Abusers abuse people. It's what they do.
Abusers Abuse People: The Sequel.
Abusers Abuse People: The Sequel.
You may have been told it was YOUR FAULT you were molested. This is a LIE. Child molesters routinely tell their victims it is somehow their fault or similar messages to make the child cooperate in covering up the abuse. It is NOT your fault. No child is somehow at fault for an adult CHOOSING to abuse them.Post Traumatic Health
Source
I was molested decades ago and spent years reading research, doing therapy, etc. A LOT of the psychological and emotional issues experienced by survivors of child molestation and incest are rooted in being LIED to by their abuser.
Unfortunately, therapists and books and articles on the topic do a poor job of telling you "You were LIED to and manipulated."
You were a CHILD. They were older than you and possibly an adult.
They did all in their power to make you feel guilty, to make you feel at fault, to make you feel like you wanted it or somehow "did" something that CAUSED them to abuse you in specific.
Reality: You are probably not the only one they abused. Abusers abuse people. It's what they do.
And then they make up all kinds of excuses and justifications and claim some part of it was somehow your fault and claim they didn't understand you didn't want them forcing themselves upon you and on and on and on.
They actively try to get their victims to enjoy being molested in order to confuse you and make you believe their pack of lies. They do this so you will keep your mouth shut, help them cover up their crimes and never go to the police and file charges.
A huge portion of what you need therapeutically boils down to "Stop believing their lies."
No matter how cute you were or how much you wanted attention etc, it is not somehow your fault. They are responsible for their decision to abuse a child. If it hadn't been YOU, it would have been someone else -- and you probably aren't the only one.
No matter how much they forced your body to have pleasurable reactions you didn't want, that doesn't change any of the above one tiny bit.
If you've seen TV shows where the doctor hits a person's knee with a small hammer and the person involuntarily kicks in reaction, it's kind of like that. If you know what you are doing, you can induce involuntary physical responses in people.
Adults will know a lot more about that than children do.
No matter what you FELT or experienced or did to cope with this situation, you were a child and not capable of giving real consent and probably protested and your protests were ignored.
It can be useful and helpful to mentally sort some things out over time, but you can also skip a lot of that if you want to by simply embracing the reality that you were LIED to and manipulated and abused by an ADULT who knew a lot more than you did. You were conned and most of what you were told served to get your cooperation to some degree but more importantly keep you from telling other adults.
Because your confusion and guilt kept you silent, unsure if you would get in trouble for THEIR illegal, awful behavior.