Did you ever get asked were you molested as a child?

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Allow me to throw a different perspective into this conversation, I WAS molested as a child and I have been asked this question as an adult.

In my experience, there are two kinds of people who ask it: those who genuinely mean well (and rarely have the slightest notion what they're doing) and want to help you, and those who suspect and are intent on exploiting the vulnerability.

I lie to both and say 'no'. It's my business, and if I want to tell you, then I will tell you after spending a very long time deciding if I trust you. A very very long time. And if you ask me outright, it's a waste of time, the answer will be hostile.

I have been asked if I was sexually abused because of the way I played with my dolls and my actions I was doing at six so whenever I told about it, I would sometimes get asked if I was sexually abused or what.

You saved her life, I bet she was happy.

I still do not know why she did not go to the conseler or a teacher? I was the worst choice for the situation due to my social anxiety. and took the riswj of me telling everyone leading to further mockery.

She may have been ashamed or embarrassed thinking it was her fault. Or she may have been afraid to tell someone and then she gets caught by her foster dad and he beats her for it. Sometimes parents or anyone who is doing it lies and makes it look like the child is making it up and they believe the grown up. I think that's what she may have been afraid of.

What's riswj?

I don't think most people who ask that are serious. I'm sure it's mostly just a way of insulting you and calling you weird. Basically, those questions just lable you as a "rape victim" who is "used and destroyed."

If someone seriously thought you were molested, they wouldn't ask you about it, and if they did, it wouldn't be in that way.

I always thought those who asked me were curious and trying to understand my actions better. I have even been asked if I was abused based on my fetish.

I have never even asked anyone if they have been raped because mom told me it's a very personal question and it's not something you ask about and lot of people don't like to talk about it.

It's incredibly hard to tell someone about that kind of thing. Sometimes you think you'll get in trouble if you tell. Sometimes it feels like it's your own fault or that people would blame you if they knew. Abusers can tell their victims all kinds of things.

You were probably just in a certain place at a certain time, and also less threatening than someone in a position of authority. The first person I ever told was a girl my own age, because I needed to say it and she was safe.

I've been asked that by virtually every counselor and therapist I've ever seen. I think that's a fairly routine question in psychology today. It rules in/rules out a lot of issues as possible contributors to a diagnosis, and it is probably the single most severely-impacting event in a child's upbringing. I was never molested, but I hate touching, and always have. I'd scream and cry if anyone (other than my mother) would try to pick me up as a baby, and I flinch and duck out of the way of hugs or pats on the shoulder, etc.

My wife, and my ex-girlfriend, were both molested by members of their own households for long periods of time, and that really did severe emotional damage. If someone was molested (physically OR mentally), there are things that a therapist will do for you that are different from other people presenting with similar symptoms, but who have not been molested.

Charles

In our Oprah Winfrey culture, people just assume everyone was molested as a child., even if you do like getting cozy with people. It's just part of the armchair mindset. People like to play the role of pychotherapist. People have asked me that over the internet, but not in person. Where I live, it's still sorta taboo to be open about stuff like that.

I was trained to be a therapist (master's in counseling) and we were taught that lack of eye contact is most often an indicator of shame, except in Asian people, who may do this as a part of culture. ASD's were never even mentioned..

So, I can see why some therapists are assuming sexual abuse or something terrible like that. Before going to therapy, I call around and ask if the person has experience with ASD's. That way, I don't end up in those situations.

No....i've never been asked this question.


Some guy tried to molest me when I was 12 though.

I was in the video arcade at a big mall around here with a cousin (who is the same age as me.) I was playing "Defender" and this 40-something spanish guy who spoke broken english approached me. He said "is that a good game"? and immediately, perhaps instinctually, I knew what he was up to.

I just gave him a weird look and said "ummm yeah". He kept hovering around me not saying anything. After I was done with the game, I told my cousin I wanted to leave the arcade because there was this creepy guy there who was probably trying to molest me. My cousin didn't really take me seriously, but he agreed to leave nonetheless.

Anyway.....this guy just followed us around the mall wherever we went. We went into B Dalton's bookstore and he stood right next to me in the whatever section I was in acting like he was browsing the books. He tried to say something to me again but I just ignored him, walked away and told my cousin we needed to leave. He followed us out of the bookstore as we made our way towards the foodcourt. Mall security was standing outside the foodcourt and there was a few cops with them as well. I pointed the guy out to them and told them he keeps following me and that I think he's a child molestor.

They confronted him and he acted like he didn't speak any english at all. Since this was in south florida, both the cops and mall security were spanish so they had no problem communicating with him. He told them he was priest and that he wasn't following me. He claimed he was just "being friendly".


They obviously didn't buy his story because they escorted him out of the mall. They couldn't arrest him because legally speaking, he had done nothing wrong ofcourse. So that was the end of that. The whole situation was somewhat unnerving, but I really wasn't scared of the guy. I was savvy enough to know exactly what he was up to and there was no way I was going to let him lay a finger on me.

Considering what we now know about many priests....he may have been telling the truth about that at least.


This wasn't too long after Adam Walsh was raped and murdered too and that was a huge story around here. Everyone was on their guard after that happened, myself included since I wasn't all that much older than Adam. They found his head in a local canal not long before my own incident here.


Thankfully....that was the only time some potential child molestor tried anything with me.

I do get asked this quite often actually.

Something similar happened to a co-worker when he was 14 at a stripmall, the guy was following him around so he went into an athletic shoe store and told a bunch of guys in the store that some guy was following him around so 4 black guys who owned the sneaker store had a talk with him. They beat him bad enough he needed an ambulance and a police car followed him to the hospital. He did not believe those black guys were going to believe him because he was a kid and white but he said after he pointed him out they got him no questions asked.

Malls are prime hunting grounds for child molestors. I spent alot time hanging out in malls when I was kid, so i'm surprised something like this only happened once. I may have social deficits, but i'm pretty darn "street smart" if I do say so myself.
I know when somebody has ill-intentions and it didn't take more than a few seconds for me to realize the guy who was bothering me did. I suppose he could've been technically classified as an ephebophile rather than a pedophile though since I was already post-pubescent at that time.

That would be pretty consistent with most of the priests found guilty of molestation too. Their victims are usually postpubescent boys, not 6 y/o kids or something. So it's very possible that this guy really was a priest.


Anyway.......do you know if those guys got into any legal trouble for beating that guy up? I mean i'm sure the guy was some sort of molestor, but he didn't actually do anything illegal. I'd be surprised if they weren't charged with assault and battery or something. The guy might have sued them if nothing else. I'm not real keen on vigilante justice, but I can't say I feel too much sympathy for the guy. My ex-girlfriend was brutally raped when she was 17. The guy who raped her was an illegal mexican immigrant. Her boyfriend at the time and a few other guys beat the crap out of the him, but he was never charged. My ex comes from very traditional asian family and her father would've blamed her for the rape, so she never reported it. So aside from the beating he received, he got away with it and supposedly fled back to Mexico not long after they beat him up.


The number of sex criminals in our society is ridiculous. I looked at the Fl. sex offender database and there's literally hundreds of registered sex offenders that live within a five mile radius of me

This is pretty upscale part of town too...but like most other criminals, these people come from all "walks of life" ofcourse.

Its risk, I have big fingers and a little notebook keyboard.