"Once we understand that abuse is not only an aveirah, but retzichah, perhaps we can begin to comprehend the pain"
Maybe I’m just too close to the issue that I can’t see the other side. I’m willing to entertain, even acknowledge that fact.
I was molested as a child. It went on for years. When, years later, I finally told someone about it, her first question was, “Why didn’t you tell anyone?”
I told her that I had looked around the world I lived in — the society, the expectations, the rules written and unspoken — and realized that I had more to lose than gain by speaking up. As a child, I understood that I would be the one further shamed, and questioned, and cast aside. That I, not the perpetrator, would be the one viewed as the damaged goods. And so I stayed silent.
My husband bore the entire weight of my broken worldview, skewed self-perception, my irrational fears. It was a lot. It is a lot.
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