Men Talk Articles - August/September 2008
Breaking the Silence Around Sexual Abuse
– © 2008 by Allan Anderson
Why aren't we talking about it?
Honestly talking about my child sexual abuse, sexuality and all the subsequent effects has taken me through many layered self-explorations over decades. The Men's Center has been an important resource through it all, from initially showing me men had complex feelings and could even talk about them and be supported. After a childhood of fear, shame and neglect, I learned to talk about myself and my life and feel the support of having others listen and understand. However, I've found child and adult sexual abuse has been and remains a complex and difficult subject that is mostly avoided at the Men's Center as by men and society at large.
The silence about sexual abuse is certainly not because of a lack of child or adult victims, or a lack of serious effects. In fact, about one in six boys is abused by age 16 and about 10% of adult rape victims are male. So sadly, all of you reading this know victims, many of our center's members are victims or are in intimate relationships with victims. The immediate effects and aftermath for males is largely the same as for females and is generally measured by severity and frequency of abuse, the age when it occurs and the support available to the victim. The effects of sexual violence are frequently life-long and severe. Males in particular are much more likely to keep silent and not seek support or help. Perhaps as damaging as the abuse is not being believed when they do. I kept silent until my 20's until I told a therapist I met at the Men's Center, and some memories of abuse have only come back to me 40 years later. Only now am I speaking more freely about it.
Victims find various ways to escape from the experience but become then cut off and isolated. Ones own body cannot be trusted and "it" becomes alien to "you". Children so effected have trouble in their child development and become adults with missing basic skills from childhood. Healing from sexual abuse involves trying to reestablish a connection to people, oneself and a world which became impossible to understand or even experience. At the same time, the psychological defenses and childhood adaptations to horrible environments that children and adults are capable of make it very stigmatizing and simply incorrect to see abuse survivors as wounded, limited, scarred or fragile people. In many ways, I have come to feel my abusive past gives me very powerful insights into others, great strengths and access to spiritual perspectives of life that others perhaps lack.
Talking to others and experiencing support, acceptance and understanding is a basic feature of healing. But it is especially difficult for men and boys in a society that is very uncomfortable with seeing males as helpless victims. We all want to avoid this truth and say, "It's over now, get on with your life", "Can't you just get over it now?" and "Forget it. It was just sex." But I cannot seem to completely forget though it helps for a while. And many have encouraged me to try.
I recently decided it would help me to talk more about my experience with other men. I sought an abuse survivor's group for the safety and understand like minded men could provide. But in this land of 10,000 groups for shopping addiction to alcoholism, I could not find a group for male child sexual abuse victims. Over and over, I was told "We can't find men who want to talk about it, or they don't show up when they say they do." Right now, I find the silence around these issues unbearable.
Women beginning in the 70's created Rape Crisis Center's and over the long term have made great improvements in the awareness of sexual violence. Men have benefited from this but have not found their own voice. And many male survivors tell me Rape Crisis Centers often do not respond in helping ways to male victims. This is my experience as well. I believe especially young adults and children benefit from frequently hearing age appropriate messages that help them speak up for themselves and get help in all the situations they are likely to get into, as well as the potentially truly abusive ones. Prevention and early detection of abuse is key.
Many might see this as a "women's issue" but I can't support that. Men need to speak out for themselves, about themselves. Where are the men involved in this issue? What would help you "find your voice" and be part of the healing of our community?
Resources:
The web site www.jimhopper.com is a psychologist at the Harvard Psychiatry school. He has an accurate summary of statistics and what is mostly known and not known.
www.malesurvivor.org, is a very active web site for males and "friends and family" overcoming sexual victimization. Men can read publicly viewable messages, can communicate anonymously and can join the site to participate in a non-public member area. Real time chat, private messaging and bulletin board messages are available.
Victims No Longer, by Mike Lew is a good book on male child sexual abuse effects and healing.What keeps you from speaking about this issue? How often has this come up in our groups and lives and do you feel able to respond effectively?