Reply to If you came forward as a victim of abuse, did family believe you?

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Reply to "If you came forward as a victim of abuse, did family believe you?"

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[quote=Anonymous]The OP did not raise this issue at Thanksgiving and was not asking about doing so!

This post is spot-on in response to the OP:
[quote=Anonymous]I have no experience with sexual abuse.  But in my experience (not direct), abuse (emotional/physical) is not believed by relatives/family.

It's not even that they think the victim is a liar or untrustworthy.  It's that they don't want to deal with it.  Even family/relatives who WITNESS the abuse act like it didn't happen because they don't want to deal with it.  They want everyone to be able to come together at holidays and weddings and pretend to be happy.

[b]For family or relatives to accept that abuse happened would mean that they'd have to reevaluate their relationships and actually face the dilemma of whether to make the abuser an outcast or accept what he/she did and be okay with it.[/b]

No one wants to do that.  [b]This is why victims often don't come forward.  It's a larger problem then just abuse within families.  It makes people uncomfortable.  It's easier for people to tell themselves the victim is either a liar or "disturbed" and "imagined it."[/b]

Again, this is not from direct experience.  [/quote]

This has been my experience. My therapist explained it in similar terms. They want to believe that it didn't happen, or that I exaggerated, so they don't have to accept the horror of it. it's denial to protect their vision of a happy normal family.[/quote]

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