The shame is not yours to carry

Today I want to talk about shame. Many sur­vivors strug­gle with intense feel­ings of shame after a sex­u­al assault. For many it comes from try­ing to look for a rea­son why some­thing so hor­ri­ble hap­pened to you. And then sur­vivors turn that look­ing inward, ques­tion­ing their choic­es, actions, iden­ti­ty, val­ue, clothes, bod­ies, and any­thing else that they think might have caused the assault. It’s nor­mal to want to be able to point to a sin­gle moment or item and say ​“that’s why this hap­pened”. Often peo­ple want this to bring back a sense of safe­ty, think­ing if they change that one thing then maybe it won’t hap­pen again. It can be so hard and can take time to accept that the only cause of sex­u­al assault is the choice the per­pe­tra­tor made to cause harm. The shame is not yours to car­ry, you did not choose to be hurt, some­one else made a choice to hurt you. 

What we can car­ry instead is self-com­pas­sion, allow­ing your­self to acknowl­edge that what hap­pened was not okay and you did not deserve it, no one does. It can be hard to reframe these thoughts to give your­self the love and kind­ness you deserve, but with prac­tice it gets eas­i­er and you can do it.

Some­times it can be help­ful to make a choice to let go of try­ing to find a ​‘why’ some­one did that. Their inten­tions don’t change the impact it had or that they act­ed with­out your con­sent. Their moti­va­tions don’t ever excuse their respon­si­bil­i­ty. Every per­son has an oblig­a­tion to not sex­u­al­ly assault oth­ers, no mat­ter the cir­cum­stances, there is noth­ing that can jus­ti­fy caus­ing this harm. When we remind our­selves that our choice was tak­en by some­one else and make an effort to treat our­selves with the com­pas­sion we deserve this can be a big step that sup­ports our heal­ing. You are not alone if you are still strug­gling with shame and self-blame, it is a com­mon expe­ri­ence for sur­vivors. Every sur­vivor is on a dif­fer­ent heal­ing jour­ney but you are already so resilient and strong and in your own time, you can learn to let go of that shame. 

If you think some­one in your life is strug­gling with this shame let them know it is nor­mal to want to know why but that the blame belongs only to the per­pe­tra­tor. Remind them that they did not deserve this and that they did noth­ing wrong. Remind them that you believe them and that they are not alone. 

If you your­self are strug­gling with this shame we are always here for you. Our ser­vices can be found at www​.sacha​.ca and our 24 Hour Sup­port Line can be reached at 905.525.4162. You deserve sup­port and to be remind­ed that you did not cause this, you are not to blame, we are here for you always, you are not alone. 💚