My Experience - (a VERY long vent)
-My heart breaks for all of my fellow victims here. I wish I could give you all a great big hug ♥️-
Looking through this sub has been very triggering- I'm probably going to avoid the subject for a while, but I still feel like I want to get my story out there.
I've only told my story to a handful of people in my life. I guess this is just me venting.
I was molested by my maternal grandfather from the ages of 3-11 (technically- he stopped doing some things when I was younger, but didn't stop all groping or inappropriate touching until I was 11).
My mom and dad were pretty neglectful and distant towards me in certain ways when I was little. They were both struggling with major depression, pstd, and marital issues, so I remember spending a lot of time by myself, and was told I talked too much or that they didn't have time for me. The only person I felt like actually cared about me was my grandpa. He listened when I would talk, encouraged me, told me I was talented, smart, and pretty, would buy me toys, art supplies, etc.
My family acted like I was some vixen who had him wrapped around my little finger and would almost act like he was MY victim (I was pretty bossy, but he was the only person who let me be bossy).
They always told me how I was his favorite (in a bad way).
My brother and I would spend a lot of weekends sleeping over at my grandparent's house, and I always liked going, but that's also when I would get molested. Me, my brother, and my grandpa would all sleep on the pullout mattress, me being in the middle and he would molest me right next to my sleeping brother. I remember I would sometimes stare at my brother, wishing he would wake up because then my grandpa would stop.
I always had such conflicting feelings. I felt disgusted by what he did to me, but I also loved him and didn't fully understand what he was doing or why.
He stopped touching me at around 11, and he started being very mean to me, a total personality 180. One time he made a comment that no man would want me because I left a few pieces of silverware in the sink after doing dishes (a very normal thing to say to an 11 year old).
Around this time my parents lost our house and we were forced to move in with my grandparents.
A few months after moving in with them, my memories that I had been pushing down resurfaced.
All of my love for him fully disappeared after I realized. When I fully realized what he had done to me and how his love, gifts, and kindness were grooming tactics, it made me feel so cheap. Like I was a hooker who kept going back to him despite hating what he did to me.
I told my mom and she was horrified, but she also has said some pretty victim-blaming things like "Well you loved him so much, so what could I have done to prevent it? If I tried to stop you from sleeping over at their house you would have thrown a fit." Etc.
We ended up living with my grandparents until their deaths. It was so incredibly painful having to live with him for that time- 8 years in total. It really was a nightmare having to live with him, having to remember what he did to me and be in the same space as him. I feel like in many ways my life didn't begin until his death.
I later found out that when my mom was a young adult before having any kids, my grandpa (her father) wrote her a letter with very sexual things in it. She won't go into specifics, but when I found that out I lost a lot of respect for her; the fact that she would let him spend time alone with her children despite knowing he's a pervert??
My abuse has left me having a very complicated relationship with sex and men. I was very sex averse until I was in my late teens, and even now I would still consider a lot of sexual things gross (but I am not asexual). I imagine this will make it very difficult getting into a relationship someday- it will probably take me a really long time to feel comfortable enough with a person to want to have sex with them.
And I find it really difficult talking to men I find attractive- like they make me very uncomfortable and I can hardly even make eye contact with them.
I'm now 24, and to this day the only sexual relationship I have ever had was with my grandpa. What a disgusting sentence.