Trust the survivor: Why it mattered that my counsellor was a woman

[IwantToRetire]

As a survivor you are hypervigilant. Aware of your own triggers, the looks, the smells, the presence that impact on when you feel safe, when you can be open, transparent, vulnerable; when you can trust.

Before I attended counselling I had sat and told three women what had happened in general terms – a close friend, lovers. I told no man. Not for decades. Not until I felt I had to tell my male GP that I had experienced childhood abuse in order to access treatment. I was uncomfortable, ashamed, guilty. From PE changing rooms at school, through all male meetings at work. I felt eyes watching me. I felt vulnerable. I felt under threat. I could not trust men.

So when I attended a charity supporting adult survivors of childhood abuse seeking counselling and was asked whether I wanted to speak with a male or female counsellor I asked to meet with a woman. And they agreed. They told me most of those attending, male and female, asked to meet a woman because most perpetrators of sexual violence are male

I met with her for months. And the counsellor was the first person I told about the detail of what happened.

https://www.holyrood.com/comment/view,trust-the-survivor-why-it-mattered-that-my-counsellor-was-a-woman

Also - not sure if this was publicised at the time but article has links to notes from a meeting with RCS about women only provision. Grim but as we now know this was / is standard in some parts of the women's sector in Scotland

How a service set up for traumatised women forgot its core function
https://www.holyrood.com/comment/view,how-a-service-set-up-for-traumatised-women-forgot-its-core-function

[ResisterRex]

It's so obvious why these services are needed. You'd have to hate survivors of child sexual abuse to want to remove them.

[IwantToRetire]

@ResisterRex

It's so obvious why these services are needed. You'd have to hate survivors of child sexual abuse to want to remove them.

I think it is more about the absolute need for validation. Who gets hurt, undermined or erased in the process never enters their mind.