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I still don’t know if my abuse counts. I’m pretty sure it doesn’t. Or maybe that’s what I want to think. When I was 10, I was at my (at the time) best friend’s birthday party. I can’t remember much of the party itself, only that I had a white cardigan on. I remember the air smelled likes churros and popcorn. I can’t remember how I got to my friend’s bedroom. I only remember what happened there. The memory starts with me, standing in front of the bed. On the bed was Name, one of my friend’s older brothers. I remember staring at him for I don’t know how long. I think he was talking, but it was all static to me. I remember there was one those party lights things, the ones that project blue, red, and green lights onto the ceiling. Then I remember he starts jumping higher. And then he jumps at me, tackling me onto the ground. I was frozen in terror. And all I did was cry silently. But to this day, I still don’t know if it counts as rape. I was 10, but he was 13. He was only a kid too. Maybe he was also experiencing abuse, and he took it out on me. I also feel like it’s my fault for not doing anything, and not telling anyone. I could have screamed or something, but I just laid there, frozen and silent. I haven’t healed from this at all, probably because I haven’t really talked with anyone about it. I don’t know what to do.

It started as sexual harassment. And I let it happen. Do not let it happen to you! I was a college intern working on my supply-chain management major. In business school you know you don’t just get a degree and POOF! A job is magically waiting for you. Unless you already have connections. I was a single woman on financial aid and had squat for family connections. I needed to make some connections while still in school that I could use to climb the ladder. It is a very competitive world. A time when we don’t care so much where we work as long as it has prospects of advancement and making money. I was interning at the corporate offices for a rental car company. I got my first choice for a class in which we had to intern at a real company. My group of four was in their logistics offices and we had no clear job at the time but my school had sent students for a while so we had a contact person and some loose idea of a project that my group of four had to put together and execute for our grade. Well that was kind of of dud and I went along with the bad idea of planning more efficient distribution routes for their cars entering the fleet. It was naive because the company had real pros who designed the system. But, because of my feminine wiles, I got invited to come in and help in my free time by a top manager. Just me. I jumped at the opportunity and on my available days I showed up early in the morning and tried to be like part of the team. It was a very masculine environment. I tried to hang in spite of the pretenses for my special treatment. “You’re not one of those feminist types who go crying to HR if a man gives you a compliment or a pat on the backside, are you?” The man who first invited me had asked. We’ll call him XX. I assured him I was not, anticipating his expected answer. “Work hard, play hard,” was something I said in my denial of values he was obviously opposed to. So the couple times XX introduced me as his mistress I went along with the joke. Another stupid mistake. As an example of my environment, after a male Y in the department first showed me how to use part of a program that calculates stock outages, he had me sit and try it and gave me a massage I did not ask for early in the morning. Well XX came up and made a joke about Y getting his hands of his girl. They had some bro moment where the male Y asked him if he was serious, saying something about XX’s wife, to which XX backed down and said something like “It’s just a joke. I’d love to in my fantasies, but she’s company property, brother.” Company property??! I was sitting right there! I tensed up but tried to pretend I was so absorbed in the computer training as XX left and male Y went back to massaging me, but this time more boldly. He got down my lower back and upper buttock then went down the arms to my thighs, stopping me from doing any work as he blatantly brushed his forearms and hands against my chest. I felt so weak and almost paralyzed by the time I forced myself to stand up to go use the restroom, stopping it. I could have just done that at the beginning but did not. Later hat same day, XX had me go to lunch with him and have a beer at a bar and grill with a pool table. I was 20 but they did not ask for my ID because I was with XX. I hardly ever played pool and while we waited for our food he “showed” me how to play. He made fun of the cliché on movies and television where a man has a woman bend over the pool table to shoot just so he can push his crotch against her backside in a suggestive manger and lean over her with his arms on each side of her to show her how to slide the stick. But while he joked about it he actually did those things to me! That was a good day for my two main molesters and an awful day for me. XX hugged me as we stood up giggling and apparently his hands now had a license to molest my body whenever he wanted. I got numb to it in some ways, but emotionally more on edge. My butt was grabbed or spanked playfully in the department, even by male Y. A few other men were very flirtatious. My shoulders were rubbed, hugs on even minor greetings with XX and finally I was supposed to get used to little pecks on the lips too. I felt like I was in a constant state of mental anguish and defensiveness. My body could be attacked anytime. But I did not defend myself! I would say clearly to XX and some others that I wanted to be respected and considered one of the guys and have a job there when I graduated and they affirmed it. Both main abusers encouraged me, but still sexually harassed me. With my moronic blessing! The semester ended and I kept going in daily during summer break. It was my only lifeline to a possible job after I graduated in a year. I was so groomed that it was not a big leap at all when XX pressured me to give him head in his office. I refused with a smile and head shake and he came back with some rationalization about how I owed him and he really needed it just then. He would not take no for an answer. The first time I lowered myself to kneeling before his desk and took him in my mouth my hands were shaking and I teared up and had to sniffle snot back up. I was the one who was embarrassed! It was like an out of body experience and my mouth dried up to where I had to ask him to drink some of his energy drink. Internally there was a huge change immediately. I was gutted of all pride and self-worth. I was like a zombie. Hardly eating. Lots of coffee. Showing up and doing the reports that had become my responsibility and mechanically giving XX his daily BJ in the afternoon in his small stale office with a small window. I started to have migraines during that summer. I drove home for 4th of July and got so inebriated I ended up sleeping with my much older sister’s ex-husband in the back of his truck. That was a terrible wake up call. I knew I couldn’t pretend much longer without a breakdown so I put my two week in at the rental car place where I was working for free. To secure my future I made sure to keep it all friendly and “you know I’ll be back working here next year”. The idea of all the time and humiliation I had put in being lost to nothing was a major fear. I put myself through two last weeks of it. I had quickie sex with XX twice on and over his desk. I gave into extreme pressure and gave male Y a BJ too when he explicitly made it about a letter of recommendation. He knew about me doing it for XX. He did not even have his own office and we had to use the stairwell. During my final year of school I became aware that I was too traumatized to ever go back there anyway. The extent to which I had been used and abused became obvious to me, where before it had not. As if I had been living in a denial haze. It was a painful time. I was a bit reckless. I got a C in the high level economics elective I took. I said yes to several dates to avoid being alone and either slept with them or freaked out in anger at them. Seeing that I needed the car rental faux-internship on my resume I did email both abusers for letters of recommendation and got a good one from Male Y, but a very impersonal, generic one from XX. I was so dejected and angry. Finally, I told my sister, the one who confronted me about her ex-husband. I TOLD HER EVERYTHING AND THAT WAS MY FIRST STEP TO RECOVERY. To letting out the pain, screaming at myself in the mirror, punching the heavy bag at a boxing gym I joined, and to seeing my first psychologist and psychiatrist. The therapy helped more than the Celexa and antipsych. The support group helped even more. I met two friends for life who have my back in times of sorrow. I have to repeat that it is not my fault that I was abused, even though it kind of was. Don’t let it happen to you! They will take as much as they can from you. Plan your boundaries now and be assertive! Report harassment immediately. Doing so you are being a hero and protecting other women and yourself. If you have already been abused, GET OUT of the situation and talk to someone about it ASAP. There is nothing to be gained by letting the abuse continue! Talking to someone makes it real and lets you start the process of hating less and starting on the path to learning to love yourself again. You deserve real love.

I was used by my brother who has grown up a lot but I still carry scars. My brother is four years older than me and when I was going from elementary school to Junior high, that summer, he made me think that girls in junior high need to know how to give oral to boys. First he did oral to me to show me it was not a big deal. I thought it was a huge deal. But I did it and he got me trained and had me keep it a secret, except from by best friend. He had his friend over when I had a sleepover one night and had her do it to his friend. Then they would have us do contests where they wear blindfolds. At least I was not alone then. It changed me even though seventh grade itself had nothing to do with anything like that. It was a lie to get pleasure from me. My brother still had me doing it at home. And sometimes he would do it to me and I did climax. So I had this weird secret sex life and felt really messed up about it. Then in eight grade I had my first real boyfriend. My parents are so strict, even though they both worked and left me alone with my brother. To go to the movies with my boyfriend they made sure it was with a group and took me there and waited outside the theater. Well one time when we went to see Snow White and the Huntsman my same BFF and me went through with our plan to go down on our guys in the last row of the theater and we did it. It was only a month later I started having sex with him which never would have happened if not for what my brother had done. We snuck out from her place during a sleepover and met the boys outside and went to the nearby park and did it in the grass. That was my virginity. The really bad event, where my life got knocked off the tracks, is when we tried it from my house, sneaking out the window and going just out farther into my big back yard that opened into nothing but the side of a big hill and my dad caught us. It was awful. The world ended. I was treated like a huge betrayer and almost all my privileges were revoked and essentially I was grounded without any end date. And still by brother would make me do the oral. I was broken hearted because I was not allowed to have my boyfriend to the point my parents made me go to the school and talk to the principal and vice principal and they made sure I would not have any chance to ever see him alone. And my brother kept creeping in at night sometimes or when we were left alone expecting me to do what he had trained me to be used to. The next really bad part was two months into my new restricted life. My brother started doing his oral on me one afternoon after school and decided to take it farther and got up and started kissing me and had sex with me. I was in the moment and did not do anything to stop him and even participated. No condom. It was an afternoon when my parents were away and so we did not have to keep quiet or worry and he did it so much longer than my few times with my boyfriend, because he was older and knew more from being with other girls that I got sore for my first time and got a urine infection. I did not eat my dinner that night and pretended to be sick and cried myself to sleep. My brother really wanted to do it again, telling me it was the best sex he ever had, but I refused and one thing I could say for him back then was at least he was not a rapist. Even though he pressured me he never tried to force himself inside me. Four months after I had lost my incest virginity the school year ended and he graduated. I went to high school and he moved out to live in college dorms 120 miles from our home town. Public school was over for me, as was planned as soon as my dad caught me on the hill. I went to an all girl’s Catholic high school. My dad had to drive me a half hour every morning and my mom picked me up from my whole first year. Then they got me a car so I could drive myself but the mileage and my times were closely monitored. I did not have an intercourse throughout high school but seven times total I did oral on my brother during summer and winter breaks when we were both at home. That was the end of incest in my life. I went to college in Atlanta but not the same one as my brother. I rebelled against my parents and even though they tried to keep control, as a legal adult I did not let them. Turmoil and sadness lasted months until they finally got it. I separated from them financial and worked and took out student loans. I was very promiscuous in college. I drank, partied and used drugs recreationally and had several guys I was seeing on and off for mostly sex. That was my life and I thought I enjoyed it at the time. I became stronger and more assertive and when my brother first hinted during a Thanksgiving meeting at our relative’s house that we go for a drive I told him I never wanted to touch him again in such a powerful way that he knew I was off limits and even seemed like the scared one in our relationship. I didn’t enroll in classes for two nonconsecutive semester just because my party life was so much more fun. I traveled on and off. Sometimes with friends, sometimes with men, usually older, who invited me to exotic places. The Maldives, Portugal, The Virgin Islands. I let my married boss use me for a weekend in Key West. I had an affair with my Spanish teacher, who only took me as far as Panama City, Florida. So many risky one night stands. My identity was that I was not looking for anything permanent, a child of the universe. While I was used as a plaything so many times and believed I liked the game. I would tell them things about wanting to make their dick happy and stuff that would inflate their ego. I’m sure there are so many text messages out there that they saved about the size of their D fitting in my little P, about being a little girl wanting them to teach me to be woman and other depraved fantasies I thought they wanted to hear. Obviously directly related to what my brother did to me. I am almost positive I avoided being raped more than once by going with the flow when I did not expect to or probably want to. It may be good that some of them I probably don’t remember. Once was at one of the few fraternity parties I ever went to. It was three guys, not my usual style. Once was with my roommate's father who was visiting her at our rented house and found his way to my bed in the early morning. One of the more extreme traumatic events was with a police officer who pulled me over for driving when I had been drinking but was under the legal limit on his breathalyzer. He followed me home, like a mile away, “for my safety” and even followed me inside. I was in an apartment then and I thought my roomate was home and told him so. But when she wasn’t there he said I lied to a police officer and he had to do a more thorough search if I wanted to avoid being arrested. He was not attractive or nice. He had a gun thought he never took it out. You can guess what happened. I finally shed that wild life during my second to last semester when I saw the end of college coming. My G.P.A was 3.3. and my major was philosophy and it dawned on me that the future was not bright in terms of what I would do or how I would pay back my loans. I buckled down and decided to change. I had an offer to strip and ‘make a lot of money’ but thankfully not only did never considered myself like that, but when I went with a friend for her interview and they tried to recruit me they were so sleazy we both ran out of there disgusted. I reevaluated my whole life. I considered ending it, but some survival mechanism did not allow it. I did not want to be the person I had been for a few years. I looked ahead and saw it was not sustainable as I aged and had no real love or stability. I quit serving when I got an offer to work in a legal office. I slept with the manager who hired me as a receptionist but it was a drop in the bucket of things to be shameful of. He was the last one like that. I got all A’s and graduated cum laude. I got promoted in the firm mostly by title but used it to spring away and take a lower paying job in a nonprofit law firm where I had not slept with anyone. There I did sleep with a lawyer but I am married to him still and my life is back together. I love him and he loves me. He does not know the extent of my sluttiness in college or about my brother and I doubt he ever will. That darkness is fading and it is not part of my life now. It is not who I am. As for my brother, he has a family now and we are on good terms. We did talk about it once while I was studying like crazy my senior year, although it was not a big deep talk. I did mention that he used me, he apologized, we hugged, and that was it. Not the cathartic confrontation some might expect. My catharsis is my husband, and my life now that I am grateful for. We adopted two toddler brothers and I am their mom. Maybe we’ll have one of our own. Maybe we’ll adopt again. I was used and introduced to sex too young and early and it strained my relationship with my parents for a long time and I’ll never get that back. It derailed my life. I was set adrift for a while but God or the universe or random luck finally put me in a good place. Everything that happened led me what I have now. I can’t say I never contemplated suicide in darker times. But like in the move Cast Away, if I may quote, “I stayed alive. I kept breathing. And one day my logic was proven all wrong because the tide came in, and gave me a sail. And now, here I am.” Thousands of hours spent studying philosophy and I quote a movie that was not even based on a book. But it’s perfect.

I’m a 27 year old female now but when I was about the age of 6-7 my sister would kiss me on the lips. I vividly remember laying down on my bathroom floor (which she told me to do) and would just tell me to relax. She is 4 years older than me. I also remember one time I really wanted to kiss her and she said yes. I think it was a game to me at that point. She had left for a moment and I got naked. I remember she came back and said to put my clothes on because our dad was going to take us out to eat. Those are the only moments I remember but my mind might be pushing down other similar moments I had with her. I’m struggling now to have a relationship with her. She has never talked about it, but I feel like she remembers. It’s so hard to speak to her without getting annoyed or frustrated. She is annoying to me and never communicates well, she tends to always ask a question when asked a question. She’s never wrong and is hard headed. At this point I feel like I need to speak to her about this and distance myself to heal. I don’t even know what I want but I just don’t want to feel this way.

This is another incident from my survivor story, IT STARTED WITH MY BROTHER. I am working up to the police incident. Please read my story for context. This one brought back pain in writing it. Sophomore year of my philosophy major in college. I had recently gone on a trip to Portugal with nice older man who basically invited me to Portugal with the understanding that I would be his lover for a free trip. He had been one of my customers at the restaurant and I took him up on his proposition for the fun of it and had a great time. That was my spring break. This was a few year period when I was very promiscuous after being abused by my brother for years at home and repressed in a Catholic high school as parental punishment for starting a sexual relationship with a boy my age. When a girl in my logic course who was pre-law invited me to a fraternity party I thought it would be nice to hang with people my own age. Fraternities and sororities were not my cup of tea and still are not. After doing a keg stand to impress strangers I was looking for the upstairs bathroom because the line for the downstairs one was long. That one had a few girls waiting and a guy who had held one of my legs for the keg stand started flirting with me and offered to take me to a secret bathroom. The bathroom was legit but then he beckoned me into a bedroom across from it where two other frat brothers were. I was apprehensive but with the other guys there I was a little more at ease that he wasn’t just trying to take me to bed. I was open to finding a hot guy, to be honest, but he was NOT it. Neither were the other two. I sat chatting with them and drinking tiny shots of cinnamon whiskey and getting more nervous when somebody tried to get in the door to the room but it was locked. My guy yelled at them to go away. Then I tried to get up and leave but was pulled back to my seat the bed. I am small so I am easily overpowered. “You can’t leave yet. We’re just getting to know you.” One rapist said. “No teases allowed here.” “What do I have to do to get back out to my friend?” I asked something like that but used her name. They looked at each other with nasty smirks and I regretted the question. What one of them came up was a blowjob contest in which I have twenty seconds to make each of them cum but I had to go in circle until one did and then he was eliminated and I had to do all three. So they stood on three sides of the bed with me in the middle and took out their penises. One had a stop watch and without hesitation I started sucking the one nearest me. I wanted to get out of there and was physically afraid of them. This was away to avoid any violence and not even give them the satisfaction of thinking they forced me to do anything. So I went round and round getting very tired. 20 seconds was too short and they had pulled off all my clothes. I stopped and asked the one who made up the game for 60 seconds. Suddenly I was pulled violently back by my legs from the one behind me he held my legs apart as he quickly started banging me. I did not even see his face until later. The one who I had been talking to got up on the bed and started doing it to my mouth. I don’t me he put it in my mouth. He grabbed my head with both hands and forced it in and was banging my face as hard as the guy behind me was doing it. I had to stay up on my elbows arched to prevent him from ripping my hair up to keep me at his level. Nothing like this had ever happened to me. It had always been one partner at a time. They were mean and I tried so hard to keep up. After that craziness was over and both of them satisfied themselves in me, the original guy pulled me up onto the bed and said something like, “Only one hole left for me.” I was not used to anal sex then. I offered to go wash up if he would please not do anal with me. He laughed and shook his head. So, laying on my back with my legs spread, he squirted some aloe vera gel from the bedside table down there and watched me face to face as he worked his penis in one thrust at a time. He saw the pain on my face that I could not hide. I had to kiss him while her hurt me. Even when he got going fast it took him a while. One of them was watching us, smiling from the side and the other was playing with his phone and I think taking pictures. Phones did not do videos yet. The smiling one once asked, “Dude, is it really in her ass?” After he was finished with me he thanked me and left. Said he had responsibilities. The one with the phone left too. I tried to leave. “Not so fast.” The other one said pushing me back down. I told him I had done everything they wanted and more and asked to please leave. He told me I was the hottest chick he had ever F-’d and he wanted round 2. I just wanted to get out of there. One more obstacle. I worked my mouth on him for a while to get him even half rubbery again and worked it inside. That failed and I had to do it again. Finally I used every trick I could including faking orgasms, having a real orgasm, and talking dirty to him to get him to release inside me. I was so shaky and exhausted after being their whore for so long it was hard to get my clothes on. I was in fear he would stop me, and he did. I told him I just wanted to got pee and clean up and asked him if I could sleep in his bed with him—just a trick. I worked. I thanked him, nonchalantly closed the door behind me and hurried down the stairs without drawing too much attention. I kept a smile on my face as I made it out the front door and off the porch. I kept of the act for a block before I just started running as far away as I could. I was actually terrified someone might be after me until I was out of the neighborhood far from campus and to a gas station. I called a taxi and went home. My roomate was sleeping in her room and I just sat in the shower. In my story I used this as an example of how I avoided being raped by just going with it when I was in a rape situation. But this felt like rape. I went back to partying and using alcohol and marijuana to dampen the impact and feel artificially warm and fuzzy. And casual sex with hot men. But this was rape. I was gang raped. Maybe better for me than if I had tried to fight them and lost but it still sucks and leaves me with hurt and guilt and fear.

i made a vow to myself that i would prove my mother wrong—that i am none of the things she said, and that one day i would become a successful person and let her know that i made it despite her. i refused to give any of the people who did me harm any power over me. being defeated, miserable, or staying in a state of depression would be allowing them to win. i could not give them a reason to think they had an effect on me. i wanted to be the best version of myself and to empower other people when the time presented itself. i now have my power back. i am no longer ashamed of what happened to me. i am now comfortable in my own body. this body has been through a lot, but now i look at it as armor. i may have been wounded. i may have some scars, but they are only reminders of what i survived. i still have my soul, and my mind is intact. when i look at myself in the mirror all i can do is smile and admire who i am, and how far i've come. i won. i won because i did not allow those people to rob my soul. i did not let them steal my chance at love, or of being the best person i can. instead i became a healer, a warrior, a lover, a leader, and a proud mother. i am who i am because god loved me, and i learned how to love myself. and when everyone thought i was defeated… i rose up. survivor

hi. i found out when i was 14 that what happened to me wasn’t okay. i have no idea how to deal with the fact that apparently im a victim of cocsa, so that’s why im here because i have no idea what to do. it started when i was 5, and she was 9. the first time, she asked what kind of princess underwear i was wearing, then asked to see. i showed her and she touched me, then asked if i liked it. i didnt know what i was supposed to like. this went on for some time, and eventually she got my sisters in on it too, they were her age. i didn’t know what it even was but i wanted her to keep hanging out with me alongside them so i didn’t complain. and the sister i shared a room with one night asked if we could “practice” so we could be good for her, then asked me to touch her. she called it her dog house, and i had to help the dog. me and my sister haven’t spoken about that night since it happened, and i cant get it out of my mind. but the girl never stopped with me, one day she came to my house and wanted to sleep over. i was so excited that she asked to sleep in my room with just me, and it got to bedtime, and she asked if i could help her, but i said i didn’t want to so she made me hold her phone that had porn on it, i sat there for however long while she did it, making me watch. i never knew it was wrong or anything, i just loved the idea of her thinking of me. the last time, i was 12. my family took her on our vacation, and she wanted to go back to the condo for whatever, she asked me to come back with her. i was downstairs eating pizza rolls, and she asked me to come upstairs. i walk in the room and her bottoms are off. she asked me to come and sit, and asked if i would help her. i said i didn’t want to, and she just asked me to take my top off and watch. i remember i just sat there staring at myself in the mirror. the whole time. for the first time, i was scared. we then left once she was done, and said nothing. when it was my 14th birthday, i talked abt it, and i was told that it wasn’t okay. 7 years of my life. i didn’t know. and i don’t know how to deal with any of this. any tips or help would be great.

I was inappropriately touched and groped by an older uncle. I have only disclosed this with 2 people. The uncle is my moms brother and our family (particularly his immediate family) have suffered horrible losses and deaths over the years and I just don’t want to add fuel to the fire. I feel like I don’t want to tell anyone and make it public so I am so so happy to have found this space. I know my mom would be fully supportive, my whole family would but I just can’t bring myself to say it. I’m 30 now and although the abuse never got far, it still happened. There are 2 occasions. This uncle in question also has been charged I am healing myself every day through mindful breathing, exercise and yoga but it is tough some days.

On the Date i got sexually assaulted by my cousin (this was in somalia) I was in my room then needed the bathroom when i was going to the bathroom my cousin stopped me to talk to him then he forces a kiss on my lips then i pushed him away and my auntie came and said ”sabrin doesn’t know somali leave her alone” then he said okay and walked away. Then when my cousin went home my other cousin came in and forced himself on me.

I was a prudish teenager in the '80s, an introvert who wanted friend but only on my terms (they had to respect my boundaries, and I had many). It was only in my twenties, while I was working with more liberal people, that I made a conscious decision to cast off my old, narrow way of relating to people because my barriers had become walls. So I opened up more, made myself vulnerable...and attracted perverts. Older men, bosses, colleagues and contacts (I worked in industry). I still had enough boundaries to prevent actual rape, but I would not push them away as forcefully; I would make light of it when a man put his hands on my hips or made some inappropriate comment. This went on for years. I had a a few boyfriends in my twenties including one I stayed with for three years and loved (I still love him but don't want a relationship with him and have to keep enforcing psychological boundaries - he was never a sex pest but he wants to be friends and gets upset when I don't want to meet him). Being an introvert, and possibly Aspie (I have yet to find the courage to look for a diagnosis) I have always felt like an outsider, and in relationships always felt as if I was playing at being "sexy". In my forties, the men who breached my sexual boundaries (with inappropriate comments and the occasional arm around me as I sat beside them on a work assignment) were men my own age and slightly younger; I was still attracting men in the same age group: 40s. They would obviously want to take things further, but I would always put up that barrier...and I noticed that after I rebuffed a man I'd lose a work opportunity. I was frozen out of the cliques in my profession (I don't have family in my industry and I did not go to university so I didn't have the underpinning network to fall back on). I dealt with this by developing a tough, jokey exterior; desperate to prove that I was "not a prude", I merged my career with a rather tarty image (I cannot go into details here without possibly revealing who I am or, worse, narrowing it down - which would not be fair to others who might not want their stories told). At first, it actually helped my career and social life; suddenly I was great craic, a youthful looking middle-aged woman who was happy in her own skin, free-spirited - and "great craic". The men who used to flirt with me would also mock-boast "I'm a prude"; they had respectable wives / partners (indeed many of these women were my colleagues). Eventually, it was time for this middle-aged disgrace to be managed out of the industry. It didn't happen all at once; my mentors and good contacts retired or died (these were the people who never abused me). There were various reasons: cutbacks, personality differences, my political views were at odds with my bosses' views, and there were new people looking to fill my role. I adapted by finding a mosaic career, doing a few courses and muddling through. Now I see my former colleagues (the flirts and their partners) getting on with their careers; I am on the outside, looking in. But I was always on the outside. And I have no doubt that my story is very common (a bit like me, some would say!).

I was so small and I still have flashbacks.

I was told my dreams never mattered. I now want to be an actress and help raise awarness since I was raised by my dad who knew everyone and was made out to be the good guy and no one cared or believed me when I spoke out about assualts or abuse by my parents or peers. I say NO MORE feeling unheard no matter who knows who, we should be seen, validated, and heard. Name

I had an aunt who had a son here in America. We were pretty close since our families only had each other here so we would go over to their house often. I was around 5 so he was like 7 or 8. We would play around the house while our parents talked and I remember us being in his parents room playing with some dinosaur figures one day when he closed the door and told me to go into the closet with him. I did and he shut the closet doors and started to tell me to do weird things like licking his hands and he would touch my privates. I cant remember exactly what else happened that day but I remember knowing it was wrong but I couldn't bring myself to tell my mom because I had done the things he told me to do. To be honest, I had forgotten everything until I went to Mexico for the first time and when I saw him, I suddenly remembered this day. I hate that I cant remember everything that happened and if it had happened more than once on separate occasions. I also hate that I'm scared of him and I don't know if he remembers. I haven't seen him since that day but it didn't seem like he felt awkward around me. I resent him so much because I have become hyper sexual but I feel sad because I wonder how he even knew this stuff. Was someone doing these things to him? I have only told my ex best friend and current best friend... I want to tell my mom, I know she will believe me, but I feel like it's already been so long that it won't change anything. I am now 19 and don't want to start any family drama. What should I do?

HOW I STARTED MY HEALING JOURNEY by Name My healing journey began after I spent five years in a narcissistically abusive relationship. It was a constant cycle of hot and cold, back and forth, until I finally got sick of the bullshit and chose to walk away for good. In the beginning, I simply sat with my feelings. I reflected on everything I’d endured and allowed my emotions to flow naturally. It’s easily one of the hardest parts of the process, but you have to let those feelings out for the healing to begin. I then moved on to one of the scariest tasks: breaking down my past. When we look at our trauma as one giant mountain, it just feels like a jumbled mess of chaos. By identifying each experience as its own separate event, it becomes much easier to process. To get these thoughts out of my head, I put them on paper. If you’re starting this journey, get a notebook and write down everything as it comes up. Use it as your primary tool. I began with my most recent experience of narcissistic abuse. I dove into podcasts and articles, desperate to understand what had happened to me and how it was affecting my mental health. Once I understood the 'what,' I started researching the 'how'—as in, how do I heal from this? That’s when I discovered the connection to childhood trauma. It’s a major key to the puzzle because we carry those early experiences into our adult lives. There is so much information available; you just have to find the pieces that fit your life. Healing is deeply individual, and you get to choose the path that works best for you."

It was my cousin and it happened more than once. I tried to downplay it, and I still do. The first time he pressured me to touch him. The second, my sister was there too and she ended up taking her shirt off. The third time, he took off his shirt and told me to put something in my body as he watched. I ended up getting an infection. I didn't equate any of this to abuse, because we were both young and he never touched me. I talked to someone for the first time yesterday, and I now realize that even though I may think it is insignificant, it still bothers me, which makes it important. I may have thought it was "not as bad" as other things he could have done, but trauma is trauma. I have behaviors I now realize are a result of the sexual abuse - I can call it that now - and I am now trying to dissociate the two. I am my own person and I got through it. You can too!

I was 14. We were at sleep away church summer camp. Me and one of my friends had been giving people tattoos. He asked for one, of course. Wanted some lyrics on his hand that were far too inappropriate for a church camp. He put his hand on my thigh to give me 'better access to his hand'. Conversation between the three of us got dirty, quick. I hate to say that i participated in it, but I did. I have a tendency to get greedy about male attention, stemming from little to no attention from my deadbeat father. Fast forward a little bit, about an hour later. Me, a few of my friends, and him. We made our way from the chapel to the lodge for dinner. He waits till we're in the far corner of the line to grope me roughly, whispering horrible, degrading things into my ear. Young, starstruck, naïve me thought he loved me so much that he would tell me those things. It was only after he tried to force himself down my throat that I realized how terrible it was. I didn't want my innocence to be taken by an older teen who i had just met, much less in a chapel. When i told the counselors, they seemed like they believed me. But his father was a major donator. My friends didn't believe me because he was 'attractive'. When i told my mother, she didn't believe me. "You probably led him on, so he thought it was fine." No. If 'Yes' was never explicitly said, then it's not consent. Since then, I've struggled. I've questioned my religion. But then I thought, why am i giving this horrible boy any extra thought? And why does everyone I love believe his word over mine? Maybe because they never really loved me. Maybe because it was easier to pretend it never happened. But a real supporter would take the scared child's word before considering the almost adult male who had a history of sexual disturbances.

I am not even sure where to begin but I am struggling lately and have come to realize that although my main abuser might be dead, I haven't dealt with a lot of feelings. I feel like I was always a target. I had no self-confidence as a child. I was painfully shy. I had a speech impediment and was always bullied in school and moving to 10 different elementary schools didn't help me make friends. I had a critical, narcissistic mother I could never please. I was first sexually abused at age 8 by an older teenage cousin. My mother allowed me to stay the night knowing that his father, my uncle, was a pedophile and molested many children. I didn't find this out until years later. He was my favorite cousin of course. I looked up to him. Went to all his track meets. He was grooming me of course. Why else would an 18-year-old male cousin want to spend so much time with his 8-year-old cousin? Back then no one spoke much about sexual abuse. Or sex at all. At least in my household. It was dirty and you will go to Hell. That is all I was ever told. I thought it was a bad dream for many years. Except it was so vivid. I could hear the music playing. Open Arms by Journey, I could smell and almost taste the round, white, powdery almond cookies my aunt served me before sending me to bed in a room with my male cousin his friend name (also male). To this day I still cannot fathom why my aunt would put an 8 yr old little girl in a bed with 2 teenage boys. It haunts me. Was she just as sick as my uncle and my cousin? All I found out later as an adult is my uncle molested all 3 of my male cousins. One turned into pedophile, one fought those urges his whole life and lived a sad, lonely life, and other one killed himself and died alone in an alleyway at age 40. I laid in that bed that night and my whole life changed. I woke up to my cousin fumbling around with my pants. I kept moving away as much as I could. I tried to pretend I was still asleep. I knew he knew I was awake. He didn't care. He did what he wanted. I just laid there. Tears silently rolling down my face. Then I forgot about it. Pretended it didn't happen, but it kept popping up in my head. I kept telling myself it was a horrible dream and dirty. When I was almost 17 I confided in my cousin. Girl cousin. She told me the same thing had happened to her while she was watching TV with him once. I decided I should tell my mother. That was a mistake. She didn't do anything. All she did was make me feel worse. Like it was my fault and she told everyone. He was still allowed around. To every Holiday. One Thanksgiving when he was at our house, he cornered me in my room. I thought I was about to pass out from fear. He said, " I am sorry about all the times I did things to you." That messed me up more. I had thought it was just one time. So, then I realized I probably forgot or blocked out other times. I could not stop playing things over and over in my head trying to remember. I could not wait to get out of my house and away from my mother. I never dated in high school. Never even kissed a boy until age 19. Yet my mother always called me a whore. When I moved out and started working, I felt free for the first time. I was saving myself for marriage, but every boy I dated and told that to would dump me. By age 22 I started thinking I would never find anyone. Stupid. I wanted to get far away from my mom and then I met a guy who was in the military. There were a million red flags. I ignored them. He drank. I didn't. His parents were both alcoholics. But he lived in state. So I wrote to him a couple years while he was in Japan stationed. Then he suddenly got out of military early. Wouldn't tell me why. I didn't care I just wanted to move. So I packed up and moved from California to state. I almost didn't when right before I was to leave he got a DUI. He was only 20. I was 22. He had also lied about his age. As a Christian the DUI really worried me and the lying about age and an almost 3-year age difference. Long story short, I of course ended up pregnant a year later. Twins. My parents didn't meet him until the day of the marriage. They didn't like him. Once married the first strange thing was when I was pregnant with twins and about 7 months along. I woke up and he had a flashlight and was between my legs doing things to me. I was horrified. I had no idea what to say. Through our marriage the main issues was drinking. I never allowed any alcohol in the house. Well, he took a job on the railroad. He was home once a week. I thought all was fine. For seven years he was home once a week. Apparently, he was drinking daily. We had 2 more kids in those 7 years and raising 4 kids alone was hard with no family around. We moved every year or 2 also. Finally, he went into management and was home every night. Thinks took turn for worse then. He could no longer hide his drinking. He was getting abusive. Emotionally to me. He stopped wanting sex most of the time and then I found dating sites, porn sites. Then he started raping me. He would wait until I was asleep. Then I would wake up to him having sex with me. I freaked out the first time. He acted like he thought I was awake. Next time he told me I am his wife, and it isn't rape. I told him don't ever do that again he knows I have been molested in my sleep and how awful that is to do to someone! He just didn't care. I finally said I was leaving if he didn't go to rehab for his drinking. that got him into marriage counseling. They told him he was raping me. That was the end of that. He didn't like to hear it. Then he got a girlfriend. I am disabled and he blamed me. Said he was sick of extra work. He was the laziest person. He was spending money from our retirement. I had always been a stay at home mom and had recently had spinal fusion and because he was spending our money on drugs and alcohol I went and drove a schoolbus in pain! I was not extra work for him. I took care of everything including children with kidney disease, and genetic conditions and chronic health issues in and out of hospitals all their lives. I filed for divorce. The abuse was enough. I was so shocked when after 21 long years of marriage he walked away and abandoned his 4 kids. No support, no visits, nothing. Due to his alcoholism I was grateful but sad for my children. THEN 2 years after my divorce was finalized my youngest baby girl confided in me something that broke my heart. She said, "Mom I have to tell you something disgusting" my heart sank. She said her dad molested her when I had been out of state for my friends funeral. She was 8 years old. We cried. I couldn't believe this horrible thing happened again to my baby!!! The guilt. I immediately reported it. Nothing was done. That was more devastating. I had prepared her for what would happen and then they did nothing. Karma in the end took care of that evil man. He died at age 46 from abusing his drugs and alcohol. He died alone. Like he deserved. My kids are Doctors, Nurses, and a Businessman. They didn't let that evil man define them. I didn't let him take my happiness. I had a very hard life. I can't even write about most of it. I never let my hard life or an evil person steal my happiness. He didn't determine my happiness I made my own happiness. If I had let my difficult life make me unhappy my children would have had a unhappy mom and had an unhappy childhood and not have turned into successful adults probably. I have bad days. Bad weeks even. Like this week. However tomorrow is a new day and I get to try again. I feel better sharing some of what I experienced. Thank you to anyone who takes time to read it. Sorry it is babbling in places lol..

“We were in a relationship so it couldn’t have been rape…right?” Wrong. Unfortunately, when the event of rape involves your partner it is often invalidated. It is a trauma that tends to get looked over because it doesn’t seem as serious. It doesn’t seem as brutal as those scenarios that make mainstream media. So I am speaking up to say that, it is very much real and it very much leaves the victim at a sense of loss and guilt. Questioning what possibly happened. Because he loves you and you love him. But this was not love. I know the feeling all too well. And I am sorry for those who understand. My story puts me at the age of 23, John and I had been in a relationship for two years and living together for about a year now. We were happy. We had a wonderful life together. Earlier that year, I had a major surgery requiring a year’s time for full recovery. In those first three months, I was not able to drive, to lift more than five pounds at a time. I was not able to shower myself, my body overwhelmed with the significant post-surgical pain. Somewhere along the way, I started to feel like I was on house arrest. I missed the normalcy of life. One night, John and some friends went out for drinks after work. When he finally arrived home, I felt his intoxicated body crawl into bed and begin kissing my neck. It had been so long and I craved the idea of feeling sexual again. I gave him one condition, “We have to stop if I start hurting. Please.” It was wonderful. At first. My boyfriend was so gentle, so considerate. Until something changed. I began to feel the weight of this man, twice my size, bearing down on my broken ribs. Pain started flowing through my body so I called it, I said it was time to stop. Then I tried to push him off as I cried, “Please, please stop!”. I will never forget his response, “I’m not done”. Within seconds, he had pinned my hands to the bed and I could not move. I could not push him away. I felt crushed under his weight as he picked up in speed and became more aggressive. I bit my lip to keep from yelling in agony, to keep from waking up our roommates, but could not stop the tears. Then finally it was over. He went into the bathroom to clean up, while I took two doses of pain medicine to try and kill the pain. For the night. Then curled into the fetal position and quietly cried myself to sleep—while the man next to me fell into a drunken slumber, unfazed. Sitting in bed the next morning, I tried to slow the residual pain from the night. The after-math radiating through my body with every breath I took, I tried to confront John. He claimed there was no memory of the previous night and took offense that the story could in-fact be reality. I retracted my words, simplifying my pain to the conclusion, “No, it’s fine. We just need to be more careful next time”. But I saw it on his face. As he walked away guilt-free, I was consumed with all of the guilt of letting that happen. That night, this morning. It was my fault obviously, I should have known better. He was drunk and he didn’t remember. He loves me… it couldn’t have been rape. I was clearly making a big deal out of nothing. I will just be more cautious next time, next time he’s home. Excuse after excuse circled in my head—for days, weeks, months, years. I came up with anything to try and make it right in my mind. To pretend I was not held down, to pretend I hadn’t cried out for him to stop. Nothing ever settled the unease of it. It just became something to live with. A part of life. John and I went on to date for three more rocky years, filled with plenty of good times and tainted with moments of emotional abuse. I never seemed to be good enough, to do the right things, to be complete. I was always at fault. At the end of the relationship, I was left with a guilt-ridden conscious and minimal self-esteem. Despite the complexity of what is a relationship, I know the downfall circles back to the night he raped me. The night he raped me was the night I lost my voice and I had lost the ability to stand up for myself. The night I couldn’t admit what was happening, what happened, what I deserved. Years after the break up, I told my best friend about that night. I told her it was one night, that it was okay. Her response was simple but gave me the validation I did not know I was searching for. A sense of relief. “That is not okay. That is rape. Are you okay?” In that moment, I was not crazy for the months of confusion, for feeling violated, for feeling broken. Finally, I was not alone. With the truth in front of me, I could face my reality head-on, knowing I would have a shoulder to support me along the way. Finally, that night was real. It happened. It was rape. So slowly but surely, I am now taking the steps towards healing. Slowly but surely, I am finding my voice. Slowly but surely, I am becoming me again. Your turn.

There were many times I was touched inappropriately and many other times I just had to sit there and take it. Pretransition, I had my puberty very early so my breasts developed faster and bigger than others. This caused adults to treat me like a teenager when I was just turning ten for one. On top of that, older men would ogle me at the mall. I remember a particular occasion in class where a male student want to 'play a game' we were basically slapping each other for fun with our folders until his hand slipped between my legs. Thankfully the counselor was there after but it was the first time I laughed off something so horrible; I had no idea how much it would affect me later. Another time an older female student slapped my butt in daycare. I was actually uncomfortable here but it happened so fast I just laughed as I tried to get away from her. She chased me and kept hitting me until my mom walked in. I just knew way too much about sex at that age and nothing about consent. I was also exposed to pornography at the same time and a friend was too. Neither of us realized the ramifications of it and we both ended up worse for it. It took forever to get to a place where either of us had boundaries and while she's fine with crass sexual jokes they would actively trigger me because of my experiences. I assumed she would be third in line to sexually abuse me so I would act overly submissive to her to keep her placated. It was only in my twenties that we discussed how it made us feel. That protective attitude drove us apart and it's still taking effort to reconnect. I just wish I didn't have to say this anonymously because the amount of people who go through nothing at all that call you the pedophile for remembering what happened to you is horrible to me. The way people casually throw around Epstein, P Diddy and other sexual abusers for fun just makes me want to shut my mouth more. Because child sexual abuse is a joke to these people. I want to change that so nobody ends up like me, still dealing with shame, hypersexuality and mental breakdowns.