what IS abuse?

what IS abuse?
P

puppy

Registrant
this question is burning a hole in my head. where do you draw the line, between what is and what isnt. i know without a doubt that my father abused me. because i was so young, because hes my father, because i eventually learned to say no. its pretty clear to me that it was wrong.

but what about when its not so clear. what about when youre not so young anymore. what if its not your father. and what if you didnt say no. i know you can still be abused, even if you dont say no. i didnt and couldnt for a long long time. and i know that isnt the deciding factor. so what is?

the more i look inside myself, the more honest i am, the further i fall into this really dark place. im so scared.
 
Puppy,
I too have doubts about what was and what wasn't abuse. I was 12 and my brother was 15 1/2 I still wonder about that because I forgot what how young 12 really is. I keep beating myself up thinking at 12 I should have known what sex was and the fact that I never said no means I was a willing participant.

MS has a good defination as to what abuse is. However I know that even when its spelled out you always doubt it anyway.

"Sexual abuse is a misuse or abuse of power and control. It may be accomplished through force, deception, bribery, blackmail, or any other means that gives one party an upper hand.."

"Consent - When a partner freely agrees to do something. This person must understand what the behavior is all about without being tricked or confused. The partner must know what is acceptable in the culture, family and peer group and must also be aware of the possible consequences for him/herself and others, as well as alternatives to the behavior. It has to be OK to say no with no worries about negative consequences. Partner must be mentally competent (of equal intelligence and not under the influence of alcohol or drugs)."
 
Puppy,
If it felt uncomfortable, if there was a significant age differential, if it felt like you had less power than the person you were unable to say no to, then in all likelihood it was abuse. There may be varying degrees of abuse but that doesn't minimize anyone's experience. Peace, Andrew
 
Puppy:

Trigger warning....

When you were abused by your father, like I was abused by my brother...you sometimes freeze in situations. That's how a married man was able to lure me into bed at 17, even though I wasn't ready for that yet. And he used liquor to try and get me drunk. That was abuse. That was rape.

And I froze when a few years later a coworker who "bought" me lunch, and embarrassed the hell out of me in the process, pulled me into a dark railway tunnel and told me to go down on him, that it didn't matter. It wasn't what I wanted. But I froze. I was frightened. That was abuse. That was rape.

There are a lot of situations where we freeze up, can't say no, and the person uses this against us. Sometimes we can't punish these people legally or any other way. But let's not punish ourselves, okay? And in our own heads, let's call it what it was: abuse!

I don't know what your circumstances were but I have no doubt that it was abuse, regardless of age, regardless of whether your body responded to it. YOU KNOW IT ALREADY. And I know it too, just from the way you asked the question.

You did nothing wrong. You have nothing to be ashamed of. You're not in a dark hole, not really. You're just trying to find your way to the light. Okay?

Things will get better. Hang in there!

Jasper
 
Puppy - I think it's perfectly normal to question what happened to us. But it's only normal because we were told to lie and keep secrets. The teacher who abused me for two years pretended he was my friend. I was living away from home at a school for emotionally troubled kids. I was 11 years old. I was 'emotionally troubled' because I had been raped by a swim coach for over a year starting when I was nine. The teacher was in his late twenties. He would give me money and cigarettes and beer and let me look at his Playboy books. He would take me from the school on overnights to his apartment. I thought I was special. I thought I was cool. I thought he was cool. He wasn't. Because all of the cool things that I thought he was doing were only to get me to do what he wanted and to keep me quiet. It was abuse, plain and simple, even though I thought at the time that he was my friend..

I'm sorry you feel so scared. That does pass, you just need to keep talking about it. Every time you let a little more out, the stuff inside gets a little smaller. Trust me, it's true. Here is something I wrote about a year ago when I was feeling the way you do now. I hope it helps, take it to heart:

The layers are fracturing me.
Steps to the light seem way too big.
Three decades later,
I still cant shake this thing.
But the want is there.
The works begun,
Laboring to give birth to one.
No more pieces.

Peace - John
 
Puppy
what we learned from our abuse was that people who had some sort of power, influence or control over us could use us as they wished.

I was first abused at about 3 yo when a man put my hand inside his trousers, and as far as I can remember nothing happened that told me what he did was wrong.
When we are young we are subject to a process called 'imprinting' where we get our ideas of right and wrong, good and bad, and many other things as well.
If we don't get the message that the 'sex' is wrong, then we carry that message with us as we get older.

I'm 100% positive that this single episode was responsible for the fact that even though I knew I didn't want sex with older boys when I was 11yo, I didn't have the message within me to say it was wrong and shouldn't be happening.

That message is still with me today at 52yo, it's going, but that's because I'm re-educating myself through therapy about the lost messages of my childhood.

Dave
 
Puppy,

I have many of the same questions about myself sometimes. I was 11 when my abuser first laid hands on me, and he had great gifts for manipulating, confusing, frightening, and demeaning kids - perps have that talent of course. Eventually I valued myself so little, or not at all actually, that I no longer cared what happened. I just did what he wanted. I was 14 by the time it ended, and by then I was prepared to do anything at all. My last defense was simply not to care. Now, however, I look back and feel so uncomfortable with the fact that I became such a "willing" participant.

But I wasn't willing, and neither were you. As has been mentioned above, abuse is about misuse of power. It isn't about sex, though that is the result, and it really isn't necessarily about adults hurting kids, though that is the way it usually goes. We have cases here of guys old enough to be in the military and being abused there, for example.

Your defenses can be beaten down by all kinds of things: troubles at home as a kid, for example, can really make you an easy target at a later age. I don't know if you say it previously, but a student of mine was having trouble at home earlier this year with an abusive uncle, and he is a young guy only a year older than you.

You talk about a dark place. Fears, confusion, and anger can all be dark places in a way, and sometimes you just need to walk through them to get on out the other side. But the dark place of "it was my fault" is a dead end. No one belongs in that stinking hole but the guy who hurt you.

Larry
 
Puppy,

As sure as anything can be, what your father did is the reason you later "couldn't and didn't" say no.

I have been in that place where it doesn't even occur to you that saying NO is an option.

I was in a three year relationship once where my inability to say NO was, I now realize, one of the most damaging things that happened to me in my life.

I blamed her, then I blamed me, and now I blame the right one, the man who abused me when I was 3. HE set the stage; HE took my voice away.

The dark place isn't real. It is an echo built of shadows and lies. Name the Lies. Drag them into the Light and the shadows will vanish.


ALL LIES

Donald
 
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