The aftereffects with respect to the Survivor’s sexuality are immediate. Humans are sexual beings from the moment of birth. The sexual abuse or incest survivor believes that their body does not belong to them. Their body is the ground on which this insidious battle took place. Touch is not experienced as affection, but as a violation for the survivor. Touch does not bond or reassure–it hurts and confuses the survivor.
E. Sue Blume in her book, Secret Survivors, writes, .Sex feels .dirty,. and the survivor may have an aversion to being touched, especially in gynecological exams. Survivors frequently have a strong aversion to (or need for) particular sex acts; feeling betrayed by one.s body; trouble integrating sexuality and emotionality; confusion or overlapping of affection, sex, dominance, aggression and violence. Sexuality is expressed through pursuing power in a sexual arena that is sexual acting out (self-abuse and manipulation, especially among women; abuse of others, especially among men); compulsively .seductive. or compulsively asexual; must be sexual aggressor or cannot be; impersonal, .promiscuous. sex with strangers concurrent with inability to have sex in intimate relationships (conflict between sex and caring); prostitute, stripper, .sex symbol,. porn actress; sexual acting out to meet anger or revenge needs; .sexaholism., avoidance; shutdown, crying after orgasm; all pursuit feels like violation; sexualizing of meaningful relationships; erotic response to abuse or anger; sexual fantasies of dominance or rape.
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