After being molested at the age of thirteen, Marcus Williams struggled to reconcile his libido with his fear of making an unwanted advance.
[All names have been changed, but the story is true.]
♦◊♦
A couple years ago, I received a puzzling piece of mail from a police department a couple counties away. It was addressed to me by name and informed me that a detective there wished to speak to me, so please get in touch. It did not say what this was regarding, but there was a hand-written note in the margins saying that the detective would be on vacation for the next week, so please wait until such-and-such date before calling.
The vague letter and extra week gave me ample opportunity to speculate and worry about what a detective could possibly want to talk to me about. I hadn’t witnessed any crimes or accidents that I could think of, and hadn’t been anywhere near the city he was contacting me from in a long time. I briefly worried that maybe I’d accidentally landed on some Internet porn that red-flagged me somehow, but I was pretty sure I stuck to the legal stuff and if it was something like that, it seemed unlikely they would tip me off with a week’s notice. I was still stumped after the week had passed, when I finally called Detective Avery to say I’d received his letter.
“Mr. Williams, I collect information for possible use in parole hearings. Do you know who Charles Dunn is?”
It wasn’t a name I could have retrieved from memory, but it felt uncomfortably familiar. Given the context of the call, I made a guess that took me back more than 25 years to a memory I’d mostly tried to ignore.
“Is he by any chance doing time for sexually abusing kids?”
♦◊♦
When I was 13, I was a “good” boy. I got good grades, had lots of friends, didn’t get into trouble, didn’t experiment with alcohol or drugs, was a frequent altar server at Sunday Mass, and got along well enough with my parents that I actually enjoyed being in a family bowling league with my mom. There weren’t many teams in the league, so we got friendly with the other teams pretty quick. Most teams consisted of parents and their kids, but one team who was a father short filled out their team with their good family friend, Charles Dunn.
A few months into the league, Charles and the family he bowled with said they were going skiing that weekend and invited me to come along. My family never skied but I had always wanted to try, so this sounded great. To facilitate getting an early start on the day of departure, Charles offered to pick me up the night before and I could stay at his place before meeting the family to all drive together the next morning. The night of the pickup, I remember my mom saying something about how nice it was to have adult friends like that who were trustworthy, not like all those creeps you had to worry about.
This isn’t a play-by-play recap where I’m seeking a cathartic retelling of every detail I can remember, but suffice to say that I got molested that weekend by Charles. As stories of sexual abuse and violence go, mine was fairly mild, in that there was never any penetration, he didn’t make me touch him, and it never recurred after that weekend. What started out as a creepy feeling escalated to inappropriate touching and staring, especially since I was not given my own bed or sleeping space, and finally to me waking up one morning with him fondling me through my underwear, at which point I pretended to be asleep and rolled over. He didn’t try again after that.
It would be years before I’d tell anyone about what had happened, and by the time I did, I didn’t even remember my abuser’s name. I talked about it to girlfriends, therapists, and eventually family, but never to report it to law enforcement. When Detective Avery put a name to that memory again, and told me he was in prison as a sex offender, I felt both relieved and guilty—relieved that he was there; guilty that I hadn’t played any role in putting him there so he’d almost certainly abused other kids after me.
Puzzled as to how the detective got my name, he told me that Dunn was having one of those “come clean” moments that convicts sometimes have and had listed every victim he could remember. My name was on the list. My last name (my real one) isn’t common, so it creeped me out quite a bit that more than two decades after it happened, when I couldn’t even remember his first name, he could come up with my full name. It still creeps me out. When I told my story to the detective, he told me I’d been a strong kid to turn over like that, because he was the kind of offender who wouldn’t get violent, but he would just keep escalating until or unless he met any resistance. I felt terrible for his victims—I have no idea how many—who were too afraid to even roll over. I remember how hard it was to believe it was even happening.
♦◊♦
Having heard so many horror stories, I’m glad my experience of sexual abuse wasn’t worse, and I feel almost embarrassed counting it when hearing or reading someone talk about more serious and sustained abuse, but the fact is, I was sexually abused and it had (or has) a lasting impact on me. It’s that impact, more than the abuse itself, that I want to discuss here. In GMP’s recent (September, 2011) series of articles on Rape and Sexual Violence, I read many profound, tragic, and often inspiring stories of survival, but I noticed that most of the male perspective being expressed was with regard to how to support women who had survived it and how to reduce it’s incidence through either personal change or activism. That’s all incredibly important and valuable discussion to have, but I was never quite having that feeling of, “Finally, someone is giving words to what I’ve felt!” so I’m resorting to my own words, in hopes of giving someone else that feeling.
Many stories of rape or sexual abuse of women that I’ve heard lead to promiscuity; I went sort of the opposite way. I don’t know if that’s typical for a male survivor or not, but having no sexual assertiveness sucked when I still had all the desire.
♦◊♦
If you’re expecting to hear how getting molested transformed me from a “good” 13-yr old into a rebellious, substance-abusing juvenile delinquent, you’re out of luck. Outwardly, I stayed pretty much the same kid: good grades, rule follower, got along fine with my parents, etc. The main difference in behavior was one that was easily attributed, even by me, to teenage shyness and awkwardness: my social circle shrank to almost nothing, and I was painfully shy when it came to dating. It would be a long time before I realized that a lot of my social awkwardness probably had something to do with being molested. Making that connection didn’t make anything easier, but it at least made sense.
Getting molested did not stunt my sex drive at all. Between the usual urges that accompany puberty and being a bookworm who read a lot about sex even before the Internet made it easy, I had no shortage of sexual desire. What it did stunt was my willingness and ability to make a move. Deep down, I was so afraid of violating a girl’s space by making an unwanted advance, that I refrained from making moves even at times when any “normal” guy would be seeing nothing but green light.
The more sexual or physical the move, the harder it was to make, but the really insidious thing about this fear was that it was inhibiting even at the point where potential sex gets started, like flirting or asking a girl on a date. I was not incapable of interacting with girls, but I’d always be so “nice” and asexual that I was one of those guys who ended up with plenty of platonic girl friends who infuriatingly told me time and again how lucky some girl would be to have me.
Fortunately, I didn’t remain trapped as an involuntary celibate forever, but I can’t say I overcame the fear of making unwanted advances, either. My first kiss was at 18 in a South American bar where the girl did 80% of the kissing, and it took a girl willing to make the first move on a date to finally have my first girlfriend and sexual experience in my fourth year of college. My lifetime number of sexual parters is not large, but almost every one of them not only showed interest first, but flirted first. Even if I initiated the first bona fide sexual move, it only happened when I was all but certain it would be welcome. If there was a campaign for “Only Enthusiastic Consent Means ‘Yes’ ”, I would be the poster boy.
That probably makes me sound like model citizen to some, but to me, it’s more about how getting molested made me afraid to initiate sex. I look back on dates I could have asked for, or probably could have gotten physical with if I’d just taken the chance and been ready to respect a “no”, and in retrospect, I think it was distorted thinking to act as though any unsuccessful advance would make me a sex offender and scar the girl/woman for life. I think there’s a huge middle ground between rape and enthusiastic consent, much of it morally acceptable to both (or more) parties, but my early experience on the bad side of the spectrum restricted my comfort zone to that level of consent that happens so infrequently—especially to a man waiting for it—that I’m more or less doomed to a life of not enough sex. On an intellectual level, I know that I can’t just passively wait for as much sex as I want, but fear of violating someone else the way I’ve been violated is a huge initiative killer.
These fears and inhibitions haven’t been so all-consuming as to prevent me from having any long-term relationships, including the marriage I’m in now. They just manifest in different ways. I’ve read and heard a zillion times that women want sex just as much as men when they’re with the right guy, and when they’re in a wanting mood, I find that believable. However, practically all my anecdotal experience—both direct and indirect—tells me that if women’s libido is comparable to men’s in intensity, it’s not nearly as durable or frequent after a couple of years. In that early part of a long-term relationship when we’re both hot and heavy all the time, it’s smooth sailing, but when that desire on her side drops off, I’m back to the wounded guy who’s afraid that me wanting it too much or touching at the wrong time will hurt the body or feelings of the woman I love. On top of that, it’s hard to ask for what I want, or how I want it, because at the first sign that she’s anxious about it, I back off, and then tend not to bring it up again. It’s not exactly a great recipe for healthy communication about sex.
Given my hang-ups about how much consent is enough (and my wife’s own issues I won’t even get into but everyone has something about sex, right?) it’s amazing I ever have any good sex, and yet I do. The kind with enthusiastic consent is the best, no question about it, but it’s not the only kind. It’s all consensual, though, so when I tune out that wounded 13-yr. old lurking inside me, I think I still qualify as a good man.
About Marcus Williams
Great story, Marcus, and sad. This explains quite a lot about a friend of a friend.
I really appreciate you sharing this. In fact, this is quite enlightening and sheds a light on things I had never really considered.
Marcus I relate to pretty much everything you wrote here. I didn’t have a girlfriend until well into college. I was painfully shy around sex. I am married now for almost ten years and feel the same way you do. Except I really can’t identify a specific event of molestation. I know in a more general sense how boundaries were violated when I was a child. But it wasn’t a specific time that causes me to turn inward on myself, or at least that I can recall with any certainty.
I thank you for the courage to write this and making me feel less alone.
Thanks to everyone who has commented. It’s gratifying to hear that it struck a chord so at least a few of us in the same situation don’t feel so alone about it anymore.
Tom – Not to discount the impact of the molestation I described, but I don’t think it’s the only way to get to that same kind of sexual shyness and fear of violating someone with unwanted advances. I think some of it just comes with having a high degree of empathy, whether you were born with it or raised that way. I can’t make the case that empathy is a bad thing, but when it comes to sex, it will get you more friends than lovers. Friends aren’t bad, but whatever the satisfaction of living up to your empathy or other values, that primal physical urge doesn’t just satisfy itself. Between rape and feeling sexually frustrated, I’ll choose frustration all the way, but I figure there was probably more healthy middle ground in that range than I managed to find. I found *some*, and got married, so it’s not hopeless, but I’ve never completely solved the tension between accepting my libido for what it is, and treating my my wife (or other partners, previously) with complete respect and empathy. Those two priorities don’t play nice together.
Read the article “You Can Get Laid Without Being a Jerk”. Basically there is a debate in the comments about whether everything other than enthusiastic consent from the woman (never mind the man…his enthusiasm is irrelevant) is sexual assault, rape, manipulation or coercion.
According to feminists Tom and Marcus are the way all men should be. Never initiate sex, never take a risk. So Marcus don’t feel so bad. You are not dysfunctional. You are the new model for men. And all it took was sexual molestation to get that way.
Thanks for your comment. I’m not current on all the comments on that article, but I did read it and some of the early rounds of comments. I’m not ready to paint all feminists with that brush, but I do think “enthusiastic consent” is setting the bar too high if everything else is defined as some degree of sexual assault.
As an example of a lesser consent being completely morally acceptable to me, I woke up a couple nights ago around 2:30am and couldn’t get back to sleep; my wife woke up enough to be aware of this and offered to have spooning sex to help me get back to sleep. It was offered and accepted with love, but we both knew this was basically me using her body, and while I didn’t hurt her in any way, it sure didn’t involve any enthusiasm. As a standard for morally acceptable, mutually rewarding sex, “enthusiastic consent” is sort of like saying the standard for eating should be a five course meal. It’s great if you can get it, but you’ll starve if you turn away all other food.
That said, of course I’m against rape, manipulation, and coercion, and as I described in the article, I’ve probably hobbled my sex life by worrying so much about even coming close to any of those things, but even so, I think enthusiastic consent is more a goal than a requirement. It also strikes me as unrealistic because in the discussions where it’s being advocated, there’s sometimes an implication that men should wait for that kind of consent before they even think about flirting. I think it would be more constructive to advocate toward making advances respectfully and recognizing when it’s time to back off, because just waiting for women to pick you out of the crowd as a potential sexual suitor leads to a lot of frustrated men. Naturally, I wish women could be just as sexually assertive without being stigmatized for it, but I don’t want to be a eunuch until that dream is realized.
I also get, though, because of my strong empathy for it, how a victim of sexual assault would embrace enthusiastic consent as the standard. It makes sense to me because they’ve experienced the bad kind. I don’t accept it as a guiding principle for human sexuality, but person to person, I get it and don’t think it means they hate me or all men. I sure hope they don’t.
Personally I think there is a very wide spectrum between enthusiastic consent and non-consent. In the course of my adult life, I’ve had sex many times where I enthusiastically consented, but I’ve also had sex at various times when I was drunk, when I was not completely in the mood, because I felt pressured and wanted to please my partner, when my partner was sad and needed comforting, and so on. I was more likely to give in to pressure from a partner when I was in my 20′s and not as good at being assertive about what I wanted. However, in all of those situations, I DID consent. I never felt like I’d been forced to have sex against my will. In many cases, the sex was enjoyable even though I may have been less than enthusiastic starting out. Having sex because your partner needs it is sometimes part of being giving in a relationship. Feeling emotionally pressured to have sex to please a partner is not good, but still, sex under those circumstances is a far cry from rape. I am not talking about a guy being mean or verbally coercive but a guy just wanting sex really badly when I’m not totally feeling to it, but I go along anyway, maybe for not the best reasons (wanting his approval, fearing he won’t like me, having low self esteem). Again, those were bigger issues for me in my early 20′s than now, but they do not mean that my boyfriends in those years (who were all good guys who I believe really cared about me) were borderline rapists. They were young horny guys who asked their girlfriend for sex and I said “okay, yes, sure.”
I disagree with Hugh’s take on the incident he describes in “The Accidental Rapist.” His girlfriend sounds like she was conflicted about having sex for some unclear personal reasons but she consented to it and she gave him no clear reason to believe she was not consenting.
Thanks for sharing that, Jill. I’m a little more caught up now (but not completely) on the “enthusiastic consent” discussion that’s been happening on other recent GMP articles (esp. “You Can Get Laid Without Being a Jerk”). I agree with what you’ve said here, that consent can be given completely free of coercion, manipulation, or other jerk tactics, and still not be enthusiastic. Maybe it’s a foreign concept to a young person still playing the field or still having nothing but passionate sex in the early part of a committed relationship, but when libidos stop matching up in a long-term relationship, enthusiastic consent becomes a sort of Holy Grail, and if you won’t have sex without it, you’ll have very little sex. If one partner wants it and the other sort of doesn’t, but consent is given anyway, that may be evidence of some bad communication or self-esteem issues, but it does not make it rape, or make the “wanting” partner a jerk. Consent is “yes”, even when it’s not expressed in the form of “Yes! Yes! Yeeesssss! You may now begin touching me.” That’s the kind of situation I perceived in Hugh’s story, and while I’m sympathetic to how bad he felt about the situation and would feel the same way in his shoes, calling it accidental rape sounded like an exaggeration to me, too.
This article was so amazing, Marcus. I hadn’t read it until today. I wonder how much abuse (like you described or even worse) is part of children’s lives. How it effects their sexual and relational development and creates dynamics like this for men and women (or the reverse, acting out too much).
I think the spooning sex you described was not using someone…..not in my opinion. She offered you a kindness, a loving sharing of her body by your own admission. Using to me is something much more caustic. I suppose enthusiastic consent is a good tool for some, folks who have no idea about consent to begin with, or who need an actual road map.
But I suppose I”m of the camp that thinks sex is a kind of communication between people. Sometimes I listen to a friend vent about things even if I don’t feel up to it. Sometimes I share my body with my husband and wind up more into it than I figured I’d be, and vice versa. Does that not count as consent?
i don’t know….I think it’s all damn complex. Sex seems like it should be simple. Want and fulfillment, but it’s never that linear.
I can completely empathize with what you wrote here, Marcus. Though I was not molested as a child, my mother was the victim of sexual abuse and assault. She a great job of teaching my sisters and I how to stay safe, though the PTSD she experienced as a result of her experiences made these conversations very frequent and the message confusing. As a teenage girl taking on baby sitting jobs, I was afraid to touch the children I worked with in any comforting way for fear that even a hug could be misconstrued as a “bad touch.” As an out lesbian in college, I loathed using the locker room for fear that even looking in the general direction of an undressed woman would draw admonishment for unwanted attention. Though seeing a therapist has helped me to overcome these fears, it is helpful to read that other people have experienced similar responses. Thanks for sharing your story.
Thanks for your comment, Samantha. I’ve worked with young children, too (babysitting and camp counselor), and felt the same way. It was sometimes hard because my instinct and what I really want to do is be very affectionate, but especially as a man, I’ve always been careful about the kind of contact I allow. Like if a little kid at camp would come jump into my lap while I was sitting cross-legged, that’s a sweet thing to do and what I would want to do would be give them a big hug, but instead, I would either move them or reposition to make sure they’re sitting way out toward the knees and not next to my crotch. Fear of being mistaken for a predator is not very unique among men, but I’m that careful even alone, for fear that the kid will at some point have a fleeting memory and think maybe I was touching them inappropriately. I’m not saying it’s a rational fear, but it’s there. One of my greatest joys as a father is feeling liberated to be as physically affectionate with my two kids as I want, because I know it’s not sexual or in danger of being taken as such by anyone who witnesses it.
I can’t relate to being an out lesbian (fantasies notwithstanding), but as far as worrying about being “caught looking” at a woman and fearing admonishment for the unwanted attention—yeah, I know that feeling well. And I’m talking about women that are always dressed! I don’t have that hang up with my wife (or partners in previous long-term relationships) but for any woman who isn’t my lover, I tend to worry than any outward sign of finding her sexually attractive will be unwelcome and treated as creepy, so I try to squelch it. It’s a respect thing, too, not just fear, but even I think I’m probably overcompensating.
I honestly doubt that your experiences have been directly caused by the molestation in question. I don’t mean to diminish the psychological impact it may have had (it certainly didn’t help!), but I don’t think it caused the problem. I’ve talked to too many men who described the exact same attitudes who had no such triggering event.
The real causes are pretty straightforward: the way men are treated by women and the way society teaches people to view male sexuality.
As I commented to Tom above, I don’t think getting molested is the only way to end up facing the kinds of problems I described. You’re free to doubt that it made a difference, but after a lifetime of knowing myself and sometimes even talking to therapists about said self, I’m okay with believing that it affected me. That doesn’t mean I think it defines me, or that I’m unaware of other factors just because I didn’t include my complete history in the article. For other men, I don’t dispute that there is more than one way to end up struggling with similar problems. However, I think it’s inaccurate and vague to just blame it all on how women treat men and society’s view of male sexuality.
Thanks for the comment.
Thanks for sharing your story and giving one more voice and perspective for men with this type of experience. It’s so hard for men to have an outlet or way to relate and I appreciate how you are able to articulate it.
Thanks for sharing this. I had a somewhat similar situation happen when I was a girl. Nothing penetrative but definitely some inappropriate interactions and touching. The impact it had on you has made me reflect on my own dating strategies and why I engage in them.
Marcus, thank you for sharing your story. Many male survivors go through the same thing you did. Part of it is that the abuse causes us to become hyper-vigilant and over-aware of our behavior. We know what it feels like to have our boundaries violated, so we kind of project that onto our own actions. That projection conflicts with the expectation of male initiation and gets magnified by social concerns about rape. The whole thing snowballs into one big “I’m a potential threat” thought.
I go through a similar problem. I grew up in my situation, so I was use to people doing things to me whenever they wanted while expecting me to ask for permission to initiate with me. I never learned how to say “no” or that I was allowed, so in my interactions with women I would be far more concerned with getting their consent than telling them that I would rather not have sex. Most of them assumed I consented because I am male and what male would say no to sex. A few were less than polite when I expressed my apprehension. My experience with men was different to the extent they were more vocal in their interests and would catch my cues about being uncomfortable.
This type of feeling is not limited to victims of abuse, but it is often worsened by abuse and by abusive concepts that play on people’s fears about sexual violence. That is kind of what you saw on Hugo Schwyzer’s “The Accidental Rapist” article.
That’s a great one-sentence summary of what I was getting at.
A much appreciated perspective.
I was not incapable of interacting with girls, but I’d always be so “nice” and asexual that I was one of those guys who ended up with plenty of platonic girl friends who infuriatingly told me time and again how lucky some girl would be to have me…. My lifetime number of sexual parters is not large, but almost every one of them not only showed interest first, but flirted first. Even if I initiated the first bona fide sexual move, it only happened when I was all but certain it would be welcome. If there was a campaign for “Only Enthusiastic Consent Means ‘Yes’ ”, I would be the poster boy.
Sheesh, that’s almost exactly my life story, except that I was never molested! I simply decided at age 14, with no religious input (that came later), that I wasn’t going “all the way” til my wedding night. That’s all it took. Even in my late teens/20s when I got religion and started hanging out in religious circles, so many of the women that I hoped might be “the one”, instead ended up being, as you so eloquently put it, “platonic girl friends who infuriatingly told me time and again how lucky some girl would be to have me”. Also, “tall, handsome, blah blah.” It got really old, I’ll tell you.
By my late 20′s I was dating (when I got dates at all… rather rarely) mostly broken rape victims who’d had their fill of bad boys. I didn’t seek them out, they sought me out. As I was told more than once, “I took one look in your eyes and knew you weren’t that kind of man”. (You can imagine how negatively I react to the feminazi “all men are rapists” meme…) After a few dates, sometimes on the first date, they’d break down and tell me their rape story. These broken women truly appreciated a man who believed that “Only Enthusiastic Consent” — plus a wedding vow –”Means ‘Yes’” These relationships ultimately didn’t work out for one reason or another but they were mostly good while they lasted.
Somewhere in my 30s I finally figured out that nearly all my relationships had been started by the women — again, as you put it: “every one of them not only showed interest first, but flirted first”. In my case, all but one, and I wish I’d never met that liar. The relationships that worked were ALWAYS started by the WOMAN! Including my eventual wife.
Now I return to my first comment: I was never molested. I was just a nice guy. So I pose a question. You said your molestation didn’t really change who you were. Is it possible that your romantic path would have been similar, if the molestation didn’t happen? Not to minimize molestation, it’s a horrible crime. But….maybe you’d have been a victim of the niceguy syndrome in any case, just as I was.
PS.. ” I finally figured out that nearly all my relationships had been started by the women — again, as you put it: “every one of them not only showed interest first, but flirted first”
In my case, however, this was not due to lack of initiative, but due to the fact that my legions of attempts to initiate were nearly always futile. If I had been too afraid to make the first move, however, the result would not have been much different!!!
This PS was a PS to a longer post which for some reason never appeared. And which I”m too lazy to type again.
I hate when that happens. I hope you’ll give it another shot later because I’d be interested to hear what you were going to say. I suggest composing in a separate editor and copying and pasting when you’re ready to post, in case something goes wrong. I’ve learned that habit after losing too many long posts around the interwebs.
it finally posted… it was just in moderation
Thanks for commenting, van R. Other than the fact that I lost religion around the age you found it, it sounds like we have a lot in common. My first two long-term relationships were with women who had been sexually assaulted, but that was something I found out later, not something I sought out. It never really occurred to me that maybe I attracted women with that history out of whatever combination of kindness or empathy or whatever that they saw in me. I just assumed it was a not-so-surprising coincidence given how frequently women are sexually assaulted. I was always sad and angry that they’d experienced that, but never thought of myself as more likely than any other guy to end up dating a woman who had.
I don’t think I said it didn’t change me; I said I don’t feel defined by it. If that sounded the same, I apologize for the ambiguity. My intended point was that although I felt affected by it, meaning somehow changed from how I would have been if it hadn’t happened, I did not feel (and still don’t) so all-consumed by it that it’s the focal point of who I am. It had an impact, and I feel that it impaired me sexually, but not that it ruined me. Notice all the “feel” statements. Whatever truth there is in what I’m saying, it’s the subjective kind, not something objective I can prove with hard scientific data if you find my assertions less than convincing.
This has been a recurring theme in the comments so let me say again that I don’t think getting molested is the only way to end up too [fill in the blank] to ask women out or make sexual advances. You could fill in that blank with “nervous”, “nice”, “empathetic”, “anxious”, “cautious”, “afraid”, “insecure” or lots of other words, so take your pick if you relate to everything but the molestation part. I won’t feel any less nice guy solidarity with you if we have everything in common except getting molested.
I’m not sure what the people questioning me (not just you) think is to be gained by suggesting to me that maybe getting molested had nothing to do with it in my case. I was writing about how sexual abuse impacted a man straight from my first person perspective of it, because that perspective was lacking in the recent series on rape an sexual violence. (Excellent series, btw—just not much attention on men as survivors.) I’ve read many stories by women survivors about how rape or sexual abuse contributed to poor self-esteem and unhealthy promiscuity. Although I have no problem accepting that some women can face those problems without being first victimized, I wouldn’t dream of asking one of those rape survivors, “Yeah, but are you sure it was the rape? I mean, you could have been just been headed for low self-esteem and unhealthy promiscuity anyways…”
Maybe you’re relating to the direct awkwardness of asking for a date or making a sexual advance, which Nice Guy Syndrome might adequately explain. But did you also:
* Go from an outgoing, popular kid to a shy, loner kid in a short span of time because you felt too nice?
* Feel like you wanted to talk about being nice, but were afraid someone might tell your parents and you didn’t want them to think it was their fault?
* Worry that if anyone found out you were nice, they’d be afraid to let you be alone with their kids because people with a history of nice are more likely to be nice to others?
* Feel guilty or ashamed about not telling anyone you’re nice, because maybe other kids got hurt or messed up when saying something might have protected them?
You don’t have to share those things in common with me to relate to every aspect of the dating and sex anxieties I shared, and I’m more than happy to hear both the similarities and differences in your own experience, but please, if anyone is bothering to read the comments before chiming in, I’d appreciate if you stop asking me if getting molested impacted me the way I think I did. I’m quite interested to hear your own perspectives, whether or not molestation was involved, but if all you want is a concession that unmolested guys can face some of the same issues when it comes to dating and sex, I’ve already made that concession a few times now. I even did it unprompted in replying to Tom, who managed to say he could relate even though he didn’t have that molestation experience in common, without simultaneously suggesting I was wrong to think it had mattered in my own history.
I’ve read many stories by women survivors about how rape or sexual abuse contributed to poor self-esteem and unhealthy promiscuity. Although I have no problem accepting that some women can face those problems without being first victimized, I wouldn’t dream of asking one of those rape survivors, “Yeah, but are you sure it was the rape?…”
That’s actually quite a good point. I only asked the question because your story so startlingly overlapped my own, EXCEPT for the molestation. I’m sorry if the question offended you, but it did seem a reasonable one to ask at the time. Thanks for the enlightening answer.
you could have been just been headed for low self-esteem and unhealthy promiscuity anyways
Welll… .among women, EVERY “slut” or repentant former “slut” I ever knew, indeed got her start by being raped and/or molested. Some of them were religious girls who were saving it for marriage, yet, after the rape, ended up sleeping around. When I was young and naive I would have assumed that a sexual attack would turn a woman OFF of sex and/or men, either permanently or for a very long time — and perhaps in some cases it does — however as an informed adult I learned that the opposite is quite common.
So… with women, yes, the connection seems solid. But with men, more specifically you and me, the connection seemed much less solid, because our experiences so overlap despite the fact that one of us wasn’t a molestation victim. Again, that’s why I posed the question.
Not sure if it connects., but though I was never molested and had a healthy family life, I was severely bullied in the school yard, as a tall skinny science nerd, till I wised up and started powerlifting. And one girl I dated in my 30s, after hearing a Focus on the Family program about PTSD, told me that I clearly showed all the signs of it, despite never having been in a war or disaster…… the relentless bullying of my youth was the only possible source of it. Maybe like attracts like, and damaged women gravitate to “damaged” men such as myself. There is also, as I noted in my original post, the fact that women can instantly tell that I’m NOT sexually dangerous (which probably hurt my dating more than it helped due to the whole badboy fetish so many women have…) . And also, one rape victim told me, that she felt safe with me, because I’m 6’3″ and, as an adult, rather rough looking — “Other men don’t check me out when I’m out with you.” Sometimes I feel like Wahb from Biography of a Grizzly… kicked around in youth, intimidating as hell as an adult.
That book I referenced is online now. The money quote:
“The All-mother never fails to offer to her own, twin cups, one gall, and one of balm. Little or much they may drink, but equally of each. The mountain that is easy to descend must soon be climbed again. The grinding hardship of Wahb’s early days, had built his mighty frame. All usual pleasures of a grizzly’s life had been denied him but power bestowed in more than double share.” — The Biography of Grizzly, Ernest Thompson Seton (1900)
To me, that suggests that women who are raped or molested are overwhelmingly more likely to think of themselves as sluts, or at least to be regarded as such, than women who don’t go through that. That sounds pretty uncontroversial to me. It makes me wonder, though, how much that feeling corresponds to actual behavior. Maybe you’ve also known women with comparable experience to the “sluts” (number of partners, frequency, etc.), but neither they nor you regarded themselves as such because it did not flow from a background of having been victimized. I think we agree about an underlying tendency here, but the slut-phrasing just sounds a little too inevitable or universal for my taste.
Interesting. I was a small nerdy kid and subject to some bullying (I wouldn’t call it severe), and never really did grow into a manly man looking kind of guy. It didn’t take PTSD to get me there, but it all combined to make me feel weak, and weak is not attractive. Between my small size, late growth spurt, and always looking at least a couple years younger than my real age, I definitely felt at a disadvantage in attracting girls my age. Maybe there were more girls attracted to me than I ever knew, but at the time, I was convinced that at most, I was seen as that nice boy it was safe to be friends with—maybe even get some help on their homework.
Thanks for sharing, van R. We’ve taken different paths, but criss-crossed enough that it’s nice to have some company at the intersections.
“…Welll… .among women, EVERY “slut” or repentant former “slut” I ever knew, indeed got her start by being raped and/or molested….”
Marcus: “To me, that suggests that women who are raped or molested are overwhelmingly more likely to think of themselves as sluts, or at least to be regarded as such, than women who don’t go through that. … how much that feeling corresponds to actual behavior….”
To clarify, my comment had NOTHING to do with how they think of themselves, nor how others think of them. And none of them used the word “slut” to describe themselves; indeed one exprostitute I dated (n >400, per her), once described certain other girls as “sluts”.
And at this juncture I’m sorry I used the word “slut”, since it seems to have confused the issue. I was being lazy: at 4 letters it’s easier to type than promiscuous, even if you use quotes.
I really meant actual behavior — self admitted behavior: Every highly promiscuous woman I ever knew well (ie, well enough to know her lifestory), got her start being molested and/or raped.
And I personally have NEVER encountered a situation where a rape/molestation victim was deemed “slutty” due to her victimization. That attitude simply doesn’t exist in my religious, conservative, crime-hating social circle; rape is blamed on the rapist. Punishing the rape victim is seen as something barbaric Moslems do; it’s considered highly unChristian.
This is nice to see discussed. Marcus, I hope you’ll do some more work with this. It still seems to be a limitation in your life you might want to get rid of. And you can. I was molested at 9 and 12. It did involve penetration. I needed a group of men to talk to about it, and ended up creating one I’ve lead for 3 years now. None of the many rape centers in this large progressive city have groups for men despite all the requests for them. Very common. But the effects you have are really very, very common to the point where I tell guys if you stick around in the group, you’ll see we all react in very similar ways. Sexual abuse of boys is very common: 1 in 6 at least (see http://www.jimhopper.com for a thorough treatment). Victims No Longer by Mike Lew is a good starting book too. Think about that. That is many millions of men. That means everyone knows male victims who are likely silent.
I’ve had the same fears. Basically, my parents left molesters to teach me about sex, and they taught me that someone is the perpetrator of unwanted sex and the other just deals with what gets forced on them. Well, I for a long time and still a tiny bit I fear being the perpetrator despite being, like you, extreme in my avoidance of anything like that. It’s boring in bed though. I frequently asked my current gf for a year if I was hurting her (with sex) and I knew I wasn’t but I just needed to constantly hear it was ok. Silence was very scary. (Like it was for me as a child). She’d of course with some annoyance assure me I was **really VERY respectful**. Like, more than any bf she’d ever had. After the 20th time we were both tired of it.
The good news is just like I learned sex is victim and perpetrator from abuse, it’s very possible to learn something much better. There are many common effects: hyper-sexuality, hypo-sexuality, orientation issues, shame, depression, anxiety, anger and rage, chemical/alcohol abuse, isolation and loneliness. But men need help and someone to do that with. It’s an interpersonal problem that needs an interpersonal solution. You can’t do it alone. Unfortunately, men and women still seem to promote the myths that men can’t be hurt. Abused. Raped. And men are blamed for the wholly normal responses. It’s blame the victim all over again.
Our issue here (fears of initiation) shows perhaps how communication and consent needs a foundation of self knowledge and empowerment to succeed. All to often, we try to force the male perpetrator/rapist frame onto the story when it’s more complex. Abuse of males is just incredibly strongly denied. A ton of people (women AND men) have abuse or other issues that get in the way of anything like enthusiastic consent.
Thank you, NotAlone. I never sought out a support group, but I did go from many years of never talking about it or facing it to addressing it in therapy, and being more open about discussing it either with people close to me, people who disclose their own history of abuse, or now, writing about it for complete strangers. I agree wholeheartedly with you that it’s possible to learn to frame sex as something other than a victim/perpetrator act, and others who have been through it can be great resources to each other for figuring that out.
I can relate to much of what Marcus, et. al are saying.
I was pretty badly abused (physically/mentally) till I left home. I would say I was not abused sexually, but I am not ble to remember the second grade at all. So, I have wondered, did something horrific happen that year?I am in currently in therapy right now, os , maybe I’ll find out.
I was also the small, bright kid. I didn’t really start puberty until later of my junior year in high school. I ddin’t finish puberty until after I did my service in the Army (23/24).
I remember, as a teenager, that I had to be different from the abusive men my mom married. So, yes, I was pretty clueless. Yes, I heard the remarks (many times) about that I was a great guy and one day you’ll find the right girl, etc. I was too cautious and too clueless. I was so careful (and still am), that I end up isolating myself from the dating world.
I am a good man, father, and friend. Now I just have to believe it.
Sorry for typos, bad grammar, etc. Got a little emotional there.
Powerful piece. Have some of the same experiences with the opposite sex.