Episode Transcript
WEBVTT
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Hi, this is Rachel and recover. We've got a special guest with us
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today, Steve. He's going to
tell us a little bit about himself and
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he he was married to a woman
who is a sexual abuse survivor and he's
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going to tell us a little bit
about that. But he's also going to
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tell us about a website that he
created for partners with with that have been
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sexually abused and being that supportive partner. Steve, tell us a little bit
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about yourself. Hi, Rachel,
thanks for having me. Yeah, so
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a little bit about myself. was
married to the survivor of childhood sexual abuse
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for quite a while and you know, relationships can be tough even in the
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best of circumstances. So you know
we have some challenges and I was looking
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around. I had my own counselor
and I was looking around also for like
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support groups, right or resources for
partners of people who have been sexually abused
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as children, and I couldn't find
any. And so there weren't any online
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forums, there weren't any support groups
in person. Support groups can find all
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sorts of things for survivors themselves,
but you know, when you say,
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well, what about partners of survivors. We have some needs to that are
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kind of, you know, special
and unique. So what about that?
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And I didn't find anything and it
was really frustrating to me. So I
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was asking my counselor about it and
she said, you know, I couldn't
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find anything either. There isn't really
anything out there, and so I thought
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that was kind of odd. Now, this was like two thousand and seven,
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two thousand eight or so, and
you know, there were a couple
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of books out there, but they
didn't really do much for me. So
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I have a bit of a technical
background, so I thought, you know,
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I'm just going to set up a
private, you know, members only,
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peer support group for partners of survivors
like me, and so I did.
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started a website that's called support for
partners dot org. If anyone wants
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to check it out. It is
completely it's amateur, you know, it's
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just you know, you're not going
in there, don't go and you know,
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expecting professional counseling. It really is
all about peer support. And so
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you know, actually my counselor challenged
me to that. She said, well,
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Steve, if there's nothing out there, what are you going to do
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about it? And so you know
that kind of spurred me to do this,
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and so that's been going since two
thousand and eight and we've had number
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of people subscribe over the years.
People have been there for a long time
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or just a little bit. And
Yeah, so that's kind of my story
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in a nutshow. Okay, I
guess tell us a little bit about your
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own experience, like what were some
of the things you you struggled with the
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most. Sure, so you know, one thing that's a struggle is intimacy
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and trust. I think you know
intimacy and trusts are sort of recurring challenges
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with these relationships and and over the
years, as I've read more stories for
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people who have joined the site,
those are some recurring themes and if you
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think about it, it really makes
sense. You know, when a child
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is abused, I think whether sexually
or physically, emotionally mentally, there's a
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level of trust that was betrayed,
right and because they trusted and it was
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betrayed, bad things happened, and
so I think that that's sort of sets
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a certain way of thinking in place. That vulnerability that's needed for trust can
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be dangerous because then that trust is
broken and bad things happen. So you
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really can't be intimate with someone without
being vulnerable and trusting them, right.
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So I think that, you know, that's one of the biggest challenges for
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partners of survivors is, you know, how do we deal with intimacy and
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trust, because a lot of times
what happens is the survivor will sort of
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shut down intimacy and trust, you
know, for whatever reasons, I'm sure
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you know, maybe it's protective or, you know, they're trying to do
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all they can to recover themselves.
But then, you know, when that
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intimacy and trust shuts down, that
can be pretty bewildering for us partners like
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hold it, what happened? Why
did that happen? What can I do?
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How can we repair this? And
you know there's no easy answers for
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that. So, you know,
that's you know, what the forum,
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they online site call it the forum
to is really all about is, you
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know, people learning from others.
You know, my marriage, honestly,
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it didn't last. We ended up
divorcing, which was, I think,
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the best outcome. I mean,
you know, no one goes into marriage
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wanting to divorce. No one is
necessarily happy to divorce, but you know,
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turns out. We weren't able to
make things work out. Divorced and
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you know I've since moved on and
and remarried and very happy. I still
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run the site and you know,
take care of that. But yeah,
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that's where we're at. What were
some of the resources you sound that were
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helpful? Yeah, you know,
that's one of the problems. There aren't
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a lot of resources out there that
are helpful. If you look for sort
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of tailor made things, there are
some books. I think you know one
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of the classics is called Ghosts in
the bedroom. We search for that book
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on Amazon you'll probably find some others
related to it and you know, it
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didn't help much for me, but
it helps other people. One of the
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best resources I can recommend for partners
of survivors is get your own counselor you
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might be in couples counseling, which
is good, but you know, trying
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to make these relationships work and working
through the issues take incredible energy and it's
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really good to be able to work
through some of those issues with someone who
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is professional at it right. So
my counselor helped me a lot with that.
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It's also good to talk with others
who are in similar situations, which
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is the pure support site that I
set up. That's what that's all about.
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It's, you know, when you're
going through something alone, you think
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you're the only one in the world. That's that's they're going through it,
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and when you join a site like
this one that has a lot of other
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people in similar situations, it's kind
of refreshing to know that you're not alone
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anymore. And those things help selfcare. I tell people's self care is one
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of the biggest things you can do
to help yourself through this. It's,
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you know, the relationships can be
draining and whatever drains out of you,
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you've got to fill it back up
and you do that with self care.
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And selfcare means different things for different
people. I say that it's you do
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those things that rebuild your enthusiasm,
that rejuvenate you, that give you energy,
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that build your energy, whatever those
are. You know, it could
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be healthy relationships with friends and family, could be cycling, it could be
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exercising, it could be carpentry,
could be cooking, and I love to
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cook and that's a that's something for
me. But whatever it is, you
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know, selfcare is, I think, where it starts, and then self
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awareness I think is another important thing
here, because you know, you have
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to ask yourself, why am I
here? Why do I continue to stay
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in this relationship with a so hard? And that's a valid question, right,
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and I think it's by searching that
question you learn about yourself and you
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learn about your partner and you have
a better understanding of how you got there
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and where you want to go.
And then, I tell thee will often
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the one of the third things that
I look at is setting some realistic expectations.
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So I think once you have your
energy back and once you have some
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self awareness about why you are where
you are, you can set some realistic
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expectations, and I say realistic because
you know you really need to be able
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to achieve those expectations. You know, if you're expecting perfection, well,
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it's not going to happen, and
perfection doesn't happen with any relationship. So
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what are some expectations that you can
set, hopefully, you know, ideally
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in cooperation with your partner, you
know, setting some expectations so that you
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know you can achieve them and you
can be a little more content. Right,
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because meeting those expectations leads to a
level of contentment and then longer term
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you might decide that, you know, those expectations are fine, you can
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live with that or you can't or
whatever. But you know, that's that's
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sort of the advice and the through
read map that I talked with people about.
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Well, and I read the book. I think it's allies of those
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who have allies and healing. Yeah, and I found because, I mean,
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I'm not only a survivor, but
I've also dated several survivors myself,
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so I'm kind of one of those
people that are like in a and Alan
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on. So that's a good analogy. I was going to talk about that
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of a at like, you know, where's the Alan on for, you
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know, sexual abuse survivors? Right? I mean honestly, I mean because
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I mean one there's a lot of
addiction with those who are survivors. So
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yeah, and I feel like a
lot of the same issues occur. Even
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though we're not addicted to alcohol necessarily, we usually have some sort of addiction.
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But you know, whatever that may
be, it may not be as
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toxic as, you know, drugs
and alcohol, but no, it's the
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emotional turmoil is very similar. Yeah, you know, I did read a
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study. I don't have it in
front of me. But they found,
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the study found that childhood abuse is
the strongest predictor of addictions and adults.
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And think about it, it makes
a lot of sense. Really, really
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really does. I like to the
way I think about it is that you
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know, as a kid growing up, you're forming your foundation for how you
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see the world and how you see
yourself, and when that is damaged through
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abuse of any kind, I think
it puts some damage into the into that
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foundation, and it's really hard to
repair foundation after you built a house on
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top of it. Right. So
the you build that foundation as a kid,
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then you become a young adult,
you're built in the House on top
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of that foundation and then eventually you
realize hey, my foundations broken. It's
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tough to fix at that point.
It's not impossible, but it's tough to
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fix. It takes hard work.
So I can I can understand. You
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know, the link between abuse and
addiction makes perfect sense for me. Well,
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I mean and I mean just eating
disorders and all kinds of other things.
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I think the list is a mile
long and you know, the higher
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the a score, the more medical
issues that come along with that. And
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they scores are base. I don't
know if you've heard about the a scores,
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but I have not. What's The
a score? The a score is
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like a it's a one to ten
survey question there and it mostly, you
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know, it has to dive with
different types of abuse, neglect. You
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know, some of the questions where
you actually used or physically abuse? You
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know, was your mother, you
know, physically abused by your father?
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WAS THEIR DIVORCE? was there?
Where was your you know, how many
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absent parents? Did you have?
A parent with the mental illness? I
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mean, and it's and I don't
know if that's all of them, but
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there's ten of them and those are
the types of questions they ask. And
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and the more you the higher your
number is. And if you're over,
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like for you just you're more your
health compliment cations just go rise tremendously.
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Yeah, for sure. Yeah,
I mean the mind and body or link.
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Oh, yes, that's for sure. Yeah, you know, it's
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a big too. A big thing
about a question I get from a lot
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of different partners is like, you
know, the abuse my partner went through
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wasn't as bad as the abuse I
know someone else went through, and that
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other person is doing so much better
than my partner. So what's up with
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that? And so one of the
things I found through just reading and research
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is that, you know, if
a kid is abused and they come back
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to a supportive family and they can
tell their family about it and their family
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supports them and get them the help
they need right there at that point in
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time, then the damage of that
abuse is likely to be much more muted
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than the long term. Oh yeah, right, make perfect sense, because
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you're you're treating the the damage at
the point it happened instead of waiting years
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right before you treat it. Come
back to a dysfunctional family or you don't
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say anything or you get blamed for
it or whatever. You know, then
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that's a whole different story and I
think it doesn't. My experience, from
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what I've read and from talking with
other partners, it's not so much the
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type of abuse or severity of the
abuse, it's the fact that the abuse
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happened in the family wasn't supportive or
the the survivor didn't feel they could talk
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about it, and so it keeps, stays bottled up inside for a long
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time and that's you know what a
stays bottled up like that. I think
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it's like an acid, right,
it's going to eat away at things and
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eventually comes to the surface, right, yeah, I mean if you don't
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address those issues and they have nowhere
to go, they'll just eat at you
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for years and you'll see it over
time. You know, they're like,
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why is this person so like?
It come out most of the time itself
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some sort of self sabotaging right,
yeah, and that's where, you know,
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one of the things that I learned
about being a partner of a survivor
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is there's a thing called secondary abuse
where, you know, partners weren't the
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ones actually abused, but the abuse
has a knock on effect, essentially to
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the partners and and I think that's
real. You know, there's there's times
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where survivors can project on, you
know, the abuser onto their partners,
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because we're touching on the intimacy and
the trust issues, and so there's a
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lot of times where, you know, partners coming to the site will say
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that they were accused of being abusive, but they weren't really when you when
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you talk to them, if you're
in describe with their they weren't abusive,
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but they were getting blamed for it. And there's other things like that.
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So there's a sort of projection that
comes on the partners too, which is
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very confusing to deal with, because
you're saying, well, I didn't know
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about your abuse, you just told
me. So you know my path actions.
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I you know, they were viewed
one way then and now they're viewed
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a different way because now I know, or you know, the anger you
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have towards me is. It just
feels so undeserved. What did I do
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to deserve that level of anger?
And so you know, the partners,
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I think you know, can be
secondary victims of that trauma and death with
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confusing because it's sort of comes out
of nowhere sometimes. Oh yeah, no,
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I mean I've been on the receiving
end and I probably distributed some of
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that myself. So because in my
experience, trauma attracts trauma. MMM MMM
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so, yeah, now I can. I can see that as well.
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And both of my yeah, my
parents marriage was a good example of that.
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But HMM so, because I'm at
least second generation on my mom's side.
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MM So, and I suspect my
dad was sexually abused, but I
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don't have any evidence. So yeah, they're yep, that stuff is it's
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not. It's multigenerational. Sometimes too, it is, it is, yeah,
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it can be. You know,
people are, I think, scared
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that, if, you know,
if their partners abused, is a going
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to make their partner likely to abuse
their own kids. And and I don't
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think that that's the issue. I
think it's not so much that a abused
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person abuses others. I think it's
I think has a lot to do with
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stability and protection of the kids as
they grow up. But even even then
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you can be the best parent in
the world and they're still truly bad people
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out there in the world who will
do bad things. Yeah, I mean
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that's that's a that happens a lot, I mean, and a lot of
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I mean, especially depending if they
end up with. I mean a lot
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of survivors end up with some pretty
severe mental illnesses from this, you know.
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Yeah, I mean we're talking Schiz
like schizophrenia or association dissociation, be
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PD. I mean the list is
a my you know, all kind of
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anxiety, depression, adhd. The
list is, you know, mental illness
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and childhood sexual abuse is really long
and the means, and some of these
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are that, you know, there
are a lot of their life first,
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you know, and there's for sure. Yeah, you know, and then't
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best thing you can do is manage
it, which can be very challenging,
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and I think that's where there's a
lot of learning for partners of survivors,
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you know, learning about dissociation,
for example. You know, that's I
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don't know how common it is with
abuse survivors, but I think it's fairly
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common. It's not, you know, not the majority, but it's there
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and when someone's associates it's really confusing
for a partner if they don't know that
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that's happening. In So, you
know, one of the things that you
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know, people in the support of
partners site will talk about is, you
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know, my partner just went off
on me and, you know, verbally
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beat up on me and then an
hour later they denied it, they didn't
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think they did, or they said
it wasn't that bad. I think that's
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that can be maybe some dissociation going
on and it's really confusing. So,
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you know, it's partners. You
know, we we fall in love with
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our partners right and we fall in
love and we don't know about a lot
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of these things and then they start
to happen and it's very confusing because it's
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like out of the blue, and
so, you know, what do I
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do now? Right. So,
everything was fine, something triggered my partner
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and now they haven't talk to me
in three weeks or it's been three years
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since we've been intimate with each other
because of flashbacks and so, but it's
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not really explained and it's very confusing, I would say. It can be.
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So, you know, being able
to talk with other people who have
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gone through that can be it's a
very well, it can help, but
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also it can be very discouraging to
you know, when people come to the
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site, sometimes they're discourage because it's
like there's no happy stories here, and
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I remind people that, you know, if you're coming to a site like
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support for partners, it's because you
have in trouble and you're looking for help.
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If, as a partner of a
sexual abuse survivor, you and your
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partners been able to work things out
and make it work and have a happy,
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healthy relationship, well there's no need
to come to a place like that,
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right. So, so it's a
self selecting sort of group and it
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can be a little depressing it.
But I tell people, you know,
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focus on the stories, right,
focus on the stories that are told and
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how you might identify with those and
what you might learn from them. And,
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you know, try not to get
discouraged, you know, because you're
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your path isn't going to be the
same as anyone else's path, and so
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learn what you can and take what
you can and apply it. All right,
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guys, thanks for listening. Steve, thanks for being here. He's
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coming back next week to tell the
rest of his story. And always find
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00:22:41.279 --> 00:22:48.160
us on your favorite social media platform
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