How to come to terms?
Hello, I (24F) come here because I feel like I have nowhere else to go,
for years I have suffered from eating disorders, disassociation and derealization and a severe addiction to maladaptive daydreaming, for years, I’ve had the same two pieces of memories: a man in my room and waking up with my underwear drenched in blood, I was in fifth grade.
Despite all these strange symptoms of trauma plus a diagnosed anxiety disorder (I have stopped going to therapy due to scheduling issues), I’ve managed to be somewhat functional, my parents love me and they have always worried for me and my sister, and have done everything for us including college and a post-graduate degrees (I wanted to go to Europe, but now I feel lost), I’m a historian and have a post graduate in HR administration, I work a managerial position and have a great salary for my age and experience, my bosses know me by name and my coworkers are fond of me, I have many friends, I go clubbing, to coffee shops and parties, I thought my life was at its peak.
Unfortunately, I have managed to solve that dreadful puzzle, some time ago, a cousin trusted me that one of our uncles molested her, this man lived in my house, in the room next to mine and my sister’s, I’m seven years older than my cousin and by the time he switched to her, I had outgrown his preference and he had been kicked out by my parents. I live in an intergenerational household, we take care of my 91 year old grandmother, who forced us to live with this man, I love my grandmother to pieces but I have just realised that she facilitated my assault. That night in fifth grade I woke up bloodied and in dull pain, I thought it was my period, I didn’t get my period until I was 13, 4 years after I woke up with blood in my undies.
I’m an activist who has heard many stories of CSA and SA, I give those who have suffered comfort and a shoulder to lean on, but now that I know it happened to me I cannot help but blame myself, had I put what happened to me together earlier, would I have been able to spare my cousin this pain? She remembers it all, I only remember pieces of it (though I would prefer, if possible, to not remember all of it), my grandmother keeps giving money to this man and the food and things I help buy for my home, he keeps inviting him to it, I can never tell my mother, for my father once confided in me (maybe it was not right) that my grandmother already knows, because he also did it to my mother and my cousin’s mother.
Today I’m at work, I don’t even feel human, I even cried at the storage room, I do everything robotically and cannot engage with my friends and coworkers, I feel lost and empty, I’ve told two of my friends but I still feel detached from myself, what can I do? Telling my parents is off the table, my mother was incredibly depressed when she found out about my cousin, this would destroy her and I don’t think I can stomach therapy while living with my parents, this man will get no punishment for what he did to us, my country has a statute of limitations and women are prey in our courtrooms, how can I keep going? I feel like my future has lost all meaning, I know why I’m broken now, but it has costed me a great deal