Hope I didn't screw this up-I emailed husband some stuff from this site...

Hope I didn't screw this up-I emailed husband some stuff from this site...
B

Brokenhearted

Registrant
Ok, last night I emailed 2 excerpts from this site to my husband, which he has not read yet (I can ck his email). The posts do not mention abuse. They are simply posts that mirror the way he has told me he feels. I think it will be helpful for him to read he is not alone, at least. DOn't know how he will react to it. Hope he's not hostile to me for any reason. Below are what I emailed:

Masking, numbing, call it a thousand things.
It is a hard but necessary way to be, how else do we get on with life!

You cannot numb the bad from the good, so both are affected, I mask out friendships because I need too much space, so I dont socialise.

Masking at work, or anywhere were I have to be with people, parties, social gatherings even shopping, I have to wear a mask.
Just to pretend nothing is going on.

In one way it is a safety device, but it sure stops us seeking help, if we cannot fully explain our hurt to others.

Ste,

I feel exactly like you. Sometimes I desperately want to leave to some far away place where I'll never see another person again. An ashram is as close as you can get to living on a desert island. I'm just cool-headed and detached from feeling.

Jesse

Acutally, I think cool-headed is not quite the same thing as being cool. What I meant by cool-headed, is that people think I'm boring and I'm not easily excited or moved.

Jesse

I am very ambivalent about my emotions. I can feel very strongly about something and then abruptly change how I feel. I do not trust my feelings and I do not trust others feelings either. I can deal with a person being angry with me. It hurts and confuses me. But I am able to accept their anger. I cannot accept love. I can allow myself to accept that people like me. Usually, because I have done good for them. I cannot accept or trust that anyone loves me. I hate to hear those words said to me. I know that they are always a lie. I work hard to learn to accept love, to trust people feeling warm towards me. But the fact is, I am fearful when that happens, I just cant trust it. I try not to let myself respond by accepting and trusting their love. No one is going to break my heart! I have built a strong wall around it. Only children and young people have pierced it. And then only for the time that they are safe kids and youth. After the child grows up they cannot pierce that wall anymore. I will not allow it. At the same time, I easily come to love people. I can feel honest affection for a person I have never actually met. Love can be givenbut I feel I would be a fool to think I could really trust that any one would love me for me. Even the thought of that seems really dangerous to me.

Please give me any feedback = esp. encouraging!! ;-)
 
Wow, those excerpts that you pulled are powerful and also describe my b/f, so much so that I printed them.

I have no clue how your husband will react, but I hope it's a catalyst to have a conversation with you.

Good luck.......Trish
 
Brokenhearted,

The excerpts you chose are very powerful and helpful indeed, as Trish confirms to you as well.

My only reservation is this. Your husband is not "plugged in" to the discussions in the same way that you are, and to him these pieces might look like disconnected fragments - wise bits that sound good but don't relate to much in particular.

Therapists often refer to how people need a "plausible framework" in order to relate to what they are told about traumatic issues like child abuse. We already have that framework because we are engaged in this discussion on a daily basis, or at least are thinking about the issues all the time in some organized way.

A traumatized survivor new to recovery, however, will not have this framework, and many guys here will tell you how totally confusing everything seemed when they first started out in recovery. NOTHING made sense or related to anything else; as I put it to my T, it was like living in an emotional hurricane.

This distinction makes a big difference in how (and whether) someone like your husband will relate to these quotations. Hopefully all will go well, but if it doesn't, please don't feel discouraged or defeated or read your husband as being gratuitously difficult or uncooperative.

All this is the long version of a simple truth: It's just one HELL of a task getting started in recovery.

Much love,
Larry
 
Thanks for the reality ck, roadrunner.

He has not read them yet. He just came home from work because he forgot his dress shirt for later today, and I asked him if he'd have his computer w/ him tonight when he's in his hotel room .
He said, "No, why?"
I said, "Because I emailed you something you might want to ck out while you're alone."
He said, "What?"
I took him and looked him straight in the eyes. I said, "I love you."
He said, "I know that."
I said, "And I know you....what you're going through-it's common."
He said, "Common?!!?"
I said, "Yes. I've found almost 4,000 other men" going through the same thing)
He just joked and said, "Are you dating them all?" haha.

He was walking out to his car as we talked so we didn't have time to go further. But anyway. Guess I just felt I had to say something. Sorry, hope I am not going all wrong about this....I know I am feeling antsy....but oh, well. He has a 2-hr drive this afternoon, but will have some coworkers in the car w/ him so he may not be able to reflect much on what I said.

He seemed genuinely surprised that whatever he is going through is COMMON. Surely that would be a huge comfort, even if it takes time for him to understand why he's not alone.

I will try to not be discouraged if he reacts negatively or not at all.

I'm just knowing someone's got to say something sometime and it might as well be me. Maybe this will be a 20-yr process, but it might as well start sometime. Before he starts acting out (or resumes it, whichever; I am now seeing that his callgirl 4 yrs ago as acting out because he was telling me things at the time that made it sound like he didn't trust himself, he said he wanted his life to be an open book to me, he didn't want to be alone when traveling anymore, wanted me w/ him, being with the callgirl was not good," etc. It now looks like it was more of a compulsion at the time, something he was afraid he coudln't control. I don't know if there's been others but before he withdraws any further or even gets so depressed he's suicidal or feels like he's dying inside, I strongly feel I have to reach him somehow whatever way I can. I can't stand him feeling this way any longer. I know I won't relieve it by myself,and not by him knowing some academic facts, but so many of you have said that finding this site has helped more than ever, just knowing others feel the way you do. I know I am probably a long way from actually referring him to this site. ?? I could let him know it exists if he ever wants to look into it, give him the resource is all, let him take it from there.

Feel free to keep responding because really I need your advice even though my emotions are helping me make decisions, probably not wise, huh, but feeling a little desperate.
 
P.S. If you think I really should, I CAN delete them from his mailbox before he has a chance to read them. OR do you think I should qualify them a little by writing something like "Here are some guys who seem like maybe they feel the way you do."?
 
Hi brokenhearted,

I read this post, but don't know the other background on your relationship with your husband and what his thoughts are on the abuse. Given that, i believe that a survivor of childhood abuse has to understand there's a problem in order to want to change it. Perhaps he already understands that and it's the part of this story I don't have, but if he doesn't believe anything's wrong, well -- it will be difficult, at best, to give him anything to suggest otherwise.

However, if he indeed realizes how the abuse from the past has shaped and formed him in so many ways that he can't even begin to understand and comprehend, then at least he knows there's something wrong. As you can imagine, the first scenario above is called denial, and the second one is called acceptance. Which is he in? The answer will heavily influence how you need to approach this.
 
Eddie, I don't know! He know's "something's not right" - he has told me he's unhappy but doesn't know why, he doesn't feel anything when we have sex so we don't any more for over 2 months now... When I told him he needs to talk to someone because that's not normal he said, "I know it's not normal." He told a minister/friend of ours that is trying to connect w/ him because he sees the problems he's having, that he (my husband) knows he needs to talk to someone but "isn't ready."

So I don't know what this means. He knows there's a problem ,knows it's not normal, he disclosed to me a few yrs back about his childhood sexual abuse, but we never talked about it again, ..........so what do YOU think?
 
It's like, he knows he had CSA, one incident he could remember, and is unhappy/disconnected/depressed/avoidant/ all the symptoms but just has not connected the two. So all I want to do is help connect the two so we can start working on this thing and I thought if he saw how others felt too that would help him to feel, wow, I'm not alone, maybe there WAS something to the csa...
 
I think it sounds like he has accepted it, and understands that it is influencing his life, his marriage, his very existence. So many men here will tell you that they went for years, sometimes decades, in denial about the impact it had on them. I know I did. All because we wanted to psyche ourselves into thinking we were "normal", when in reality we finally came to a point to where we couldn't keep fooling ourselves about it any more. It sounds like he is at or near that point. It took me 31 years to get there, some take longer, some take less.

I would strongly recommend that you buy him the book "Victims No Longer" by Mike Lew. It's widely agreed to be the absolute best book on the subject, and when he reads it he will see so many patterns in his life that he hasn't been able to put together until now. All the puzzle pieces start falling into place as to why we do and think the things we do. It all goes back to the abuse, and how it shaped us during childhood during those formative years.

I'd also recommend that you show him this website and let him know he can just browse and read what others are writing and posting. Seeing others with similar thoughts and struggles is a real equalizer.
 
Brokenhearted,

Just try to take a few deep breaths. You're doing good. I know you want to just gush all this new found knowledge you have with your husband. You know it's not the right thing to do, but your emotions could get away from you.

I think the best you can hope for is that giving him a little of your knowledge and this resource will open him up enough to consider some things and talk to you a bit. Hang tough lady and stay smart. ;)

ROCK ON.......Trish
 
I'm trying to calm down here.
 
I've just written a reply to you other post...

really hope it all goes ok for you...
keep in touch,

peace to you,
Beccy
 
He seemed genuinely surprised that whatever he is going through is COMMON. Surely that would be a huge comfort, even if it takes time for him to understand why he's not alone.
Click to expand...
My partner also made a joke of this at first. He said something like, "So you're telling me I'm nothing special."

In truth, he was very unsettled at the idea of not being alone-- for many years, there had been a secret at the core of his life-- a big part of his identity was about having a secret that no one knew, and to be "not alone" with that secret was challenging and scary.

So while I was very comforted by all the research and all the "company," he had to come to that very gradually.
 
Brokenhearted,

He seemed genuinely surprised that whatever he is going through is COMMON. Surely that would be a huge comfort, even if it takes time for him to understand why he's not alone.
Click to expand...
SAR's partner had one experience with the discovery that he wasn't alone. Mine was very different. Perhaps the key is how one comes to make this discovery.

I made it by coming here. I lurked for a bit and saw how well new guys were received, but I still hesitated because I thought my own case was so shameful and disgusting - and of course, all my fault. I did register, however, and at first I posted very timidly. Nevertheless, I was immediately noticed and I swear to God, it was like a circle of protective friends was forming around me. I really wasn't alone! They believed me and they understood what I was talking about. It was an incredibly positive experience.

But that was because the discovery that I wasn't alone was coupled with the fact that I immediately got a lot of understanding and support. My secret suddenly didn't feel so dark and terrible anymore, and that encouraged me to accept that telling the secret would actually help me.

Much love,
Larry
 
Larry,

How did you come to get yourself to look at this site, though? Was it after someone suggested it to you? Did you already know that your csa was causing you problems, or did it seem so unconnected to your current problems that you just didn't come to the site for a long time? And if so, when you did come here, was it because you were just curious or because you knew your csa was significant enough to cause you problems in later life?
 
for me i came to a point where i knew what the problem was but not what to do about it ,well i had one idea that involved a bridge over the ohio river ,instead i sat down and typed in abuse survivor on my pc ,typing those two words saved my life ,i found lots of sites for female rape victims ,but in that list i found ms .i think it comes down to choices you can go on being totaly screwed up inside and let it ruin your life ,you can take the easy way out and jump ,or you can decide that you didnt live through hell just to waste your life suffering ,for me i think i owed it to the little boy that went through so much to try to make what he did mean something ,the kid in me didnt endure all that horror just to grow up to be miserable ,we owe it to our kid inside to use the life they fought so hard for ,as a way to be happy ,why survive at all if your just gonna continue to suffer forever ?if i didnt give up at 11 years old i sure as hell didnt want to give up at 21 years old .the abuse royaly screwed us up but its up to us to either deal with it or just give up .living a life thats empty of everything is worse than not living at all. am i over the abuse ,?no but i'm not just letting it be an excuse to not live
 
Brokenhearted,

Maybe what I should do is just tell you how I ended up here and why.

I guess I started to come out of denial (I will use that word though in my case it was more complicated than that) about six years ago, but at first I didn't know what to make of the things that were coming into my head. I thought they were just nightmares, but then I started getting flashbacks as well and things were coming together in a more coherent way. At one point I thought I was "becoming gay", because of the male/male sexual content. Then I wondered was I losing my mind, because of the extreme emotional surges I was having.

Eventually the fragments became large enough and fit well enough into my other memories that I "knew" what they meant. For example, I had retained since childhood the memory of being in a bedroom at a friend's house and his father entering in his underwear and telling me to take off my trousers. I remember being afraid and confused, but doing what I was told. End of memory. The rest of what happened that day came together as I was emerging from denial. I also remembered taking extra underpants on Scout trips and going to great efforts to secretly dispose of "ruined" ones before my Mom would see them. There too, the connecting bits came to me as I was coming out of denial.

As I said, I did think I was going mad, but it may be that I wanted to think that because the alternative would be to admit that I had been abused. I think the big trigger for me was having to deal with a young relative whom I thought had suffered date rape. I could read her and her behavior like a book, and I was very uncomfortable with the fact that I could somehow "see" so much.

Gradually I came to realize that I had indeed been abused, and not once or twice, but something like weekly for four years. I could see that it was affecting everything I was doing, and the more I thought about it the more afraid, anxious and ashamed I became. I was especially afraid that I would not be believed. Then finally in November 2003 I was talking to my sister on MSN when, for no particular reason, I decided this was it. I typed "I was molested as a child" on my screen, looked at it, and hit "send".

My sister helped me a lot, and in fact she has been my main support through everything. I was still a mess at home, though, and though I didn't see it I can now say I was becoming a very mixed up, erratic and unpredictable partner to my wife. I was angry and judgmental, and fear of being disbelieved kept me from saying what was wrong. Finally, in the course of a stupid argument she broke down in tears and told me, "Whatever it is that's bothering you, it's not my fault." That showed me how bad things were getting, so I told her the whole story, so far as I knew it to that point.

I came here as a result of a goggle search for something like "sexual abuse of boys". MS was the first on the list and I checked it out. After a short time I registered (May 2005). I was very timid at first and I found it difficult to talk about my own issues. But one of the mods helped me out and encouraged me, and I soon got over that. Further encouragement here led to me starting therapy in Germany, where I work, and near the end of last year my T thought I had made enough progress that I really needed therapy in my own language. So I started that in Oxford this spring.

I hope I am answering your questions. Mainly, I would have to say that I came to this site because I felt like I was falling apart fast. I was desperate and I feared that if I didn't do something pretty quick I would have a nervous breakdown and lose my wife and family. At first the anonymity of the site was very important to me. As I said, I feared I would be disbelieved, and when I thought of scenarios where I WOULD be believed, I was quickly overcome by shame and guilt.

So overall, yeah, pretty much of a mess.

Much love,
Larry
 
Thanks, everyone, for your candidness and I can't imagine the stuff you guys feel/have felt. Your posts are most helpful for me to be able to understand the mind's process. The atrocities you have endured are unspeakable. I am glad some of you have loved ones to share the burden with. I also hope you have faith that you lean on - it is the only thing that keeps me going sometimes. I know that no matter how bad things are, I'm never alone, I'm loved.
 
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