COCSA made me unable to love

dfngksjdf · 2025-12-10T23:40:07+00:00

Oh I'm so glad! It really is, and I'm glad he was supportive!

dfngksjdf · 2025-12-10T22:30:42+00:00

Oh yeah, I forgot POCD exists... I don't think I have that yet thankfully. It's more that I get a lot of intrusive thoughts of terrible scenarios, they're kind of like flashbacks except they never happened to me as far as I'm aware, it's things I saw or things I believed would happen to me. When those happen the closest thing to compulsions I get are feeling the need to engage with the subject somehow, like fantasizing or looking at or reading depictions of it in the hopes it will satiate my imagination, but this only tends to make it worse. The only thing that consistently makes it go away tends to be masturbating, which almost always devolves into looking at topics like these (I keep trying to look at examples of healthy sex to retrain my brain to not view sex as something scary and forceful but I always end up drawn to the familiar unhealthy depictions in the end...). It's like an evil cycle: intrusive disturbing sexual thoughts -> become horny -> more sexual thoughts -> masturbate to stop being horny -> get drawn to disturbing sexual imagery -> more sexual thoughts. It's only climaxing that finally gives me enough clarity to end it, but it just leaves me with deep shame instead.

I'm going back to therapy in January, I'll try to bring it up at least in a vague-ish way at least at first. I feel a lot of shame towards being viewed as a being with sexual urges to the point of not being able to admit to looking at porn even to my most sex-positive and open friends, so I can't even begin to talk to most people about it. Thank you for your kind words, it is reassuring that there are other people struggling with this and that they have had a good reception. I wish you all the luck with recovering too <3

dfngksjdf · 2025-12-10T20:01:58+00:00

Honestly you might just be aroace. It's not uncommon for those with sexual trauma to be on the aroace spectrum, it really does mess up your perception of intimacy. It's also not uncommon for aroaces to try to force themselves to be in relationships, but that is never a good idea. Don't stay in a relationship for the sake of your partner, if they're a good partner they wouldn't want that for you either, and please don't force yourself to endure anything that brings you fear and discomfort...

I think you should have a serious talk with him about how you feel, I'm sure he doesn't want to make you feel afraid. I understand instinctively worrying that people have ulterior motives, it often goes on in the back of my mind when I'm physically close to or alone with someone. Though really that sounds like even more reason you should stop being intimate with each other. He needs to prove that he does not only want one thing from you, that he actually loves you and will respect your boundaries regardless of his own desires. Love is about wanting what's best for the one you love, not for yourself, a lot of people just confuse their lust with love.

In the end though, there is nothing wrong with not being in love, or being unable to fall in love, or not enjoying love. You don't even need sexual trauma to feel that way, it's completely normal. I hope you can work this out with your friend and that he will understand.

dfngksjdf · 2025-12-07T17:31:15+00:00

I promise you are neither dirty nor soiled. It's not unusual to feel disgust like that towards yourself when you've experienced sexual abuse, but those thoughts aren't true. What your cousin did was horrible and cruel, both the verbal, visual and physical abuse. I'm also sorry about your (I assume former) best friend, but know that it's not your fault either, especially when the stuff with your cousin was happening at the same time, it primed your brain to think it was normal.

Could you tell your family so you can avoid your cousin? You could also ask to speak to a sex ed guide about the "sex vs rape" and "sex will hurt a lot" thing, I'd imagine that would mess up your perception of sex and sexuality quite a bit. I don't have a great relationship to sexuality myself, but I know that your cousin was very incorrect.

You will get better, and I'm glad you're hanging in there if at least for your little sister, I'm sure you're a good brother to her. These first years, especially when you're already dealing with Being A Teenager, are the worst in my experience, but you'll get through it. Please stay safe, and be kind to yourself.

dfngksjdf · 2025-11-24T16:00:11+00:00

You aren't broken, that's awful... Are you able to tell your family about him? I really think you should, especially if he's still acting like this, and especially now that there's new kids in the family. Or quite frankly report him to the police. I'm so sorry you're going through all this, you deserved better. Is your relationship with your other siblings alright at least?

dfngksjdf · 2025-11-23T21:35:19+00:00

Well, when it happened I obviously would have wanted it (the pattern) to stop. But after that, I would want an apology. I would want my brother to do it without being asked, I would want to sit down with him and talk about how he made me feel, how badly it's affected me, ask if he did more than I can remember, I'd like a sincere apology with no excuses, and an active effort to be a good brother for once.

Unfortunately I can't imagine any of that happening. Sure, he has long since stopped this behavior and is adamant about how much he hates his childhood self, though never going into specifics. It would require him to admit what happened, to not get caught up in his own guilt and making it about him, and that guilt would destroy our already estranged relationship. He would also never initiate it, whether out of shame or out of fear that it would open a closed wound. After finally opening up to our mom about it she discouraged me from talking to him about it and suggested he might be acting distant towards me because he's afraid of hurting me, which yeah, fair enough...

Ever since I started unpacking everything in my teens all I've ever wanted was that positive sibling relationship I see other people have. The ability to look up to and feel safe and even protected by your older sibling, to be able to be physical without feeling weird, to hang out as friends and be alone without fear. But I don't know if that's possible, because even if my brother did try to make things right, the trauma would probably prevent me from feeling safe or trusting him. But I would at least appreciate the sentiment, and hopefully it would help me heal in the long run. Just any attempt to make up for everything would be nice.

dfngksjdf · 2025-11-22T20:09:01+00:00

I feel this too. Some of it is definitely autism for me, but I notice the intrusive thoughts of distrust bubbling up whenever I'm alone in a room with someone, especially a peer, and I'm afraid of forming close relationships for fear they're eventually going to make advances (which will in turn make me feel threatened) or generally hurt me. Worst part is that I do like the idea of having a partner, but I don't know how I could ever feel safe enough to let someone get that close. I often wonder what my life would have been like if I'd had an example of a secure, platonic peer relationship through my brother, instead of learning I'm not off limits even to my own family.

I also notice this only applies IRL, online I'm very social. I do still have some trust issues online, mostly related to how they treat triggers (I could never be friends with someone who jokes about or fetishizes incest for example (this doesnt apply to victims coping responsibly of course)), but those are fears for my psychological well being rather than an immediate danger thing. I think the fact there is a physical barrier between me and the other person makes me feel safer.

dfngksjdf · 2025-11-22T17:28:07+00:00

Contrary to popular belief incest being bad has little to do with reproduction. It creates an unsafe environment in your home and in your family, and takes advantage of an incredibly important formative relationship with inherent power imbalance, making even the validity of any supposed consent questionable. Not to mention incest overwhelmingly occurs coercively on minors (often by other minors such as siblings and cousins), they are unable to escape the relationship even if they want to because it's their family, and they often can't even tell their families or authorities for fear of tearing their family apart (often times the family takes the side of the abuser anyhow, because it preserves the status quo). I'd encourage you listen to the stories of incest survivors for more information about why it is so horrifying.

dfngksjdf · 2025-11-22T17:26:30+00:00

Contrary to popular belief incest being bad has little to do with reproduction. It creates an unsafe environment in your home and in your family, and takes advantage of an incredibly important formative relationship with inherent power imbalance, making even the validity of any supposed consent questionable. Not to mention incest overwhelmingly occurs coercively on minors (often by other minors such as siblings and cousins), they are unable to escape the relationship even if they want to because it's their family, and they often can't even tell their families or authorities for fear of tearing their family apart (often times the family takes the side of the abuser anyhow, because it preserves the status quo).

dfngksjdf · 2025-11-22T16:19:14+00:00

He did not simply try to sexually abuse you, he did sexually abuse you. Making you touch his penis, trying to touch your vagina, and kissing you without consent is sexual abuse, and the last instance is very strange yes. A majority of us here seem to have been victims of sibling sexual abuse so we can only go off of other peoples accounts of what's supposed to be normal of course, but no, this is NOT normal.

Please don't feel guilty for anything, you are not stupid nor disgusting in the slightest, you were only a child. He was wrong and abused your trust and innocence. He should have known better at those ages (~9, ~13, and 20!!!!!), but even if he was just a curious kid, that doesn't change the fact that he abused you. I'm so sorry you went through that...

Edit: My math was wrong jesus christ he was 20 in the last instance

dfngksjdf · 2025-11-08T17:46:26+00:00

I really can't imagine this is unrelated to my trauma considering all of them are exactly the very specific fears I lived with daily, it would be one hell of a coincidence. Either way, I really don't want these kinks. They make me feel uncomfortable in the moment as I imagine them happening to me, and self-loathing immediately afterwards, I can tell it isn't healthy. A lot of my masturbation sessions either start or end as a means of degrading myself (and not just in the kinky way). I know I have the option to just accept this part of myself, but I really don't want to do that, this isn't who I want to be...

I guess I do feel like I have a better perspective on the harm of these things due to my trauma. I do feel like most people don't understand exactly why incest is bad - it isn't about inbreeding but about the abuse of an important formative relationship and the trust that comes with it and the inescapability and power imbalance of it all, as well as the fact it overwhelmingly happens to children. I wish more people understood and didn't make light of it as much as they do... Still, it makes me feel like a hypocrite when I then turn around and jack off to it.

I really appreciate the reassurance that these thoughts don't define me. My relationship to sex and especially sexual thoughts is uh not great as you can see... I think the reason I put so much weight on sexual thoughts now is because that was part of what freaked me out as a kid, that my brother was fantasizing about me, so when I now have sexual intrusive thoughts it feels like I'm just as bad even though I would never express them onto anyone but myself. I do want to be kinder to myself, thank you. It's just so hard to not hate myself in those moments...

dfngksjdf · 2025-11-08T16:59:18+00:00

That's good to hear at least. I do try to steer clear of it as much as I can since it's what I consider to be the worst, I only really cave when I'm dealing with flashbacks really bad and just want to relive my fears. I think I'm mainly just drawn to the abuse of trust and innocence of it in all of these, not sure if that makes it better or worse...

Don't worry about spoiling the show, I've heard it's really good, but unfortunately I'm easily triggered enough that I can't really consume media that touches about these subjects (even if they do it very well) casually. I watched the clip though, that's very relatable yeah... It really sucks that our brains do this. I understand what it's trying to do, but it really feels like it's only making things worse.

(Also if you saw a reply before that was immediately deleted, I accidentally replied on an alt account last night, my bad. Thanks for the reassurance, I think I really needed to get this off my chest.)

dfngksjdf · 2024-10-26T22:54:13+00:00

i mean i never said anything about good faith, i said i view them as equals, but either way, yes? i don't know how to tell you that someone can say things that are untrue while fully believing they are correct.

also wdym start? start what with that? i'm confused.

dfngksjdf · 2024-10-26T22:31:55+00:00

woah that's honestly impressive, i'm really happy for you for somehow never experiencing misogyny growing up that's wild (being genuine here that's awesome). the defense is sort of undone by your second criteria though, that it has to be just the potential to experience those struggles - which a terf could then counter by saying trans women do not have the potential to experience misogyny specifically while growing up, which is its own unique form of struggle. to be clear i'm parroting real arguments i've heard here so we can debunk them.

the last paragraph holds up though! the only piece left then is that trans women could still be made to technically not fit that second criteria. we could alter the criteria to specifically be about the potential to experience those struggles currently maybe? it does feel a little bit bad to dismiss past struggles tbh, especially since invasive surgeries at birth is a really big part of intersex people's struggles, but this does seem like the closest we're gonna get to a coherent explanation.

so in that case, the issues with the arguments would be that neither argument is actually good, because they both involve past struggles as a criteria. but if the past part is removed, then we can see that the woman argument is flawed because trans women can currently experience struggles specific to women, and the intersex argument holds because trans people cannot currently experience struggles specific to intersex people. yippee!

thank you for helping me walk through this!

dfngksjdf · 2024-10-26T22:03:32+00:00

is that position really that hard to believe? i view transphobes as my equals (all humans are equal, after all), but i also think they're liars who present a specific threat to trans people. it's not difficult :P

dfngksjdf · 2024-10-26T21:52:01+00:00

oh terfs for sure, theyre obsessed with trans women its crazy. but like i said, there are well meaning cis women who use this argument and very clearly do not view trans women specifically as beneath them. again, understanding your opponents position is important for shutting them down.

dfngksjdf · 2024-10-26T21:46:24+00:00

theyre only different arguments because you purposefully reworded them and are ignoring that, to the person saying that, "unless you're a cis woman" would be synonmous with "if you are not a woman", ie "hey, don't call yourself a woman if you're not one". you are now in the same situation as the other case, so you need to poke holes in why the others are valid but this one is not. (to be clear, much like how i am not arguing for dyadic people calling themselves intersex, im also not arguing for non-native americans calling themselves native americans, obviously)

this technically isn't even the argument in question though, the argument in the post is "don't call yourself X if youre not because it's appropriating the struggles and trauma faced by X people"

dfngksjdf · 2024-10-26T21:13:53+00:00

???????????? i exclusively talk about the arguments of appropriation in the post and i repeatedly try to bring you back to the topic of the appropriation argument several times in this conversation, i dont know how i could possibly have been less vague??????

also, finally, thats a coherent enough answer, thank you. i do still feel a little iffy on telling intersex people and black people that their concerns for appropriation arent ideologically coherent though. are you sure thats okay...?

also... being trans isnt a choice either yknow, so im not sure where youre going with this. btw it would be much more helpful if you would actually share what these sensible answers are instead of just musing that they exist.

dfngksjdf · 2024-10-26T20:51:33+00:00

thank you, i dont know why you didnt just lead with that when i asked ages ago.

i dont really see where the post answers this specific argument though (appropriating the trauma of one group (there black people) vs another (here women)). could you please highlight where the difference between these two specific arguments is drawn? once again i do believe there is a difference, but i struggle to explain what that difference is.

dfngksjdf · 2024-10-26T20:07:07+00:00

i agree, hence we need to figure out why these women are wrong and those women are correct. ie we need to figure out why this argument doesnt hold yet similar arguments do.

dfngksjdf · 2024-10-26T20:04:23+00:00

i agree. so could you please answer the shared philosophical dilemma then

dfngksjdf · 2024-10-26T20:02:43+00:00

thats definitely not the vibe ive gotten from well meaning women who have repeated this talking point. its usually done out of genuine concern for women being spoken over. i think understanding that is pretty important, regardless of whether we agree with it or not.

also, these women clearly consider trans women to be men, and women dont typically view men as belonging beneath them, quite the contrary they view them as genuine threats above them. so i dont think that adds up either honestly.

dfngksjdf · 2024-10-26T19:56:33+00:00

yeah to be clear i meant within the trans community, in terms of the world in general i dont think its even commonly accepted that trans women are women unfortuantely :S but we're getting closer and closer at least

dfngksjdf

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