Have you confronted your abuser?

My only recent abuser was an old guy who thought that I had stolen his parking space – even though there was a sign there allocating it to me. He knew some rather colourful words.

Physical or sexual abuse is something that I don’t really understand, that is if it had happened, why anyone would not avenge themselves once they were able to.

I recall an incident in the seventies where a friend who had a ten year old daughter “interfered with” sorted it out without Police involvement. They found the guy on the side of the road about one hundred miles from his home. He was permanently crippled – each elbow and each knee torn from the socket and rotated. The abuser never went to the Police – he couldn’t. We never discovered what he told people had happened to him.

@DarkScribe thats great i would’ve done the same thing to that guy

@DarkScribe violence of any sort including what was done to the person that was the abuser makes me cringe

Yes. But I was given a bunch of crap that he has rationalized as a means to absolve himself of guilt. I accept that he is too weak to handle the guilt, and so his blocks are a matter of self-preservation. The same is true for my mother, whom I feel should have been more aware of what was going on under her own roof, and that her daughter was a miserably depressed child—how does a mother not know that, or not do anything about it?

I have. I finally stood up for myself to my mother, and she kicked me out. Best decision I have ever made.

@Simone_De_Beauvoir violence of any sort including what was done to the person that was the abuser makes me cringe

I am not pro violence in almost any instance but child abuse. My kids have never had a problem, but if it happened I would go Biblical on the perpetrator, not hand it on to the the courts.

@hearkat
I’m sorry
I’ve heard that so often
and I don’t know either how parents can just ignore it

@chelseababyy I remember your story, yes
good for you

@DarkScribe
this would indicated that you have as much darkeness in yourself as well and could lead to you ending up in jail and through the courts as well

@Simone_De_Beauvoir We all have darkness under some circumstances, and yes, it could lead to legal repercussions, but I would try to avoid that. The problem is that something of that nature is one area where I could not let it go. The people who do this are bent and never really capable of being mended. They need to be prevented from doing it again as well as punished for doing it the first time. Eye for an eye, like a good Christian. ;)

I am OK with it now. I can’t let the fact that I was victimized as a child dominate my adult life. I did nothing wrong, and have nothing to be ashamed of. I accept them both as weak individuals, and bear no grudge.

@DarkScribe I just don’t know what effect it would have on my children, for example, were I to go bat-shit on their attacker

@hearkat sounds solid and stable

@Simone_De_Beauvoir I just don’t know what effect it would have on my children, for example, were I to go bat-shit on their attacker

I think that they would sleep better at night – at least they would be absolutely sure that particular person was never going to hurt them again.

I am pretty laid back in most areas, but not when it comes to harm to my family. I am not talking about parents or siblings, but my wife and children. In modern times a life sentence means that the perpetrator could be on the streets again in fifteen years. That isn’t good enough for me, not in prisons that have TVs and Pizzas.

@Simone_De_Beauvoir Thanks. Funny part is she told everyone I ran away, but she had left me a voicemail telling me to come home, pack my stuff and leave. Don’t you just love when you have hard evidence?

Yup, and he’s still playing the victim card. Blames what happened to him in his past for his actions. I’m sick of hearing it. Also, he’s doing nothing to help himself now. I am dealing with my past (the abuse) through therapy. It’s up to him as to whether or not he chooses to deal with his issues. Like I said in a previous post, you just need to worry about yourself…

@jmah yes a lot of the time people who have faced these things themselves continue to do it
and yes to a certain extent you have to be understanding of it
but they do have to put a stop to it
be the last link the in chain

For him, it wasn’t abuse. It was the fact that my Dad wasn’t there. Anyhow, I hear what you’re saying..

@jmah yes, well whatever the reason

I know. I hard to be sympathetic, you know?

No. He still scares me.

Yes but I should have done more. I wish I had been brave enough to go to court and put a restraining order against them on the books to go along with a Sheriff’s report and to back up a friend of mine who did take them to court. I understand now for the safety of others how important it is to document dangerous people.

Via telephone, I confronted my longest-term abuser, my aunt/guardian, who denied doing anything to me, including the emotional abuse I let her get away with as an adult. In fact, it was a torrent of emotional abuse from her at the beginning of the call that led to the confrontation. That was about 9 years ago.

A few months later, via letter, I reiterated my claims and let her (and her son, another piece of work) know our relationship was over. She still tries to contact me on occasion and is convinced that she loves me as a daughter and that I’m the ungrateful and selfish one. Pah! I have a new family now.

As for my original abusers, no, I have not confronted them. They were out of my life so early on, I have no idea where they might be now, and that includes my BM.

I used to get my ass kicked, physically and mentally in 7th grade by the 8th graders when I played football and lacrosse, it eventually led me to quit. Then I got bigger than everyone else, 6’4, they stopped giving me shit when I got to high school so I just left it at that. I still regret not beating their ass though, there’s always a chance for that though…

I go to church with the boy who molested me. I’ve never spoken about it to him. I try to avoid him though he often seeks me out.I never told my family (whom I live with and did so at the time). I want him out of my life, but it isn’t an option right now. I guess because I was 15 at the time I feel I was old enough to have done more to stop him, so I don’t feel I can completely blame him.

A guy once snuck up behind me as I was walking and grabbed me there. I whirled around and chased him for several blocks. So much adrenaline that I actually managed to scale a fence in one move. If you gave me a million bucks to do that now, I couldn’t.

I almost caught up to him, but paused to pick up a piece of lumber. At first I was furious for not catching him. But in retrospect, I’m glad I didn’t.

When you have time to think, you realize that two wrongs don’t make a right. But when you’re in the moment, you’re not really thinking straight. You have adrenaline pumping through you and you’re just reacting.

Maybe that says something about me? At my basest instinct, my response is violent. I’d like to think that I’m more level-headed than that. But I’d hate to see how I’d respond if someone actually “interfered with” someone I loved.

@DarkScribe don’t give me ideas…

I have not had to face this personally, but my daughter has. And I’m at a dead end. Things are a lot more complicated in my case, and there are no easy solutions, mainly because there is no working framework within which to operate (or even rules to break). As far as I’m concerned, yes, I’ve faced the people who have hit me and tried to kill me, both in court and outside it. I’ve looked them in the eye and stayed calm, which for me was the greatest victory. I don’t really care about petty revenge, I’m too busy trying to save my daughter to think about trivial things like that.

My abuse was from a friend of the family’s son. He was 9 yr old I was 4, his sister was 3. He practiced his own abuse on both of us, we were very much in complience with him most of the time. This went on pretty much every wed. (baseball night for my dad n theirs) on the weekends it was cards n bonfires! All of us kids were well watched by there wonderful, kind, intellegent, good-looking son!
I was sneaking to use any thing I could find to masterbate at 6 yes old, my parents thought It normal! I had kindney infections all the time, I could not use bubble bath!
He used the both of us girls against each other to fight, then we would make up with each other in his way. Over the course of 5 years I learned how to read body language, hide everything I needed to hide, teach his sister how to make him happy. I live with such guilt as to what I have done as a child. I realized that I knew how to have an orgasim at 5yrs old, three years ago, I have been in intense therapy since. I wish I could say I’m over it and moving on. But i’m not! People in my family say,” wow three years is a long time is it working?
Being an adult I know he too at the age of 9 must have endured abuse also, but I’m now so messed up with emotions that I could never confront him.

I cant even look him in the eye after what he took away from me and put me through.

@Bobbilynn thank you for your story

It’s nice to have a place I can share. It’s still very fresh in my thoughts most days! I’m not sure if it will ever leave me.

@Bobbilynn
I want to recommend hypnotherapy to you
my partner has had great results with it
in escaping the effects of his abuser