This is going to be hard to write….
But I have to because I’m no longer going to be burdened with the labels and shame I’ve had to endure for over twenty five years…..
I’m a sexual abuse survivor, when it first happened to me I was 14 scared of being dumped again into care where the chances of you being raped and abused were over 80%. Think Rotherham scandal but everyone knew about it and said nothing.
So I’m left with a group of people who over the next few years do their worst to me, mentally, emotionally, physically, sexually, having yourself treated like a doll to use and touch whenever they wanted or desired.
I’m not going to go through this again, there’s not enough time to go through the pain and get over it again.
So lets just say it’s not a healthy place for someone who never grew up with any male influence in her life.
I soon learned.
It made me into a scared scarred person, especially around my own sexual self, on one hand feeling everything a normal healthy young woman should. Having hormonal surges and rises like everyone else but being the weird endocrine person I am, mine are turned upto eleven!
Now put this in the hands of men who think they can get away with everything they can while blaming you for being ‘on display’.
So you’re given clothes that cover you, all of you, not one bit of skin on show but it just makes things worse for you. Because now the marks they leave when they grab at you can’t be seen.
So I’ve had difficulty in being ‘normal’ when I’ve never been, I’m open about my own sexuality, I’m what I used to call a percentage person. One day I’m more female led, other days more male, beauty is in mind, soul for me not skin.
So I’m already primed for being a target, because that’s what I’ve been. I’ve been silent took it all, said nothing because I was told it wouldn’t be believed and I knew it would get worse if I did say anything.
I learn how to read moods, eyes, body language, scent, unspoken threats and nuances that others don’t seem to recognise. I see it all and learn, quickly.
It makes the animal me dangerous because the hate is there, the powerlessness, the being used as a ‘thing‘, to be called a ‘liar‘, a storyteller in the worst sense, that I make up ‘stories‘, that I can’t be believed because I’m delusional.
No I’m not.
Everything happened ‘AT’ me, not ‘TO’ me, for that to happen I had to be a willing participant, to allow it to happen.
That abuse was ‘AT’ me, what came next after it WAS ‘To’, and I have to admit to myself I allowed it in many spaces and times. Because I’d already given over the keys to my control, I’d told them everything I could bear to, and over the years I told them more and instead of helping me get over it, helping me to drop it, they used it against me.
Or at least that’s what it feels like.
When I was first with the person I put my hopes on we were quite evenly matched sexually wise, I had the bigger appetite but then some women do. At first this was fun for them, to be able to just look my way and get exactly what every man wants or wanted from me.
And I admit I scared him, I wanted, needed, gave everything in every single act I did with them, and it was ‘with’ not just for me, not just to scratch the itch I felt. But there was the rub, I was the open minded one, who had to educate him because he’d been given nothing from his family about it. And besides, back then women just did as their man told them and that was it! Especially where we came from, it was expected that the woman would know less than her partner.
Errr…..no, not this woman, I knew what I wanted, how to get it, and how to please him as well. But him about me? Nope, didn’t ask, didn’t want to know, he even accused me of sleeping with someone when he was out because when he got in he came to bed and I was already ‘ready’.
I had to tell him women were when their lover came home, it’s not something you have to ‘prime the pump’ for, sometimes just hearing the door lock open can get you. Even thoughts of your own, it was as if I didn’t have or was allowed to have sexual thoughts of my own.
And it was there, in that place things went south, he knew my history, my horrors, and then the accusations came, of me wanting or of having slept with someone. A very good and close friend who eventually got driven away by his jealousy, his need to be the only man who had ‘rights’ to me.
Yeah, you read it correctly, ‘RIGHTS’, that’s how he put it to me once, he wanted ‘HIS’ rights, not if I wanted to, or felt safe enough, he wanted what was his, which meant me.
He would tolerate no other male touch on me, not even a hand from a friend, he trained me to refuse it, to turn away from it because he knew my triggers, my history.
He called me all sorts to control me, telling me I was leading them on, didn’t I see that, that other women hated me for taking their men’s attention from them. Telling me I must like the attention or why was I doing it?
Me, an abuse survivor, being told I wanted other male attention, sexual attention when I found it hard enough to deal with my own self.
My sexual drive has always been high, it naturally was, but when your own partner begins to complain to his male friends in front of you that he wishes you’d leave him alone for a while kind of gets embarrassing and makes you feel awful.
Especially if like me you’re constantly trying to please someone you think loves you and cares for you as much as you do them. So I stop being myself or at least try to, but I get frustrated, so I get ‘help’. The solid kind, which was very useful and welcome, given by a friend to help me stop being so ‘twitchy’ and ‘wired’. Think blue balls for a man, ladies you’ll probably understand when I say you feel ’empty and hungry’. That for weeks on end, when you do touch your partner they look scared of you and tell you off for being an ‘animal’.
To stop looking at them as if they’re a meal to eat, alive.
Now most men I’ve come across in my life wouldn’t or haven’t complained about a partner (both male and female) who finds their lover attractive and wants to be with them as much as they can be.
Mine did, constantly.
So the gradual destruction of my sexual self began.
It started with the useful ‘items’, they made them feel less than he should so he threw them away. When I asked for what I needed I got either ‘can’t you see to yourself?’ or the other one where it was begrudging.
You see I’m a strong woman, good thighs, strong shoulders, I can put a back out if I’m not careful or tear muscles.
I did, several times, not me, him.
Gripping too hard, or not shifting in the right way at the wrong moment, and what man worth his balls would admit he’s been hurt by his partner who’s stronger than him?
It was never on purpose, I know I have the proclivity but to do it to see him hurt? Never, I’ve been hurt by others it makes you avoid it not dish it out.
But another black mark, another punishment for me, no touch for six weeks while he healed, no touching myself either, yeah, think on that for a moment….
High sex drive, no touching partner, not allowed to relieve your own tension and so when people get ‘earthy’ you just react and then get punished for it again. Accused of wanting another person because they can’t at the moment.
When even having their touch on me unexpectedly made me shrink and jump until I knew it was them. They had to talk to me first before touching me, just in case, trauma survivor here remember?
So the control got deeper, harsher, making me question everything I was doing, what I was saying, how I dressed, how I presented myself, what scent I wore, or if I looked people in the eye.
I became cowed, less than I was, and it continued, more restrictions, the illnesses and the weight gain made me ‘less’ in his eyes. Even though his taste was always for the larger lady, yet when it came to me I was suddenly ‘untouchable’.
We tried to come to terms, we did over the years, we tried, talked, discussed, but it came down to the same fault, and it as always mine. I was an animal for wanting sex as much as I did, that my hungers disgusted him, that I was treating him like a piece of meat who was just there to please me.
Yes I admit there were times when I wanted just that, passion, need, the whole ‘rip clothes off and get to it!’ yet most times were soft touches and hugs that went deeper. But even then it was rebuffed because he’d see my eyes and the look in them, the need for him to be with me fully.
Now I know why he never was, but it still hurts to be used, lied to, cheapened by someone who knew why but never had the courage to tell you why. And to blame me for it all, because I’m an ‘animal‘. yeah me the one who avoids men I don’t know, who has to be sure of you before I let you close.
We were incompatable from about the fifth year of us being together, but I was a one man woman, I’d made my choice an by that time my training was being re-enforced daily.
To dress to cover (like I had with my abusers), to not look at people in the eye (like I’d done with my other abusers), to keep things ‘clean’, to behave ‘properly’ and be demure at all times.
But when he wanted, I had to be the thing he wanted, to be dressed in red, a whore in all but word, to want everything he wanted and no thought to my own satisfaction, just his.
Then life changes, things get worse on this front, as both of us working doesn’t help. Then the world slips sideways and we’re in a different place and city, trying to get away from small minds and no work anymore.
There is no room for need, for sex, for want, but being seen by other men who still see me, are still attracted to me even though I’m not dressed well, I’m not wearing make up, I just have something some men ‘like’. Most are being friendly, some want more and I panic, push them away and can’t believe it of me. That I’m worth their attention, that there’s anything worth looking at.
Yeah he’s done his job, I’m no longer sexual, I no longer ‘feel’ myself and touching myself is now a guilt ridden thing I hide from him because he doesn’t like to hear me or sense me doing it.
This state exists for so long I give up on myself, stop any sexual feelings dead, become celibate, which for him is quite okay, because I’m no longer pestering him for anything. He still wants what he wants, and I give it I do, but for me, nothing, no feeling, no sense, just deadness.
People notice, people ask if I’m okay and I answer as best I can, never revealing the biggest bit of pain I have. That the person who says they love and adore me to everyone else, doesn’t want me anymore.
I’m burdened with the guilt of it all, labelled as adulterer by him more than once, told I lead men on with words and looks. I’m the one to blame with all my ‘animal needs‘ and that I’m not ‘normal‘.
When what they really mean is, ‘You’re too much for me, you want more than I can give you and that scares my ego. I’m the MAN, you’re supposed to do what I want and you won’t so I’ll hurt you.‘
That it’s my problem that makes him look to other women, I see his looks and try to keep his attention but fail, I’ve been pushed into ‘mother’ territory. And there is no coming back from that.
I try to talk to him over the next few years, and I mean YEARS, trying to get him to see how I see things, it’s not all about sex, it’s touch, sense, feeling cared for and loved, being ‘seen’ as a whole person, as I am.
Others see my attempts at trying to get through to him, even after the fuck up of his affair with someone else who was bigger than me size wise. I try to reconcile, I ask what I could do, yet there is nothing I could do, I was already gone to him years ago.
Then when I’m at my lowest, when I was dying he accuses me of being a prostitute to friends who were taking him to the hospital to see if I was alive or not. Inside his head I was already dead, and he was trying to put me in my place in his mind.
I knew more about sex than he did, so that must mean I was a prostitute, made to be one by my abusive family, it was the only thing that made sense in his world. Not that I asked questions, found out, read books, read porn, oh no women don’t do that, they take what they’re given an like it!
So he painted me a whore to the world while I was in recovery telling people I’d cheated on him, don’t know how when he controlled every movement I did.
My sexual self is so damaged, so destroyed I doubt I’ll ever be whole again, once I asked for help to get over the abuse I’d suffered. It was a way to take back the feelings, to feel safe with the one person I trusted, the one I thought would never harm me.
He refused point blank and told me I digusted him for even considering it, that he’d do anything with me that copied or was like what I’d suffered. I didn’t want the same abuse, I wanted a different touch, from someone I thought loved me, making new memories, new feelings, of trust and care.
But no, I was a disgusting animal for even discussing it with him, he walked out and came back after a few hours of being away. So that stopped me ever asking for help again, to even broach the subject in his company. He’d just look through me as if I was scum on his boot, as if I’d asked to be mauled by men.
Then he accuses me of being the abuser, that I was the one who kept his sexual self locked up when it was his problem all along. I was the one who asked him his needs, what he needed, how he needed, he never did the same. Never asked me what I needed, how I needed and how I felt about myself.
So here I am after years of being trained out of my sexual self, being called ‘disgusting’, ‘cheap’, ‘animal’, ‘whore’, and now ‘prostitute’. Because of course in their world they know more than anyone else and that includes sex doesn’t it?
This has been hard to admit, to write, to share even because it’s been a thorn in my soul for so long. Even when I couldn’t express my sexual self I turned to writing instead, a way to channel the feelings, the expression had to find a way out. But even here I was sneered at and debased, “Can’t you write anything other than porn?”
No, actually I can’t right now because I still feel, still have drives, but because I can’t touch you, you don’t want my touch, don’t want me at all. An you tell me so, every morning when you tell me off for waking you up as I ‘grope’ you in my sleep. No what I did is touch your side as I turned over, then took my hand away remembering you don’t want my touch.
I slept on the edge of the bed because you told me you never wanted to touch me again, that you weren’t interested and probably wouldn’t be again. I wrapped myself up in a blanket, slept on top of the bed because you didn’t want my touch or my weight near you.
I lost myself long before I lost you and I helped you do it, thinking if I did you’d love me again, like you used to. Like I did you once upon a time.
But the night in the hospital told me how much you really cared for me, then when you did visit, you’d been through my entire world online and personal files looking for proof that I’d slept with someone. How? You never left me alone long enough with anyone and you’d beaten the words ‘unlovable‘ ‘fat‘ ‘ugly‘ ‘worthless‘ ‘animal‘ into me so well I was planning on killing myself rather than go home to you.
There is more than this, more hurt, more labels, more times they looked down on me, hurt me, told me I was ‘disgusting‘ or ‘predatory‘. Yeah, think about the word there, ‘predatory‘ makes me out to be the abuser, the one hurting the other, all I ever wanted was to make you happy, to get you to understand me, when all you ever heard was ‘More sex’.
Enjoy your new lover, I hope she’s brighter than me, better than me, because there’s nothing left of the old me, she died, along with any hope of being loved again.
You want to know anything else?
Ask but be prepared for the truth, not stories.
ghosthare22 