Thank you for posting this. The importance of your last paragraph cannot be emphasized enough.

My storey involves a lonely 9 year old boy being taken advantage of by a neighbourhood teenage boy. The teenager befriended and groomed me. Sexual exploration was introduced which progressed to oral and eventually intercourse. Resistance met with threats of losing a friend and being exposed to the community. Sometimes there was violence. It became something I had to do to earn his friendship and attention.

When it stopped a little over a year later I was left with a heap of emotions that I could not process. I was angry at myself for being 'dirty'. I was angry at myself for pushing him away and losing a friend and being alone again. I was angry at myself for failing my parents. No one could ever know what I had done. (At the time I believed I was entirely to blame and that there was something fundamentally wrong with me)

The aftermath really set the tone for the next twenty or so years of my life. I worked hard to bury what had happened from those around me and from myself and I became successful at it. Emotional regulation and repression! The actual events became a distant nightmare that rarely made their way into my conscious mind. What I could not escape were the emotions and feelings towards myself. I aways felt completely alone and my inner critic was out of control: little mistakes were disastrous and I could never ever do enough to over come my feelings of inadequacy.

I became compulsive, but not in the expected ways. I would compulsively exercise, trying to attain some impossible level of perfection, I would put others before myself even if it was damaging (self harm through altruism!) and I would WORK. I would work to the point of exhaustion. A busy life meant that I was never alone with my thoughts and I would do almost anything to avoid being alone with myself. I was all unsustainable and it was catching up with me.

I started therapy almost a year ago and I am still peeling away the defence and coping strategies I developed to deal with / burry my experiences. The sexual abuse lasted a little over a year but the aftermath has been with every day since. I am optimistic that my life will improve and I am becoming much more aware of my true feelings and emotions.