Did you ever have a chance to confront your abuser (as an adult)

I agree that’s the biggest load of crap I have ever heard. I would never abuse someone because ” I didn’t feel loved”. (I would never abuse anyone.) I think it was a power trip or he just wanted to hurt you so he could feel better about himself. Anyone that wants to rip my balls off for this answer go ahead. I’ve never been a victim so I’m speaking from my own viewpoint.
@Mama_Cakes I have nothing but admiration for you for being able to discuss this. You are a warrior.

He apologized to me out of the blue one day when I was 13 years old. It was a rare, very lucid moment for him. He didn’t offer any explanation for his behavior (I knew he was mentally ill), just said that he knew he’d hurt me and was sorry. The very next day, he tried to molest me again. That’s when I found the courage and strength to fight him off, finally. It was the last time he ever touched me.

When I was an adult, I chose to no longer see him, so I stopped attending family functions. My mother and grandparents knew why, but they never told him – to protect his feelings, I guess. Since he didn’t know he was the cause of my absence, he kept buying me presents for Christmas, which my mother would then deliver to me (WTF?). So I wrote him a letter, explaining how hurtful it was for me to have any contact with him whatsoever and to stop sending me presents, to stop asking the family about me, to stop even thinking about me. To let me get on with my life without any notion of him in it. I only ever had to interact with him one more time, at my grandmother’s funeral.

Yes, I have; and he made excuses as if to claim that he didn’t know better. His refusal to accept responsibility, and my mother’s claim of ignorance that she didn’t know I was being abused, seem to be defense mechanisms because they are not emotionally strong enough to deal with the guilt. Based on that assumption, I have forgiven them for being weak, but not for the actions or inaction of theirs that robbed me of my childhood and left me feeling unlovable and worthless.

I am considering this very thing. Since I now live in the same country as him. I have mulled it over from (to be honest) abusing him. (Which I guess is ridiculous and I would never do that). To asking him flat out why he did what he did. I would imagine there would be loads of reasons from his side. So would this help me in anyway? No. It would help if he apologized. But I doubt that would happen.

I just feel if a person is apologizing so to speak, then offering a defence for their actions they have not really taken responsibility for what they did. So to me they can shove it.

No, and I wouldn’t even know where to start looking if I decided to confront them.

Thankfully I’ve never been in that situation but that must have been a horrible car ride. I hope you never have to breath the same air as him again.

I confronted all but three. One had died, the other two were unknown to me(drugged).

I found all the occasions terrifying beforehand and then disappointing and unnerving.

After the fact very unsettled if they bothered to acknowledge it they offered a flimsy excuse.

I do think I came away with more power. It became apparent that when I stood up to two of them they were more frightened of me then I was of them. The third was a standoff.
I have no doubt it was very uncomfortable. But hope you find peace and strength from it.

There is no excuse for abusing a six year old and to imagine there might be one is offensive.

My mom asked what she had done and over the years I told her what I thought she could handle. She’s sober now.

Yes and I did and he said it never happened that way. With another case, no, because he died.