Toubled Mind

[Little_E]

Yeah it me again!...This is hard for me, but i feel i need to get it of my chest, and tell. So hears goes...

***POSABLE TRIGGER WARNING!!***

As you all know i been posting here the past month, and am very slowly coming to teams with my past! This past year I have been forced to relive them event from my so called childhood in flashbacks - These scare the shit outa me! (Sozz I dont know any better word to descibe it). I have allways know i was abused, but just forced the images and events to the back of my mind. And NOW, now they are coming back to haunt me!

I talked before about me not sleeping, getting drunk or stoned just so i can pass out for a few hours - To avoid my Nightmare! They are so vivid and stong, I cant stand the images they project any more!

My uni - My jobs all 3 of them, well just the 2 now, i go fired from my 3rd job the other week. Apparently my Puncality wasnt to their standers. WELL, if they fucking gave me shifts i could get to, and now leave me one hour from the time my lectures finish to get there! They know the busses are all fucked up! But that dont matter, gives me more time for me and my new girlfriend. AND That my friends is whats realy freeking me out right now!

She is great, friendly, bubbly, funny. Its just all the intermete stuff, thats starting to freek me out. This stuff has never effected me before (in my other relationships), I dont know! My be its becaue I'm starting to rember, and work throught these images. But they are getting in my way.

E.g.1> We where having sex and when we had finished there was blood on the condom, This brough back images from when i was young and...and...he used to fuck me, after there was blood on him and blood coming out of me. He got into group sesions at when i was bout 9/10, so it wasnt uncommon for him to sometime bring in another boy(s) and there perps, and watch us. **I'm not going into deatil about that subject** Sometimes they bleed like i did - Fucking sick perps, took pics and videos. To think out there somewhere are pics of me in some other sick fucks hands, getting off on the fact that my life was stollen. Looking and watching me do things wiv people,things that a I shouldnt have even known about at that age!! And thanks to cyber-space my Horror will last forever!

E.g.2> She stays over somenights, and we share the same bed. I dont mind this, but it means going to bed. Which inturns means Nightmares! I woke the other day and i was that little boy again, and she was him, huging me, touching me, well i leaped out of bed and ran to the bathroom and lock the door, i guess she through i just needed to go to the toilet, but i sat there in the corror, rocking. Cause for a few seconds I throught that he was'nt dead, that i was still a child, and the abuse was still happening, that everything else was just a dream, and that the nightmare was real! When i composed my self and finaly went back up stairs a good 20/30 mins later, she asked if everything was ok, and i lied and said yes!!

Recently i'v had this Nightmare! Of a scared young boy crying as he is bend over a bed and raped. That young boy is me, i can see him so clearly, its like an outer body experiance. He looks at me, and his eyes ask for help, but i cant move, i cant stop it. I can hear him screem, and i see the smiling face of the devil, taking pleasure in hurting, scaring, and destorying his life, my life! They it changes and i'm no longer watch but i am the boy and the man is doing me. A sence of helplessness, dispare, comes across me, and i allow him to contiune his abuse of me. Doing what ever he told me to, like i always did! Trying to be that good little boy, so i wouldnt be that bad little boy that desvered this!

Over the weekend i went clubbing for my mates birthday, while driving back my Bestfriend told me that i had changed. I was taken aback by that. He said that i was no longer the happy and carefree "E" that he had meet, that i look like i'm constenly sad. That in the club i spend more time trying to enjoy my self than accutaly enjoying my self like times gone by. And he was right. I've Changed with out even knowing it. I can no longer lissen/dance or Totlerate CHEESEY music, I lissen to PUNK/METAL anything loud. Me and him had one of our deep converations about our love life and girls, and i just wanted to tell him, tell him of my woe's but he was driving and i he would have probley crashed the car if i said anything to him.

Changing the subject again here, I was abused from the age of 7 to 13/14. I dont know how it started or why. I cant rember back that far, maybe that is a good thing! But what i do know is that at first i didnt want to, and he made the usealy treats, his mind games to control me, and they worked. Then I slowy got use to it, i know that sounds starage to me, How the fuck could i ever have gotten use to it, why the fuck did i start to think that it was ok?? Then puberity hit and well by then i was "Enjoying" it! I was no longer waiting for him to get me, but was going there and being a willing victim in his evil. Then when i was coming home from school one evening, there was a cop car in the street, poilce tape, and a smashed up car in the tree down the road. He was dead!! Just like that, gone from my life, and i was free, if that hadnt happened i dont know how long it would have gone on for, how many more years. And what i would be like!! - I dread to think! Are family went to his funeral, and thats the last time i cryed, I cryed for this monster that i think for some stranged fucked up reason i loved.... If you know me, you would know i never use that word ever in that context....

Well My sister is have her first baby on Thursday! And I'm gona be an Unkel for the first time, This is problery the only good thing at the moment. Me an Unkel, but i scared, scared what type of world it is being born into. And I vow on this day, that no one will ever harm it. That it will live a safe life, and a happy one! I only wish i could do that for everyone, but i cant! And it hurts me to know that people that have been given the power the right to resonserbility to lookafter another life, a yound life, can do that to it! Makes me so angree! Its unreal.

Thanks everyone for letting me post this. I know it might have been hard for you to read and i'm sorry, but this stuff has been eating me up and i needed to get it out!

Many of you have told me to get a T, and I now know your right i do need a T. But I cant aford one. I dont have the money, I'm in aneough debt now as is. And the uni couiling session is ran by students for students, they not trained, I know this. I work for our SU (Students Union). So if someone could recomend a good T for me, that dont charge and is in London, please let me know!

Elliot!

 

[The Dean]

Elliott, you are going thru a season of recall. That is as bad as it gets for us. At a time like this it is wise to try not to read or listen to any reports of a child being harmed. It can help to talk to someone if they are able to understand.

I hate it that you are going through this. It is all a part of getting better.

Many of us come to admit that we evenutally got to a point where the sex in some way was pleasureable. That does not mean it was ok for the adult to violate us and betray our confidence.

It soounds like you can't tell your girlfriend what is going on. It might be best to tell her that after you make love that you will sleep on the couch or somewhere that is safe for her. Just let her know that you are a "fitful" sleeper and don't want to hurt her or scare her. I think it will take some time before you will feel safe in bed, even with your girlfriend and that is ok.

These are terrible memories. Usually at University Counseling centers the students who do the counseling are grad students and are often watched by there mentor or taped and s/he discusses how they are working with you. I would hope you could get something like that.

Medical schools that have psychiatric residenceis also have doctors who are in the final years of theeir formation doing counseling. Look around and see if you can find something. It is really difficult to be where you are now and be alone in this.

Take care Elliott--go slow and be easy on yourself.

Bob

 

[michaelb]

PLEASE SEE A COUNSELOR!!!!!!!!!!!!....i feel your pain so deeply because it resembles my own in many ways, especially the nightmares!!!!!.....thought i had the solution with medicine, risperdal....the bad part is i've fallen asleep before taking the pills and the horrors come marching back into my mind.....

Your dream of being raped is so much like mine, it makes me quiver.....it is like there is a strobe light or an old time movie projector....i'm above watching things happen, so it cannot possibly be me those things are being done to....but i see the terror in the boys eyes, i feel the excruciating pain and shame....and there is nothing i can do to stop or change anything....

I tell you to get help because i think you need to talk these things through with a living, breathing, understanding person. I'm not familiar with UK's psychological counseling, but i know medicine is socialized, i'm assuming psychologists are too????? please go talk to somebody....THEY CAN HELP>>>>>>>>>> they'll give you medications to ease the symptoms and i know in my case sometimes dreams i had over and over for many years were eliminated once i understood what the dream was trying to tell me....

I'm not sure you should dump this stuff on a new relationship, i'm afraid you will overwhelm her and scare her away......PLEASE SEEK OUTSIDE HELP FOR YOUR OWN PEACE OF MIND.....those dreams, thoughts will not go away on their own....trust me, i thought they would years ago, but they just kept re-surfacing and the pain, torture and self-hatred just kept intensifying inside myself....now there is so much pain and hurt there, there are many days that i just feel like i can go on no MORE!!!!!!!!!!.....please deal with this and do not let that happen to yourself...

if i can be of any help at all, please do not hesitate to let me know.....take care....michael

 

[Lloydy]

Elliot
What Bob says about the season of recall sounds right, and Michaels advice to get a therapist is also right.

It's a world of confusion is we try to sort it out ourselves, it just doesn't happen. Therapy is the answer.

The first place to try is 'Survivors UK' a male orientated group that are London based, but a lot of national groups are affiliated to them. And they have some very good people working for them.

the web site is -
http://www.survivoruk.co.uk

the telephone help line is open Tuesday & Thursday 7-00 until 10-00 pm.

Phone them for advice on couselling etc.

I have some more contacts somewhere in this pile of paper and crap I call an office, and I'll post them when I find them.

Also try rape crisis centres, some do deal with men, and most will have information on who does if they dont.

Relate might help, they have psycho-sexual therapists. Again they might know where to go as well.

Med' schools are excellent, ok you'll get a student - but they will be supervised properly, and they're free !!

Elliot, what you're going through now nobody deserves.
And the problems with intimacy are so common to us.
I remember when I was in my 20's I was ok, or so I thought, and things got worse very quickly.
I still struggle to be intimate.

In a way you're lucky to be confronting your problems while you're still quite young, stick with it, recovery is possible.

Dave

 

[Mark S]

Hi.

Just to concur with what Dave has already posted, Survivors UK were able to point my then girlfriend in the right direction regarding a counsellor for me. Most seemed to be based in or around London so you shouldn't have a problem finding a suitable counsellor. Luckily for me, there was one organisation on the south coast who also helped male survivors so I ended up there.

The good thing most of them offered a pay as much as you can afford scheme.

One word of advice, If you get an appointment to see a counsellor and you don't hit it off. If you don't feel you can work with him or her, ask to see another. They wont be offended. So many clients seeking counsellors feel they have to accept the first person they see.

Good luck and best wishes.

Mark

 

[Lloydy]

After the BBC documentary tonight there was a phone number for a helpline that might well be a useful source of information.

08000 839 839

Dave

 

[Wuamei]

Elliot:

I shared this, about my flashbacks & some of the ways I try (or have heard about & maybe should try) for dealing with them, in a Members forum recently:

My belief is that my flashbacks began to fade out when all of the memories of specific abuse incidents came out, at least I hope it's all of them. I suspect it was the main ones, or at least the ones I really need to know for now. Probably what's left would be more of the same, more than likely just details.

My first major flashback that started it all was August 2001. The floodgates opened, so to speak, with 9-11; very triggering for me, as I was born in Manhattan & my abuse started there, in infancy.
I had minor to severe flashbacks with some regularity until after my last biggie in March 2002. Since then only a rare quick flashback involving some details, no new events. Last one was right after 9-11 anniversary last year.

That last one in particular could have gotten ugly but I'd started learning how to deal with them. Actually I used some of the same stuff I mentioned before relating to anger: some yoga, stretching, relaxation techniques, deep breathing,
exercising, writing, walking around, praying--till it dissipated.

How those would have worked on the earlier & more major flashbacks I don't know. With those about I tried pretty much the same stuff but just didn't know much about it, the techniques, etc. Just kinda tried to relax, breath, ride out the storm.

Making emotional progress?--slowly but surely, lots of ups & downs. The knowledge the flashbacks gave me, the feelings they brot out, were hard to deal with but part of my growth, my growing up, letting out Little Victor.

If you can handle it, it might help, in therapy, to consider the info you gained in flashbacks, and also try to remember the feelings, then try to sort it all out & see where it fits in how your past has affected you now, and how you can change things for the better as you may need to.

Here are some tips on "dealing with flashbacks"; doing a search on those words will yield more, but this is a start:

Dealing With Flashbacks Or Flooding

From Triumph Over Darkness by Wendy Ann Wood, M.A.

"When flashbacks or flooding occur, many survivors do not know how to deal with the intensity of their feelings. During the first week of treatment I give my clients a homework assignment: Develop an emergency list that tells you how to take care of yourself in times of flashbacks, flooding or a crisis. The list should contain ten to fifteen items.

I encourage clients to carry their lists with them at all times and to have them posted in prominent places throughout their homes, workplaces, and cars. When flashbacks occur, and they will, go through the list as many times as you need to de-escalate the feelings. Some people need a second list of activities that they can do in their work setting, so be sure to prepare for that. Here are some things you might want to put on your list:

1.Sit up straight with your feet flat on the floor. Inhale through your nose, count to ten, and exhale slowly through your mouth. Repeat five times.

2.Find a safe place to be with your feelings.

3.Talk about what you are experiencing with someone who is really listening and is not afraid to ask questions.

4.Remind yourself that you are safe. Tell yourself that you are remembering what happened in the past and that you are in the present -- safe.

5.Journal: Write down what you saw, how it felt, and what you are currently feeling.

6.Tell yourself that you are not going crazy. Flashbacks are part of the healing process. They are not going to make you crazy, even though it feels that way.

7.Do three things on your self-care list.

8.Do something physical, such as walking or running in place, pounding your fists on a pillow, or shredding newspaper.

9.Call someone in your support system. This may be someone from group, a recovery partner or an intimate partner. If your support person is not available, try calling a local crisis line for support.

10.Ground yourself with an object of empowerment and safety. (Many of my clients carry a special rock that they can hold onto to ground themselves.)

11.If you have gone through this list three times and are still feeling intense emotions related to flooding, flashbacks or a personal crisis, put a call in to your therapist. It is likely that your therapist will not be available the moment you call. Keep working through your list until you feel better and/or your therapist calls back.

All material on this information sheet is provided for INFORMATION ONLY and should not be construed as advice or instruction. Action should not be taken based solely upon the contents of this sheet; instead, appropriate professionals should be consulted."

Take care Elliot

Victor