YOUNG MALE VICTIMS OF SEXUAL ABUSE SUFFER TOO ... AND HOW!

Yesterday marked a milestone for me. It was simultaneously disturbing but very fulfilling. As a result of my previous day's blog post at http://vigaland.blogspot.ca/2012/08/incest-that-could-never-happen-in-my.html , I was contacted by not one, but two men who were sexually abused as youngsters. This brings to 3 the number of men who have shared their story of abuse with me. I feel so honored to have their trust and support for what I am trying to do. Thank you gentlemen. You know who you are.

One of these men was incredibly brave. He wrote his story on my personal Facebook page in full detail. I cried as I read it. His sordid tale came straight from his heart. What had I unleashed? But it was good. He is now one of the members of my FACEBOOK community group, OUT FROM UNDER, and has kindly given me permission to copy/paste his story here. I have copied and pasted it just as he wrote it, full of emotion and heartache. I can sense his desperate need to be heard, to tell others what happened to him and his relatives too. It may be a little hard to follow, but you will get the gist of it ... and it's not pretty. But it is all real.

This gentleman is the first of the members of either sex of OUT FROM UNDER at FACEBOOK  to speak publicly. I applaud his courage and thank him so much for sharing his story. Here's what David wrote:

 "Viga,,please as I share,,forgive me,,thanks,where I was sent,,as a child,,it was later called " The Doherty Farm of Horrors,,"outside of Portage la Prairie Manitoba,,he was I guess a step father,,he never adopted me,,thank God,,he abused all of us,,me,,his daughters,,and 4 boys,,he beat mother,,into I guess getting his way,,she closed her eyes as he did it to us,,we did sex acts for him,,yes even us boys,,ok,,in the mouth,,etc,,he made older girl pregnant,she ,had daughter of incest,,Helen,,he did sex abuse,,he did beatings,,verbally he was bad,,for example as I was not his kid,,his name for me,,was,,The BASTARD,,ok,,,he did emmotional abuse,,to all,,mentally he had us,,we were wrecks,,his like puppets,,,,,,Viga,,later when many of us went to Child family Services for help,,we were told we made it up,,as some of us left,,I ran away 29 times,,what I and other kids told he did,,we were told kids should listen to the parents,,and not lie,,make stuff up,,in 1995 Aug there was a murder on that farm,,I testified against the bad man,,Earl Doherty.and Earls son,,Clarence Doherty,,a 8 year old boy was hiton head and killed on that farm,,.can you believe it ,,he got off,,,anyways,,many of us,,esp me,,charged him,Earl Doherty,,,RCMP said he was too old,,only get house arrest,,so no justice,,I am post traumatic stress dis orders leading to severe bouts of anxiety and depressions,,I am called,,Multiple personality dis orders,,I am called also by Doctors,,Bi polar,I am dis assocaiative,,??,,I drank,,drugged to forget all my life,,I gave up booze,,Drugs Jan 10 ,1996,after I cut my both arms to the bone,,close to the elbows,,deeps,,and I stabbed my leg,,I was sick an tired of the flash backs,,memmories,,and booze ,,drugs were no longer killing it in my head,,I was sick an tired,,wanted it to end,,as the murder had just happened,,more talk,,more publicity,,so,,,,Viga,,I read really fast,,I have many children in me,,little ones,,ok,,,I love your post,,I loved the videio that girl spoke on and did,,folks want to write about me,,I get scared,,the devil,,bad man,,Earl Doherty died,,my so called mother died,,we,,the brothers,,if thats what you call us,,Clarence,,charged with murder,aug,,1995,Gary,,on skid ,gary is lost,,hopeless,,i find him once a yr,,in Vancouver,,,alvin,,a loner,,divorced,,Brian,,he is totaly goofed up,,he did time in juvenile place,,one girl,,Faye,,went to a woman,,fell in love,,got married,Faye and I visit,,we do not much talk about it,,,Daughter of incest Helen,,hiding out sort of on a rez in Manitoba,,we all rarely communicate,,scared,,embarrased I guess,,???We,,yes all of us divorced ,,some a couple of times,,where was God,,where was my Mohter,,why did no one help us,,no one cared,,every one took us back there,,I am alright,,today,,got lots,,lots of help,,head shrinks,,doctors,,counsellors,,many peoples helped me,,mentally,,but,,,some times it just grabs me,,a living hell,,even today,,Thanks for listening,,I send you a jentle respectful hug,,Viga,,just because I am supposed to" 

 After reading David's story, I did some research on male victims of sexual abuse and found THIS ARTICLE  which I have added to my information site at VIGALAND. It is so in line with some of what David has shared above. Do have a read, and while you're over at VIGALAND'S INFORMATION ARTICLE SITE, check out some of the other articles I've posted there. All worthwhile reading for anyone interested in or affected by abuse of any kind.

Have a great weekend everyone. May the sun shine in on your day and chase the heartaches away ...

NOW I GET IT! I HAVE SS - STOCKHOLM SYNDROME

Those who know the more intricate and ugly parts of the incestuous relationship between my father and me have often asked how come I didn't kill him. They don't understand how I can even talk about him now without going off the rails etc etc. Or sometimes, they just look at me funny and you know they are thinking "well it mustn't have been as bad as you say ... "

What little they know. And yet, I have asked myself the same questions over and over again and come up with no answers. Part of me always loved him even when I hated him. When he died of cancer in 1980, already a skeleton before he took his last breath, while I could not bring myself to cry, not then, not later, nonetheless I took his cold, already dead bony hand in mine and asked him sadly, almost lovingly, why he could never have been just a father to me. I had loved the father. I loathed the lover.

Today, as I read through another incest survivor's pain--filled blog, she several times mentioned "Stockholm Syndrome".  She wondered if she had it. Where she had shared some last letters she had exchanged with her father, she signed off with

Love you always,
me”

He had signed off similarly. And yet, he had molested her for years, physically abused his wife and the writer's brother most of their lives together, and all up, was one horrid person. Yet she said "Love you always". Does she have Stockholm Syndrome? You bet! Do I? Well now I know I do.

What is Stockholm Syndrome? Dr. Joseph M Carver who has written the 4-page article I found, does a far better and more comprehensive job of explaining it than I can ... and I also cannot condense 4 pages into a few sentences in a blog. Perhaps the shortest explanation is what he says in this paragraph:

In clinical practice, some of the most surprised and shocked individuals are those who have been involved in controlling and abusive relationships. When the relationship ends, they offer comments such as “I know what he’s done to me, but I still love him” 


 and 

While the situation doesn’t make sense from a social standpoint, does it make sense from a psychological viewpoint? The answer is — Yes!

That's the situation I found myself in, before, during and after the incestuous abuse ended when I was around 23. The abuse had started somewhere around the age of 11 - 12, slowly at first, then intensifying  over the period of about a year. Because my father was so physically violent, I was terrified of him, as was my mother. Even as an infant, I was afraid of him. His big leather strap had left welts on my bare backside many times by the age of 10. My face had been smashed into the hard kitchen table when I couldn't get my math questions right. My ears had been boxed till I could barely hear. I had been called "stupid" too many times to count. All my life with him, even at 23, I walked on eggshells around him all the time ever fearful of inciting his rage. And yet, part of me loved him. What's up with that? It made no sense. But now I see it was, without question, Stockholm Syndrome.

So how can this be? How can someone who brutalizes you mentally, physically, and sexually still have your love? Well there are many reasons and scenarios cited in that article above. You'll have to read it to see which applies to your situation. For me it was that he wasn't always horrible. In fact, many times he was downright nice, even nicer to me than my mom was. While he was doing the dirty, so to speak, he was also working hard to provide me with all my basic needs: food, clothing etc. If I got hurt, it was he who took care of the cuts and scrapes. If I was ill, he nursed me back to health. If I needed protection, he provided it. I knew I could count on him if I were in danger. All of this made it difficult to fully hate him. When he did these things for me, he was acting as my father. I loved the father in him.

Also, somewhere along the way, he confided in me about his own past: the heartbreak he felt losing his mother to TB when he was only 10; the beatings he suffered from his own abusive father; the agonies of  living in war camps during WW2 when you didn't know if you'd be alive tomorrow and you were starving while doing hard labour. And then there was his disappointment and anguish when he had gone to Australia, ahead of my mother and me, to set up a home for us after the war and word came to him that my mom was having an affair back in Germany. For the second time, a woman had broken his heart.

All this obviously created an empathy within me for the person I knew he was or could be when he wasn't being a predator and child molester. According to Dr. Carver, this is what is known as the "Small Kindness" shown to the victim by the abuser. When the abuser shows the victim small kindnesses, it gives the victim hope that things might improve and makes the victim feel the abuser is not "all bad".  When the abuser shares details of his/her own difficult past, revealing their own "soft side", the victim feels sorry for them and even wants to help them, believing that things might just change for the better over time. Of course, all the while the abuser is sharing these things, he/she is also, consciously or unconsciously manipulating the victim,  exxonerating himself or herself of all the blame for the situation. After all, he/she has been a victim too, right?

But all that said, now, years after his death, as I finally drum up the courage to share my story, I cannot and do not forgive him for what he did to me. I see no reason to excuse his actions. I have been horribly abused but that doesn't give me the right to abuse my own children. And he had no right to do what he did, regardless of his own story. Sadly, all I ever wanted from him was a father. He became more than that and I hated it. I realize that to this day I still suffer from Stockholm Syndrome. Do you? I'd love to hear your story and hope that by telling you mine bit by bit in this blog, you'll find the courage to tell me yours. The freedom that comes with sharing your story is worth the pain of telling it.

INCEST: TABOO, BOO-HOO or YOO-HOO?

I set up this blog a couple of months back, then chickened out. After all, what kind of fool talks about a part of her life that conjures up extreme pain, shame, blame and shares it with strangers? And for what purpose anyway? It's too late to punish the guilty. He's dead and buried. Amen. And if it hurts those living on (family), then perhaps it's better left buried with the guilty. With that kind of reasoning, I had slipped back to doing what I've done all these years: keeping it to myself. Whose business it it anyway?

Then something happened. Actually, several things happened. A dear friend came to me in agony: she had discovered the man she'd been dating for 4 years and hoped to marry was interested in her only as a smoke screen for what he truly is: a selfish predator who has been using his daughter as his sexual partner for years. My friend was distraught, not just because of suddenly realizing who and what he really was but out of fear for the welfare of the victim. What would her future be? Would she survive this and go on to lead a productive, happy life or would she, as so many have done, end up in the streets, selling herself for love or drugs? Or had his handling of the situation been so insidious, so clever that she too was now a willing participant, convinced that only her daddy could ever love her this much and fulfill her needs?

My friend was also beside herself for not recognizing the signs that were as clear as this writing is on the screen: that what was going on was incest, a dirty word. Taboo. The topic no-one wants to talk about, but is, from all my research, far more widespread than I'd ever imagined. And I learned something else that rocked my old world: some people think incest is great! 'Scuse me? What's more, certain cultures accept it as part of growing up. They even encourage it between siblings, between parent and child. What?!

I looked up "incest" on Facebook. There is one page, started by Wikipedia. There is no information other than its definition but it has over 16,000 "likes" and the numbers "talking about it" is in the hundreds. There are zero posts on that page. I found another page that was a community named "Incest Sex Stories". It has 788 likes. Again, there's just about no posts on the page but if you click "recent posts by others" it brings up a slew of posts and links. It was there, reading some of those, that my jaw hit the floor and my stomach turned in revulsion.  Here were people for whom Incest is a "Yoo-hoo" and far from taboo. How innocent I still am at 66! But I shouldn't have been surprised. After all, daddy had assured me way back when he started on me that what he was doing was quite normal, a part of most families, and that he was doing me a favour. Really? If he were alive today and internet savvy, he'd  probably join that Facebook group that says it's okay to screw your child's mind, body, spirit & soul.

So all of this has now set me back on track. I'm on a mission. Enough sitting in the closet and keeping all the hurt and heartache bottled up inside. There are too many out there like me and they need all the encouragement they can get to open up and talk about it to someone who cares or is in a position to help them out of their situations. Folks are speaking up and rallying together against domestic abuse and violence. Gays are "coming out" and telling us they're not ashamed of who they are. Neither should we, those of us who do see ourselves as victims of (and not willing participants in) incest, be ashamed to tell our stories. We need to be like Marilyn Van Derbur, former Miss America, who told the world on her father when she was 48! That's how long it took her to drum up the courage to speak out. And look how long it's taken me!

My research tells me there are many more celebrities like you: Sandra Dee, Rita Hayworth just to name a couple. If high profile and well-known people like these can risk speaking up about this taboo topic, what have we got to lose? Perhaps, at least by doing so, we will give some poor girl or boy somewhere who is confused, lost and ashamed, the courage to stand up, talk to someone and get out of a situation that is surely but slowly killing them in ways they've yet to realize.

Here is Marilyn's video. There are two of them but this one is more complete. Watch it, listen. I say thank you Marilyn Van Derbur for telling us your story.