A month or so after I was raped, when I was liaising with a detective and various support lines, I was told upwards of ten times that it wasn’t my fault.
I've said this before (and it feels weird to say here again) but you're a very talented writer Frances, and I think you convey emotions very deeply. I feel like there's something about using writing to process things that I don't know how to describe, but for me feels like it can make things comprehendible at least, or maybe more manageable, and I hope maybe you also feel that sometimes. Also your therapist sounds lovely and I'm glad you have her
Thank you Max, you always take the time to leave such a kind, thoughtful, deeply complimentary comment about my writing and it increases the seratonin available in my brain every time :)
Yes, exactly, couldn’t agree more. I actually think we might have certain aspects about our psychology that cause us to have a really similar relationship to writing!!! Like, I would say sensitive (in a positive way), analytical about emotions & experiences, often feeling kind of detached from the world. Obviously correct me if I’m wrong, but I think these traits maybe make writing a very central emotional processing outlet, it definitely is for me. And I find it very grounding. Writing things out is like, “okay this happened, it’s here, my feelings are right here, there’s a kind of beginning, middle, and end.“ Very productive process for me.
When the TIME article started getting into talking about EA group-house governance assigning probabilities to sexual assault and such it was a... I don't have a word for it. Just evoked a certain feeling of this is not a place for fractions.
Self-blame is so hard, even harder when the responses to someone doing violence against you are blaming ones and not compassionate ones. So glad you have such an understanding and good therapist.
Ivy <3 “This is nor a place for fractions” - totally. It’s this deep misunderstanding of statistics, which are what we use to talk about general, broad patterns that we want to study. The idea of trying to do this for people in our lives, individuals that we know and owe respect to and have direct interaction with, is so absurd.
I imagine you’ve had a long journey with self-blame yourself given all the blame that was put on you. Thank you for how open you always are <3
thank you so much for your support <3 it truly means the world
and yes!! the longest journey that i'm still in the middle of in some ways, rupture between individuals and communities is so big and amorphous, and something that's incredibly hard to reach an end to
definitely helps to know my experiences help others <3
> “You know Frances, you could be raped again,” my therapist said
Wow. I had to pause when reading that, because that's a *bold* therapeutic strategy. Shows you how much I know about therapy because I would not have dared that in a million years. I'm glad it worked and I'm very glad you're doing better.
LOL she’s completely changed how I think about therapy!! I’m sure her approach doesn’t work for everyone, but previously I’ve only had gentle therapists who try to be very guiding and strongly refrain from giving takes or opinions. My current therapist will say stuff like this, and I find it very grounding. Especially because I can get really fixated on certain beliefs or trains of thought and ruminate a lot. I think saying stuff in this more jarring, blunt sort of way is her way of being like, “girl, I see where you’re going and you need to take a beat,” which really works for me! Thank you Bob :)
I hope it’s okay if I share - I am a survivor of abuse, starting from childhood. I can relate to having a volatile mother and how that skewed my perception of what constitutes abuse.
In my most recent experience of abuse, I was having a mental health episode (manic psychotic) and was convinced by a man (who knew I was having an episode) I met online to travel across the country to stay with him for a week. He had warning signs that I saw and ignored- my judgment was off due to the episode I was in but I still look back and wish I had paid more attention to my gut feelings. I still struggle with the self blame for that.
The reaction of the community we were both in was a second trauma. When word got out that people were having bad experiences with visiting this man, people immediately started talking about false accusations and false accusers. It caused me a lot of distress, alienation and self doubt. Some people seemed to think it happened because I had bad boundaries. I internalized this, and even though I had made clear boundaries and had them violated, it still felt like it was still my fault.
It still feels like it was my fault. I feel like I made myself vulnerable online by posting publicly through a mental health episode which attracted this sexual predator (and later everyone found out he was a convicted pedophile).
Thank you for sharing something so personal Frances.
I find it interesting that our subconscious in these situations is basically doing moral philosophy, and being a consequentialist (not sure if you are) would make it more difficult to do this reasoning. I hope it's not inappropriate to share my thoughts on the moral philosophy here:
I'd say that even IF some of your choices had causal influence on the rape happening, there's only one person who chose to gravely harm another person. Even though I can't quite put my finger on it, I feel like even in a consequentialist framework it's appropriate to say here that 'proximate moral agents making free choices are the appropriate locus of moral responsibility.'
Some causal responsibility doesn't have to imply some moral responsibility. And definitely doesn't imply deservingness of an outcome.
Totally!! I think this is a really important distinction to draw, and it’s where a lot of victims get stuck, partly because rape culture often tries to make the claim that causal influence = moral responsibility. It could be true, for example, that rape is more likely to occur when there are substances or drinking, but this does not mean someone who drinks is morally responsible for then being raped. In the same way that, it is true that driving at night may make you more likely to be hit by a drunk driver, but driving at night does not make you morally responsible for being hit by a drunk driver.
One of the most interesting parts of therapy for me was realising how quickly and intensely my subconscious came to a bunch of conclusions. This is not my area of expertise, but I generally understand this as my brain trying to do very quick calculus on how to keep me safe in the future. But unfortunately, it went in a lot of wrong and counterproductive directions (which is one of the main ways trauma can wreak a lot of havoc). Really appreciate this comment Siebe :D
I've said this before (and it feels weird to say here again) but you're a very talented writer Frances, and I think you convey emotions very deeply. I feel like there's something about using writing to process things that I don't know how to describe, but for me feels like it can make things comprehendible at least, or maybe more manageable, and I hope maybe you also feel that sometimes. Also your therapist sounds lovely and I'm glad you have her
Thank you Max, you always take the time to leave such a kind, thoughtful, deeply complimentary comment about my writing and it increases the seratonin available in my brain every time :)
Yes, exactly, couldn’t agree more. I actually think we might have certain aspects about our psychology that cause us to have a really similar relationship to writing!!! Like, I would say sensitive (in a positive way), analytical about emotions & experiences, often feeling kind of detached from the world. Obviously correct me if I’m wrong, but I think these traits maybe make writing a very central emotional processing outlet, it definitely is for me. And I find it very grounding. Writing things out is like, “okay this happened, it’s here, my feelings are right here, there’s a kind of beginning, middle, and end.“ Very productive process for me.
Thank you for writing this Fran, this is so real.
When the TIME article started getting into talking about EA group-house governance assigning probabilities to sexual assault and such it was a... I don't have a word for it. Just evoked a certain feeling of this is not a place for fractions.
Self-blame is so hard, even harder when the responses to someone doing violence against you are blaming ones and not compassionate ones. So glad you have such an understanding and good therapist.
Ivy <3 “This is nor a place for fractions” - totally. It’s this deep misunderstanding of statistics, which are what we use to talk about general, broad patterns that we want to study. The idea of trying to do this for people in our lives, individuals that we know and owe respect to and have direct interaction with, is so absurd.
I imagine you’ve had a long journey with self-blame yourself given all the blame that was put on you. Thank you for how open you always are <3
thank you so much for your support <3 it truly means the world
and yes!! the longest journey that i'm still in the middle of in some ways, rupture between individuals and communities is so big and amorphous, and something that's incredibly hard to reach an end to
definitely helps to know my experiences help others <3
> “You know Frances, you could be raped again,” my therapist said
Wow. I had to pause when reading that, because that's a *bold* therapeutic strategy. Shows you how much I know about therapy because I would not have dared that in a million years. I'm glad it worked and I'm very glad you're doing better.
LOL she’s completely changed how I think about therapy!! I’m sure her approach doesn’t work for everyone, but previously I’ve only had gentle therapists who try to be very guiding and strongly refrain from giving takes or opinions. My current therapist will say stuff like this, and I find it very grounding. Especially because I can get really fixated on certain beliefs or trains of thought and ruminate a lot. I think saying stuff in this more jarring, blunt sort of way is her way of being like, “girl, I see where you’re going and you need to take a beat,” which really works for me! Thank you Bob :)
Thank you for this.
I hope it’s okay if I share - I am a survivor of abuse, starting from childhood. I can relate to having a volatile mother and how that skewed my perception of what constitutes abuse.
In my most recent experience of abuse, I was having a mental health episode (manic psychotic) and was convinced by a man (who knew I was having an episode) I met online to travel across the country to stay with him for a week. He had warning signs that I saw and ignored- my judgment was off due to the episode I was in but I still look back and wish I had paid more attention to my gut feelings. I still struggle with the self blame for that.
The reaction of the community we were both in was a second trauma. When word got out that people were having bad experiences with visiting this man, people immediately started talking about false accusations and false accusers. It caused me a lot of distress, alienation and self doubt. Some people seemed to think it happened because I had bad boundaries. I internalized this, and even though I had made clear boundaries and had them violated, it still felt like it was still my fault.
It still feels like it was my fault. I feel like I made myself vulnerable online by posting publicly through a mental health episode which attracted this sexual predator (and later everyone found out he was a convicted pedophile).
I write more about all of this including self blame here: https://lump.substack.com/p/when-a-door-is-closed-for-you?r=1uo9zg&utm_medium=ios&shareImageVariant=overlay
Thank you for sharing something so personal Frances.
I find it interesting that our subconscious in these situations is basically doing moral philosophy, and being a consequentialist (not sure if you are) would make it more difficult to do this reasoning. I hope it's not inappropriate to share my thoughts on the moral philosophy here:
I'd say that even IF some of your choices had causal influence on the rape happening, there's only one person who chose to gravely harm another person. Even though I can't quite put my finger on it, I feel like even in a consequentialist framework it's appropriate to say here that 'proximate moral agents making free choices are the appropriate locus of moral responsibility.'
Some causal responsibility doesn't have to imply some moral responsibility. And definitely doesn't imply deservingness of an outcome.
A rapist deserves 100% of the blame.
Totally!! I think this is a really important distinction to draw, and it’s where a lot of victims get stuck, partly because rape culture often tries to make the claim that causal influence = moral responsibility. It could be true, for example, that rape is more likely to occur when there are substances or drinking, but this does not mean someone who drinks is morally responsible for then being raped. In the same way that, it is true that driving at night may make you more likely to be hit by a drunk driver, but driving at night does not make you morally responsible for being hit by a drunk driver.
One of the most interesting parts of therapy for me was realising how quickly and intensely my subconscious came to a bunch of conclusions. This is not my area of expertise, but I generally understand this as my brain trying to do very quick calculus on how to keep me safe in the future. But unfortunately, it went in a lot of wrong and counterproductive directions (which is one of the main ways trauma can wreak a lot of havoc). Really appreciate this comment Siebe :D