Curate, connect, and discover
TW - SA
I suffered SA by a family member when I was 12-13 years old and one of these days I was thinking abt it and couldnt understand why I didnt react faster, why it took me so long to just get away from this person
Then I realised that 12 years old me didnt have any idea what touch in a sexual way felt like, no one had ever touched me like this. I only knew what it felt to be touched with care and love or straight up anger. When it happened I didnt even have had my first kiss yet.
This realization helped me to forgive myself a little (it obviously isnt my fault, but shame and guilt are hard feelings to push away completely), but it also added a little to my pain. It feels like something was stolen from me. I never had the chance to slowly learn what being touched with desire felt like, to leran it in my own time, in a consensual way with someone I desired too. Instead I had my trust explored by a f-ing grown man whom I loved and cared about. And this will forever be my first experience with sexual ""affection""
I sit in the bathtub. Now I understand why girls keep the water scorching. I sit down, feeling the water scratch at my back like the dog of hell. Now I understand why the girls get pretty after saying ‘beauty is pain’. I sit under the shower head praying that it will burn every last cell off my body-be-rid me of the sins that occurred in the last few hours. As I sit under the burning water I finally understand. I can feel something, some morsel of humanity within the pain I’m experiencing. I almost don’t feel like a monster as I claw at my skin. As I ask the gods why. As I cry to myself hearing those words my brother told me. As I question why he did to me what he did.
- A. F. A. Makar
puppeteer.
That kind man, forged from a generational habit of skillful deceit, found his way into the unguarded chambers of my mind; with his soft words, he carved and morphed the memories that his Hyde had inflicted on me; what resulted was near insanity, as what I knew to be truth, what I knew to be reality, crumbled. I had --- and still have --- moments where the very fabric of reality seems to be wearing thin, and I can see no difference between reality and these captivating, yet nonetheless dreadful, memories. As years passed, and Jekyll continued to wear thin the cognizant layer of my mind, I had more and more moments where I seemed to slip from my body; not in a paranormal way, but in the way of one who knows not who she is --- what she is. What she means.
Confusion. Hysteria.
An evolutionary and well-developed terror at the thought of my captor and those calloused hands that molded my torture. Delirium because the vividities of last night were mere dreams, mania because yesterday's twisted events never happened.
Half-assed apologies over text, disorienting "I love you"s slipped under doorways post-episode; a huge sheet of unlined, white paper, with crude sharpie scribblings and an effortless, three-featured smiley face. "Sorry if you think..." "Sorry that you feel...but..."
A doctor could say someone's guilty. A prosecutor would say you're guilty. Yet here I am, doing nothing.
I must not waste my own love on a love that shouldn't have been. And yet here I am, crying more for my father, who still lives, than for any dead being. There are not tears enough in the ocean with which to express my cries; not enough fire on all the earth to succumb my rage; not enough beauty in this world to make up for the illusory treasure I have forever lost. I must hold my head high and acknowledge gone. I must hold my head high and acknowledge forever. It was not meant to be. I am not dissonant enough to believe there is some higher, divine purpose to this injustice. But I am no longer foolish enough to give him all of my love. I am no longer foolish enough to sell myself to a soul so loveless that it cannot survive without a vessel. It is over. He is gone.
My ugly swollen face, dark bedroom and the only light is my phone screen while I write this shit.
Preacher in my head trying to make sense of all the pain this life have caused me and guessing if any of it was my fault.
Maybe it was, maybe it’s an important lesson I was supposed to get.
Maybe.
Maybe one day the childhood memories gonna come back and I’ll understand what I did so wrong that God’s only choice was to deeply traumatise me and let me suffer til I die.
Maybe.
Maybe I die without living a day without being terrorised by these nightmares.
Maybe.
But I’m scared I won’t stick around for long enough to learn how to not feel pain.
Maybe.
02.01.22 02:27
TW: mentions of SA
Can we talk about how normalized it is to see SA scenes in media (often completely unnecessary ones which only serve to fulfill the perverse fantasies of some random incels), to the point where books with SA scenes are part of school curriculums and everyone just expects you to be fine with it? Because I was just reading a book we're reading for english class rn and we're writing an exam about it soon, when I saw that it had an SA scene (noone warned us about it btw) and had to put the book down because I had a fcking panic attack over it? Like yes, obv my teachers couldn't have known that I have a problem with these kinds of things due to some stuff that happened in my childhood, but they shouldn't just assume we (all of us are minors btw) are just going to be fine with it when they don't know if we might have had experience with that kind of stuff? I do admit, it was very vague and the male protagonist did manage to 'stop it' in time (also in this case i dont think it's a bad thing we got more male SA representation), but I'm personally extremely sensitive to scenes like that and I just have to wonder why we're being forced to read smth like this?
"Radfems aren't safe people and they hurt women!"
If I brought up the little details of my sexual abuse to radical feminists, I wouldn't be blamed.
I wouldn't be told "well 17 is still legal" or "6 years isn't that bad of an age gap".
I wouldn't be told that it's not possession of child pornography because I "willingly" sent him photos of myself.
I wouldn't be told I led him on.
I wouldn't be told I stalked and abused him when I was behaving like a confused, traumatised child who didn't know what else to do.
I would be told it wasn't my fault. I would be supported. My pain would be validated. My experience wouldn't be diminished by "other people have it worse".
And I would be confident that this support wasn't a facade.
I will never get that from any other "feminist" community and believe me - I have tried.
Radfem spaces are the safest places for women who are victims of abuse and sex based violence.
hello
My friend thinks I hate them and it’s all my fault. It’s my fault for never being able to tell people I care about them and not being able to express my feelings. It’s something I’ve struggled with ever since I was a little kid and I’ve never been able to get over it. I stopped going to counselling because I fucked my sleep schedule up. It’s always gonna be my fault. EVERYTHING has always been my fault. No one is left to blame but me. I always ask for everything and it’s what I deserve. Cause who would I be without what he did to me? Sure, it might've made me "stronger" but what if I didn't want to be stronger? What if I just wanted someone to love me? If my trauma makes me stronger why do I still feel so weak?
Craving intimacy.
Kisses on foreheads, gentle touches, sweet words, to be treated like I’m fragile even though I’ve built my walls out of stone. For someone to kiss me anywhere but my mouth. My mouth is dirty, filled with blood and strangers spit, spewing filthy, clumsy words. Treat me like I’m brand new, never been used, not dirty.