How To Move Beyond Childhood Abuse And Have Healthier Relationships As An Adult

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Jim looked at Shannon with a cacophony of feelings; love, lust, appreciation and fear and wanted desperately to reach for her.

Shannon could sense his looking at her, in spite of her back being turned to him as she washed the dishes.  Her spine tensed and she felt afraid and then angry. 

Jim felt her energy shift and could feel the coldness she projected out at him. He stood frozen in his tracks uncertain as to what to do.

He knew she loved him, and that she wanted to please him.  He also knew she would succumb to him if he asserted himself, but she would be angry with him for days.  He went back to clearing off the table and securing their doors for the night.

How it all began 

“Jim and Shannon” are a composite of couples I have worked with over the years. Shannon is a survivor of childhood sexual abuse and had yet to understand all the ways it impacts her relationship with Jim. 

Shannon thinks Jim is too focused on sex and, unspoken she really believes he only loves her for what she does for him sexually.  She feels shame that he can’t love her for who she is, but doesn’t really think anyone would.

Jim spent his life craving touch. His mother knew that she shouldn’t “coddle him”; her mother taught her well that boys need to be “toughened up”.  She let him console himself when he fell and discouraged his affection toward her. 

When Jim became a teenager he discovered the joy of touching girls, and the rush of hormones that came with that touch.  Touch then, for Jim, became inseparable from sex. 

When he met Shannon he thought he had found a woman who was very open and comfortable with sexuality.  She never denied him anything he wanted and he felt loved for once in his life. 

Ramifications of abuse 

Now, as he stood in the kitchen wanting her so badly, he didn’t understand why she no longer seemed to be able to love him as she once had.  He felt guilty for wanting her and confused at her rejection of him.  His anger and resentment built every time she rejected him.

Shannon had started therapy and she told Jim her therapist said she should not have sex with him until she wanted, and to assert her own needs rather than always succumbing to his. 

Shannon’s sexual abuse had taught her to please men, but not herself. The disgust and pain she felt at the thought of sex convinced her she could just as well live without it.

It made her angry that Jim continually pushed her to do something he knew was painful and not fun for her. It reinforced her belief that he could only love her if she gave in to his sexual needs.  She felt resentful and angry at his insensitivity, a belief her therapist reinforced in each weekly session.

How to untangle the mess

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