Surviving Child Abuse

It is amazing how much the past affects us. Not many people admit it but everything we have experienced has a direct affect on who we are at any given moment. Sometimes this is hard to accept. When the experiences that we have been through are not pleasant ones it takes a toll on everything in our lives. Relationships with children, lovers, parents, and even those met in our daily lives are all affected by those experiences. The worse the experience the more devastating the affect on ones life.

When a child is molested the impression the experience makes upon the child's live is immense but when the perpetrator is a parent it is just that much more terrifying. As children our sense of the world is given to us by our parents. We learn all of our basic survival skills from them. If you were molested as a child, you may already realize that you may have a few skills others don't. Skills having to do with survival but on the other hand there are more than a few things you didn't learn or maybe did learn but in a warped sense of reality.

* Trust. Trust is what it takes to get along in this world. Many times it has been said, "you have to trust someone", although this is true, for a survivor of sexual abuse it means nothing. Children start learning trust from their parents even before they learn to walk. A child has no choice but to trust that their parents will provide for them and do what is right, after all children come into this world with no clue as to how it works or how to survive. When that very basic sense of trust is breached with a young child it is extremely difficult to recover, even as an adult. Children trust because they have no choice, a child literally knows no better. From that moment of realization a child often is never able to trust again. From the very beginning the basic survival skills are tarnished if not completely destroyed.

* Security. For most a sense of security starts at birth. Mothers hold their child for the first time and something referred to as bonding takes place. According to the medical and mental health communities this bonding time may well be the most crucial moment of life. For the child who is the victim of molestation although they may start with that bond, a sense of security, when the molestation begins, be it at six month or six years, that sense of security is shattered. This sense of security is closely related to the issue of trust, if you can not trust the very person or persons that brought you into the world who can you trust. For a child sexual abuse survivor this lack of a sense of security will bleed into adulthood. Not having felt secure as a child often as adults we shun the idea of relying on anyone else for security. In other words since the child was not allowed to hold fast to the bonding experience as adults many simply refuse to bond ever again.

* Love. The experience of child sexual abuse presents many dilemmas for the survivor. The most devastating of these is the survivors definition of love. Once an abuser starts taking advantage of the innocence of a child he/she starts giving the child false notions of what love is. When the abuser is a parent the child will at some point in the course of the abuse begin to relate love to sex. Often times the abuser may be telling the child that he/she loves them as the abuse is taking place. As children we are innocent. Children have to be taught the definition of life and all of it's complexities. When a child is molested he/she is shown that love and sex are the same thing. Even if the abuser never tells the child that he/she loves her, a child will still equate the abuse with love. This is just one of many survival techniques abuse survivors utilize.

* Communication. Victims of child abuse learn early on in live to suffer in silence. Silence for an abused child means many things not the least of which is survival. Many children are assured by their abusers that their silence is imperative for survival. Not just for the child but for their family as well. Children are often told that telling anyone what is happening to them will, "kill mom" or "make daddy have to leave" and any number of other lies that will make it impossible in a child's mind to go to anyone for help. All of the mixed messages that an abused child is subject to during abuse can lead that child abuse survivor into a very confused existence as an adult. The mixed message received as a child makes it nearly impossible for an adult survivor to determine what is truth or fiction. At a young age the survivor is taught to watch people to see the truth instead of taking them at their word. The overwhelming lesson as a child was people lie and as an adult it is difficult to let that go. This difficulty with trusting often leads to problems with adult relationships. The ability to trust is essential in developing strong adult relationships. If the ability is hindered or not there at all developing good relationships as an adult are so difficult that after a time some may give up trying all together which in the long run allows the abuser continued control.

Can an adult survivor of child sexual abuse become a healthy adult with long lasting healthy relationships? The answer is yes with a lot of hard work and a reliable support system. It starts with the realization of where you've been and giving yourself credit for surviving. Once you've given yourself credit for surviving realize that you have been directly affected by your experiences as a victim of childhood sexual abuse and go about the business of re-learning what you should have as a child. Understand that those things mentioned above as well as many others are lessons in life that you've suffered a mis-education in and fix it. Realization is the first step. There are many self help books that can guide and aid survivors in the journey home to that place that houses who they really are. It's a long ride but the journey is well worth the trip. It starts with one step. Step out of the dark and into the light where all of the monsters of childhood can be exposed and you can regain control of who you are.