#abuse recovery

[secretsintheabyss]

I don’t miss you. I’m gonna sparkle for myself from now on.

I miss you, but I miss sparkling ✨

[thelatestkate]

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[uncanny-tranny]

Honestly, there is a certain type of fetishizing of violence that occurs when you are the victim of abuse - wherein people talk directly to you about how much they fantasize about your abuser/s dying and being killed - "all abusers must be killed!" they say.

As a victim of prolonged abuse, I never felt cared for when people indulged that information to me. It often feels like my abuse is being exploited for others to enact their own violent fantasies and secret desires - my abuse means nothing to them in the same way that I didn't matter to my abusers. It's not support - it's just another cycle of violence.

I'm begging people to care more about victims and survivors than they do about retribution of abusers. Nowhere along the way should your focus on the abuser outweigh the people affected by their abuse. If you truly want to support abuse victims and survivors, start with us

[carnage-cathedral]

softness is a privilege that some take for granted.

kink/porn/sexually centered blogs please stop interacting with this post. your content is triggering and I don't want my art posted alongside it

[gentleaffirmations]

You have innate worth as a human being.

There is nothing you have to do to earn it.

There is nothing you can do to diminish it.

You are worthy and nothing can take that away.

[neuroticboyfriend]

get in bitches, we're surviving rock bottom no matter how much further we dig. one day we'll put down the shovel and climb out of this for good. we have to. as long as we're still alive there is hope.

[sparrow-the-tired-lesbian]

here’s a friendly reminder for survivors of any sort of abuse that

It wasnt your fault

You are strong

You didnt ask for it

No one gets to invalidate your experience

If someone invalidates your experience, you get to dump their ass

[furiousgoldfish]

I don't get why there are no resources for healthy expressions of anger. Are we as a society fundamentally opposed to people feeling anger? Are we afraid that if people get angry they're going to cause destruction so as an alternative we want anger to just not exist? Anger will go somewhere regardless of whether we want it to exist or not, and if a person who has good reasons to be angry, is not allowed to feel angry, they'll get eaten by self hatred and depression because that's what internalizing anger does.

It's also interesting that when abusers and people in power are angry, they can pretty much do whatever they like. Say no to them, they're having crazy revenges, they're tearing apart your stuff, they're starting wars, they're telling you how they're going to kill you in detail, no self restraint, no consequences, nothing. Anger is theirs to do as they please with and in response the society is just, too scared to do anything, so they assume that this specific anger is 'justified' and 'cannot be helped'. However when victims of something are angry, then they're labelled as 'unreasonable' and 'dangerous' and 'unable to move on from things'. Their anger is a problem that needs to be squashed, erased, there's apparently no justifications for these people to be angry, nothing that is reasonable or okay for them to do about it, they just get demonized and shamed for having a completely rational response to injustice.

Is that it then? Those who are able to act out on their anger, get justifications and obedience, but those who are helpless but angry for very good reasons, are just to be suffocated? Anger is allowed only for some parts of human society and it's the most violent, destructive and dangerous part of it too? Where is this getting us? Is the amount of injustice ever going to decrease if we defend injustice, and fight for it to keep going on?

If I look up ways to express anger, I get stuff like 'anger management steps', and 'letting go and moving on from anger', like excuse me. I didn't even get to express 1% of my anger and I need anger management? I have never had problems with controlling my anger, the struggle is to get it out at all! To integrate it into my personality, to hold people accountable without having to think about it, to show resistance when I'm being stepped on! What anger management? Why am I pushed to move away from anger, I haven't even arrived to anger!

Why is it assumed that every person who struggles with expressing anger is a maniac breaking things, enacting revenges, trying to injure or murder people, lashing out and doing harm to everyone around themselves. I can guess why. Because all of the resources are created for people who are letting their anger run wild without a cap and who use anger to get their way. The world is adjusted for people who are allowed to be angry, who were never pushed to the point where getting angry meant loss of survival, where expressions of anger would lead to torture. I am apparently not even considered to exist. I'm either a maniac or not a target audience for anger resources.

If someone's been traumatized out of being able to feel angry, people don't think it's worth having this person angry. It's very obvious this person has giant reasons for anger, so if we let them feel it, they could become 'dangerous', or 'just like their abuser'. You know, being angry at the abuser does not make anyone like the abuser, it makes them Normal. Rational. Having Self Worth. Human. Logical. Reasonable. Engaging in everyone's best fucking interest because you know that abuser is going wreck havoc forever and if nobody is even angry at them, it's giving them an even easier time. Anger is scary when it's in hands of abusers, in the hands of victims it is liberating, just, it puts things into perspective and back where they belong.

Now give me the fucking resources to get angry. I'm sick and tired of hating myself.

[unwelcome-ozian]

[desultory-suggestions]

You are not defined by what happened to you

[spookietrex]

Daily reminder that no one belongs in your life if they can't respect your boundaries!

[creature-wizard]

A warning for trauma survivors looking for online support

You may have come across the acronym "RAMCOA", which stands for "ritual abuse, mind control, and organized abuse."

If you search the Internet for RAMCOA, you might come across a result like this:

If you click the link, you'll be taken to a site that briefly describes what RAMCOA supposedly is, with content like:

MC - Mind Control. A shortened form of TBMC, standing for Torture Based Mind Control. MC is also known as programming, where victims are repeatedly tortured starting at a very young age to intentionally cause a system of dissociated parts that function perfectly to suit the abusers' needs.

alpha : a base program, one of the very first implemented. it trains the victim's mind to accept every order given by handlers willingly. parts with alpha programming will often have no will of their own, and very little personality outside of following orders.

aiw : alice in wonderland. typically split into 3 different sections : black alice, white alice, and crazy alice. ideally, a system scripted with aiw would have all three. white alice makes sure the system forgets the trauma, black alice makes the system feel like theyll be a danger to others if they remember the trauma, and crazy alice makes the system think theyre making it up or going insane if they ever remember it.

Literally all of this comes from a conspiracy theory - specifically, the Project Monarch alter programming conspiracy. It was developed and pushed by far right conspiracy theorists. Most of what people run into specifically traces back to Fritz Springmeier, a man who claimed in the 90's that the fight for gay rights was part of a plot to enthrone the antichrist in the year 2000. The Project Monarch conspiracy theory was always adjacent to the Satanic Panic, if not a somewhat niche part of it. If you start checking citations, you will find many of these people citing Svali, a conspiracy theorist who gets a lot of her material from Springmeier. (Example 1, example 2.)

This is no accident. The term RAMCOA was created by the International Society for the Study of Trauma and Dissociation (ISSTD), which was created by and for psychologists who believed in the myths promoted during the Satanic Panic.

The RA part comes from "satanic ritual abuse," which was coined by Dr. Lawrence Pazder of Michelle Remembers (cw for descriptions of horrible abuses) fame. Lawrence Pazder is the man who effectively started the Satanic Panic. It cannot be overstated that Pazder, now a known malpractitioner, was considered the expert on ritual abuse during this time.

The MC part comes from "trauma-based mind control," which was coined to refer to the alleged abuses inflicted in Project Monarch. Parts of this conspiracy theory that can't be traced back to Fritz Springmeier can usually be traced back to Cathy O'Brien and Mark Phillips, two other (really racist) conspiracy theorists.

Ultimately, the entire conspiracy theory is constructed from tropes that go back to The Protocols of the Learned Elders of Zion (a known antisemitic hoax), blood libel, and early modern witch panic.

Searching the Internet for RAMCOA resources, ritual abuse, or trauma-based mind control will always bring you to conspiracy theorists.

(Also, the term OEA, which stands for "organized extreme abuse," will lead you to conspiracy theorists as well.)

So yeah, if you're looking for support, be very wary of this stuff. It will absolutely not help you heal; just the opposite.

[thelatestkate]

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[whumpandothercomfort]

Whumpee who's been recently rescued from a lifetime of horrific abuse, unable to understand why Caretaker doesn't hurt them. How do they show Caretaker that they can be good? What's going to happen when they mess up?

Caretaker discovering several weeks in, to their horror, that Whumpee has been making up increasingly horrific punishments they might need to brace for.

Caretaker trying hard to control their voice so Whumpee doesn't see their rage or worry. Gently telling them that they aren't going to be hurt here. They don't need to be scared. Nobody's ever going to do anything like that ever again, okay?

And Whumpee just looks... crestfallen. Heartbroken. Being hurt is scary, but being ignored is a thousand times worse. They don't want Caretaker to give up on them.

"You... you don't want to train me?"

[autismvampyre]

you know, I barely think about it anymore

the fact that I'm a csa survivor used to be my whole existence, it was everything I thought about and thought I'd never live to see a day where it did not define me. it felt like that was all I was, just a husk of a person who had everything scraped out before I even knew how to spell my own name. I was very young when I was assaulted, and I used to mourn the little kid that I was and who that kid could've become had she had normal childhood. it was hard

I don't think about it anymore. my skin doesn't crawl every time I see something that once upon a time would've reminded me of him. I'm better, and I'm not normal cause I never will be, but I've healed in a way I never thought I would

what I'm trying to say is that it can get better. one day you might wake up and you won't feel as bad as it did the day before. there is a future for you, and it might not be perfect but it can be good still.

[nothing0fnothing]

hey I have some lived experience personal care advice I had to learn the hard way in my adulthood after growing up with abusive neglectful narcissistic parents. Maybe it will help someone else.

The most important room in your house to be clean is your kitchen. If you only have a few spoons and a whole house of mess, spend them on getting your kitchen clean, hygienic and tidy enough to be usable.

spending money on things that last longer or work better isn't a waste of money. You don't have to use the cheapest of everything because spending is bad work out what YOU think is worth splurging on.

Always buy the best shoes you can afford. Taking care of your feet is so important for your health. If you're afab the same goes for underwear, buying one pack of good quality, good fitting cotton breathable underwear will save you so much money on feminine care supplies if you get what I'm saying.

Get your feet measured in a shoe store. Especially if you're over 25 your feet will have grown since you were 18. I spent years thinking my body was wrong because my feet ALWAYS hurt. My girlfriend suggested we measure them and I realised I was in shoes two sizes too small. For years!! I didn't even know shoes were supposed to have space in them.

a cheap bottle of washing up liquid (dish soap) costs like £1 and can be used on basically every surface. Clean your counters, toilet, sinks, bathtub or shower, oven and hob with a scrub daddy and some cheap washing up liquid. It doesn't react with other chemicals and it cleans deeply and easily. I even use it on the inside of the shower glass where it collects that crusty water residue.

When bathing with an unscented bar soap everywhere first. Then wash a second time with your scented soap. The scented liquid soap isn't designed to clean you it's designed to make you smell beautiful.

Don't use scented soaps on your kitty. Don't use femfresh or other feminine washes on your kitty. Don't use feminine wipes on your kitty. You use your unscented bar soap you use on the rest of your bodh on your kitty once a day. That's all it needs.

You don't need sewing skills to mend things. A £5 sewing kit you keep somewhere in your house and maybe a 2 minute YouTube tutorial is all you need to fix holes in your clothes and make them last longer.

Cereal for breakfast is quick and convenient but aim to eat protein for your first meal. Things like eggs, meat, a protein shake, Greek yogurt. You'll feel fuller for longer and your body will appreciate it.

most things don't need to be ironed. For the things that need creases out a steamer is better for the fibres and easier to use. Simply hang up the item and hold the steamer against the creases.