What makes you a survivor?

What makes you a survivor?
I'm a survivor because I am still alive after having been sexually abused.

There are lots of men who have been sexually abused who did not make it any further in this life.
They are dead. They could not survive.
They are not survivors.

As long as I keep sucking air, I will survive. What happens after that is a matter of a personal decision and a lot of grace.

Today I'm grateful to have survived. And I never want to forget all the guys who were abused and couldn't, wouldn't keep living.
I want God to bless them and love them and keep them safe.
And me too.
 
What makes me a survivor? That really made me thimk...

I believe I knew I was a survivor first when I began to realize I liked who I am. For years I was trying to overachieve, convince people I am a good person..but one day, I realized, I AM A GOOD PERSON. My attitude on life changed and I no longer felt inferior - I could be happy for you because I could be happy for me. If you had more than I, that's just fine and I am happy for you! Because I had me and I am okay!

Secondly, was when I liked my life. I liked what I did, with whom I did it and where I did it. I am okay and my life is okay.

My perps took 45 years of my life away...but it is worth the struggle. I recognized my CSA about 15 years ago and hit the point of being a survivor about 5 years ago. It feels fantastic!

I am not through with my journey completely and I encourage everyone on the path to wholeness to hang in there...life can be good again!

Howard
 
This thread has some really powerful stuff. I think we all need to be careful not to think of being a survivor as a permanent victory, because then a person can feel like a failure if, like me, you're on cloud nine at one point in your life and then later find yourself stuck in shitty feelings and lonely. With that in mind, I'd say I became a survivor not so much when I left home at 16 and made my way, but really after all that, when I was 20 or 21 and had to learn to trust people, to fight off the urge to give up. It may sound stupid, but I lived on a 4th floor room when I was 21, with a low window. One day I couldn't take the temptation of having the window there any more, so I moved my desk and blocked it. I guess that, and crying on the phone to friends, made me feel like a survivor. But I still have to find my way back to that place over and over again. You think you're home free, but then you get all cold and distant, drink too much, and before you know it, you really need to find your way back again. It ain't pretty.
 
Muffin,

But I still have to find my way back to that place over and over again. You think you're home free, but then you get all cold and distant, drink too much, and before you know it, you really need to find your way back again. It ain't pretty.
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That is so true, and it's right up in my face these days.

When I stopped denying what really happened, when I began to learn about how this kind of abuse affects men, and when I accepted that the "coincidental similarities" to my own life were not coincidences, I made a choice. I chose to change, to break the power of the abuse over me, then to learn and practice healthy ways of living the time I have left.
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I have to make that choice, over and over, or something else will choose not for me, but for its own vile purposes.

Thanks,

Joe
 
Survive......to continue to live, exist, live longer than. Victim...one who suffers as a result of an act of another. Thus the dictionaries explaination of the two terms. To me the key words here are SUFFER and LIVE. The suffering has to end before the life can begin.
It is so awfully hard to remember that it was not your fault. It is so hard to explain to a loved one why you are so cold, why you have a fear of intimacy, friendship etc, it must be a big part of the suffering. I felt so long that I was different, I couldn't tell, who would believe me...too hideous to believe, there are many other people worse off than I. Well, I my body is not different, I don't have to hide, I can play football and take a shower after without fear of someone seeing that "I was abused, because of it my body is different" My abuse is no less or more than anyone elses, if it happened once, ten time, a hundred times, doesn't matter, abuse is abuse.
We are victims, suffering from the perverted, selfish wills of another. Robbed, robbed from our youth but, we can and will survive once we tell ourselves that it will no longer dominate our lives.
Bob
 
Al, I am sorry you feel of that way. But I do not know that I am survivor yet, real. Yes, to physical survive of things, I guess that make it a 'survivor' in some definition. But I do not know that I real be survivor until I start to live again, of my own life, and not of fear. I am not so sure, I am sorry.
 
Ah, what is a survivor? I have survived the SA, physically alive. There I am a survivor.

I did not survive the SA mentally or socially. There I am not a survivor. I am just there, taking up precious oxygen, space, and other precious resources.

Last October, I realized for the first time some of the affects that it had on my life. Some I am correcting, some won't seem to correct. I am starting to become a survivor.

In December, the fears inside showed them for the first time, with such realism, it was I was being raped all over again. Today I am still paying the price for that. There I am not a survivor.

After years and years of not showing any signs of rage, they are now a fairly common thing. The television and radio get a lot of verbal abuse. This may be good, or it may not. I have not been violent, this Is good. I am becoming a survivor.

I have started T. First for depression related to my wife leaving, the first visit I realized it was mostly caused by the SA, now the therapy is almost all SA. Now I am really working at becoming a survivor.

But I want to be more than a survivor, I want to be a thriver. I have been just surviving, being alive, but not living. It is time to live. Time to Thrive.

Bill
 
I did not survive the SA mentally or socially. There I am not a survivor. I am just there, taking up precious oxygen, space, and other precious resources.
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Bill,

If I may, let me set out a different vision.

I see a man coming here to create precious resources, out of his own blood, sweat, and burning tears. I see him offering these as precious gifts to others stumbling their own way here in pain, maybe dragging themselves here in desperation.

Speaking for myself, I like what you do with oxygen, space, etc. You put them to very good use. That's my selfish opinion, because I've dragged myself here in desperation and found hope in your words.

I guess I'm cluttering the post with words again. What needs to be said is

Thanks,

Joe
 
For me, my abuse started when I was just a baby and continued until the time I went to college. Things had become such a way of life for me that it wasn't until I was long out of college that I began to understand, all of these things were just not right.

The point that changed everything for me was when I became paralyzed in 1991. I was 25 years old and the world came crashing down on me. Even at that time, I didn't fully understand all what had happened nor could I even proclaim the words that I had been abused.

It wasn't until many years later when I really went into intensive therapy to work through the nightmares I was having. And when I really started to confront the issues is when my life began to evolve into being a survivor, and not just a victim. I remember going to a Voices conference and talking with other survivors and if there was any one point where I could say I was moving to being a "survivor", that would have to be the point.

I still held on to the only badge of life that I knew and that was being a victim. I couldn't see myself as anything else than that and my entire world revolved around what had been done to me. It was all I knew and it was all that felt safe to me.

More recently, I have begun moving beyond these things and being able to see that my life is defined by so much more than what was done in the past to me. I remember Mike Lew saying in a workshop that what was done to you is not who you are. That had a big impact to me.

The other day in class when I gave my presentation, most of my classmates heard for the first time, my life of being abused. I had purposely not told everyone because I wanted to have them get to know me for me and not because I was abused. So I withheld this information from the class in general until this time. I then asked a couple of people if they saw how I was around everyone as a victim or as a survivor and they immediately proclaimed - you are a survivor and you didn't come across as a victim. That made me feel good because I have struggled so hard to get to this point and remember so vividly that I never ever ever thought I would.

Now, my classmates and some of the instructors have been asking more and more questions from me and sharing some things they went through. It warms my heart and it makes me feel like I can deal or talk about this on a more level basis. It is a very good feeling. I'm not going to hide this any more from people, but when I share about it, I am going to keep in mind that there is so much more to me than the abuse. I'm still discovering all of that, but I now know it is there.

And I want it all!

Don
 
I have avoided posting here for a long time. The reason is is that I do not know when or if. There are days that I feel great and things are going really well but the recent past has been awful.

I found out that at 6 years of age I was abused by my mother's youngest brother. It hit me like a sledge hammer. What am I?? A walking victim looking for it again and again. What else have I forgotten???

I have also felt the powerful urge to re-enact. It draws me like a putrid fog. It is like heroin the intoxication of it. To feel the pain and all the rest again. God it draws me. I am so frightened of it. I am so afraid of harming myself. I am afraid of who I am. It feels like all the walls are closing in and I am choking to death.

To be a survivor means that you have come to grips with your past and I have not. I dont know if I ever will. Do I know all my past? Will I ever know it all?
 
Mikey,

I feel like I'm chasing you around the board.

You're gutsy. I just asked if I'd ever know all my past, too, but I tucked it away in the members' area.

I sure don't know all of your past, but I know something of your present. You ask what you are, and I can tell you what I have seen in your words.

You are a strong man, a devoted husband, and a loving father. You are a caring individual who takes time from his life to come here and help people who suffer extreme physical, mental, and emotional pain. You put memories of terrible things in your life out here for others to learn how to better their own lives.

Can something from your past that you remember tomorrow change any of that? No. It is done. You have already done tremendous good for a great number of people. It's in stone. You can't change that any more than I can go back and put up more resistance to the perp. Nothing can change the fact that you have taken terrible events in your life, overcome them to be and do so much good, and shared your experience, strength, and hope with men you may never meet face to face.

Why do you do so much for others? Because you're a good person, that's why.

I'm not trying to minimize your pain, because I know all of us have real pain to feel. But don't ever forget how good you are. Ever.

Glad to have met you,

Joe
 
I'm not quite sure I'll ever be a survivor as I don't think I'll ever be normal because of it. It will always impact my life in some way or form. Am I still alive? Sure I am but I do feel damaged. It's all just sortof become part of who I am that until recently I've always just sort of lived with it. I've never actually took it and examined it for what it was. It's almost like a virus that I've just lived with for years without getting treatment. I've more or less just continued to be a victim without ever actually acknowleging that I was a victim or that a crime had actually occurred. I don't think until recently I ever blamed anyone but myself..because I participated in it and didn't say no I never really looked at it like something happened to me...that someone had done something to me that damaged me. In ways I think I felt better before I ever started down this path. Now I actually am starting to feel things that I should have felt a long time ago and now just isn't a good time. I'm not quite sure where to go from here, this is really the first time I've ever spoken out on here.
 
Adam:
I ever blamed anyone but myself..because I participated in it and didn't say no I never really looked at it like something happened to me...that someone had done something to me that damaged me.
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What happened to you was wrong. It was never your fault. As I said someplace else you had as much chance of preventing it as a cow being led to shaughter. Something horrible happened to you and you were made to feel a part of it. Why? To keep you quiet to protect the perp. We all do a good job with that for them.

In ways I think I felt better before I ever started down this path. Now I actually am starting to feel things that I should have felt a long time ago and now just isn't a good time. I'm not quite sure where to go from here, this is really the first time I've ever spoken out on here.
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Adam we all have felt that way. You are not alone. We were comfortable with it. We had our coping mechanisms that seemed to work. But just by posting here and being here you recognize that these mechanisms just are not working for you any more. I came to a point in my life where I wanted to live life and not merely pass through it. I buried my SA for 40 odd years and boy did it do a number on my life and jobs those who love me and my sense of self worth.

But you have now opened the door to your dirty little secret. Only you know what. It is not your dirty little secret but your perp's. I am sure that you have been harmed by what happened. What has happened to your perp. Nothing. We are treated like a piece of meat and then cast aside till the next time. We were used all of us. And we were brainwashed into accepting responsibility.

Adam stick with us. You are on the right road. Post, read and support.

If you have never had therapy you might want to consider it. Most if not all of us need that kind of support from professionals. I am sure there are good therapists in your area. On the opening page of Male Survivor there is a listing of afffiliated therapists. Have a search for it.

You have opened the door and the roof did not fall in. No judgements only concern and compassion from here. That is what we are all about. Together we are stronger and can do it.

Feel free to pm me anytime you want
 
What makes me a survivor?

I think the better question would be does it matter that we are survivors? Would the world be different if we didn't exist? We live day to day, figuring out the best way to continue the fight to stay alive.

Some of us have the good fortune of finding partners who are understanding, who will love us, who will hold us in ways that we needed at other times in our lives but weren't afforded that luxury.

Some of us are dealt cards that offer little hope.

Every child deserves to be loved, held, cherished.

Some children do not have either of those three cards in their deck. Nothing can ever be done to change that. Maybe in their next lives, if such a thing exists, will they be granted something better.

What makes you a survivor? It doesn't really matter.

Jim
 
Jim,

There's a lot of good sense in that approach. We are what we are after going through what we did. But
Would the world be different if we didn't exist?
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I don't think I would have, possibly could have written my snowflake poem if I hadn't read the recent Chapter 2 of "Jimmy's Fall." It all came together when I read about how he wanted to be a snowflake. That in turn led me to a lot of work on trying to express myself.

So I know the world, my world, would be different. It's better because you came here and wrote.

Thanks,

Joe
 
Joe,

Jimmy wanted to be a snowflake so that he could fall into and become one with the rest of the snow and not be noticed. Then soon afterwards, he would melt into the ground and no-one would have known anything differently nor noticed that Jimmy had ever existed.

Jim
 
Guys - Maybe for it doesn't matter whether you are a survivor or not but, to me, it means a whole lot. I wasn't dealt any really good cards and the jokers I got were not good wild but meant "anything goes".

WARNING!! TRIGGERS!!! WARNING!!! TRIGGERS!!!!

My abuse started at 5 and my parents knew about it and beat me for it! I was the victim...nothing stopped. I was raped at 8 along the railroads tracks I grew beside in a tough area of North Philly. I was a street child at 12 when my parents gave me a house key and said "now don't get in trouble". My parenting ended long before but I guess the key was graduation - you are on your own. The abuse lasted one more year then I chose to be sexual (gay) with globs of teens! I had a learning disability (ADD) the school never recognized I graduated 1450 out of 1500 students in my class.
I won awards in scouts and community service but never saw my parents at the award ceremonies, even though they knew about it. When I saw them sometime at home, they forbade me to talk about it because "they were too busy". The rest of the crap, I'll leave out! I had no family to help me...too "stupid" to go to college...I worked into my dream (TV entertainment) at 18 by sheer street moxy and push...my push...and so on....

But, you know what? I survived the years of sexual acting out, the alcohol, the starvation from lack of love, low self-esteem, physical and sexual abuse (ie. beatings with welts ALL over my body and made to strip naked so the ladies in the neighborhood could see how "bad a boy" I was; when I was 4 yo my penis was smashed in my dresser drawer by my mom who laughed at me and sat me on the couch with an ice bag inviting people in to see what "her dumb son" did...there's more but)....I survived suicidal thoughts and clinical depressions...I survived a whole bunch of crap, humiliation and hurt and pain!! I am a survivor!!

Because I kept pushing on toward a healthy life I began to find answers and refused to accept the negatives I was raised with. Of the 6 friends I had before 11 yo, only 2 of us lived past 18 (shot while robbing a store; killed by gang members; suicide in teens; killed in detention/placement/jail; etc). I didn't want to be a statistic...I was a survivor.

I did make it through a bunch of stuff in my life. [I am religious and give God the credit.] Because I survived, I got to tell my story to other guys and helped them. I was privileged to work with kids and teens going through the same crap! Because I am a survivor, there are others who have a chance to be survivors.

For some of us...being a survivor counts a great deal!! If I was not a survivor - there would be many kids/teens (3-18)+ would not have had opportunities to overcome what's happened to them in life!!

Everyone on this Board who is a survivor has something to add to each other and make a difference! Every time we post and share...it counts! There are guys who don't post or not often at least who benefit from what we all say here!! Being a survivor does count and wanting to be a survivor does count!!

Sorry for going on here BUT I have strong feelings about recovering our lives! Being who we were meant to be. I realize there are down times but they can't compare to the good days!
No matter what cards you were dealt, there is a way and the destination is "survivor".

Every once in a while I just get "wound up"!!

Howard
 
Howard,

I would like to clarify a comment I made earlier. It certainly matters that you have chosen your path and have helped many teens and kids through their problems. You may have told your story to other guys and helped them. Of course the fact that you've done these things matter. However, you could have easily helped these kids or these guys without having been a survivor.

There are countless thousands of individuals all across society who have had zero exposure or experience personally with abuse, whether it be sexual or physical; these people are making differences in the lives of others, kids, teens, adults, who have experienced abuse. They matter not because of their abuse (because they had none), they matter because of the things they are doing for the better good of humankind.

That's what matters. What matters is the here and now and what you're going to do with your life.

The facts are pretty simple. You are conceived and received an internal set of codes - DNA (card number 1) You cannot and did not choose the parents you were born to (card number 2).

As you grow older, you learn (hopefully) how to live through your life experiences (remaining hand of cards). If the cards you are dealt are weak, there is no way to trade them, you must only play them out. Maybe that's what survival is.

Howard, you said : "Sorry for going on here BUT I have strong feelings about recovering our lives! Being who we were meant to be."

"Recovering" would imply getting something back that was lost. What exactly are we getting back that was lost? We can never ever ever go back to being 5 or 8 or 13 again. Ever. We can never go back and change or recover experiences lost from bad parenting. Getting back what lives? We have our lives currently and I go back to what I said earlier, we have that simple hand of cards that we must play out. No if's and's or but's. Just is. Nothing to recover.

"Being who we were meant to be" would imply that we were derailed somewhere along the line (by our own actions?) and we need to get back on track and be the good man God intended. If we were meant to, as children (for example), be loved, cherish, and held by loving parents, then why weren't we? What is it that we are 'meant' to be? I think the answer lies back in the simple analogy of the hand of cards.

I, for example, was meant to be born to narcissistic parents, a father so self centered and full of hatred for me as a person that he could never even call me by my name. I was meant to be so physically abused by him that to this day, I cannot bear the thought of either seeing him or hearing his voice. I was meant to be sexually abused by my older cousin (although I submitted to him freely). I figured out, early on, how to hide. I am quite certain, that had I been confronted with the issue of sexual abuse from an adult male, I would have submitted freely, actually at times I went looking for it, but never found it. I would have given anything, including my body, to be noticed, to be loved, to be held. Know what Howard, I didn't' even have that. I have my beliefs why that didn't happen, but it matters not.

See, it's all about the cards. It's how you play them, how you hold them. That's what matters.
:cool:
Jim
 
Jim - Thanks for the reply and clarification. You made me reflect on several very good points you make. I fully understand the restrictions of the cards dealt to us. I sometimes will provide services to a male teen in foster care. His parents have "no way" (!) of parenting him in healthy ways. I call this "having a 4 cyclender child with 2 cylinder parents". Those parents will never get those other 2 cyclinders. I do agree that it does matter how we assist that 4 cylinder teen and that teen can go only so far on those 4 cylinders. However, he receives services so he can function on all cylinders. For that he needs outside interventions.

I agree there are many therapists that do extraordinary interventions with CSA survivors. However, like recovering addicts/alcoholics counselors in Drug and Alcohol rehabs,they are more productive with many teens because they can better understand the feelings, better read the non-verbal signs and overall know what a recovering teen means. Likewise, I've found it with CSA recoverers. Therapists with CSA backgrounds can usually detect CSA before the person ever thinks of disclosing it. They can listen to a child and recognize the crap (not so technical but descriptive) that the victims are left with. Early on, when I serviced adult male survivors, these guys would come from years of psychiatrists and psychologists and enter my practice. In 6 months they would be recognizing gains they had not made before in all those years. Why? Not me but the fact I knew where they were coming from. Survivors have a lot to give to those recovering. The problem emerges when we sell ourselves short. When we make gains, however slight, there are those farther behind us on their journey we can help by sharing. If I had the choice, I would choose a therapist who was a survivor and with evidence of healthy recovery.

But, alas, you are right, the cards can put limits on our recovering abilities. Yet, with the right support and motivation, I believe everyone can make significant recovery.

What I meant by "the person we were meant to be" is, assuming there were no perps in our life, our lives would have taken other directions. We can not exactly return to that path because, once we experience the CSA, we will never be the same. However, we can recover enough of ourselves to live productively and find joy in what and we are and in that way turn from who and the perp meant us to be. Does that make sense?

Again, thanks for your reply, Jim. I hope this clears some of the fuzz from my first post. I want to thank you for making me think and reflect. We all need that from time to time.

Howard
 
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