1/When I was eight, I was molested. The experience wasn't scary or painful, just confusing and uncomfortable, because I didn't understand what was going on. After becoming an adult, I experienced a strong incentive to reinterpret what had happened to me as-
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2/traumatic. Sexual assault on children was considered to be one of the worst things that could happen, and if it happened to me, then it should have seriously fucked me up, right? I started to interpret problems in my life as having been caused by those childhood events.
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3/But after some time, I stopped doing that, because I realized I was trying to force a narrative. In reality, the experience I had as a child had very little, possibly no long-term adverse effects on me. The actual adverse effects came from other things - a sense of
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4/betrayal of adults who were supposed to had been more protective of me, and a serious awkwardness around the molester in later years.
I feel a bit of fear saying all this, because THE IMPLICATIONS. Did I want it? Am I saying it wasn't serious? Am I minimizing? Am I delusional?
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5/No, yes, no, and no. I'm being honest about my experience. I also don't mean other people need to interpret their experiences the same way - but I DO recognize that culture seriously pressured me, with partial success, into experiencing suffering I wouldn't have had otherwise.
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Do you think this affected your sexuality, and if so, how? I'm asking because 1) I have a friend who was molested at a similar age, and he's the only (openly, confidently) bi-sexual and polyamorous person I know, and 2) I've heard a huge percent of porn actors have been molested.
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I think it's highly unlikely that this childhood experience led to my sexual openness. There's several other reasons that are way more salient and convincing, and at no point during my reliving of childhood during acid trips did the molestation come up as important.
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Do you think there's a connection between the experience and your casual attitude towards sexuality? In the sense that the associated societal taboo has lost some of its meaning, and what was previously unthinkable became somewhat "normalized".
I hope I'm not being insensitive.
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No worries! As I've responded to a few other commenters, I think it's highly unlikely the molestation affected my sexuality. There's several other explanations about things that influenced my entrance into sex work that are waaay more compelling to me.
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Very good book about this very subject called The Trauma Myth—with a very interesting historical context to background of how these beliefs took shape. Highly recommended.
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