Some experts suggest that 25% of all girls and 15% of all boys have been sexually abused. Abusers include parents, step-parents, baby sitters, relatives, neighbours and family friends. In rarer cases, the abuser is a stranger.

In my private practice, as many as 40% of clients report some form of sexual abuse.

The emotional and psychological consequences of sexual abuse are serious and can include:

  • Low self esteem
  • Toxic guilt and shame
  • Sexual dysfunction or perversion
  • Phobias, general fear, fear of men
  • Depression
  • Anxiety
  • A lack of trust in people, men or the world
  • Disease
  • Chronic Stress
  • A sense of failure or of being bad

Many victims of abuse feel that they are to blame. This is common because when a child is abused, the child can not make sense of it--they assume it must have something to do with them. This remains as a belief in the unconscious of the victim. The damaged inner child lives on, cut off from the wisdom or understanding of the adult.

Victims often live with a sense of shame and feel dirty or bad-often without knowing why. As children, all they knew was that they were doing something bad.

And many victims live with fear and anxiety. This is often caused by the abuser threatening them in the event of exposure. The inner child carries around a dreadful secret.

Not all abuse victims remember the abuse. Often it has been repressed and resurfaces during the course of therapy. This may sound horrific, but it is necessary to remember that as long as trauma is repressed, it will result in problems such as depression and anxiety. In my experience it is always better to bring it out. I have found that the unconscious mind possesses the wisdom to know what can be released, and when to release it.

However, abuse victims can be helped. I use a combination of counselling, hypnotherapy, inner child therapy and NLP.

Abuse victims need to go through a number of stages. It can be painful and it is not always easy. Therapy can take a while-but it is worth it!

Just talking about to a therapist is in itself a huge release. Thereafter follows a period of feeling the pain, accepting what happened, feeling angry with the abuser, dealing with the guilt, and rebuilding the self esteem.

I have a lot of experience in dealing with childhood sexual abuse. If you have been abused, take the first step to freedom and call me. Remember, everything you tell me is in strict confidence

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CASE STUDY
CHILDHOOD SEXUAL ABUSE
Details to protect the identity of the client have been changed.
Emma came to see me after twelve sessions of counselling. She had gone to counselling to sort out her life, and she had gradually developed a suspicion that she had been sexually abused.

Emma was the features editor for a major newspaper, had lots of money, dressed provocatively and was over assertive and aggressive. She clearly lacked self esteem. She said she had an unhappy marriage, with two children. She had never had an orgasm, and she found intimacy with her husband repulsive. She was a workaholic.

She asked me to use regression therapy to find out about her childhood.

It took Emma four sessions before she began to trust me enough to open up. When she did, she remembered graphically, being sexually abused by her father. During subsequent sessions she remembered abuse taking place from age 9 to 14 (such is the power of the mind to repress memories).

During each new session she would doubt her memory, only then to say, well, I know deep down it happened; I just don't want it to be true.

She also discovered that being abused by her father had made her feel special and she had enjoyed the sexual feelings. This caused a particularly difficult kind of toxic shame and guilt.

At one stage she discussed it with her mother, who finally admitted that she had known all about it but was too afraid to act.

It was necessary for Emma to be very honest with me and with herself. It was necessary for her to express everything she felt and had experienced. This cathartic experience was Emma's ticket to freedom.

I saw Emma for 14 sessions during a 6 month period. By the end her self esteem was nearly repaired, she was free of guilt, and had experienced orgasms with her husband. She went on to make many changes. I saw her two years later and she had left her job and was self employed, writing children's books.