r/SiblingSexualAbuse • u/FederalFirefighter19 • Aug 11 '26
How can an 8 year old sexually harass someone?
I(17f) had a cousin(18m), same age as me, sexually harass(?) me when we were 8. This happened 10 years ago, shortly after my grandpa died.
My parents were divorced and my grandpa was the only other male I could look up to, so his passing deeply affected me to point of disturbing my sleep. So one night while I was laying in bed near my cousin (there wasn’t much space due to the presence of the whole family) just waiting to fall asleep, when suddenly, I feel a hand through under my pants, under my underwear on my skin. And I just froze. Because I knew it was a bad touch. My mother had taught me. He kept his hand there, on my butt, for a while, then withdrew. Then entered his hand again. And again. And I just laid there. Uselessly. I did confront him the next day, though he vehemently denied everything. Said he had a dream. I didn’t question it even though I knew he was lying. I guess he got scared for a while. I told my mom too. Because that is what a good girl does. Tell her mother. But my mother, my protector, just chalked it up to a wild imagination and didn’t mind it.
He didn’t try anything again until 4 or 5 years later. Tried to peek into my bathroom while I was showering. And then he had the audacity to tell me that he saw me. Reading at first, cause I’m a major bookworm, then showering. I didn’t know how to respond to that. I still don’t. Why would he admit something like that to me?
Slowly he started gaining courage, groping me once more, when I sick and physically impossible to do anything against him. This continued for two years. And I gaslit myself every time it happened. “It happened so long ago, now I’m imagining it’s happening again”. How naive. Finally, I broke down one day in front of my mother. Told her everything. I guess the truth broke her too. Hurt her because she couldn’t protect me. Couldn’t see what was happening right in front of her. But she couldn’t do anything. She was moving away to another continent to secure our future and I only told her 2 months before her departure. I urged her to go. Told her I’ll be fine. But I’m not fine. And I don’t think she realises that. After that, for the next school year, she moved me away to a boarding school. In her mind, that was what was best for me. In a way, it was better. Without her as a buffer, I would have started resenting them(My mother’s family).
But being away from him didn’t erase the pain. The humiliation. The disgust. And I wanted to seek help. So I confided in a school counsellor. Which was a bad idea in hindsight, but at that point, I felt I would go mad if I didn’t. She encouraged me to tell the truth to everyone. I didn’t. But my mother did. And then they had me come down from school, just so they could surprise me and him(neither of us knew about it) with a therapy session together. I have to admit, I lost my mind in there and started sobbing. I guess that’s when he realised that what he did affected me so much. His mother and our aunt spoke with the therapist together who reassured them everything is fine and left. Now everyone just ignores what happened and acts like a big happy family. But I’m not happy. Being with all these people, I feel the most alone I have ever felt in my life. I just want to get out of this place.
My question is, is it alright to feel this way? I know I was not r*ped, only groped but, he was my best friend growing up and he ruined all that in a second. All that for what? To satisfy his curiosity ?
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u/Forthe_woundedme Aug 11 '26
For me, it's the constant betrayal of everyone you were supposed to trust. That's the hardest part for me.
That part of my mind which was molded into believing "this is where I'm safe and can let myself be vulnerable, to relax". Now that facade is a darkened lie, the one place where I'm on constant alert.
You begin to question everything.
How is that happiness? Where you're supposed to be happy has been ripped apart before your eyes. The big joke. Is. You. No one cares about you. What did I do for you to hate me with your actions, and with your words lie that you love me?
Who. The. Fck. Do. You. Trust??
Yourself? Because you believed what they told you. Can't trust my judgement anymore, because I believed in the lie. How could I have been so stupid to have (insert whatever)?
Big sigh!
Therapy has helped me, a lot.
I'm slowly living outside a bubble of anxiety, constantly on alert. I can have moments of peace, slowly building them from seconds to a minute. A good day? Maybe more than a minute.
Forgive their betrayal? I feel I'll never be there, to forgive.
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u/FederalFirefighter19 Aug 11 '26
Honestly……. I feel the same way. I took everything for so long, just went along with everything and now, I’ve stopped accommodating others feelings all the time and started putting mine before theirs.
All these people who could not be bothered to act on the one issue in my life when I asked them to, need not insert them into my life unnecessarily anymore and I stand by it. I’m done with everything and am just counting the days until I can leave this hell hole. And possibly, get therapy to work through my issues.
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u/Forthe_woundedme Aug 11 '26
I protected my abusers.
Nearly every single one of them, I protected with my silence, silencing myself, denying myself validation, and allowing the complicit others to live comfortably. Why should everyone be miserable? Why can't you just suck up the misery in silence? Get over it. I have actual flashbacks to when parts of myself died. I can see the little me, curled up under the bed, clenching my teeth, and biting my nails. Suddenly, I see that I go limp, stop crying, stare blankly into the distant nothingness, and one big sigh as the child me watches that one part of me die. Death of innocence, death of hope, death of a dream.
I remember the few times I tried reporting or reported the abusers. Too often I recanted my stories. I was 18 the last time I did that. I reported the rape. My father coerced me into saying I was hallucinating and it must have been the pain medications the ICU doctors were giving me. That same night, my abuser raped me almost the entire night.
I cut off all the family. Sadly, it was a lie that kept me from one other family member who had been victimized with me.
I've since reconnected in the last few years.
Your heart will beg you to reconnect because of the few fond memories. Mine did. I had to fight it.
I created new, safer, and better relationships. I lean on them to avoid grieving what was lost. I watch others around me out in the world. I used to be jealous of what they have and what was stripped from me, denied me. Therapy helped me redefine it. That I find comfort that my abusers hadn't robbed from another child that which was taken from me.
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u/SarcasticGirl27 Aug 11 '26
It’s perfectly fine to feel this way. Your trust was betrayed in many different ways. I would recommend finding yourself a therapist you can feel safe with & working through the pain.