Incest can create a severe ripple effect in someone’s life. People that relate to the person who experienced incest are affected negatively. Families and loved ones are left confused about why a person would harm a loved one in this manner. Moral reasoning begins to crumble as the person who experienced incest attempts to make sense of why this atrocity occurred to them. Incest erases someone’s personhood, in the end, and corrodes the “self” in many ways.
Incest survivors, particularly girls, may have entirely different developmental pathways. Dr. Van der Kolk argues he is an influential trauma researcher and psychiatrist. Incest experiences may lead young girls to dissociate so they can forget or avoid thinking about the incest memory. Dissociation is the felt experience of feeling like some memories split from discomforting memories to avoid re-experiencing painful physical reactions. The emotions are difficult to bear for a young girl so her body, by virtue of her biological make-up, begins to ignore physical experiences so she is not reminded of the incest incidence(s). The body “numbs” out. The alternative for many girls is to be reminded and be haunted constantly by the helpless feeling they felt when they were being raped by a family member, neighbor, sibling, or trusted friend. The experience of incest speeds up a girl’s bodily process which may lead to many hormonal imbalances down the road, as well. Incest disintegrates her sense of worth.
People who experience incest may dissociate during sexual activity, in the future. I have had patients who report feeling more pain than pleasure when they are penetrated by a partner. Patients report feeling scared of hitting their climax in sex because a strong sense of vulnerability is required during intimate moments like these during sex. The desire to be connected with a partner becomes a fear for people who have an incest history. Spacing out is common for some women who have an incest history during sex as well. Opening yourself up to another human is more tolerable when a person distracts themselves. Cognitive avoidance helps a person not attach a sexual activity to an incest memory from their past. Further, some individuals spend most of their lives living with dissociative states like these so they can “move on” with their lives. Incest memories act like a parasite to the “self”.
Lastly, incest experiences develop self-hate. Studies show that incest children’s identity shifts from “I make mistakes” to “I am a mistake”. As a result, children who experience incest blame themselves for incest occurrences. The parent, family member, or sibling creates a story for the incest survivor child to believe the sexual acts are “normal”. This story told by the perpetrator is essential to maintain the perception the perpetrator appears “good”. Denial, blame, and nonintervention further creates a self-blame message a child could receive (Courtois, 1997). Later, children become adults; their self-hatred and symptoms related to these thoughts increase sadly. Studies show that people who are incest survivors are more likely to experience depression, PTSD and CPTSD symptoms, anxiety reactions, revictimization, relational disturbance, major cognitive distortions, and other addictive-compulsive behaviors. The experience of having your worth taken from you by a trusted person is unimaginable for many people. Your identity dissolves after experiencing any form of incest.
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Clinical Complex Trauma Specialist (CCTS-1),
Certified Dialectical Behavioral Therapist (C-DBT),
Certified Alcohol & Drug Abuse Counseling (CADC)
I’m not sure if I’m sad or relieved that there’s not more comments on this article. I’m glad most people don’t need to google the same things as me to find it. Sometimes it feels like there’s few online resources that actually offer relevant true-to-life facts about long term effects of incest related trauma, most online resources use 5000 words to say “get help” without having real help or information to offer, so this article is a rare gem and I appreciate it. Thank you for writing this and using an honest voice to help people find some clarity.
I think many just struggle with knowing what to say.
My ex told me what happened to her 7 months into our relationship. We lasted 5.5 years. In the end, the trauma, it’s effects, and me being her emotional punching bag were too much. The damage done by incest is devastation. I pray she and others are able to find healing.
I am a survivor of incest. I have been searching for answers abought revictimization and to understand why I have been vulnerable to harm from not having boundaries with others. I understand I deserve to be treated with respect intellectually but emotionally I must not believe it. I want to know where I can find out more about why I struggle to protect myself from things that I should be able to.
Hi, Jackie,
Thank you for your question.
I first would recommend a seasoned therapist who has specialized training in complex PTSD therapy interventions.
The second thing I would recommend is looking to see if you are able to get a therapy animal. Therapy animals begin to help incest survivors learn to express emotional needs without the risk of being harmed by another human. Dogs preferrably are amazing at picking up signals of mental suffering from their owners.
I wish you the best on your healing journey. Healing is not linear. 🙂
I totally agree and understand! I was a victim of incest with my father. My mother complete denial. Therapy helped soo much! Stay with it. You are able to restore self esteem and recover to live a normal life. But it’s a very tough and emotional experience. Understand it’s hardest emotional loss to go through other than losing a child. It’s awful. But go through therapy and grieve. Be gentle on yourself. But go through it. Totally worth it in the end. Best wishes and love to anyone dealing with this issue
Dear Ramon
I am an incest survivor. My father molested me and my mother molested my brothers. I tried to normalize everything. I is no lo ger see any of them. I left. Incest is a big ball of spaghetti…it’s messy and can take a lifetime to make any sense of it. There is no sense actually. It’s just a tragedy to heal from. I got lots of help thru the years from specialists. No one else wanted to help. I carry on now like it never happened in order to appear normal
In a childhood survivor of incest from my father. My mother never believed me. Now as an adult I have hypersexuality disorders and can’t control any urges. It’s hopeless