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Effects of Childhood Sexual Abuse, Part 2

Effects of abuse, part 2
By Paul Irby Special to the Abilenian
Abilene Reporter-News
Posted January 7, 2009 at 11:28 a.m.

Last month we examined the multifaceted reasons why some children who are sexually abused seem to have more intense and pervasive effects from the abuse and why other children seem more resilient. This month we begin taking a look at what some of those effects can be. Just as the factors leading to these effects are multifaceted, these impacts are multidimensional. Also, keep in mind that the effects mentioned are possibilities, and not all survivors of abuse will experience all of the signs or symptoms detailed in this and subsequent articles. Although we are going to be examining these dimensional impacts in separate articles, they are connected. We know that how we think and what we believe influences the way we feel, and how we feel influences our behavior. Therefore, we begin our discussion with the cognitive or mental impacts sexual abuse can have on its’ victims.

Flashbacks and nightmares are two of the more widely known residual cognitive manifestations. Flashbacks can be triggered environmentally or experienced as unexpected seemingly spontaneous intrusive thoughts. The most common environmental triggers are associated with sight and smell. Seeing the abuser (or even someone resembling the abuser), visiting the location of the abuse, and encountering odors associated with the abuser or location of the abuse are obvious triggers. More subtle triggers are associated with other senses, such as hearing certain phrases, voice tones, inflections and encountering certain textures.

Flashbacks are generally experienced in one of two ways. Either the survivor experiences memories of the abuse like a terribly vivid movie playing in their mind, or they have a memory that causes them to consider all the ways they could have done something differently, further exacerbating the harmful myth that they had a role in perpetuating the abuse.

Nightmares are an issue that deals with the unpredictable and irrational subconscious, and therefore it is difficult to have truly insightful comment. Therefore, my input here is fairly limited. Nightmares can have varying degrees of frequency and intensity. Some experience recurrent nightmares (the same nightmare over and over), while others have different nightmares that reflect or distort what they encountered. Some antidepressant medications, such as Cymbalta, have been associated with more vivid and realistic feeling dreams. Please consult your prescribing physician if you have questions related to medication side-effects.

Beliefs that survivors of abuse develop about themselves and the world around them are other devastating cognitive impacts. Consider for a moment your own experience of sitting in a restaurant and noticing couples or families sitting together and seemingly enjoying a meal. It is most people’s natural tendency to assume the best about those whom we observe. We assume the couple are happy and in love or that the family is healthy and stable.

Between the ages of 10 and 13 children begin to develop more abstract, deductive and inductive reasoning. Along with this development, the abused child comes to the correct understanding that his home life and/or experiences are different from what he has seen on the Disney channel or read about in books. This child who is at school or other social places with peers begins to make the same assumptions as we do. However, these assumptions often lead to the distorted belief that no one else’s home life is like theirs and, therefore, they are different from everyone else.

Being exposed to the trauma of sexual abuse often leads its’ victims to believe that the world or certain aspects of it are untrustworthy and unsafe. This is especially true of the child who is abused by a parent or other family member who is “supposed to be” trusted. It is these core beliefs that the child develops about themselves and the world around them that lead to feelings of depression, anxiety, fear, anger, shame and guilt that will be explored in this article next month.

Paul Irby, M.A., is a licensed professional counselor with the Ministry of Counseling and Enrichment. Mental Health Matters is facilitated by the Mental Health Association in Abilene.

Original article found here:
http://www.reporternews.com/news/2009/jan/07/effects-abuse-part-2/

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Effects of Childhood Sexual Abuse, Part 1

April is designated as abuse prevention month for the state of Texas.  Therefore, the majority of posts for this month will orbit around childhood abuse and the effects of such abuse.  I pray that our world can come to a place where no child is ever abused again!

Effects of abuse, part 1
By Paul Irby Special to the Abilenian
Abilene Reporter-News
Posted December 3, 2008 at 11:21 a.m.

It seems the sexual abuse of children is an epidemic in our society. This evil respects no boundaries of gender, race, ethnicity or socioeconomic status. The Mental Health Association of Abilene recognizes thousands of people in the Big Country have been impacted by this epidemic. Therefore, executive director Kirk Hancock has commissioned the penning of six articles over the course of six months for the purpose of educating the general public regarding the potential developmental impacts of sexual abuse on its victims.

When approaching the discussion of this subject, it is important to note there are no standard or predictable outcomes, and some seem to adjust better post-abuse than others.

For the next five months, Mental Health Matters will have articles highlighting how specific dimensions of a person can be impacted by sexual abuse. These articles will take a “shotgun” approach to describing potential impacts. It should be noted not all survivors of sexual abuse will experience all the effects discussed, and the intensity with which others endure their respective impacts will differ. Therefore, it stands to reason that we first answer the question of what factors influence the intensity of the adverse developmental impacts on a child who has been sexually abused.

The duration and frequency of the abuse is one important component to consider. Some children experience the abuse on a daily, weekly or monthly frequency for a duration of months or years. Others have endured less chronic or isolated instances of abuse. It is this latter group that has the least amount of susceptibility to adverse consequences down the road.

Another consideration is the kind of abuse perpetrated. Survivors with the most intense developmental impacts are those who sustained penetration orally, anally or vaginally. The invasive nature of these acts adds to the already deep sense of violation, both physically and psychologically. Sexual abuse can include less invasive, yet still horrific, forms such as manual stimulation and groping over the clothes.

The response of adults to the child’s disclosure of the abuse is another vital piece to understanding the resilience of some abused children.

Common mistakes parents and other significant adults make when a child musters the courage to disclose the abuse are not believing the child, blaming the child or defining the child by the abuse. The lack of support, blame and even punishment of the child can have just as devastating impacts as the actual abuse.

Other factors include the age and temperament of the child, the presence of violence or intimidation, along with the sexual abuse and the relationship of the abuser to the abused.

While nothing positive exists in an abusive situation, there are “best case” scenarios. Bear in mind, even children who come from a “worst case” scenario who access quality professional help and have a solid social support system can not only survive, but thrive.

Next month we will explore possible mental or cognitive impacts sexual abuse can have on a child.

Paul Irby, M.A., is a licensed professional counselor with the Ministry of Counseling and Enrichment. Mental Health Matters is facilitated by the Mental Health Association in Abilene.

Original article found here:
http://www.reporternews.com/news/2008/dec/03/effects-abuse-part-1it-seems-sexual-abuse-children/

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Red Light

I have taken the liberty to edit out what I felt might be triggering language for our readers in recovery.

Red Light
by Brian Westbye

They used to say that my looks could stop traffic. Yeah, I’d stop traffic for any cheap hood waving a $20 in my face. Looks can only take you so far, and then it’s what you do with your looks. And when you’re young and dumb and desperate to make it…

I worked Avenue B a lot. Noon rush, usually. I’d get lots of executive types that would cut out for a little “exercise” on their lunch break, if you know what I mean. Alphabet City was a wasteland back then, so these big-wigs would come down from midtown or up from the financial district, ‘cause they didn’t want to be seen anywhere around their offices. Smart, right? But business was good. Lots of Jaguars and Mercedes and guys that had money to burn on cocaine and hookers. And there I was.

Like I said, I was young and dumb. Fresh from the sticks. I wanted to make it as an actress. Hell, who didn’t? I tried waitressing, but I was horrible at it. Tried working in a grocery store, but I was horrible at that, too. Tried working as a secretary, but I couldn’t pass all those tests. I was out of work, and one of my girl friends suggested I try it. Some friend, right?

I guess I got “lucky” on my first time. I went out with my girl friend, and my first was some middle-management guy in a cab. He was clean, and he was staying at the Sheraton on Seventh at 52nd.  First time out and I hit the jackpot.

If only the rest were like that. You wouldn’t believe what pigs some of them were. Guy in a Bentley pulls up, I jump in and the car reeks. Can you imagine sex with that? Sometimes we’d do business in the car on the sidewalk in broad daylight. And sometimes we’d check into the most disgusting flops you could imagine. Cockroaches, stains on the sheets…just sick. Lot of times after a  job like that I had to take my shoes off in the street and shake out the bugs. And you can imagine what it felt like up my skirt.

It’s a hell of a thing to be servicing a guy whose wardrobe is worth more than your monthly rent in a dump like that. It really kind of makes you feel your place in life. But I felt my self-worth in a pile of bills in my hand at the end. And then I went out and felt even more self-worth.

Me and my looks, right? Jesus. Me, the Human Red Light.

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Rising from the Depths of Pornography

Rising from the Depths of Pornography
September 19, 2012
By Alcoholic’s Daughter, Schizophrenic’s Sister

Let me tell you a side story of my life…

As a child around five or six years of age, I was inadvertently exposed to visual pornography by careless adults, including my alcohlic father, who watched videos thinking I was already fast asleep on the couch, or who left their magazines just lying around.

When you can’t understand things, you are not even sure why they are wrong. My natural curiosity made me want to go over them time and time again. I also played the scenes back and forth in my mind. I even encouraged my sister (who was diagnosed as schizophrenic in her late twenties) to join in the fun, not to chicken out and turn off the TV when intimate scenes were on display.

At one point, I remember pre-adolescent me crying and in a tantrum as my mother found the stash and threw it away. The problem was that she did not leave me any explanation of why this was wrong and sinful in the first place.

For a time, I had no more of such stimuli, and developed a fascination with the written word. By my teen-aged years though, literary pornography came into the picture with graphically-written romance novels and best sellers describing the requisite intimate moments. Peer pressure was on with this being the favorite pastime of all the girl in my high school. I kept on buying and borrowing books. Even the required English class reading featured a few scenes here and there. By this time, I would go back to these books, re-read these specific scenes and practice self-abuse. If I had ever been in a relationship during those turbulent years, I would have had dallied with pre-marital sex, gone through teenaged pregnancy, married at a young age and then separated by the time I was in my mid-twenties. This happened to a lot of my peers, even those on the honor roll.

In my late teens, God’s grace intervened. I rediscovered the beauty of the Catholic faith, started to frequent the Sacraments, followed sound advice from prudent spiritual directors, and answered the call to virginity for the sake of the kingdom of God.

I still have to struggle to live chastity in my state of life and live a temperate life with all the temptations made available to us by mainstream media and the new media powered by the internet. I have also been left with self-esteem issues due to comparisons with the reality of my developmental changes in comparison with what I have seen or read.

I count on the grace of God though to overcome my past and look forward to a future in His Heavenly Kingdom.

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Toxic Porn, Toxic Sex: A Real Look at Pornography

Toxic Porn, Toxic Sex: A Real Look at Pornography
Find freedom from porn addiction, see the 9 lies of pornography and how to break free.
By Gene McConnell
Originally posted to: http://www.everystudent.com/wires/toxic.html

Porn & addiction…sex out of context

effects of pornography - porn addiction - pornography addictionOn a cold, dark night, there’s nothing better than a blazing fire in the fireplace. You can pile on the wood and let it burn nice and warm. It’s safe, warm, relaxing and romantic. Now take that same fire out of the fireplace (which was built for it) and drop it in the middle of the living room. Suddenly it becomes destructive. It can burn down the whole house and kill everyone inside. Sex is like that fire. As long as it’s expressed in the protective commitment of a marriage relationship, it’s wonderful, warm and romantic. But porn takes sex outside that context.

It’s a big business that makes a lot of money and doesn’t care how. They’ll show you whatever they think will make you come back and buy more. “There were 11,000 porn video titles last year versus 400 movie releases from Hollywood last year…[and] 70,000 pornographic web sites.”1

What Fuels Porn Addiction

One of the most vital parts of mental environment is a healthy idea of who we are sexually. If these ideas are polluted, a critical part of who we are becomes twisted. The porn culture tells you that sex, love and intimacy are all the same thing. In porn, people have sex with total strangers — people they just met. All that matters is my satisfaction. It doesn’t matter whose body I’m using, as long as I get it. Porn gets you to think that sex is something you can have anytime, anywhere, with anyone, with no consequences.

The problem with porn’s shallow perspective is that relationships are not built on sex, but on commitment, caring and mutual trust. In that context, like fire in the fireplace, sex is wonderful. Being with someone who loves and accepts you, someone who is committed to you for your whole lives together, someone you can give yourself completely to, that is what makes sex really great.

To Find Freedom from Porn Addiction: Recognize the Lies

You can’t learn the truth about sex from pornography. It doesn’t deal in truth. Pornography is not made to educate, but to sell. So, pornography will tell whatever lies attract and hold the audience. Porn thrives on lies — lies about sex, women, marriage and a lot of other things. Let’s look at some of those lies and see just how badly they can mess up your life and attitudes.

  • Lie #1 – Women are less than human The women in Playboy magazine are called “bunnies,” making them cute little animals or “playmates,” making them a toy. Penthouse magazine calls them “pets.” Porn often refers to women as animals, playthings, or body parts. Some pornography shows only the body or the genitals and doesn’t show the face at all. The idea that women are real human beings with thoughts and emotions is played down.
  • Lie #2 – Women are a “sport” Some sports magazines have a “swimsuit” issue. This suggests that women are just some kind of sport. Porn views sex as a game and in a game, you have to “win,” “conquer,” or “score.” Men who buy into this view like to talk about “scoring” with women. They start judging their manhood by how many “conquests” they can make. Each woman I “score” with is another trophy on my shelf, another “notch” in my belt to validate my masculinity.
  • Lie #3 – Women are property We’ve all seen the pictures of the slick car with the sexy girl draped over it. The unspoken message, “Buy one, and you get them both.” Hard-core porn carries this even further. It displays women like merchandise in a catalog, exposing them as openly as possible for the customer to look at. It’s not surprising that many young men think that if they have spent some money taking a girl out, they have a right to have sex with her. Porn tells us that women can be bought.
  • Lie #4 – A woman’s value depends on the attractiveness of her body Less attractive women are ridiculed in porn. They are called dogs, whales, pigs or worse, simply because they don’t fit into porn’s criteria of the “perfect” woman. Porn doesn’t care about a woman’s mind or personality, only her body.
  • Lie #5 – Women like rape “When she says no, she means yes” is a typical porn scenario. Women are shown being raped, fighting and kicking at first, and then starting to like it. Porn teaches men to enjoying hurting and abusing women for entertainment.
  • Lie #6 – Women should be degraded Porn is often full of hate speech against women. Women are shown being tortured and humiliated in hundreds of sick ways and begging for more. Does this kind of treatment show any respect for women? Any love? Or is it hatred and contempt that porn is promoting toward women?
  • Lie #7 – Little kids should have sex One of the biggest sellers in pornography is imitation “child” porn. The women are “made-up” to look like little girls by wearing pony tails, little girl shoes, holding a teddy bear. The message of the pictures and cartoons is that adults having sex with kids is normal. This sets the porn user up to see children in a sexual way.
  • Lie #8 – Illegal sex is fun Porn often has illegal or dangerous elements thrown in to make sex more “interesting.” It suggests that you can’t enjoy sex if it isn’t weird, illegal or dangerous.
  • Lie #9 – Prostitution is glamorous Porn paints an exciting picture of prostitution. In reality, many of the women portrayed in pornographic material are runaway girls trapped in a life of slavery. Many having been sexually abused. Some of them are infected with incurable sexually transmitted diseases that are highly contagious and often die very young. Many take drugs just to cope.

Bottom Line of Porn Addiction

Pornography makes a profit from the ruined lives of young women and entraps men who will spend lots of time AND money succumbing to their product.

effects of pornography - porn addiction - pornography addictionWe might think that the things we see and hear don’t affect us. Yet we all admit that good music, good movies and good books add a lot to our lives. They can relax us, educate us, move us or inspire us. Just as uplifting media can benefit us, pornographic images can negatively affect us.

Images are not always neutral. They can persuade us. Businesses know that if they can get a persuasive image of their product in front of you during a highly emotional moment, it will sink into your subconscious mind. The advertising scientists are so good at what they do, they can predict just how much more of their product you will buy if you see their ad. Sometimes, viewers don’t even see the name of the product. Reese’s Pieces paid a huge price just to have their candy shown for a few seconds in the movie “ET,” and sales of Reese’s Pieces skyrocketed. Why? Because the emotions connected with watching that small boy reaching out to the alien were transferred to the visual image of the candy. If a split second view of a product — even when it’s not the center of attention — can affect people’s behavior, imagine the effect of a movie that keeps your attention glued to the screen for an hour and a half with sexually explicit images.

What are the effects of pornography on a man?

What kinds of ideas is porn putting into our heads? If the wrong things keep getting dumped in, your mental environment can get so polluted that your life is going to have problems. One of the most vital parts of mental environment is a healthy idea of who we are sexually. If these ideas are polluted, a critical part of who we are becomes twisted.

Porn Addiction: The Pull of Pornography

Not everyone who sees porn will become addicted. Some will just come away with toxic ideas about women, sex, marriage, and children. However, some will have some kind of emotional opening that allows the addiction to really grab hold. The porn companies don’t mind at all if you become completely addicted to their product. It’s great for business. Dr. Victor Cline has divided the progress of addiction into several stages; addiction, escalation, desensitization, and acting out. For porn addicts, I’ve found that there is another stage that comes first — early exposure. Let’s look at these stages:

EARLY EXPOSURE Most guys who get addicted to porn start early. They see porn when they are very young and it gets its foot in the door.

PORN ADDICTION You keep coming back to porn. It becomes a regular part of your life. You’re hooked and can’t quit.

ESCALATION You start to look for more graphic pornography. You start using porn that disgusted you earlier. Now, it excites you.

DESENSITIZATION You start to become numb to the images you see. Even the most graphic porn doesn’t excite you any more. You become desperate to feel the same thrill again, but you can’t find it.

ACTING OUT SEXUALLY This is the point where men make a crucial jump and start acting out the images they have seen. Some move from the paper and plastic images of porn into the real world, with real people, in destructive ways.

Porn Addiction: Am I Addicted?

If you see any of these patterns in your life, you need to put the brakes on right now. Is porn becoming more and more in control of your life? Do you have trouble putting it down? Do you keep going back for more?

Porn Addiction: What Can I Do?

The first thing you’ve got to do is admit that you struggle with pornography. Believe me, you are not strange or unusual if you do. Millions of men are at various stages in the struggle with porn. It’s really not surprising. The porn industry has spent billions of dollars trying to snare you. Is it really shocking that they have succeeded? For some of you there may also be issues in your past, such as abuse or sexual exposure, that makes porn addiction even harder to shake. There is only so much you can do in fighting addiction without help.

You need someone to help you break this addiction. Overcoming the secrecy is absolutely vital. You probably can’t escape addiction without it. That doesn’t mean everyone has to know you’re struggling. Pick someone you can trust who counsels men who are having problems with addiction — a pastor, youth group leader or counselor. Someone you can completely trust, feel safe with and has experience in the area of addiction isn’t going to be surprised.

Is There Any Freedom from Porn Addiction?

Pornography entraps you with lies. In contrast, God can lead us into truth. Jesus said, “If you hold to my teaching, you are really my disciples. Then you will know the truth, and the truth will set you free.”2 Those who heard Jesus say this were offended and countered, “We have never been slaves of anyone, how can you say that we shall be set free?”3 And Jesus explained that people are enslaved to sin, but that He can set you free.4

Sin not only enslaves us, but it distances us from God. And no one is perfect. No one is righteous in God’s eyes. Instead we’re told that “We all, like sheep, have gone astray, each of us has turned to his own way.”5 We all deserve God’s judgment and punishment. Yet God, who is holy and loving, provided a solution for our sin, so that we would not have to be justly condemned. He personally took the punishment for our sin on Himself. Jesus Christ, the Son of God, was tortured and died on the cross for our sin so that we could be forgiven. Three days later Jesus rose from the dead, just as He said He would. And He now offers you a relationship with Him. One of the most amazing statements in the Bible is this one, “If we confess our sin, he is faithful and just to forgive us our sin and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness.”6

The Most Important Relationship

In your search for intimacy and love, pornography is an empty substitute for real love. We have been created by God to have our intimacy needs met most deeply by God Himself. “For God so loved the world that he gave his only Son, that whoever believes in him should not perish, but have everlasting life.”7 In contrast to the darkness and destruction that pornography can bring to people’s lives, Jesus said, “I came that they might have life, and have it more abundantly.”8 God offers you his forgiveness through a relationship with Him. Do you want to ask Him to forgive you and come into your life? You can tell Him right now. If you need help putting this into words, here is prayer that might help:

“Lord Jesus, I am aware of my sin, and I know that you are also. I ask you to forgive me and cleanse me. Thank you for dying on the cross for my sins. I ask you to come into my life right now and begin to work in my life. Direct my life as you see fit. Thank you for your forgiveness and for coming into my life right now.”