From: anon-1536@twwells.com
Newsgroups: alt.sexual.abuse.recovery
Subject: none
Date: 4 Jan 93 20:53:08 GMT
Organization: Anonymous Posting Service at twwells.com

Hi to everyone out there,

I'm posting this to introduce myself and possibly get some information about
resources in my area. Also to share my current hurt and anger.

I'm 42 years old and just recently owned the fact that I was truly damaged by
incest.  I'd never repressed the memories, have always (!) been sexually
dysfunctional and yet had never made the connection between the two.  One of
the things that has made it so difficult to acknowledge the seriousness of what
happened to me was that the perps were brothers, 4 yrs and 7 yrs older than me,
and it never involved any violence. The fact that it was also physically
pleasurable - though an emotional/psychological nightmare - blinded me to the
reality of how I was violated. Anyhow, I think I must have always felt that
whatever was wrong with me was hard-wired physically and could never be fixed -
I just had to "live" with it.  And I've always had the fear that I would just
have to go through life alone - better alone than in bad company, and since I
really couldn't have sexual intimacy, most of my relationships became bad
company sooner or later...

Most recently, I've been celibate, not even dating anyone, for about 6-7 yrs.
And though I've had some long, lonely moments, I wasn't going nuts trying to
find someone either.  Then I met someone at a conference about a month ago
(just in time for a holiday crisis - how convenient!). On our 2nd time together
I went to his house for lunch, and quite inappropriately, we tried to make
love. I say inappropriate because although I was very turned on by the petting,
I really didn't want more, and yet couldn't say no. Anyhow, as soon as we began
having intercourse, I saw the "curtain fall". That is, I went away mentally,
stopped feeling any thing, and went into waiting til it's over mode. The funny
thing is that after so many yrs of not doing that dance, I just couldn't do it
anymore. We just stopped, got up and got dressed and talked for awhile. The
first thing I told him was that I have trouble enjoying intercourse because I'd
had incest in my childhood. It blows my mind that I told him - and at the same
time was admitting it to myself for the first time.  What I didn't know is that
from that point on, he began running away from me.  Alcoholism, incest, and
lots of other kinds of "quiet dysfunctions" were so common in my family that
those words don't have any shock value for me. What hurts most is he never said
anything like "this is too much for me to deal with", "I need time to think
about this", - never gave any verbal indication that he couldn't handle it. And
since I didn't realize the impact of my words, I had no idea. He just got
slower in returning my calls, made himself too busy to see me, etc. We haven't
spoken for 2 weeks, I was out of town for the holidays. I don't even know if
I'm reading him correctly. But I do feel really abandoned, hurt, and angry. And
waking up to my victimization leaves me feeling very vulnerable. QUESTION:
Should I even call him to say I'm back - or just let it fade?  I now want very
much to be in a relationship but don't want to leave myself open to someone who
is emotionally unavailable and/or unsafe.

What a year this is going to be... I'm scared and excited about the personal
growth this will lead me to. Can anyone recommend therapists/self-help groups
in the Central New Jersey area? I've already left a couple of msgs to referrals
I got from a survivors hotline, but recommendations from personal experiences
would be great.

thanks to anyone who answers - sorry I don't have a handle yet.



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