Episode Transcript
WEBVTT
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Hi, this is Rachel and recovery. We've got a special guest today,
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Christina. She's gonna tell us a
little bit about herself. Hi, Rachel,
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my name is Christina. I am
thirty three years old, high work
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in real estate. I am single. I live with my two year old
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dog, and is my baby right
now. Hobbies that have just probably reading,
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anything outdoorsy, and it seems that
lately my biggest hobby has been working
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on my recovery. So that take
up USO Santal and that I'm right now.
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Okay, so Christina is a survivor
of childhood sexual abuse. We're going
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to ask her some questions about her
recovery program and she's gonna answer them to
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the best of her abilities. So
question one, what things have you done
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for your recovery of being sexually abused? So the past couple years I have
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done quite a bit. Prior to
that I really didn't do much and then
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I really started seeing the way it
was affecting me in my life and especially
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over the last year, I really
got into committing to therapy. I see
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a therapist once a month and recently
I started doing amdr therapy, which has
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been intense, but really great.
I've read books, talk to other people,
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Meditation, Yoga. I think the
biggest thing recently that I did was
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going to retreat or survivors of childhood
sexual abuse and meeting other people that had
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gone through that and just meeting the
staff there and people that are trained to
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help people like this, because it's
just been something that most of my life
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I've avoided and that has really that. That really changed the way I saw
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Maarica very recently. Okay, what
has been the most helpful? The most
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helpful probably connecting with other survivors,
and that was really important for me because
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I spent so much time in denial
from the fact that it happened to me
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and that I really didn't talk about
it much. And I've pulled a couple
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people throughout my life, but nobody
that had really experienced it or could offer,
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you know, their own experience,
and so I felt very alone with
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it a lot of the time.
So just connecting with other people and having
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a support group that I was stayed
connected with and, you know, we
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can bounce things off each other and
keep each other updated on our progress,
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has really been beneficial for me.
I think that's the most selful how did
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your family respond? Not Well.
So only one person in my family knows
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and my sexual abuse happened actually with
a family member, and I think that's
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why it made it such an uncomfortable
conversation to have. And through my recovery
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work I've planned on telling the rest
of my family. That point has not
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been reached yet where I feel like
it's the time to do it, but
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previously I did tell a family member
and I think that they were in shock
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and you know, I get my
denial honest in my family. Everybody in
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my family does not acknowledge their emotions
anything uncomfortable. We're just going to sweep
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it under the rug. And that's
basically what happened. Is I was told,
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okay, I will do what you
need to do to get through this,
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but we're not going to talk about
it again, and we sure have
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it. It's just been something I've
had to tiptoe around and recently that's something
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I figured out that I'm not comfortable
doing for the rest of my life.
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So it wasn't well received. That
was about ten years ago, so I'm
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hoping, you know, the next
time I go about this it goes a
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little bit better. That can be
so disheartening. It was, and I
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think that's why I avoided doing any
work for a long time, because the
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response I got, you know,
when I finally like, as survivors,
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it's such a big deal to finally
confide in somebody about it, because we're
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so protective of the secret and we
finally get to this point where we're like,
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okay, I'm going to tell this
person and they're going to finally help
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me, and you know, it's
just this big relief we're supposed to be
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and so when it turns out really
negatively, it's it's like, oh well,
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I shouldn't have done that, I
should just, you know, keep
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it back inside, just signal I
do what I was doing because that was
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better. And I don't, you
know, this person, I don't think
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did it intentionally. I think they
weren't able to deal with it. She
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doesn't, you know, make it
any less hurtful, but I understand everyone
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deals with things in their own way. How did your community respond? So,
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as far as community, the only
people that I've really told have been
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really close friends and depending on how
close they were, you know, that
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determined the level of detail that I
shared with them. But all of my
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close friends that I've told about it
have been so supportive. The first person
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I ever told was my best friend
and I remember going to her house and
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I'm thinking in my head like I
can't believe I'm going to tell somebody,
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and I shared this with her and
she was so supportive, so understanding.
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She actually ended up sharing with me
that she had gone through a similar experience
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as far as having, you know, childhood sexual abuse happened to her as
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well, and I really felt good
about that. And anyone else that I've
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told has been very supportive. But
I'm very particular about who I choose to
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tell as well. So, you
know, I make sure I have a
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good relationship with them because I don't
want that scenario to happen again where it's
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like a negative response. So I'm
very I'm very aware of who I'm telling.
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Fair enough. was there any re
victimization or victim blaming? Yes,
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whenever I shared with my family,
or the one family member about the abuse,
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it was a lot of victim blaming
or, you know, saying,
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well, why didn't you say anything
before? Are you telling me the truth?
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You know, what did you do
want? And so it's, you
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know, a survivor's worst nightmare for
somebody to say, well, what did
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you do? You know, and
we have to understand it takes this a
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long time to understand that it wasn't
our fault, and so when someone says
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that to you, it sets you
back. So so there was and I've
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had to work through that as well
to understand that their response has nothing to
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do with me. That's so true, and it's such a difficult thing to
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work through anyways, and then that
just compounds it drastically. It's almost worse
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than the abuse itself, when sometimes
it is. Yeah, that's a good
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point, because I remember even in
therapy I was, you know, going
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through these events and the events directly
really to the abuse. I remember I
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really didn't get that emotional about and
then when I was talking about that instance,
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you know, I got really emotional
about it, and it did.
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It felt worse than the actual abuse
because you're like expecting that to go better,
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you're expecting it to have it,
but it does. It see opposite.
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How has this impacted your career?
I don't know that it has impacted
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my career, surprisingly in a negative
way. I've learned to be extremely independent
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and a very hard worker because I
I sometimes escape through that. So work
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is distraction for me and if I'm
working, I'm not thinking and I have,
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I've always done well as far as
work goes and, you know,
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have that perfectionist mentality, and I
think a lot of survivors do, where
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it's like, you know, that
control and if everything's perfect, then okay,
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which in a lot of situations has
worked to my advantage, and so
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I do think that that has been
of gloss of my career. You know,
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of course, the negative of that
is it's allowed me to be distracted
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for a long time without working on
these issues. But, you know,
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I finally got to a point where
I was ready to do that. How
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has this impacted your dating life?
My dating life has been very I don't
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want to say rocky, but it's
very close there. It's hard for me
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to get close to people because of
this. It makes me very uncomfortable to
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be in a stable relationship. So
I've had experiences where I've been in a
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lot of long term relationships but I
wasn't able to just stay in them and,
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you know, back to me be
being very avoided and like to,
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you know, live in denial.
I would get these relationships and then whenever
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things were world serious and stable,
I wanted to run. That's kind of
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my my Goto move is to get
away from the situation and not discuss things,
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not work things out. It's like, you know, just escape.
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And so for a long time I
didn't understand why I was doing that and
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I had a lot of relationships that
a I would either leave or be they
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were not healthy relationships. I wasn't
getting treated well and I would stay in
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those too long. So those were
my two relationship patterns. And just in
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the last year when I started really
working on these things, I took a
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year off of dating. Night just
gotten out of a relationship that was not
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good for me. He was not
treating me well and I finally got out
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of that, started doing therapy and
took the whole year off of dating and
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I've just now started getting back into
it and I feel much more confident,
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much more secure in what I want
and how I feel and just working on
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these issues, especially like sexual issues, because I know people that experience this
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type of abuse. How you know, long lasting sexual issues, and that's
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been something that I've been working on
the last year. So I feel better
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going into dating now than I ever
have before because I know these issues that
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I can work on. But there's
a part of me that's, you know,
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ears dated that it took me so
long to finally figure that out.
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Um, yeah, no, that
can be frustrating, just especially the older
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you get, the more frustrating it
can become. Yeah, and I just,
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you know, sometimes when I'm working
on the stuff, I'm like,
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man, I wish I had done
the work, you know, five,
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ten years ago, but there's also
that side of me that understands that I
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wasn't ready to do it. You
know, all those experiences brought me to
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where I am today, where I'm
able to work on it, and that's
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that's just the way life goes.
How do you think this has impacted your
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finances? I don't know that it
has impacted my finances. I have always
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been pretty good with money, again, with the control thing, and and
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I have like anxiety surrounding money in
general. So I'm always, you know,
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afraid of not going to that I'm
not going to be able to be
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independent if I don't have my own
money. So I've always worked really hard,
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always try to save money so I
can take care of myself, which
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has been a good thing. So
I don't think this is directly affected finances.
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How how has this impacted your overall
long term health? HMM, long
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term health. So mentally, I, you know, have struggled with,
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you know, depression and anxiety on
and off because of this, and of
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course that affects my physical health,
just feeling, you know, a lot
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of times just exhausted, and I
know it's a common theme with survivors that
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they have like stomach issues. So
you know, I've gone through periods of
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time rights it's not like nauseous for
no reason, and this these weird,
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like physical symptoms that I've always had
all my life but never could really attribute
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them to anything. And just as
I'm reading in about the effects of I've
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used on your physical health, they're
all starting to make sense to me now.
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So I've been lucky to not have
anything, you know, majorly wrong
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with my physical health. I've always
tried to say, you know, in
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pretty healthy shape and eating well and
things like that. So I've been glad
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that nothing serious has happened. But
I have had, you know, times
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where it's frustrating because that you feel
not a hundred percent physically, but there's
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nothing really diagnosable about you, so
that that can be frustrating. I know
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that you struggled with alcoholism before.
How has that connected to your health and
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it's long term effects? Yeah,
so that's something that I completely left out
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of this whole story. And I
have been in recovery from absince use for
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eleven years. I got clean when
I was twenty one and so luckily I
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haven't had any long term health effects
from that. I Bove. You know,
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I'm for sure that my drug and
alcohol used very my tweenage years was
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a very adaptive hoping mechanism for me. You know, it was killing me,
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but that was the way that I
was protecting myself. You know,
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if I was Numb, I didn't
think about it, didn't have to feel
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any emotions, and that's the way
I like it. So you know,
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that worked for me for a number
of years. Of course, there were
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a whole slew of negative consequences that
came along with that until I finally got
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clean. And actually right after I
got clean was the first time I ended
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up telling someone because it was so
difficult for me to keep that inside when
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I didn't have dugs or alcohol to
Nem it. It was almost to the
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point of like, I have to
tell somebody this, for I'm going to
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end up using again, and so
for my health and mental health, I
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didn't want to continue the way I
was going and so I did end up
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telling, you know, my best
friend at that point and and I've had
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a support group through that as well, which has been super important for me
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and so helpful. You know,
even if I wasn't directly working on this
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issue, just having that support group
of people was was what I really needed
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at that time my life and still
need today way. So yeah, with
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that I'm glad that I didn't have
any long term physical issues from that,
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because I very well could have.
Definitely did not take care of my body
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for a long time. How has
this impacted your social life? Social Life,
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I don't know. I think that
I've always been a very I don't
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know if they vary. Not Anymore, but when I was growing up and
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when I was a kid, I
was very shy, very reserved, and
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so it was I was always more
on the quiet side and so it was
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difficult for me to meet people,
as difficult for me to trust people.
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And you know, through having a
support group and just being clean and learning
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how to, you know, live
without drugs. I started building some of
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those social skills that I never had
before, but I'm still still to this
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day, I find it hard to
fully trust people. Socially, I've done
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much better. I'm, like,
a lot more outgoing now. Don't have
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as much of a problem meeting people, but I do, you have a
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problem getting close to people because you
know, especially if your abuser is somebody
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in your family, that you were, you know, supposed to trust and
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have that connection and be able to
depend on them, and then they do
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something to you like that, it
makes you learn that you can't be trusted.
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So that's very hard to break and
it's been something that I've continued to
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work on and just keeping good people
in my life has really helped with that.
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How is this affected your long term
mental health? Long term mental health,
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I mean, like I mentioned earlier, I've been diagnosed with depression and
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anxiety and really just started working on
that last year. You know, I
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decided to start taking medication for that, which is really helped, and for
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a long time I put that off
and didn't want to to accept that that
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that was something that I need to
do, because then I would have to
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accept that I was depressed. And
if I was depressed, I have to
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accept that I had this abuse happen. So it's, you know, just
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this long line of denial for me. But once I really start working on
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that, it's gotten a lot up
better. But there's definitely days were,
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you know, if I'm working on
something tough or something stressful in my life,
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Thursdays I just wanted the lay about
all day and I've had to work
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hard to get away from that because
it can suck you in quick so I
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know that that that is an impact
that it has had on me, just
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having that struggle with depression. To
other victims out there, what advice would
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you want to give them? My
advice would be not to run away from
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it. That that has been,
you know, the thing that has gotten
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in my way the most where I
just didn't want to face it. And
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when I started facing it and nating
out for help and doing the work,
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it got better. And I know
that, you know, survivors have a
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lot of shame surrounding their abuse and
in you know, there's just this mentality
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of don't talk about it and and
if we just start accepting our truth and
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and speaking about it, even if
it's scary. You know, we don't
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have to go shout it from the
rooftops or anything like that, but it
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just telling one person. We don't
have to carry it by ourselves. What
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was the grooming process for you?
I don't know, it's not something that
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I've thought a lot about. And
I read that question, you know,
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whenever you hit had sent it to
me and I was telling myself I'm to
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think about that later and then I
just didn't. But but you know,
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it's just not something that I've really
thought about. I mean, I'm sure
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that you know at some point the
abuse that started with just like small things,
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you know, it like just kind
of testing the waters and seeing,
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you know, is this going to
be okay, it's something that they're gonna
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you know, let me do and
and then getting worse from there. But
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but aside from that, I don't
know how was just impacted your faith.
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I've always been a pretty spiritual person. I don't know if I've ever been
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really religious, but but I have
always believed in something and but there's been
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times where I've been very angry at
that something, you know, that I
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think, well, why did this
have to happen to me and I have
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these thoughts of you know, there's
other people in the world that have never
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had to experience this or understand what
it's like to go through it, and
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it's, you know, it's easy
to slip into that pity of like,
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you know, why me? Why
this? Want, you know, what's
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the point? But I've tried to
stay out of that and stay more in
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the gray's food I have for being
able to recover and get better. And
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that's the way I feel today.
You know, tomorrow or next week I
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could feel completely different and be back
in that why, I mean mentality.
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But but today it's been okay,
and I think you know, especially whenever
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I was in a much darker place
in my life, whenever I was using
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drugs and alcohol during this you know, I hadn't told anybody, you know,
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or even back when it was still
happening and I was using drugs and
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it just felt very hopeless, very
dark. So during those times I definitely
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struggled with my faith. Today I
feel like I have a more solid foundation
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and I've been at peace with it
much more. Okay, Christina, just
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anything else you would like to tell
tell us before we wrap this up?
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I just want to thank you for
doing this podcast and I think it's great
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that people are talking about it,
sharing their stories, sharing their experience and
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just letting people know that other people
have gone through this and people aren't alone
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their self out there. There's support
out there and recovery is possible. All
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00:26:33.519 --> 00:26:37.519
right, guys, thanks for listening. Tune in next Thursday for our next
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show and always you can always follow
us on facebook, twitter, Linkedin or
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00:26:44.640 --> 00:26:51.910
Instagram, and you can always visit
our website at www Rachel and recoverycom and
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00:26:52.349 --> 00:26:56.670
always listen to us on any of
our podcast platforms with its spotify, apple,
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00:26:57.430 --> 00:27:04.259
Google, tune in or audible.
Thanks for listening. Thanks.
