what am i supposed to feel?!
what am i supposed to feel?!
- Thread starterkuurt
- Start date
reality2k4
Registrant
Kuurt,
firstly, it happened.
Why did it happen? The big question.
Thinking over and over will not solve anything.
Whether he was abused or not, he has no right to abuse others.
Problems in society are from people who build cycles of abuse or violence through their "Own" free will.
It is not your fault that it happened, it is his, and he cannot blame his own abuse on making him do it, he had his own free will.
A lot of guys in this place have gone through the same emotional turmoil that you find yourself in, and the best way I found is to forgive, otherwise you are taking it out on your self.
Sounds easy, it is not, but it is the only way,
ste
firstly, it happened.
Why did it happen? The big question.
Thinking over and over will not solve anything.
Whether he was abused or not, he has no right to abuse others.
Problems in society are from people who build cycles of abuse or violence through their "Own" free will.
It is not your fault that it happened, it is his, and he cannot blame his own abuse on making him do it, he had his own free will.
A lot of guys in this place have gone through the same emotional turmoil that you find yourself in, and the best way I found is to forgive, otherwise you are taking it out on your self.
Sounds easy, it is not, but it is the only way,
ste
Hi Kurt,
You are supposed to feel whatever you feel. I don't really understand felings and am not always in touch with my feelings, but sometimes I have a big jumbled mess of feelings that I don't understand. This is OK. I can eventually deal with them all.
I understand how you are feeling....I have gone through the same line of thinking. I do feel sorry for the person that abused me, but he had a choice. He was really still a child when it happened and he has had a very hard life. I still blame him for the abuse. It was not my fault it was his fault. I was 7 years old and he was 13- my older brother. He was older than me and I trusted and idolized him.
So, even if your perp was abused, it is still his fault, it is not your fault. You have a right to be anry with him.
I also agree with ste about forgiveness. It is not easy and may be impossible if the hurt is still extremely strong. I just had to stop thinking about hating him and let it go- move on with my life.
I don't know if all this helps, but I have gone through the same line of thinking many, many times. You are not alone.
Bill
You are supposed to feel whatever you feel. I don't really understand felings and am not always in touch with my feelings, but sometimes I have a big jumbled mess of feelings that I don't understand. This is OK. I can eventually deal with them all.
I understand how you are feeling....I have gone through the same line of thinking. I do feel sorry for the person that abused me, but he had a choice. He was really still a child when it happened and he has had a very hard life. I still blame him for the abuse. It was not my fault it was his fault. I was 7 years old and he was 13- my older brother. He was older than me and I trusted and idolized him.
So, even if your perp was abused, it is still his fault, it is not your fault. You have a right to be anry with him.
I also agree with ste about forgiveness. It is not easy and may be impossible if the hurt is still extremely strong. I just had to stop thinking about hating him and let it go- move on with my life.
I don't know if all this helps, but I have gone through the same line of thinking many, many times. You are not alone.
Bill
roadrunner
Registrant
Kurt,
All the things you are thinking right now are so natural and normal for a survivor who is new to the effort of recovery. You are looking at things logically and asking logical questions.
The problem is that there is nothing logical about someone deliberately causing harm to an innocent trusting child for the sake of their own sexual gratification. The issue of whether the abuser was himself a child is important, as also is the question of whether he was an abuse victim himself. But neither is the place to start for you.
The place to start is that YOU WERE ABUSED. The question of how you should feel about that is one we all ask, but there is no answer. We are all individuals, and our cases, however similar in many ways, are still our own cases. Your feelings are there - that's the long and short of it. In order to recover you have to acknowledge these feelings and work with them, see what they represent and what issues they are flagging for you.
ALL of the emotions you describe are legitimate because they are yours. This is how YOU are reacting to what happened. It is absolutely normal to be confused and frustrated at this stage - you are just NOW allowing yourself to begin to deal with what happened, and all your feelings are just tumbling out. You want to arrange them and classify them and understand them, sure; meanwhile more are tumbling out and messing up whatever sense you may think you have already made of it all.
You are also expressing a concern that many new survivors feel: Is this how it ends? Does my work at recovery just mean remembering more and more crap and feeling worse and worse?
The answer here is no, it doesn't end like this. Things do get a LOT better. The problem is that at first we don't understand what is going on - it's all so new and scary and unfamiliar.
Take the fear that many survivors have of remembering more things that they had stuffed away in an effort to forget. It is scary and traumatic to remember that junk, yes, but it IS there, and chances are it will come back sooner or later regardless of what we do. What we don't bear in mind, or even realize, is that very often we recover these memories specifically because we are getting better. We feel safer and more self-confident, and that frequently allows us to handle thinking about things that would have been too much for us in the past. If someone had told me in May 2005 what I would be saying and thinking in January 2006 I would have thought they were nuts - I could NEVER do that!!!
I know all this is a bit much right now Kurt, and a lot of it will sound like psycho-gibberish. But it isn't - this really is the way things work. The most important thing for you to realize, bro, is that TALKING about it is essential. It is this that gets you on the way forward and keeps you there. Don't try to bury and hide things - that can only harm you, even if this option looks really great right now (and I'm sure it does!).
You are not to blame for anything that happened Kurt, and the truth cannot hurt you. Hang in there, and believe me when I say that we are all here for you. You are frightened, confused and angry, and I know this totally sucks. But you have resources within you that you have just begun to tap into (for example, the courage to come here in the first place), and it is these that will get you through.
Much love,
Larry
All the things you are thinking right now are so natural and normal for a survivor who is new to the effort of recovery. You are looking at things logically and asking logical questions.
The problem is that there is nothing logical about someone deliberately causing harm to an innocent trusting child for the sake of their own sexual gratification. The issue of whether the abuser was himself a child is important, as also is the question of whether he was an abuse victim himself. But neither is the place to start for you.
The place to start is that YOU WERE ABUSED. The question of how you should feel about that is one we all ask, but there is no answer. We are all individuals, and our cases, however similar in many ways, are still our own cases. Your feelings are there - that's the long and short of it. In order to recover you have to acknowledge these feelings and work with them, see what they represent and what issues they are flagging for you.
ALL of the emotions you describe are legitimate because they are yours. This is how YOU are reacting to what happened. It is absolutely normal to be confused and frustrated at this stage - you are just NOW allowing yourself to begin to deal with what happened, and all your feelings are just tumbling out. You want to arrange them and classify them and understand them, sure; meanwhile more are tumbling out and messing up whatever sense you may think you have already made of it all.
You are also expressing a concern that many new survivors feel: Is this how it ends? Does my work at recovery just mean remembering more and more crap and feeling worse and worse?
The answer here is no, it doesn't end like this. Things do get a LOT better. The problem is that at first we don't understand what is going on - it's all so new and scary and unfamiliar.
Take the fear that many survivors have of remembering more things that they had stuffed away in an effort to forget. It is scary and traumatic to remember that junk, yes, but it IS there, and chances are it will come back sooner or later regardless of what we do. What we don't bear in mind, or even realize, is that very often we recover these memories specifically because we are getting better. We feel safer and more self-confident, and that frequently allows us to handle thinking about things that would have been too much for us in the past. If someone had told me in May 2005 what I would be saying and thinking in January 2006 I would have thought they were nuts - I could NEVER do that!!!
I know all this is a bit much right now Kurt, and a lot of it will sound like psycho-gibberish. But it isn't - this really is the way things work. The most important thing for you to realize, bro, is that TALKING about it is essential. It is this that gets you on the way forward and keeps you there. Don't try to bury and hide things - that can only harm you, even if this option looks really great right now (and I'm sure it does!).
You are not to blame for anything that happened Kurt, and the truth cannot hurt you. Hang in there, and believe me when I say that we are all here for you. You are frightened, confused and angry, and I know this totally sucks. But you have resources within you that you have just begun to tap into (for example, the courage to come here in the first place), and it is these that will get you through.
Much love,
Larry