From: jdiamond@netcom.com (Joan M. Diamond)
Subject: Re: Relkie
Date: Thu, 20 Aug 92 16:58:46 GMT
Organization: Netcom - Online Communication Services  (408 241-9760 guest) 

I just want to say one a few things  I never said that
I didn't believe Relkie, nor did I say that I
did believe her.  I never said that she was
manipulating me, but that I FELT manipulated by her.  What I was
mainly trying to say is that I really cannot afford to let myself
get involved again.  For over a month in May/June, all anyone in this
group and at least for my fiance and me at home could think or talk
about was Relkie.

I was the one back in December who warned this group about trying
to diagnose or "save" each other.  It is too easy to get out of
facing my own problems by fixing someone else's.  It is just
another manifestation of the training we got as kids to stuff our
own issues and take care of our parents' or family's issues.

For the record, when I was 17, I also slept with an older, married
man.  Yes, I was manipulated into the act.  Yes, he persued me, against
my wishes and after I told him that I did not sleep with married men
and that I was too young for this.  Yes, I had a low self-esteem.  Yes,
sex was the only way I knew how to interact with men and also the
only way I could get attention.  Perhaps you would call this rape.
I only know that I made a mistake, and so did he.  That neither of
us was thinking clearly.  I know the confusion and pain of this.
I'm sure many others here know it too.  I do not want to underestimate
the pain Relkie is feeling.

On the other hand, I cannot help either Relkie or Bill by taking
sides.  I cannot help Relkie by droppin my issues to deal with
hers.  Can anyone here really say that they can solve Relkie's
problem?  Didn't some of us try that before?  Isn't that what
let to this current problem?

I think everyone here really cares about Relkie.  I know I do.  I lost
a lot of sleep back when the disasterous rescue attempt was taking place.
I blamed myself then for not speaking up more strongly to dissuade the
rescuers from taking the action they did.

Relkie, as I said before, if you feel the need to talk about this
here, go for it.  If Bill feels the need to defend himself here, fine.
But, I do not think it helps you to do it the way you started out,
with the "Let's play guess who." type of thing.  If you had just
stated your case, simply and directly, and asked for support,
you would have gotten it.  By approaching it the way you did,
you enabled me to read a malice in your writing.  I am a writer
by trade, as are others on this group, I see things in the way
a person writes, not just in the content.

I think both Relkie and Bill are hurting.  I think this is an 
important message to us all.  Broken people should not try to fix
other broken people.  Needy, damaged people make faulty decisions.

So, Relkie, you have my support.  I hope you can find POSITIVE
ways of dealing with you many injuries and broken dreams.  I hope
that you can rebuild your life, with the gift of having this group
to allow you to keep a hold on reality and to know your truths, regardless
of the messages you are getting from the adults in your life.  I truely
believe that you are going to buid a beautiful life for yourself.
You have great strength and are learning wisdom.  I'm sorry that
you have the same burden I had, of people always seeing you as older
and more mature than you really are.  It leaves you wondering inside
what will happen when people find out you aren't as strong as you
appear.  But, you will also find that it will help you when you
are on your own and have some real power.  It has been indispensable
to me.

Bill, you also have my support.  I am not surprised you had sex with Relkie.
I do think that you were wrong to do so.  I think you know why you
were wrong.  I think it is up to you and Relkie to define what it
was, rape or stupidity.  However, the law is clear that it is
considered statuatory rape to have sex with a minor, even consentual
sex.
 
I truely hope that you can find a way of overcoming your denial and
getting therapy.  I know you have been abused by authority in your life,
but now you have experienced how easy it is for someone with authority
to abuse it (as you did with Relkie).  Keep trying different therapists
until you find one you trust.  You need to find out why you behaved as
you did.  You not only violated a young girl's trust, but also your
wife's.  You need to find out why you needed to have sex with Relkie
that day.  Maybe you need to look at why you would do something that
you sensed was wrong, but continued simply because she didn't say no.

Now, all that said.  I am going to go back to my own issues.  I will
not involve myself anymore with this issue.  I support you both, but
I won't give you anymore advice or criticism.  Nor will I invest anything
more in you than I already have.  I feel that for me, your issues are
toxic.  I get entangled an it hurts me.  I have to disconnect from
the toxic interactions in my life.  I have to heal Joan, or I will
never be good for myself or as a help to soemone else.

Good luck and healing to all of us.

Joan

Newsgroups: alt.sexual.abuse.recovery