On my blog entry entitled Worrying about Reactions to Your Child Abuse Story, a reader posted the following comment:
What do you do when even with minimal information (eg that my father sexually abused me) your friends avoid you because all they can think about when they see you is sad things? (Even if you don’t say anything about it and are only talking about happy things.) I just feel so lonely and so confused and don’t know what to do. ~ ericatherunnergirl
I, too, went through this with many of my friends in the early years of healing from child abuse. The surprising part to me was that even some of the people who took my news very well in the moment and said all of the right things pulled away after my disclosure.
One in particular was great at first – she made a point of making eye contact and saying, “This is NOT your fault. You need to understand that.” I sooo needed to hear that message and thought, “Wow. She gets it.” Then, crickets. I still bump into her from time to time, and she is as sweet as can be, but she pulled away when I needed her the most.
I think the problem is that emotionally unhealthy people attract emotionally unhealthy friends, so the pool of friends to choose from for support is likely not to offer the best choices. I am no longer friends with any of the ladies I used to hang out with before healing or during the early stages of healing. If we bump into each other, we’ll do the casual chit-chat thing (other than the one ex-friend), but I have healed too much for any of those friendships to work anymore.
If anyone had told me this would happen, I am not sure I would have had the courage to continue healing, and I sure would not have viewed this as a good thing. I had such a deep-seated fear of abandonment that I would have been scared to do anything to push away the people I loved … and I did love my friends.
In retrospect, I recognize that losing these unhealthy friendships cleared the way for healthy friends to enter my life. I have three close friends locally as well as many others who are not as close. All three close friends are much more emotionally healthy than any of the friendships that have fallen by the wayside, and all three of those friendships have room for me to be myself in them. I can talk about anything I need to, including the abuse — all three of them are happy to listen and can handle it.
Photo credit: Lynda Bernhardt
Blooming Lotus 
My understanding of friends & friendship also changed dramatically after I started healing. I remember starting to tell one friend about starting therapy and then stopping and apologizing for taking up too much time and talking about stressful things. My friend told me: this is how people become close friends with one another. In other words, friendship is actually built through sharing painful things as well as happy things. I do have friends that I mostly just share happy times/activities with, but they are not deep, close friends. I wish the commenter good luck.
I think it also comes down to trust; as an abused person my definitions of trust are somewhat damaged, but we all trust people, we trust the bus driver to get us safely to where we want to go, we trust the taxi driver like wise. Its more to do with who we trust with what! You have said that people are fine until disclosure but then they keep clear; they dont understand! They have no idea of what you are going through, or where you are with it. It wasnt done to them, so they really dont know. You can have hundreds of friends, but only one true friend! Mine is my wife and i’m very lucky!
My issue is more to do with pushing people away. I go into isolation when i’m hurt; its a personal reaction, a coping strategy i learnd, if theres no-one near me they cant hurt me. But this later became a behaviour that when someone defied, let me down, made fun of me, hurt me, upset me, i withdraw and sit on my own, keep my own company, but it can be pretty lonely at times!
I celebrate your survival, you have made it to here! keep going, kind regards, mark.
Same thing happened to me. I’m still in the process of sorting it out. It’s good to hear positive things about a situation that just seemed to add to my pain. And I do have three new friends who can handle what I need to talk about and still talk to me.
Well said. Thank you.
For me the way it works is some people seem to already know I am hurt. In a way they saw what I could not. It really makes not difference with many of my friends. When I found out everyone was not multiple and started telling people it was easy for me as most said. That makes sense or were surprised it was news to me.
I did experience some of what Faith describes. Those that could best talk the talk could not walk the walk. Those people seemed to think they understand the effects of abuse, when often they frame everything through their experience or knowledge not understanding their limitations.
Most of my close friends go with “Nothing is wrong with Michael he is just different.”
The people that I can not deal with are the ones they lay claim to the worst abuse ever and do not accept that torture and death is different than sexual abuse.
The more I process and the more I know it seems to get easier. Perhaps it is confidence. It was hard when you do not know what happened. I seem to have developed a “look” a friend who is a policeman said “Well we see the worst that life has to offer.” Seems my look made him understand I was not impressed.
With the MKULTRA it is easy to lead in with back when 37 states in the US had sterilization programs they had other well funded programs also one of which I experienced. In a way the MKULTRA is easier than the cults. It takes a very sophisticated and knowledgeable mind to see how those two go together naturally.
Behavioral scientist have issues accepting that MKULTRA was run by behavioral scientists.
I really have not run into anyone who knows me at all that was shocked. Some think trauma and are limited to sexual abuse. That is common and can be a stumbling block for some people.
i have had a few people who bolted when I was suffering and then when they have hardship in their life all of a sudden want support from one who has suffered. I do not go there.
As I write the only real issue I have is those that think they understand all abuse. It really seems to come down to the look. Weird I did not know that.
I would sure like to know if you guys are hearing me out there.I am processing some horrendous memories right now and it hurts. I tried to get my(family) to help, being they went through the same thing, and all I got was Sorry! I am in denial right now but call back when everything OK. The other response was to blame me and verbally abuse and cut with words and blame me fore what happened to them. Yes, I was the scapegoat in the family. Something goes wrong in the (family) Time to abuse me to pay for thier sins. It was not very healthy!!!
And Yes My dad was in the military and I remeber some wierd stuff! Thang you for listening!
Thank-you for answering, Faith!
I seem to attract emotionally unhealthy people towards me; my psych says this is because I’m open about the fact I see a psych and therefore people feel safe talking to me.
I’ve been drifting away from my “friends” and have kept only a couple and one new(er) friend who is now my best friend – still no emotionally healthy but certainly a step up from the others. At least I feel like I have a connection of sorts to her. Perhaps because she is several years older than I, unlike my teenage friends who are tiring with their (appropriate) immaturity. Or the other students who talk to me – and to whom I listen because I feel useful helping them with their problems even if it is to my own emotional detriment.
I hope that as I heal more and grow up that I will make healthier friends as you have.
When I was a teen, I always made older friends. Always. In high school and college, both. Until my husband, I also tended to always date older men and women. Unfortunately, due to the abuse, and because I’ve been in therapy on and off since I was in the fifth grade, those friends and significant others were not the healthiest people.
Now, in my 30s, I still find I do not attract healthy people. My most recent failed attempts at friendship were people from my industry (when I was employed), three male and one female. The woman seemed friendly, but gave me the cold shoulder after I didn’t want to attend her wedding as a “second-choice” option on short notice. The first man tried to turn the friendship into something more when he got divorced, and was very hurt when I laid boundaries and refused his efforts in “teaming.” The second man manipulated me with flirting, lavish gifts, expensive dinners, and more to get me to do inappropriate personal favors for him, and I felt taken advantage of. (I also did not want the lavish things.) The last man is someone I have helped many times, and even asking form him a small favor or a bit of support requires me to do most of the work.
When I took a new job from which I was let go almost immediately (boss had it in for me, and I didn’t fit it), I was surrounded by women who gossiped, tried to force me to get drunk and spill negative dirt about myself, and tried to force me to attend a themed party where I would be required to wear skimpy clothing that made my breasts hang out. One, who was resentful that I was hired to be her boss, took me out for a “getting to know you” drink and told me how to do my job, while ordering me to relax, take my hair out of its chignon, and “loosen up.” When I did not follow the orders she barked sufficiently, she violated my boundaries in the extreme, pushing my shoulders around and posing me to her liking. I was scared to tell her off because I already fit in poorly at this job and was fighting back tears. I wound up being let go anyway.
I am done with friendship for now. It is simply not for me.
I am in the early stages of healing and have never had much luck with friends. I have DID, and it interferes with most all of my social interactions. I am developing an awareness of how my parts/alters play a role. Basically it boils down to not feeling emotionally safe around people. I was thinking while I am working on healing, there must be some way to get the parts to go to a “safe place” or do something else and let other socially competent parts be engaged in interactions. I need a strategy for getting parts to cooperate so I’m not so burdened and constricted when with others. I desperately want to have close friendships, and the lonliness is unbearable. Any practical suggestions that might help in the short run? So far safe places hasn’t worked.
Hi, Nezumi.
My problem was that I wanted to find one person who I could trust with all. My therapist told me that what matters is that my needs get met, and that can be through interactions with different people for different things. As an example, I might trust one friend to have a fun night out, another friend to talk about deep issues, and a third friend to babysit my child. Perhaps you can work with your multiple system in this way for compartmentalized friendships. :0)
~ Faith
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