I know the question on a lot of people’s minds is why I should read your blog or listen to you. I understand this question completely because I asked the same question when I was looking for help. Especially when I had no clue where to look or even what could help me. There isn't a lot of information out there for victims of grooming or sexual trafficking most of the information is geared toward the parents.
The best answer is because if your are reading this as a fellow victim I've been in your shoes. I researched for years and had to combine a bunch of therapy's for different areas that actually helped me recover from a traumatic childhood, grooming and trafficking . I will share a little of my past experiences with you here as well as future blogs in hope that I can inspire you or encourage you that healing can happen even when it may seem hopeless.
My father passed away when I was only 6 years old, and it was just my mother and I after that. Growing up in a single parent home was a struggle at times and I had no real father figure in my life. My mother also started fighting cancer right after my father passed away. The result of this was spending a lot of my childhood and teen years helping take care of my mother and the house when I wasn't in school until I was able to work at 15. When I was 18 my mothers cancer became terminal and she went into hospice care. She wanted to die at home and I tried to make that happen and for months I stayed with her every night because she couldn't be alone.
Growing up I was afraid to make friends or get close to people especially in high school because I knew if my mom's health took a turn for the worst id be moving 1700 miles away to live with an aunt. I had very few people I felt I could really confide in which made things worse. I knew no one in my school could really understand what I was going through or how it was affecting me, which only lead to lower self-esteem and lack of self-worth. I was a bit of an outcast I wasn't allowed to do things after school or hang out with friends. I was a loner and it wasn't by choice.
This left me to be a very easy target for a friend of my mom's to start grooming me and it became even easier when he became my boss. At first I thought was a great relationship and I really viewed him as the father figure I never had. He taught me how to drive, gave me some self defense lessons and he complemented me when I did something right. At that time having positive re-enforcement in my life was something I clung to. I didn't get much of any from anywhere else.
After 6 months of working there and a over a year of him talking to me in a fatherly way him asking me about boys in my life didn't seem odd. I was honest and told him there wasn't anyone and I doubt anyone would be interested in me. The conversation continued a little bit but nothing seem odd. A few weeks later he said he could teach me how to kiss. I told him no and I wasn't comfortable with that.
Things went back to normal until he until he raped me the first time. I'll never forget his words when he was done "You can't tell me you didn't want that". I became his sexual play thing whenever he could get me alone for 8 months before I was able to escape. It was difficult it was in the 90's and he was well know. I knew no one would believe me and the couple of people I tried to tell didn't believe me. I had to figure this out on my own and as time went on the mental damage was getting a lot worse. He had convinced me that he was in love with me and I accepted the affection I desperately craved for a while even though I knew it was wrong.
These experience left me very damaged and broken. I became a huge people pleaser putting everyone else’s needs ahead of my own. I constantly pushed myself for perfection to try and get any kind of respect, praise or appreciation because I didn't feel good about myself. The neglect I had as a child also led to huge subconscious beliefs that I wasn’t good enough. These feeling were made worse by the grooming and the sexual assaults.
Because of this I formed relationships with people who treated me the way I felt about myself. I spent most of my life putting other people first and neglecting myself. I very much overextended myself and had trouble saying no. It was made worse when I became a single mom of 3 kids and I pulled in as much as I possibly could for them as well. They were in Girl Scouts, pop warner cheer, tumbling classes, school sports and I was also PTO treasurer for a couple of years. This caused me so much extra stress and to loose myself. My health failing but even on sick days I couldn't rest. I had put on a lot of excess weight and was miserable.
The longer this went on the more I deprioritized myself and subconsciously I felt worse about myself. I had a special talent for understanding people and their perspectives and sympathize with them but I couldn't do that for myself. I saw relationships and friendships as people I could help. I was trying to find fulfillment in helping other people while neglecting myself more than ever before.
I kept getting in worse and worse relationships and easily feel for the love bombing phase of narcissistic partners because I so desperately craved that feeling of being loved. My last 2 relationships really destroyed me. I didn't realize it but I needed to be destroyed so I could properly rebuild. The relationship before my last one was very toxic and left me a shell of myself.
This was the true beginning of my journey into healing, self-worth and self-acceptance. I had lost so much of myself previously that I had completely forgotten whom I was. The only identity I had was a mom and employee/ member of some group. I fell into what felt like a crippling depression. I was lost, alone, and completely empty, I didn't trust myself or my own intuition anymore. I couldn’t figure out what was happening to me why I felt the way I did or how did I start feeling like me again. That started a 5 year journey into research and working on myself. I have read a ton of books, websites, blogs, taken programs or watched webinars for some, listed to countless hours of YouTube videos all in an effort to feel like me again.
It was during this time I discovered that there is not a lot of information out there that is just not helpful. Finding anything geared towards victims of grooming is almost impossible. Just about everything out there is geared towards parents of victims or the signs to watch for. Because of this I read just about every self help book on the kindle I could all addressing different area's trying to find anything that could help me feel normal again. When I was at work I would listen to YouTube videos on some topic's or podcasts. I became obsessed with finding a way to be normal again and to be a better parent to my kids.
I learned what a lot doing all this research. I won’t lie to you and tell you that my journey was easy because it wasn’t. I had months where I felt like something was really wrong with me and I might need to be committed. This was mostly because I didn't have a real support system in my life. It was just my kids and I. I attacked this on my own because at that time I felt like the only person I could depend on was myself and I shouldn't have because that was the extra hard way.
I’m going to share the things I learned and also what has helped me and some of my clients get back to being themselves again. How I got from a point where I was living in constant survival mode, with high functioning anxiety, PTSD, and depression to a place where I feel whole and complete on my own. My friendships and relationships are more supportive and feel more reciprocal for me and I feel at peace with myself.
I don't want you to have the same struggles I did. It was a horrible path to take one that caused me to be burnt out and extremely sick. For free resources please subscribe to my page for updates on new blog posts. I also have a podcast available on Spotify, Google, Amazon and Iheart. A link for the Spotify page is below.
If you have been a victim of grooming and feel lost, alone, are struggling and want to work with me directly please book a call on my Services page.
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