Pages

Monday 29 October 2012

Alone

The purpose of this blog was not to share my personal struggles. It was meant to be an educational blog. It was meant to be a place full of information and full of hope. But today the loneliness is too much to carry. I'm not sure if anyone will be able to learn anything from this post, but I need to talk to someone and this is the only place I have left.

I need to bleed.

Now, it would be a simple thing to take a blade and draw blood from any convenient vein. But I'm not yet far enough gone to loose sight of the fact that doing this would only compound the weight that I'm carrying today. It would create another secret. More shame. More to hide.

It would isolate me further.


So I chose to bleed ink onto paper, staying up all night with my journal. But my journal has become empty. No one but me reads it, so it only shifts the secrets from my heart onto paper. The secrets remain secrets. In black and white, the loneliness just becomes an even bigger, greyer emptiness.

I wanted to share my biggest secret. I created this blog for that purpose, but decided to use it for something less self-centred instead. So I joined what I thought was the appropriate community to share it with. But my secret isn't wanted there. It is too big, too extreme, or perhaps to explosive. Perhaps they fear that my secret will light a fuse that can blow up the entire community.

I don't blame them. They have hundreds - no, thousands - of other members. The many is always more important than the one.

And so I am left feeling more alone than I've felt since the first time I found out that there were millions of other boys like me, who were used and abused like me. None of these millions of boys/men carry a scar that is quite the same shape as mine. They don't have blood on their hands. Their feelings of guilt is the product of stigmas, myths and ignorance. It is the handiwork of perpetrators who had spent months, perhaps even years, carefully grooming them to take the blame on themselves.

My guilt is different.
My guilt is rational.
My guilt is real.

Today I have to face the fact that, even in a group of male sexual abuse survivors, I don't fit in.

I believed that I was on the road from survivor to thriver. I had no idea that the road ran this close to the edge of abyss, that it would be this easy to slip back into the deepest darkness of depression where even God seems unreachable.

Is there anyone out there who is like me, or will I have spend the rest of my life wearing masks, pretending to fit in in groups of people who will never really know me completely?

I'm not sure if I have the will to live life like that...

8 comments:

  1. I have read some of your other posts and as a mother of 2 grown up daughters I can give you some hope. You have a daughter, hang in there for her if you cannot do it for yourself. Guilt eats you up and she needs every ounce of you. I work with terminally Iill patients as a volunteer - providing them with an opportunity to prepare themselves. Every single one of them has guilt of some sort. My job is not to judge them and I don't. Some people ask me why I do it and my answer to them is that there is nothing as real as connecting with a person that is looking death in the face. I have been told some things that some might find shocking but I feel privileged that they have chosen me to hear it. I always say to them look at the reasons why you did certain things in your life, not to justify it but so that you remind yourself that you are human and at the time it was the best you knew to do. Give yourself some slack and enjoy your relationship with your child.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Thank you, Rose. It helps just to know that someone read this.

      And thank you for once again reminding me that my daughter needs me. She is the main reason why I have been holding on this long, and I will continue to survive for her.

      Delete
    2. My husband like you is a survivor of both sexual abuse and rape, so I know something of what you are going trough. We live in South Africa which has all sorts of other problems, both now and in the past. I think you are doing a great job. I hope you meet up with my husband someday, he is a really great guy who is currently starting up an organization to assist guys such as yourself.

      Delete
    3. Your husband is fortunate to have your support.

      Delete
  2. It's me again, I think it is quite ironical that I stumbled across your blog. From reading your story I think you may also be from South Africa. Please do me a favour, my husband has also started a blog with his story, take some "time out" and read it. It is www.kilimalesurvivor.com whatever you do don't give up, I know your story may seem different but you were pushed beyond what anybody especially a child should have to deal with. I must add that I have just completed a creative writing course and I now look at people's writing in a different light and your writing is brilliant, very compelling and sincere. Well done on your blog, your talents may lie where you have never looked. I will stop harassing you now.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. I prefer not to comment on where I'm from. I want to keep this blog anonymous, and sharing my location is an unnecessary hint that might identify me to someone who knows me in real life. But I'll check out your husband's blog. And thank you for the compliment on my writing. It means a lot to hear that from someone who actually have some training...

      Delete
    2. Oh, and I don't call the harassment. It's good to know that this blog is reaching someone ;)

      Delete
  3. Hi. I am not sure what you would consider "like you." I find solace in a support group for others who have been a victim of sexual assault/abuse resulting in PTSD. Its amazing how different our traumas are, we all have the same issues now because of it. Thats where I find solace and companionship, knowing they struggle with the same day to day issues.

    ReplyDelete

Please note that all comments are moderated and may take a while to appear.