Recently I went to a Mike Lew workshop for male survivors and he played us this song before we got started. This song made me want to cry but I held back my tears since I wasn't ready to weep in front of my peers. This song made me realize that I am not to blame for what was done to me as a child. He abused me, it's his abuse but my wounds. This is something I think many survivors battle with and if a simple song like this can help anyone realize what I did then that is very powerful. When I listen to it now it makes me shed healing tears every time, it wasn't my fault, not at all, it's his abuse to bear and my wounds to heal.
What I realized later was also pivotal. In our society (at least Western ones) I have always felt that a lot of emphasis is placed on individual responsibility which is hard to reconcile with being abused because naturally we are responsible for own actions. However, as a child I had emotional needs that were not met by my loved ones, so naturally when someone else offered to fulfill my basic human emotional needs whatever I had to do in order to have those needs met seemed logical to a child trying to survive in his emotionally absent home.
Like many survivors I have abused myself with drugs and alcohol, hurt others emotionally and done other regrettable acts. What I now realize is that while I am responsible for my actions after the abuse, I am not responsible for the actions that were done to me that led to my future abusive actions towards myself and others. That to me is the way to reconcile society's expectations of responsibility with being a survivor. And to me that's huge, so huge that when I read these words I still get teary eyed cause I'm still processing how I didn't fuck it up. So now it's up to me to go unfuck it up with all my survivor brothers and sisters.
