This isn’t a well-thought-out thing, just something I keep bumping against. I am talking with a young person (not on this site), who has recently disclosed and the abuse has only just ended, which means I get a rare snapshot of what it is like to be dealing with someone who is very close to the experience of abuse.
So many of my conversations are with people for whom the abuse happened decades ago — we’re all remembering, unpicking, patching it together. But with someone younger, it’s not memory. It’s now. Still unfolding. Still raw.
And strangely, that’s good for me. Good to be close to it. It shakes something loose. Connects me to feelings I’ve buried or blurred. Things I’ve filed away under “too much” or “not yet.”
It stirs the parts of me I pretended were done. Reminds me how fresh it once was. Still is.
Strange to note how someone young is confused by the feelings of still caring about his abuser. Affection and love still exist despite not liking what he has done to him. Obviously, we all deal with an aftertaste of that, but this is very much in the moment and raw emotion, and it is interesting to see the confusion it swamps everything with. If I go to the police, it means this for him and has these consequences for everyone involved.
It struck me that we probably have in us, us survivors, regret that we are no longer adored and touched and desired and lusted after in the way our abusers did. I imagine those are powerful feelings when we were young and those things were happening to us.
That we probably felt a sense of loss when they stopped. It is something that is rarely, if ever, mentioned, but it might shape us more than we ever admit. To be worshipped in that way for our youth and our bodies to be admired and praised must have fed our ego and our self-esteem in a way that has never been since. Yet we never seem to discuss those feelings. Maybe we should.
Maybe it is also worth noting that it probably contributed to why grooming works so well. If, as I have been assuming, the idea of an unprotected boy is a vulnerable boy, then part of that unprotecting is the element that lacks love and attention. That kind of worship of our body must have filled a gap in our self-esteem.
And yet, there it is: the grief of being adored by your abuser. The grief of no longer being the one they wanted. The grief of matter-of-factly losing that twisted pedestal — even though that pedestal was built out of your own exploitation.
It’s the kind of loss that doesn’t get a eulogy.
It is the part of grooming nobody wants to admit. it feels good. At first. Until it doesn’t. Until the cost is everything. But affection? Tenderness? Even desire? Those were real feelings at the time, and pretending they weren’t just breeds more shame.
Grooming works because it confuses. Because the brain, especially a young one, links being wanted with being worthy. Being touched with being special. Being lusted after with being safe from abandonment. When it stops, there’s silence — and often, the cruelest thought of all: I must not be beautiful anymore.
I am starting to think the most important thing to advocate for is honesty. Brutal, stark, absolute honesty. With ourselves. That has to be the starting point. To be honest about where it leaves us, what we felt and what we feel now. What it took from us and what it left behind. Once we have worked that out, once we know what we are dealing with, then we can tell others about it.
What if I just tell my therapist honestly what I feel and fear and know and don’t know?
What if anyone asks me anything about my abuse and I just answer honestly? What if it shocks them? What if it does? I have had to adjust to their world, turn and turn about.
If we start to stand in the cold light of honesty and just state things how they are, won’t everyone eventually catch up?
There is no one answer. You have to listen, or you won’t understand. It is harsh because it is harsh. It is not easy to hear; it was a lot more difficult to live through.
You might not understand, but that doesn’t make it not true.
I am not over it, and may never be. now: love me whatever it takes.
I am here. In the shadows. Exhaling.
a blog less ordinary 