Thanks, everyone, for your empathy. I really do appreicate it. But my purpose in posting the story was not to garner sympathy (though I very much appreicate it), it was to further the discussion on becoming a woman... and respect.
I think you can all see how it would be very easy to get stuck in a mind-set of this event being the main crux of all my problems. It would be easy to take that time in my life and use it to foster a victim or martyr mentality, to use it as an excuse for everything 'bad' that continued to happen to me in my life. It would be very easy to use that time in my life as a reason for being distant, emotionally unavailable, to dodge vulnerability... to be perpetually angry.
And for quite some time I was all those things. It was a very, very sad thing to have happened, make no mistake. And it did cause me some very serious problems that took me years to address (and things will still crop up from time to time).
But what I wanted to underscore, again... was the complete and utter lack of respect in my life, and how its absence further solidified in my mind my own lack of respect for the feminine and for myself. When you lack respect for self and others, I don't know that it is something you tend to notice... for you've never experienced it... so how could you possibly recognize its absence?
Abuse of any kind... whether it is physical, emotional or verbal... kills respect. One who abuses certainly lacks it... the one receiving the abuse WILL lack it at some point, if not removed from the abuse. Acting/reacting, speaking in anger... lacks respect. It is not to say that people should stuff their anger, it is not to say that people don't have a right to FEEL and RECOGNIZE their anger... but to act/react while still in the mode of anger is completely irresponsible. We can ALL be abusive to others, at least to some degree, when we act like this.
So anyway, I think you can see why I was still puzzled that I continued to experience problems long after I had dealt with my abuse, my abuser, etc. I still had anger, I still had resentment, and all those other things. I knew the abuse and the situation in and of itself may have caused me untold issues... but it wasn't the root of my problem.
The entire notion of lack of respect, and my anger and resentment of women finally clicked it all into place. Without respect, you CANNOT have a healthy relationship... with ANYONE, including yourself. You cannot set effective boundaries, and you will seek out, unconsciously, others, like yourself, who do not respect.
I read somewhere once, the line: "another individual cannot abuse you any further than you are willing to abuse yourself." (Speaking for adults. Children are a different matter). For if another abuses you FURTHER than you abuse yourself, you stick up for yourself... fight or flight impulses kick in.
Being the 'peace keeper' in a relationship, being the fixer... is a lack of respect for self and other. It indicates lack of trust, and a need to control. And it is dishonest. And those who do this go a long way in perpetuating and setting up an atmosphere of disrespect.
Okay... so now I have discovered all this about myself, and I understand now WHY... all the stuff in my life, my Rs, etc., have gone the way they have.
It has been a critical discovery for me. But guess what? It has not solved my problems... like I've said... the anger is gone, the resentment, etc., etc... but still, doubt and some sense of fear remain.
This has perplexed me. Until I realized why.
I have a life-time of conditioned behavior and unconscious response to myself and the world around me to UNDO. To REWIRE. To relearn. I have a whole new way of BEING and THINKING to learn. And I am CONSTANTLY catching myself. It is exhausting, for I ALWAYS have to pay attention. It is mentally and emotionally draining. A lot of things are counter-intuitive... but... it's not like I lack intelligence or awareness... so I don't want to make it sound as if I was a monster or that this is something impossible to overcome.
This notion of respect and honoring self and others is not an altruistic ideal... at least it isn't to me.... not anymore. It is a very complex understanding that many of us just ASSUME we get, assume we have.
Even thinking back on my life... the things I learned to respect came from a place of fear or intimidation or consequence... which isn't true respect, at least not to me. It is pain/pleasure response.
What I am talking about may sound like 'self-love,' or 'loving' behavior. <nod> It is. But to me, that is exactly what love is. Genuine and honest respect. So when people say love is a decision, not an emotion... I say absolutely, for it is a conscious choice on how you decide to act and react to people, place, things and with self every single moment of the day.
I would go so far, at least at the moment, to say that if you are experiencing problems in your life... respect, or lack thereof, is going to be at the root of it all.
