and not to be trusted. All because of my DM's and DS's jealousy. If your own DM can be jealous of her daughter then........?

Mummie we are here on this thread when you feel stronger.

exotic, how sad for you, I am here, but i am very anxious about some other stuff going on I don't think I can cope with right now

Calvados thanks for your response. I am going to talk about it with my (new) therapist....I think. I will see how I feel when I see her. I might not feel comfortable talking about this straightaway with her.

Just to explain a bit more about how the puzzling memory became clear.....when I was on holiday one year, I must have been about 22/23, I met a guy and had a bit of a 'holiday romance'. Something happened with the guy in 'the bedroom' which, although I didn't realise it at the time, but can see very clearly now, triggered my memory relating to the sexually abusive incident involving my dad when I was a child. Although the memory was triggered during the holiday, it did not come into my conscious mind at the time, it was triggered but remained 'hidden' from me. But, a few days after the incident with the guy on the holiday, my eczema started flaring up when previously my skin had been completely clear and had been so for a number of years. Until now I had never worked out why my skin had flared up on that particular holiday, it had puzzled me for years. I had thought maybe it had been the sun, the food, the water, I had no idea. But I know now. It was the incident with the holiday guy which had triggered the memory of the incident with my dad; the childhood memory had been triggered, but did not emerge into my conscious mind as a conscious memory at the time, but it showed itself in the form of an eczema flare up on my body.

The more I think about it, the more I realise how similar the 2 incidents were, so it's not surprising that the holiday incident triggered the memory of the childhood incident. At that time I am sure my body somehow knew I was not ready to deal with what had happened which is why the triggered memory did not become a conscious memory. But it now is a real and conscious memory and as I said, all the puzzling incidents and memories now make sense. Another thing is that a therapist I saw a few years ago, when I told him as I believed at the time that my dad had no sexually abused me, only emotionally and psychologically, said it was unusual that I had not been sexually abused and that he was surprised at this. I realise he said this after hearing about all the other abuse from my dad and he must have known that contrary to what I wanted to believe, my father was just incapable of respecting me and respecting my boundaries as a child and he would not have been able to help himself from crossing my boundaries and using me to meet his own needs. Like all narcissists, in his mind, I did not exist as a seperate individual, I was merely an extension of himself, there only in so far as I could meet his needs, and so it was inevitable that one day the need he would look to me to meet would be sexual. I can only remember once such incident and I am sure there was only one incident. But one is enough to cause huge damage to a child. All trust is destroyed with that one incident.

Like I said, I feel strangely 'ok' having realised all this. Perhaps I even feel relieved. It was as if this 'secret' was there inside me, and I knew it was there but I was trying to ignore it and pretend it wasn't there. But the pretending felt worse than staring at the secret in the face. Now that i have done that I can almost physically feel that a load of tension has left my body. And the realisation is not the terrible blow that it might once have been. It is just part and parcel of the whole thing. I am not surprised about it. My body did know when I would be ready and able to cope with this latest realisation and it was right, I am ready at this point in time. The knowledge is not threatening to destroy me as it might have, had I somehow tried to deal with it before now.

Something I read in one of my books struck me as well. The book said in families where there is sexual abuse, they very often outwardly and publicly portray a very puritanical/victorian attitude to sex, which was true of my parents and my dad in particular. He always gave the impression that he thought sex was dirty and bad and disapproved of the whole thing. And yet he would also make inappropriate remarks at times, I overlooked these at the time, but can remember them clearly now. My dad is clearly a very very very damaged individual who has never once even contemplated this fact. He always places the blame at everyone else's door, but never looks inward and reflects upon himself. I do wonder sometimes, now that I am out of the picture, onto whom is he dumping his toxic waste? Or is he turning it inwards and becoming ill? I don't care as such, but I am curious.

I am so very glad I stepped out of that 'house of horrors'. It just doesn't bear thinking about that I could have still been a part of it all to this day.

MH, thanks but please don't worry about me at all. I know you are going through a very tough time. Concentrate on looking after yourself and being kind to yourself and leaning on anybody who you feel will be safe and supportive, including posting on here. We're all here for you. x

Exotic - wow I can't help but respond to your post because it has really triggered some important issues for me. I remember posting a while back about how at times I found my adoptive Dad 'pervy' but I couldn't put my finger on it. A few posted back with similar feelings about their fathers.

I have a memory of making my adoptive Dad undress me after school, even though I could undress myself. I remember the feeling of doing it to get his attention but I also remember him finding it awkward. It almost felt like flirting (although of course at that age I didn't know about flirting)and I can't describe it appropiately in words - it feels very uncomfortable. I suppose I feel that I sought his attention by making him undress me because on some subconscious level I knew that he wanted to do it - to see me naked. I was just always so desperate to gain his love and approval and this feels like an entirely inappropiate way to do it

Then there were the 'pats on the bum' and the hugely over reactions to boyfriends and sexy clothes. The times he wanted me to try on new clothes, which seems innocent enough but he would make me twirl and parade for him and I could feel his eyes on me, scanning every detail to make sure I met his standards of slimness and femininity.

I am sure I have repressed memories - maybe of worse. Too difficult to remember, because the memories I have are subjective and could be interpreted innocently so my brain allows them to be processed. I just don't know. There is also a niggling doubt within myself that I am looking for reasons to hate him, to justify my rejection of him to myself, to others, to society in general. I am certainly not lying about the memories I have mentioned and they don't constitute sexual abuse, but maybe I have inerpreted them wrongly.

I am sure that he 'crossed boundaries'. Even just in the sense that as a teenage girl, flourishing into womanhood he could be a little too intense about certain things e.g. my weight, my clothes etc. I will admit this on here but nowhere else. Ocassionally when I am having sex with my dh, images of my adoptive father flash into my head and I feel physically sick. How twisted is that? It is like my brain is forcing me to imagine the unimaginable - or is it some kind of repressed memory? He makes my skin crawl and has made innappropiate comments about young women/girls in my presence before.

My adoptive parents were also highly prudish about sex in general. My Grandmother freaked when I got my first period and made me wear a home made sanitary belt and pad. She would not talk about tampons or normal pads to me. I remember going through hell the first few periods with incorrectly inserted tampons I had sneekily bought with my pocket money. I once wrote about oral sex on a piece of paper when I was about eight. Now I had no idea what it meant and I think someone with an elder sibling (who had learnt about such things from them) made me write it down as a dare or something. My adoptive parents found it and went mental. Shut me in my room every evening for about a week and made me eat my tea there. They made out I was dirty and bascially sexualised an eight year old.

I am sorry you are having to process this stuff exotic. Whilst I would not say I was sexually abused (not yet anyway) I identify with the inappropiate boundary crossing in general. Your father sounds like a horror, he really does. I am so glad you have access to therapy.

Sorry you are in a bad place mummiehunnie. Keep posting if it helps

exotic I'm more of a lurker than a poster on this thread as I often find it too painful to post.

I've been in therapy for 2 years dealing with the realisation that my mother is deeply narcissistic and have since realised that I was also sexually abused by my Dad.

I can really relate to how you decribe the memory surfacing. I only really started to remember when I was 38- and I reckon I was around 3 or 4 when it last occurred (he left when I was 4). I still haven't remembered the full picture, just fragments of images and a very powerful bodily sense that makes me convinced I now know what he did.

It's been, and still is, very, very painful. My therapist says that when things happen when you're so young you don't always have language to express it at the time so you store the memories within your body rather than conscious memory.

What you said about other bits of the puzzle finally fitting really made sense to me. My therapist said it will have become written into my character and way of relating in the world without me realising it. Looking back I can see that really making sense.

Please continue to post if you find it helpful; I think there are lots of us going through similar things and there is a lot of compassion and undrstanding on this boar.

Calvados - you mentioned a while back about jealousy. I think a huge barrier to a mother/daughter relationship can be jealousy. My grandmother's reaction to me telling her I was going to be a nurse was 'I am too sympathetic to be a nurse'. She couldn't even allow me any limelight about that could she?

cremeeggs - you said 'just fragments of images and a very powerful bodily sense that makes me convinced I now know what he did'

That articulates what I was trying to convey so much better than I could. I have that sense too, I really do.

roseability from what I have read about sexual abuse you don't actually have to have been touched for it to have happened. So being made or encouraged to do things that made you feel uncomfortable or seem strange looking back can also come under the heading of abuse. I guess the point is that you didn't understand any of it at the time, therefore you couldn't make a rational decision or create your own boundaries for your behaviour. It was up to the adults around you to create your boundaries in this sense and it sounds to me like your dad particularly completely lacked the ability to do this.

It is very easy to look back and feel guilty and think that you actually did things you now see as "wrong". You couldn't have known that at the time as the adults around you allowed and most certainly encouraged this behaviour which would have made you feel it was "right".