Gtabula's Blog

[gtabula]

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[Joseph]

First off, you are to be congratulated for having the bravery to come out with this. Breaking the silence is a great part of the healing, and you are demonstrating to others, your perpetrators, but mostly yourself, that you will not stand by and be silent.

A few things jumped out at me:

1. Your urinary tract infections.

2. Your child sexual abuse

3. Your first sexual experiences with your girlfriend

4. Your sensitivity in the shower

I think that one of the things that you need to talk about the loudest is your recurring UTIs. It is often proclaimed by advocates of infant child mutilation, that circumcision "lowers the risk of UTI." You are not the first circumcised person I know who has recurring UTIs. I have another friend who has the same problem. In his case, the scar constricts his urethra, and he has urine retention problems, and he has had a couple of nasty infections that have gotten all the way up to his kidneys. I've also read other accounts of UTIs in circumcised men, and they need to all be gathered and stapled to Wiswell's head. I've furthermore read study in Israel where circumcision has been shown to UP UTI infection. Just google "Haaretz" and "UTI" and you'll get the news reports.

You are to be commended for choosing to come forth regarding your child sexual abuse. You're reading a fellow abuse survivor who has sought help for this. I think this is an important part of your life; this is the part of your child sexual abuse that you could remember. Your physical condition regarding your penis is one thing, but to add insult to injury, two older boys abused of you, adding to your situation. I've only been able to talk to my mother regarding my child sexual abuse. I don't feel I have that close of a relationship with my father to tell him what happened. He's also been a bit absent when it comes to instruction regarding the birds and the bees. Physical restoration is important, don't get me wrong, but I also think that you should deal with what happened with those boys. I really recommend a book called "Victims No Longer" by Mike Lew. This could be affecting you more than you may want to believe.

This ties into your first experiences with your girlfriend. I had a similar problem with my first girlfriend; I was so nervous that I couldn't get an erection. I honestly had doubts about my sexuality. Especially remembering my own sexual abuse, I already had feelings of being "damaged goods." "What if she knew? She'd want to never talk to me again." These thoughts kept racing through my mind, always distracting me. Like you, I can remember my sexual abuse, and I felt, maybe still feel, guilty about "partially enjoying it." "Maybe I'm gay?" I thought to myself...

Fast forward to my second sexual experience with a different girl; at this time, I'm already beginning to deal with my sexual abuse. I'm seeing a therapist and attending a men's group. That I'm with a second girl is a miracle in and of itself; it took about four years to muster up the confidence to even get together with another girl and go as far as having a sexual encounter. At this point, I'm beginning to feel more confident in myself, though there are still some doubts: "Does it show? Can girls see it in my face that I was sexually abused? What if she doesn't like it that I'm not circumcised?" This girl was really into me, and she knew what I liked. It didn't take long for me to get an erection. To break a fantasy, she didn't mind at all that I had an intact member. But she could tell that I was still holding something back...

Eventually, when talking, I came out to her about my sexual abuse. I thought "fuck it, she needs to know if she wants to be with me." So I told her, hoping that she'd be grossed out by the whole thing. To break yet another fantasy, she was listening, and understanding, and didn't at all reject me as I had been fantasizing. This was a key thing that I had been working with my therapist; "Breaking Fantasies." I have come to realize that the greater part of what we think isn't real; it's all fantasy, and we men tend to make up entire storylines around a fantasy that isn't even real. Here I was thinking that this girl would reject me for having been molested as a child, for having a foreskin. On the contrary, she was open and accepting; she came out to me - SHE was dealing with child sexual abuse herself. She hadn't seen a therapist yet, and it was through my prodding that I encouraged her to see one. We are no longer together... it's been about 5 years... I'm with someone new... but we still talk. Though we broke up, we have decided to stay friends, and remember that because of each other, we managed to grow and heal.

I also wanted to comment on your sensitivity in the shower. I'm not circumcised, but I remember as a child, I got erections in the shower, and though I couldn't retract my foreskin then, the tip of my head would protrude from the foreskin. It was so sensitive that I hated taking showers with my dad. Each drop of water that would tap the head of my penis felt throbbingly painful. I much prefered baths. With time I got used to it, and I eventually was able to retract and touch the head of my penis directly, but it was really painful at first. I can only imagine what a freshly mutilated child feels; having to endure urine and feces, not to mention the pain of when hands cleaned your now permanently exposed penis head.

Kudos on writing this blog. You are a very brave guy.

Just to put things into perspective, I'm 28. I was the youngest guy in my men's survivor group. It seems the trend is, guys try to hide and belittle their abuse for as long as possible, until it becomes too much to bear. This tends to be at about mid 30s, to 40s. One guy was in his 50s, and he was coming to terms with being abused by his own dad. I still have questions regarding my sexuality today. Am I gay, bi, or what? I've come to just appreciate the now. I'm with my current Mrs. of 3 years, I love her just the way she is, and she loves me just the way I am. No mutilation needed. :) I love to eat her out, and stick my penis as deep inside her as possible (she likes this too :D ). She worships my member, and I worship hers. She knows about my abuse too, and even about my affinity towards the male sex. She knows how I feel about circumcision, and if one day we were to get married and have children, we would never circumcise them.

I've come a long way.

You have too.

Thanks for writing out your story.

[Joseph]

You know, that's something you never hear people say when they discuss their sexual abuse. You never hear them say that they got some kind of pleasure out of it. I realize not everyone could or would say that, but it's the one thing that left me with the most guilt over the whole experience. It's a very confusing, troubling, and conflicted place to be left in emotionally.

For the longest time this was something that kept me from even talking about it. "It can't be abuse if you enjoyed it." On the one hand, looking back, I felt very used. But on the other hand, back then, I didn't know what was going on, and I didn't cry out. I didn't tell my parents. As if I somehow intuitively knew it was something they weren't supposed to know.

I'll come out a little bit more about my abuse; this was a guy who was real liked by the church my parents went to. He was our landlady's grandson who would sometimes come over to "play." He would sometimes be asked to babysit, sometimes staying overnight. You get the idea. His encounters with me were quite often, and I remember they happened over about two or three years.

It was quite a strange and ackward experience at first. I remember not wanting to be there. (I was maybe 4 at the time...) I wanted to not be there when put his penis in my mouth. I would blank out, because I remember it was so big I almost choked. I just closed my eyes and imagined I was somewhere else. In psychological terms, this is called "dissociation." It is said by some doctors that this is what happens when a baby is undergoing circumcision; he dissociates and wants to be somewhere else to escape.

This happened once... twice... I told him that I didn't want to do it anymore... that I'd only do it if he didn't jam my head with his hand, because I felt like choking... he went gentle after that... soon, it was like a routine. A routine that I knew... became familiar with... and grew to actually look for... it was kind of comfortable... my dad was a stern, disciplinary figure. This was a charismatic guy; kind of the heart-throb of the church.

It all started once he decided he wanted to get baptized. As a kid, I didn't understand what that was, but I understand it now. He started telling me to stop looking for him. He started saying things like I was "ugly," and saying that I was disgusting for doing what I did. (Because he trained me?) He called me fag... then one day, he locked me up in a room, and he took out a type writer... he was typing on it, and he would say things like "I'm writing a letter to your family... your aunt... your mother..." "Your son is a sick disgusting pervert. He always wants to suck my dick..." Then he took the paper from the machine, put it in an envelope and said to me: "Ask me again, and I'll send this letter to your family."

He was doing what the perpetrator does; threatening me to be silent.

I didn't know what the homosexual implications of what we did at the time were, I couldn't even understand it when he called me "fag." What does "fag" mean to a child? It means nothing. I didn't know the depth of what we had done. All I knew, is that this was something bad. Something dreadful. Something that my mom and aunt and family should never know about.

I shut up about it. That was my "break up" with my perpetrator. I never spoke to him ever again after that, though he still kept coming to my house to visit... He was my "ex" and I couldn't do anything about it. I'd see his face all the time... he'd eventually be given a place at church where he would preach loudly of fire and brimstone...

So that's why I felt guilty of my own abuse... I was made to feel as if it was all my fault. I was the one who went to "look" for it. (No, actually HE started it, and trained me to be his sex toy.) So up until I started dealing with this, I grew up with the fantasy that it had all been my fault.

"Some lovers, we, you mad M.D.,
bound for all eternity!"
~Van Lewis


And I think what you said was in fact a big part of it, questioning my own sexuality. But I think another part of it for me was that I felt more like the perpetrator when we tried having sex. I felt like having sex with her would leave her in this troubled state that I was left in when I was abused.

EXACTLY HOW I FELT!

I had major problems with my 2nd girlfriend... she sat me down and asked me, why, if I liked being with her, did I not "go for her?" Most guys she was with would immediately just have their way with her. Why was I different? This was when I started talking to her about my abuse.

I felt that I couldn't just let things flow naturally, because I felt I would be abusing her. I didn't want to grab her breasts or private parts without her permission. To my surprise, another fantasy broken, she asked me to go for her; she WANTED me to just take her and have my way with her like an animal. It took me a while before I felt comfortable with my own desires, but it's happened. My current GF has my ex to thank.

Again, I'm so glad you've decided to write about this.

[gtabula]

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[gtabula]

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[Joseph]

Yesterday was something of an emotional roller coaster for me. Lots of bad feelings resurfaced from my childhood that left me feeling incredibly depressed. I've never felt so much anger and hatred in my life, it just kept getting worse. Everytime I tried to relax and just let it go it just kept boiling up, I was concerned I'd do something stupid, start smashing or breaking stuff, or call up one of the family members this anger's directed at and say something stupid. I wanted my family to know how angry I was, how full of rage I was, I wanted them all to know just how much pain I was in.

Geez man... you must have so much to say! I hope you get your chance.

Also, I think you should just keep posting at the bottom. The top first post is going to get so long...

[ctrclckws]

That's what the new posts buttons and links are for.

I find yours hard to follow also.

eventually you'll probably run into a posting size limit.

[gtabula]

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[ctrclckws]

gtabula, thank you for switching, at least for me, this is easier to read and follow.

I also use weighted tension, but feel that now that the top side has "caught up" the skin is growing all round.

KOT with what ever works for you.

[NewStretch]

I felt that I couldn't just let things flow naturally, because I felt I would be abusing her. I didn't want to grab her breasts or private parts without her permission. To my surprise, another fantasy broken, she asked me to go for her; she WANTED me to just take her and have my way with her like an animal. It took me a while before I felt comfortable with my own desires, but it's happened. My current GF has my ex to thank.

Again, I'm so glad you've decided to write about this.

Thanks for sharing guys. Though I've never experienced any real sexual abuse, I was exposed (and became addicted to) porn at a very young age (around 8), and I know I have reservations abt sex bec yeah, I don't want to be the perpetrator of causing pain or discomfort to a woman. It seems backwards to say you love someone and to think of women as delicate, and you need to be tender w/them, etc. and then to see all of these guys in porn just banging away, in a way that can seem violent and overly dominating. Sounds like in the right context, appropriate sexual passion will actually give pleasure to the woman, since she's designed to receive pleasure in that way. Part of me believes that, and part of me still doubts, and I'm sometimes tormented in my mind bec part of me just wants to bang away, too, haha. But in a way that we will both love and enjoy. Any more help or guidance on this topic would be appreciated! I want to have a healthy and mutually awesome sex life one day!

(Sorry to hijack your thread, Gtabula--and thanks so much for sharing your story)

[gtabula]

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[freddys]

Wow!
freddys.

[gtabula]

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[gtabula]

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