Seeing that I am a person: Self and recovery among women sexually abused as children

Abstract

Disturbances in the experience of self are reported frequently among adult survivors of child sexual abuse. This paper focuses on disturbances of sense of self and the process of eventual reparation of the self as reported by ten adult women who had been sexually abused in childhood. The women were participants in a qualitative research study on the experience of childhood sexual abuse.

Participants identified damage to self in terms of having no sense of self; feeling negatively about oneself, as expressed in descriptions of themselves as having low self esteem, feeling evil or unclean, being guilty and feeling ashamed; and detachment or dissociation from self.

The recovery processes they identified included the experience of hope for the future; the development of a stronger sense of self, as experienced in a sense of being separate from others' wishes and needs, being in control of one's own life, being able to assert oneself and to act in one's own interests; and the experience of absolution, of no longer feeling guilty.