The feeling is so real! Shame along with it, ...triggers

[willtobecomplete]

Hello everyone! Hope your todays are better than your yesterdays. Had a nightmare that it will do good to process and get feedback on. I don't know if any or how much of the imagery is real but the feeling that I remmembered during the the dream was very real and I think that it really sheds light on the way I was SA, because so much is so schechy STILL!! Anyway, the dream was of my granfather at his house, as he was coming out of the bathroom and i was telling him about my day and he was asking me mundane questions and giving advise, he was in his underwear and I was following him into his bedroom then onto the bed, anyway as this was happening the feeling that I was experiencing was of curiosity and expectation that my body was going to like what was about to happen, like we were going to do something grown up and special. That is where i woke up, very freaked out because I remember that feeling being so real. This is very difficult to express because I feel so much shame about feeling that way, how could I possibly have felt good about something happening that was so horrible? I know i didn't understand what was going on, I was just a boy, I even disaccociated or blocked it to the point where I barley remmember it now? What kind of evil perverted slimeball could groom a boy into that kind of situation? This is just so disturbing!

 

[ForeverFighting]

That was the hardest part of therapy for me. It was easier for me to look at my uncle as this evil, ugly monster that did something to me that I hated from the very beginning. I liked the idea better of me dreading his visits and him being this horrible creature that I tried to stay away from. But if you read the stories of the men here and the emotional roller coasters we go through, you find again and again that that's not how SA always happens. A lot of us here were SA in situations where our bodies reacted or the attention seemed like a good thing. Like you say, they "groom" their victims. I didn't have anybody, my parents were cold, we kids were never good enough for them, and they were always gone. And here was this uncle that showed me attention and played with me. Even though the SA was abuse, it was closeness with another human being, and in my brain there was a form of acceptance going on, like he must like me or he wouldn't do this. At the same time it was, he must not like me or he wouldn't do this. If I could just be a different way maybe he wouldn't do this or would do that. I don't know. And so, as a boy with this pervert being my only "kind" living male role model (gag), and since there was a point before his face changed that it wasn't horrible, I thought I must be like him. But his face did change, and it felt bad, and thus comes the shame and the guilt and the secrecy. Maybe I went into it as a "playmate" or whatever, but I came out of it a rag, used. There is no way a little boy can deal with that kind of emotional conflict and make any sense of it. We were children. Look at any child that age and think. How could you, as a child that age, possibly understand what was happening?

Remember though, dreams are just dreams. The subconscious mind's door swings open without anything standing in its way so we're off on this crazy ride where everything happens and nothing makes sense. Please don't dwell on the details of the dream and drive yourself crazy over it.

But even if that feeling is familiar, and if you've felt that feeling before, that doesn't change anything about who you are. It doesn't matter how much they messed with our thinking, we never wanted to be raped. Ever. Maybe I appreciated the companionship or just someone spending some time with me, but I was a little boy. Never did I ask to be raped. I was set up, and so were you. You are good, better than a lot of people I know. What they did to us does not make us that.

I am so sorry about your dream. I know the feelings you describe all too well. And maybe we know the slimeballs groomed us, but that doesn't lessen the shame and the pain. Like my therapist always says, "I know you know that. But what do you feel?" It's those feelings that are so hard. I am really sorry you're having to go through this.

Talk to me anytime. I'm here for you.