Mail Online

I’ve been abused all my life: do I deserve to find love?

BEL MOONEY WWW.BELMOONEY.CO.UK

DEAR BEL,

SEXUALLY abused as a child, I finally (as an adult) took the man to court and won my case. But the scars are always with me.

At a controlling church I met my husband, but intimacy was a big problem. So he decided to boost my ‘self-esteem’ by putting me on a dating website. Hesitant at first, I became addicted to the excitement, coming alive for the first time in years. My husband dated others, too; our marriage was ‘open’. He even had sex with a woman in our house while our children were asleep in their beds.

Through the site I fell for Lee, a married man. He left his wife and encouraged me to leave. I no longer wanted the open marriage. Lee moved to a lovely house and I believed this was the start of a better life, so I ended my marriage, despite my husband’s pleas.

He said I was being manipulated. I moved to what I thought were temporary lodgings. But three years later Lee still kept me a secret from his family and he became controlling, moody and upset me.

I regretted leaving my marriage but it was too late. My husband had met someone new and was happy. I tried to make my new relationship work, but couldn’t.

Divorced, I bought my small house and lived alone. Now I’m seeing a man (also met online) who is separated. Divorce has been agreed and things are reasonably amicable with his ex. He wants us to build a life together but, despite meeting most of his family, I still haven’t met his adult children and don’t know when that will happen.

He says he doesn’t want to annoy his ex while sorting stuff out. The situation with the children reminds me of how it was with Lee.

Bel, I have made such a mess of everything. I have apologised to my ex but he has never said sorry to me. I apologised to Lee for how I split with him, but he won’t talk and has never said sorry either.

I feel my world was rocked from the moment I was put on the dating website and my husband typed all the messages, kept records of my dates and how far I went sexually. He expected me to report back.

What I’m asking is, how do I reconcile myself to all this? I just want to be settled, with no more secrets. Scared of heartache, I want to progress with the new man.

All I’ve known is abuse, from when I was a girl at the hands of a man the same age as my father, to being in a draconian church, to what happened in my marriage and the controlling relationship with Lee. Should I accept people like me don’t deserve to find love and happiness?

LAURA

You should no more ‘accept’ unhappiness than you should agree that it was somehow your fault that you were sexually abused as a child. No, no, no!

What is meant by the defeated phrase ‘people like me’? Your distressed, confused letter (the original over three times as long as the edited version printed here) reveals you are shouldering the burden of a guilt that is not yours.

You have been the victim of men all through your life (and you know that), so it’s time to stop blaming yourself. Time to stop saying ‘sorry’, unless it is to the sad face you see in the mirror.

You reveal in your longer letter that you did have help with the consequences of the sexual abuse, yet such wounds can probably never be healed. The secret self- disgust you probably felt then still marks you now, making you vulnerable to exploitation.

I hope you have researched the long-term effects of abuse online; there are websites that give information and help, and may even encourage you to find therapeutic help at this stage, when you so desperately long to create a new life (see sexualabusesupport. campaign.gov.uk).

Try to find the positives that can make you proud. It’s not your fault you came to enjoy the controlled extramarital sex that was entirely your husband’s shocking idea.

It’s not your fault that you fell in love and wished to escape the marriage. It’s

not your fault that Lee lied about his intentions and kept you as his shameful (as it seemed to you) secret.

You are more sinned against than sinning and it’s important for you to know that — not so you feel sorry for yourself, but because you should acknowledge the strength that has kept you going and brought you to this spot. Don’t let the past spoil the present by assuming your new love will behave as Lee did.

It makes sense that he should finalise his divorce before progressing to a life shared with you, so try to be patient. Issuing needy demands to meet his adult children is not the way forward.

You have your own home, so make it the tower from which you survey the world; a sanctuary you deserve.

Can you ‘reconcile’ yourself to the past? Only by accepting that somebody damaged you long ago and ( I repeat) none of what happened was your fault.

Every time you’re on the verge of self-blame, look in the mirror, take some deep breaths (with long exhales), put your hands on the mirror for support and say aloud: ‘I’m going to make things different now.’

Let your new man know you are now in charge of your own life, and as worthy as anyone of happiness.

Belmooney

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2021-06-12T07:00:00.0000000Z

2021-06-12T07:00:00.0000000Z

https://mailonline.pressreader.com/article/282522956411108

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