Thought-Stirring Post: Sex, shame, and guilt.
PUBLIC ENTRY
This week's TSQ is brought to you by blueserenity22* , who came up with the idea last week!
Your family of origin's views on sex may have been / may be an influencing factor in how you experienced and process abuse, specifically in regards to how much shame and/or guilt you felt or still feel about your own abuse. As with anything we're introduced to by the people who raise us, it's often hard to separate what we're taught is "normal" from what we later recognize to be "abusive". It's also often not until we can compare our experiences with others that we are able to see perceptions, mindsets, and habits we picked up as kids as potentially damaging or skewed in some way.
For example, if your parents had required abstinence of you, would it have possibly made your abuse feel invalidated because sex was presented to you as "wrong" in general (and therefore quite similar to the "wrong" that sexual abuse felt like)? Would it have made it even harder for you to tell someone about your abuse? Would you have blamed yourself for "breaking the rules" or would you have possibly felt shame after having been taught that any sexual contact was generally sinful? How would that situation have exacerbated the shame and guilt you may have felt towards your own abuse history?
That's just one example, and there are likely a million different nuances that could arise from your own specific situation.
This week's questions are:
This week's TSQ is brought to you by blueserenity22* , who came up with the idea last week!
Your family of origin's views on sex may have been / may be an influencing factor in how you experienced and process abuse, specifically in regards to how much shame and/or guilt you felt or still feel about your own abuse. As with anything we're introduced to by the people who raise us, it's often hard to separate what we're taught is "normal" from what we later recognize to be "abusive". It's also often not until we can compare our experiences with others that we are able to see perceptions, mindsets, and habits we picked up as kids as potentially damaging or skewed in some way.
For example, if your parents had required abstinence of you, would it have possibly made your abuse feel invalidated because sex was presented to you as "wrong" in general (and therefore quite similar to the "wrong" that sexual abuse felt like)? Would it have made it even harder for you to tell someone about your abuse? Would you have blamed yourself for "breaking the rules" or would you have possibly felt shame after having been taught that any sexual contact was generally sinful? How would that situation have exacerbated the shame and guilt you may have felt towards your own abuse history?
That's just one example, and there are likely a million different nuances that could arise from your own specific situation.
This week's questions are:
- How does (or did) your family of origin view sexual activity?
- How did that perspective affect your feelings about your own abuse?
- How does that perspective continue to affect your feelings and behavior regarding healthy sex?