Shame, pt. 2

I’d say the solitary event that brought the most shame and changed the trajectory of my esteem for 17 years is when I was raped at age 14. Sure there was prison and counseling involved at the time, but it didn’t go far enough. No relative outside of my immediate family knew (immediate being mother and younger brother). I may have only told one or two close friends about it. I even had a boyfriend I told used it against me when we got into an argument and I vowed to never talk about it again.

Prior to my experience, I do not recall being sat down and explained to what rape was. My idea of rape was courtesy of television. Rape was violent. Rape involved a woman at least putting up a struggle to keep her honor. But, sometimes rape isn’t violent. Sometimes the victim is blamed. Sometimes the victim can get counseling but still suffers, like a person involved in a car accident with side effects long after the moment of impact happened. I felt shame because I was raped and I did not fight back. I felt like a loser. Counseling did not explain this feeling away.

As a young adult, I witnessed some with the courage to air their dirty laundry face criticism. And it was not just of rape, but whatever else society considers to be dirty laundry (molestation, addictions, abuse, poverty, etc). I silenced myself for fear of experiencing the same and pretended to be a well adjusted human being and get on with “normal” life. But there are some things you cannot work away; you cannot party and drink away, and you cannot sex away; you cannot eat or exercise away, you cannot shop away, you cannot concert away, and dare I say you cannot even church & pray away with fervor (yes, I wholeheartedly done that too).

It makes sense now, the difficulty I’ve faced trying to trudge through life goals full steam ahead while dismissing what I perceived to be trivial mental distractions. It was really my intuition calling me to address what I’d suppressed for so many years – the deceitfulness and betrayal of the shame I felt in being me, a young girl who did not fight back. Every wrong, every unfavorable outcome or opinion, every imagined rejection, every soured relationship, I would tell myself how I allowed it to happen and didn’t fight back, and suddenly I was 14 again. This pattern wasn’t a conscious realization until now.

The right questions and answers have been coming to help me figure out how to go about getting true healing for myself. I no longer shun the idea of seeking counseling again. And as I said in pt 1, I believe part of my healing & letting go was being transparent and writing about it. I am going add complete self-honesty and really thinking about my needs first. I need love without judgment. I need people I can trust. I need to practice trusting wisely and loving without judgment and not running away when things get ugly or imperfect. I believe it all starts with me - loving and trusting myself without judgment, and without shame.