MY Domestic Violence - Sexual Abuse story-triggers

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MY Domestic Violence - Sexual Abuse story-triggers
I wrote the following for another message board. I'll post it here, then add more at the end.

I've written my story down three times before that I can recall. The first was about 10 years ago, when I was just starting to realize what I had been through was sexual abuse (though I could not use the term "abuse") and had to give it to my therapists to read (I couldn't say my story aloud at that point). The second was at another forum, about 8 years ago. I still couldn't label my experience as abuse. The third was in 2014 as I was going through trauma therapy for the first time (it didn't take). I finally called it abuse, but only because they threatened to kick me out of the program if I didn't.
I couldn't actually call it domestic violence and sexual abuse and believe it until just over six months ago, when a horrible triggering event made me realize that I finally had to get serious about my healing.

In all of my previous narratives, I've led with a life story that explained why I was so vulnerable to being abused. Here I'll just say that my Catholic upbringing, middle school bullying, and personality led me to internalize a LOT of guilt and shame about being a man. I feel like most people won't believe my story, because I'm a man who was abused by a woman. Growing up, I learned that men are predators, never victims, and I was continually accused by my abuser of abusive behavior, which I swear never happened. And just a couple of months ago, I posted to Reddit in a RAINN "ask me anything" thread in which I mentioned that I was a male victim of sexual abuse by a woman, and 500 Redditors called me a misogynist, an MRA, a liar, and much worse, and told me to go kill myself. So I would be very hesitant about sharing my story, except that I know the only way that things will get better for abused men is for us to out ourselves and talk about what happened to us. And yet we are still not believed by other men or women.

Maybe I wouldn't believe me either. It sounds made up. I married the first girl I ever dated. She was a CSA and rape victim. I used to think that absolved her of what she did to me - she was only trying to keep herself safe. I don't believe that anymore. I think she used it as an excuse to purposely control me. She started by refusing to have sex with me literally the day we married, and she strung me along to such an extent over the 10 years we were married to the point where I would do literally anything for her if she would have sex with me. Later, she started accusing me of abusive behavior - and she was aided and abetted in this by her therapists. Once we saw a marriage counselor, and the counselor asked my ex-wife, "Have you ever willingly had sex with him?" (meaning me). My ex paused and answered, "No, I don't think so." When the counselor didn't challenge that statement, my brain exploded. I didn't think I was abusive, but that's what men did, right? I'm sure she noticed the effect that response had on me and called me abusive whenever we fought after that; after a few months of that, I stopped fighting and just acquiesced to whatever she wanted.

And what she wanted was to control and hurt me.

I let it happen. In fact, the only way I could figure out a way that we could have sex without being "abusive" was for her to sexually punish me. I'd always been a little bit into pain; now I let her hurt me during sex. She was really into it, except the sex part; that was almost always done grudgingly, as an afterthought - but it was just enough that she kept me begging for more. And then we discovered an online body modification community. We joined and it very quickly normalized what we were doing. I could frame it as just kinky sex. And then the body modification kicked in. Anything extreme was looked on as positive by this community. I wanted a way to make myself a safe person; not the abuser I thought I was. We announced to the community that my ex-wife was going to cut off my penis. Thank god that part didn't happen, but she did end up mutilating my di*k permanently.

I have struggled so much with my role in this. Was I complicit? Was I actually to blame? My therapist and some trusted online confidants have repeatedly assured me that even if a person begs to be abused, that doesn't make them complicit in any abuse that actually takes place - abuse is abuse. Furthermore, she had gaslit me to hell and back in thinking I was a horrible predator and rapist who had to be punished.

Before she could finish the job, she fell in love with someone else and left me, which emotionally destroyed me. I felt nothing except shame, guilt, pain, and anger for many, many years. I was so, so angry at women for a long time. Eventually I met someone else and she was the first person I told. Ten years ago we got married and we're still together, against all odds, even though we both have a lot of issues because of my trauma.

That's my story. I let it fester for 15 years until this past March I couldn't take any more and sat down with my therapist and made a commitment to heal my trauma. I've been working incredibly hard since then. This is the hardest thing I've ever done. But I can tell that someday - maybe not soon, but someday - I will be more myself than I ever could have been before.

Thanks for reading.

It is refreshing to be able to tell my story in a place where other men will read it, instead of an audience that's most women. I feel very constricted in what I am able to say because of #MeToo and the current anti-abuse movements that tend to skew very, very anti-male. Because I was wrongly accused of abuse, it's very, very triggering. I used to hate women - now I'm just occasionally triggered, which is a vast improvement. I'm working on it, and it helps that my amazing therapist is a woman and that my current wife and I have very good communication between us.

I often wonder about the future of masculinity in our culture. I don't think it's headed anywhere good, and I see signs of despair from young men everywhere. It's a big issue for me, because I have a middle-school aged son. Someday I want to sit him down and tell him that no matter what he hears from other people, no part of him is "toxic." He is free to choose the kind of man and the kind of person he wants to be. He doesn't have to be led by others - not women, not other men.

My dream for him is that he escapes what happened to me.
 
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