does it make a difference whether the perp is dead or alive?

does it make a difference whether the perp is dead or alive?
T

tschirret

Registrant
From your experience, either as a partner or as a male survivor, is recovery different (and if so how) if the people who abused you are dead or still alive?
Direct confrontation has to take a lot of courage and emotional energy, but what happens when there is no one left to confront, either the perpetrator/s or parent/s?

Be well.
MN
 
MN,

We did an interesting exercise in Mike Lew's preconference workshop in at the conference in MN. I will not be able to describe it adequately, unfortunately.

We were "talking" to someone who hurt us in the past (not necessarily, but possibly a perp), telling them what they did to us. We worked in pairs, with each taking a turn talking and a turn just listening, as if the person we wanted to tell were listening.

Then we followed up with another "conversation" where we told the same person what they could do to help us now.

You know what? They can't help us now. They cannot change the past any more than we can. In some cases we, survivor and the other person, can salvage something of a relationship in the present, but that isn't the same as them helping us. I could be wrong but it seems to me that's pretty rare, at least between survivor and perp.

With or without confrontation, we have to do the work.

Thanks,

Joe
 
It is not always possible for direct forgivness even when alive. You can get through feelings in many ways weither or not the perp is alive or dead.

Michael Joseph
 
:D The no good son of a bitch who seduced and abandoned me after several years of sexual abuse is dead. And I'm really glad he is.

And It seems to have made a difference to me......he died last november, or anyway that's when I found out he was dead.....and it seems like I've been able to move through some of the difficult decisions I've had to make since then.

Plus, now that he's dead, I imagine that he is finally getting the punishment that he deserves.

Finally, I would say that the man who sexually abused me will continue to live on in my head until I am able to "kill" him and escape from the influence and domination that the abuse exercises over my conciousness. Even though he is literally dead, as 'taking a dirt nap', in the hole, unable to physically harm any more boys; I still have to kill him many times over again in my head when he starts to try to resume the abusive role and when I start to re assume the victim role.

I have to "kill" him in my head so that I don't continue to victimize my self over and over again.

The victim groove is so deeply scratched on my brain that only an aggressive and powerful effort, like murdering the bastard in my mind, can jolt me out of signing up for the next round of suffering.

When I was young, I was a victim. Today if I allow myself to be abused I am a volunteer. One of the ways I can stop being a volunteer to the abuse is to escape the influence of the abuser who lives on in my head.

This is in no way advocating violence or any criminal activity.....I'm speaking of "killing" the perpetrator in my head, in my thoughts, rooting him out of my heart and my soul where he so viciously intruded so long ago.

It doesn't just happen once for me.....but I must do it over and over again. The son of a bitch won't stay dead.....not yet anyway.

I'm gonna keep trying t o do him in for good.

This is one of the ways I do that, by coming here. Take that you bastard. Sam Jackson was a fucking pervert, controlling user and abuser of young boys and I'm glad he's dead and I feel sure that a loving God is making sure that he pays for his crimes.

Being nice and forgiving and clean and reverent about all this crap from him didn't work.....getting my hands around his throat and choking the living shit out of him has helped much more.

:D
 
MN, the person who physically and emotionally abused me is now dead. I felt relief the day she died. I was with her less than an hour before she died. I only mentioned her physical abuse and she always told me that I was a little brat and deserved it. But, she was schizophrenic, and I saw all of that as her illness taking over an otherwise very loving person.

The men who raped me: one is deceased. I am truly unclear who the other guy was. He did not rape me, I think, he just made me give him oral sex until he had an orgasm. He was a good ten or twelve years older than I. I didn't have much feeling about him. The main perp is probably dead, I don't know for certain. If he is alive he would be about 80-85 years old.

There is a long list of the effects of the SA on me. I did not tell anyone about it until I was in my late 40's or early 50's.
I felt love for this man when he was not abusing me. He was like a big brother to me. He gave me stuff. He talked to me and listened to me. I wanted his love. I guess I felt that I had to do his will in this other stuff and bear with his beatings as the cost of his attention.

If he is alive today, all I would want to do is to fiind out if he violated other boys. I think I would be partially responsible for that, because I never told anyone, even after I was an adult and in the safety of my monastery. I just wanted to forget it. And, I really doubted that a guy would be doing that to other guys.

Had I confronted him when I was a young adult in college, I think it would have been very ugly. I don't know what I would have wanted from him. Today, I feel I would have wanted him to tell me that he truly did love me and just could not control himself when he harmed me. He would probably not have said that.

The third male who sodomized me was a good friend and fellow scout who was very viollently forced to do that to me. He fought hard against it and was nearly killed for it. In fact, for a minute or two, I was sure that he was dead. All I would ever want to say to him is that I am sad that he was raped first and then made to do that to me. I would want him to know that I love him as a friend, and that I was proud of how well he did. He married and had three kids.
He died in a freak accident 25-30 years ago, and many people said that it was suicide because of what he did.

I would just want to be sure that my main perp, who raped me many, many time, could not harm any more boys. I don't have enough energy, or maybe security, to try to see if the old man is still alive. I have no idea what I would want from him today--but, I don't think I want him to be suffering. As crazy as it sounds, I still think of him with very mixed emotions of anger and affection.

I hope this helps a little.

Bob
 
Two of my abusers are still alive, the rest I don't know - or care.

The two that are alive, I'm waiting for the day of their downfall - and it will surely come. I think I'm getting ready to help that day come sooner rather than later as well.

One of my survivor friends abusers died the day he was released on police bail, he crashed his car at speed deliberately. I knew the man, and although I knew nothing about his abusing I didn't mourn him - he was a horrible man anyway.
But my friend is missing 'something' he has trouble defining it, but he wanted more than his death.
Maybe he wanted to hear some 'words'.

Another friend lives close to his abusive father, and he makes his life hell on earth, he shouts abuse at him in the town centre - shouts at him across crowded streets that he's a "child abuser"

I like the second option, I lived in misery and fear, why not them.

Dave
 
MN, both of my main abusers, father and coach, are alive. I have not seen my father in 13 years, although he has called me some in the last two years, only to get money or such. My former coach, I have seen at other competitions since leaving him, and I did confront him in September at a competition that we each had students at. It went well, and did not go well. The actual confrontation went well. The following day, it was bad. I made judgement error and allowed him to harm me again.

I am not sure, if with either of them, if it matters if they are alive or dead. Because the one thing I think it would make a difference of is the actual confrontation, and as I say, it did not go so well with me.

Of course, if they are still alive, there is always the thought of 'are they still doing it' also, which can motivate different behaviors, whether for good or bad.

I better stop before I confuse myself further. I apologize.

leosha
 
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