“I am so angry that I could [fill in the blank]” is a statement commonly expressed by female survivors of childhood sexual abuse and their husbands. Some of us are scared of our anger, some of us salivate in our anger, and some of us are scared while we salivate. I was so enraged at my wife’s perpetrator that I…
In my last blog, I wrote about the Distorted Perceptions inflicted upon the survivor of childhood sexual abuse. The family of the survivor, on the other hand, often adopts Selective Perceptions. With our selective perceptions, we interpret information in a way that is congruent with our existing beliefs. For example, most people who voted for Trump view his first 100…
Childhood sexual abuse inflicts and imprints a distorted lens through which the survivor interprets – or misinterprets – life. The distortion affects the survivor’s perception of life, God, men, themselves, sexuality, etc. It is difficult to identify an aspect of human life not affected by this imprint. That is not to say that all survivors have a distorted perception of…
My wife and I recently conducted another weekend conference for Marriage Reconstruction Ministries that focused on the effects of childhood sexual abuse and how the survivor can be “Moving from a Shattered Past to a Strengthened Future.” During the two-day event, we offered some time for Q&A. One of the questions was, “Psychology seems founded in/from ungodly men and women.…
I wonder how many of us husbands were raised by non-communicative fathers? Kyle, a friend of mine, and I were having lunch the other day at Applebee’s. His dad is experiencing aging issues that include some behavioral changes, some expected and some not so expected. Kyle said that his dad has started talking about his feelings – that’s an unexpected change.…
Caleb stood in the hallway and poked his head into the room, enough to see in but not enough to be easily seen. He was deciding whether to attend my breakout session at a men’s conference or the breakout session on pornography – how men are enticed into it and neurologically affected by it. My breakout session focused on helping…
This week, every one of us will hear it sung, “We wish you a Merry Christmas.” For survivors of childhood sexual abuse, however, Christmas can be accompanied by heightened anxiety and shame. It’s anything but merry. The long-term effects of childhood sexual abuse are vast in that they include psychological, physiological, and social impact on the survivor’s life. They are…
Clark Barshinger, in Haunted Marriage, calls childhood sexual abuse “murder of the psyche.” The depth of psychological injury from childhood sexual abuse and the long-term existence of its manifestations surpass the effects of most other forms of trauma. The notion that survivors “just get over it” ignores the trauma of abuse and the intricately intertwined wiring of our personhood; emotional,…
Tina Zahn experienced dissociative moments common to many survivors of childhood sexual abuse. In her book, Why I Jumped, Tina described how her stepfather ordered her to their dark and dingy basement. She recalled how she hated her stepfather’s breathing, being held down by him, and the smells that emitted from him. As her stepfather went through his abusive ritual,…
Many survivors of childhood sexual abuse experience a phenomenon common to trauma survivors known as dissociation. Dissociation serves as a means of self-protection against the terror or horror of the abuse. When the common experience of dissociation becomes a practiced pattern, it develops into a disorder known as Dissociative Identity Disorder (DID).