Thanks, Kieran:
I am fairly new here and just began therapy. Like so many, up until now I have never spoken about being sexually abused as a child by a friendly, nice and well-like neighborhood man. This experience affected and altered my entire childhood. I became obsessed about sex from that time forward. I thought about it all the time. I dreamed about it at night. I fantasized about it during the day sometimes inserting the faces and bodies of friends, acquaintances and total strangers as the objects of my sexual desires in my fantasies. I was only 4 when the abuse started and continued frequently throughout my kindergarten and first grade years, until my family finally moved out of the neighborhood and away from that man. My sexual obsession and fantasies also began at that time (around age 4 or 5) after being sexually abused. It affected my teen years and the way I viewed myself and my sexuality. I began to abuse myself, and became a compulsive masturbator, as much as 5 or 6 times a day. It caused such damage that I felt like I was sexually "crosswired" even throughout my entire adult life. It has affected every friendship and relationship I ever had. And, ultimately, it affected my marriage. It (the marriage) lasted ten years, but I could never face the truth about the thing that made me different from other men. I could never speak out about it. I never told anyone how I was confused about my sexual orientation nor did I ever tell anyone about my contradictory sexual experiences which were sometimes with women and at others with men (there were so many men) and still I considered myself to be basically heterosexual. I acted out in ways that fill me with guilt and shame, so much shame. I suppose that everyone here reading this can guess that least of all I never told my wife. Reading your story here tonight has had such a positive and healing effect on me. It has made me cry so much, but it also gives me such hope. I want you to know that I am encouraged, and strengthened by your story of hope and support and healing. I have just begun therapy (I've only had 2 sessions) with a good therapist who understands male sexual abuse survivor issues. I feel that as we explore further all the events of sa in my life that have brought me to my current state, I will be able to face the reality of what happened and will begin to believe that I as a 4 year old little boy was not responsible for it happening. I am now in a long term (9 years) relationship with a woman who is loving and caring and supportive. She knows I am now in therapy and supports this. In fact she stated that she was very glad that I am finally heeding her advice to see a therapist. Obviously, she has lived with me for 9 years and has observed me in almost every situation. She recognizes that I have some serious unresolved issues which need to be worked out with a therapist. To her everloving credit she has never nagged or pushed or threatened. She is so far beyond me in so many ways -- especially in her enlightenment. I have remained mired in my own personal "dark ages" of the mind for so much of the time that we've been together. Yet she has not given up on me. Now, hopefully, she will feel that some positive things may begin to happen for us as I continue and progress through therapy. This is all good, except for one major thing that still remains to be revealed. I want so much to be able to tell her everything about my sexual victimization and how it affected my life thereafter. I want to tell her about the resultant sexual obsessiveness, and how I began acting out in various and inapropriate ways, and the guilt and the shame and all the lies of omission. I want to stop hiding and running and fearing that some one will discover the truth about me. I want to be free like you. Thank you again for sharing your story. I am so happy for you and the way it turned out for you with your wife. Like I said, it fills me with so much hope that when I do tell my fiancee (AND I KNOW I WILL, SOON)she will respond true to form, she will be loving and caring and supportive, like she always has been for me, and like you, I will have someone who can comfort me for all the things that happened to that 4 year old little boy, and I will finally begin to heal and recover my stolen life. Thank you, Kieran, for your courage. I see what your honesty and sharing has done for others as well as for me. I hope that someday I can share honestly without fear and without wanting to run and hide. And, hopefully, someone else's life can be recovered, and even better, maybe someone else's little 4 year old boy can be rescued from the hell that all we who communicate in this forum were forced to experience. Sorry, Kieran, my sobs and my tears are interfering with my thoughts and I fear I am rambling on with no further points to make. But please know this. My prayers for you, your wife and for all the brothers here(Oh! By the way, I am honored to be considered as one of your brothers, here in this place --- Thank you) are that we will be granted continual grace and courage and strength to be able to overcome our sexual victimization, and that we would be granted a strong and unified voice with the legal, medical, professional and financial power behind it to finally put an end to victimization of persons during our lifetime.
Thanks for everything you shared, Jess.
