A
female
age
30-35,
anonymous
writes:I have a complicated situation. Without going into too much detail; my father sexually abused me as a child. I told my mother and together they shrugged it off saying I was lying / it was a dream. It was never spoken of again.Fast forward 10 years and I have been in councilling and decided the best thing to do was to remove myself from the situation to work out my feelings. I moved to another state with my bf of 2 years (we planned to move anyway) and changed my phone number.I was planning on writing a letter to my mother explaining why I left and asking her to acknowledge what happened to me otherwise, I cannot even begin to think about healing the relationship.Now I am thinking that I am just a jerk and if I bring this up again after 10 years, it is just going to put a strain on their relationship - and they will tell me I am lying again.I am not really sure what to do and would like an outside opinion.. Reply to this Question
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female
reader, chigirl  +, writes (27 June 2012):
 Dear poster. While what happened to you bad a bad thing you are the one who needs to go on with your life and not be a victim. It did happen a long time ago. That doesn't mean the pain goes away, or that the damage is healed. But you can't continue being a victim for the rest of your life. At a certain point, when we are adults, we can no longer blame our parents, or happenings in our childhood, to be the cause of where we are today.
You need to realize that while what happened was bad, it does NOT need to impact your life any further than what you allow it to. You are not limited by this incident in your past. You are not wounded beyond repair. You are not damaged for life. Your inability to make friends and stay friends is based on how you have chosen to handle situations. You can not blame this on your past. While the past important to understand where you are today, you must also remember that your current actions are what will predict your future. Your past does not predict your future, it is your current actions that will predict what will happen to you next.
So if you can not hold on to friendships you need to look at how you handle situations NOW, and what you can change in your life in order to maintain friendships. You can not blame this on your past.
By this I do not mean to minimize what happened to you. Not at all. But you are the one who is in control of your life, at all times. You can only blame your past to a certain degree, after that it all depends on YOU. And you have every ability to CHANGE certain patterns that you have fallen into. You have every ability to heal and grow. And that is what you need to do. There are several people who have been put through incest, repeatedly, over several years while growing up. In my own family there are two who have been sexually abused as children, from the ages of 5-11 years old. But these women stand strong today. You'd never guess at what they've been through. They are like everyone else.
And that's another thing for you to know: everyone has a dark secret. Everyone carries something painful with them. Absolutely everyone. We choose ourselves how these things in life are going to affect us, and whether we will let them break us down, or get back up and grow and develop and not let it hinder us.
A
female
reader, Abella  +, writes (27 June 2012):
 Whether it happened ONCE or MANY times it is still abuse.
You are way too hard on yourself.
Your therapist may even suggest that you do write that letter, but not send it until you are emotionally stronger.
And not until you stop blaming yourself.
Even if your father did it once it is still unacceptable and none of those things you mentioned (ashamed, malicious and selfish) apply to you.
In no way can you attribute any blame to you for what happened.
All the Blame belongs to your father for doing it, and your Mother stood by and said nothing. So she is also wrong.
As so very confused suggested, good therapy will make you stronger and help you realize how wrong your parents were on so many levels that they did this and let you suffer.
All the SHAME, SELFISHNESS and MALICIOUSNESS belongs to your parents.
Not you.
Because of what happened to an innocent child, namely you, you were the one wronged. And you were innocent of any blame at all.
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A
reader, anonymous, writes (26 June 2012): This is verified as being by the original poster of the questionThank you everyone for your responses. One reason I find all of this so difficult is because it only happened ONCE. I am not sure why it never happened again - maybe it was a mistake, maybe it was because I told straight away? Do I actually deserve to cause all of this over one event? That is the thing I struggle with most every day.@So Very ConfusedI am sorry that happened to you, my father used to be quite physically.. not quite abusive, but he took "smacking" too far.. to myself and my sister as children.Which brings me to something else you said, about your mother. My mother has bipolar and has struggled with it for a long time - longer than I have been alive. She often hurts herself but it is more a cry for help (attention) than a suicidal thing - but I still worry about what she might do to herself.Writing this letter, or doing anything completely for myself is a really difficult thing when I consider all the people involved and the fact that I want to hurt nobody. I think about the implications involving my realtionship with my sister and her kids, my grandparents.. the rest of my extended family.I feel ashamed, malicious and selfish for bringing all this up after so long. For the longest time it was almost like I had two sets of parents. The first set who did this thing to me, and my normal parents who were just that... my parents. This seperation in my mind is coming apart though. Pretending everything was normal was kind of nice but I now feel like I no longer wish to look at my parentsI feel like because of what they did to me I have been unable to have a normal life. I live with my boyfriend (I love him very much) and he has so many friends, owns a house and has a good job. Compared to him I feel like a shell of a person. I am unable to hold onto friends (I have none), unable to stay motivated to continue my schooling or to get a job. Life just seems quite hollow. Perhaps I am a coward, it was only one bad thing which happened to me long ago.I really do thank you all for your insight.
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A
female
reader, So_Very_Confused +, writes (26 June 2012):
 When I confronted my parents (in a supervised therapy session) about the fact that my dad abused me (he had a temper and physically would hurt me in anger) and my mom ENABLED him to do it (driving me to the hospital to get stitches in the EARLY 70s long before child abuse was a huge issue she told me "don't tell them daddy did this they will take daddy away from us") it was very hard.
I screamed. I cried. My mom cried. My dad sat silent.
I was SCREAMING at them. I was so ANGRY.... but it helped me heal.
I have forgiven my dad (my choice) and he worked hard on his temper issues and my children have always been with him and never been in danger... when my mom died, I had peace that we had resolved the issue...
The GOAL here is for YOU to heal. IT has to be about YOU taking care of you... who CARES what happens to your parents.... IF you wish to forgive them you can. I did. I moved on and forgave both my dad for his temper and my mom for her lack of protection.... as I got older I totally understood it.
As a child I had no clue what was going on....
As a young adult (way older than you btw in my 30s already when I did this) I needed to have the closure of having my say. It was healing.
My mom was destroyed by having to deal with the fact that she allowed my father to abuse me... it was quite devastating for her emotionally.
Write the letter but accept that she may not be able to cope with the fact that she failed to protect you as a child.
YOU now have to take care of yourself. I would suggest therapy if you feel the letter won't serve as enough closure and healing...
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A
female
reader, Abella +, writes (26 June 2012):
You are NOT jerk. But your Mother failed you.
You had your innocence taken by a Pedophile who just happened to be your father. your Mother is guilty by being complicit. She said nothing and supported your father instead of supporting you.
Please Read "Toxic Parents" by Susan Forward before you consider and confrontation (in writing or verbally) with your parents. It will give you lots of support.
You were NEVER to blame for what your father inflicted on you. No matter what lies your father told you, you were NEVER able to give consent to what your father did to you. He manipulated you to think he had the right to do this.
It is to your credit that you sought out counselling instead of suffering alone. That was very brave and smart.
The guilt your mother carries within her ought to be huge. But her DENIAL may outweigh her guilt. Your father is a different matter. You may not be the only child he sexually assaulted. Never allow your own children to spend time with him unsupervised. Many Pedophiles do not make any effort to ever change their ways. and so remain a risk to any other child they come into contact with.
You abusive father will not want the truth to come out. You Mother may, again, support your father and continue to deny it could ever have happened. You know that it did happen.
Ask your counsellor to give you support and help you through this difficult time. Your parents denial - if that occurs - may make you feel those same horrible feelings you had when your mother unjustly denied it had happened. That was very cruel of you mother.
You were always the innocent child. You did nothing to cause it to happen. The Blame was always SOLELY with you father. Though once your mother went into denial and did not support you then your mother from then on shared the blame with your father.
if you approach your parents in person then have another person you trust with you, just in case your parents reaction distresses you all over again.
It will be distressing confronting the perpetrator of the abuse, either in writing or verabally. But it will allow you to shake off the lies than you were made to keep to protect the abuser.
I heard a term for it and it was 'Breaking the Silence" although you have already taken the BIG step of speaking to a counsellor first.
Telling your Abuser and your Mother that you truly were abused will allow you to unburden yourself of protecting the reputations of your abuser and your mother who denied you the support you deserved way back then.
Best Wishes
Abella.
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A
male
reader, no nonsense Aidan  +, writes (26 June 2012):
If you feel that you need to write the letter in order to help you come to terms with what happened to you as a child, go ahead and write it! The only caveat I’d add is that you need to think about how you will feel if you are accused of lying, and once again your parents refuse to acknowledge the abuse that you experienced. If you think that it’s likely that they will do so, and that this will make things much worse for you, perhaps you are better off forgetting about the letter and trying, with the help of counselling, to move forward with your life. But if you think that you could deal with being shrugged off again, you should write the letter. If they do dismiss it, you won’t be disappointed, and if they don’t, it could be hugely helpful to your healing process to have at least one of your parents accept that you did indeed suffer abuse. So you need to take your time in making your decision. You need to weigh up the benefits against the psychological impact of a second rejection by your parents. In reality, it’s possible that they may never acknowledge what happened to you, but if you are able to deal with that and cope with that possibility, you should do whatever you think is necessary to help get some closure for yourself. So think about all the possible outcomes if you did write the letter, and how you’d cope with them, then make your decision on that basis.
I wish you all the very best.
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A
female
reader, missmatador +, writes (26 June 2012):
 Dear Anon,Firstly, you are so brave just for speaking openly about what has happened to you. This is all part of healing and it sounds like you are striving to make things right again within yourself.Nothing about this process makes you a "jerk". You feel you must have closure on what happened to you and there is nothing wrong with seeking the love your mother should have given you as a child, now. Writing her a letter may be the way forward in your path to healing. What happened when you were younger is not something that was within your control and it wasn't your fault. Your mother should have protected you at all costs. Your father was (or is) a pedophile. Aside from anything else, you have to protect yourself and others from what he did to you. He has put you in a place of suffering for so long. It is your right as a human being to feel well and to have that sense of closure.Write a letter to her. Be honest, be open, be heartfelt. If she doesn't respond you may have to accept it and move on in the knowledge that you tried. And that it is highly likely that she is lying to herself only to instill that she was a good mother when she failed you when you needed her most. It's not a very positive affirmation BUT you can strife to be the person and the mother that she couldn't be for you. God willing, she will remember her love for you.Good luck and all my strength to you,Miss Matador
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A
female
reader, chigirl +, writes (26 June 2012):
Write your mother that letter. What they do with it is their choice, what your mother does is her choice, and what your father did was HIS choice. You are not a jerk in any way, nor are you responsible for what either of your parents do.
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