Has the abuse/trauma impacted your sense of masculinity?
That states more accurately how I feel and how I have always felt: "other". I have always known that my body has a penis and testicles and, thus, my body ("I") was male - but I never "felt" male - and even though I was teased and taunted throughout childhood (and adulthood, too), I never identified as "female" even though my own father said I throw and run like a girl and I was called pansy and fairy and faggot... I never knew what any of those words meant. So, I felt, and still to some degree "feel" isolated, different, "other" - in fact Monday of this week I told my therapist that I feel like a fucking freak because I don't know anyone else who was raped by multiple men and women (my own "mother") and, very significantly, in addition to this horrific violation - I was mutilated - treated like a piece of meat.Full confession, I asked because I knew I wasn’t alone. And I needed to know I was in the company of men. A hallmark of my trauma was severe isolation from everyone. The destruction of my right to boyhood and the resulting inability to be with other boys was devastating. I existed in a weird limbo. I didn’t feel “lesser”, I was not even on the spectrum. I was “other”.
I always wanted to belong. I still want to belong. But it seems I will never overcome the feeling of not belonging. I think that is somehow related to wanting to be loved, to be considered of value - to be considered as of equal worth as other human beings.. I was so lowly I didn’t have a right to even want to be a boy. But that’s all I wanted. I wanted to belong. I wished I wasn’t so terrified if another boys was nearby. But I was. I was scared if anyone learned of my dream I would be humiliated and shamed. (I was to little to realize this is what the assault taught me).
I’ll say it. It was horrible. I knew I had a male body. But that was almost worst. It betrayed my secret desire to be a boy. I don’t expect anyone to understand. It wasn’t rational or logical. But it was my truth.
I don't know who my "pre assault self" was... except I know he had the courage to fight back to try to protect his grandmother from being raped at the same time he was raped by this gang of barbarians; but that experience as well as the experience of trying to beat up my father when I was very young in order to prevent him from beating up my mother and he just tossed me across the room.... those experiences taught me "learned helplessness" so I just stopped fighting back because I knew it was futile - so I never tried to catch or throw a ball because I knew I would get screamed at and that terrified me because it was a prelude to being beaten or raped... and I "let" other people belittle and berate me and use me sexually and I did not fight back... in some cases, I was frozen.Knowing that about me, it may be easy to think my bodybuilding is about compensating. It is not. I have to fight my demons who scream ugly things at me for even thinking about building muscle. I had an affinity for physicality and muscularity before I was assaulted, before my gender was taken away from me. Every time I touch a weight or post that I did is a fuck you to my demons. It’s also serving my pre-assault self.
I suddenly realised that yes there is something about being male which actually has a point. Something which is not related to not showing emotions, or being competitive or playing sports.
A good female friend of mine once called it the male protective impulse.