Understanding the Effects of Sexual Trauma
Sexual trauma can have profound and lasting effects on survivors' mental, emotional, and physical well-being. It can affect the very essence of individual identity and self-worth. Statistically, individuals who suffer from sexual trauma are three times more likely to have mental disorders, including depression, anxiety, substance use, eating disorders, and impaired interpersonal functioning. Men who have suffered from sexual trauma are also at a particularly elevated risk for decreased work productivity, homelessness, eating disorders, and suicidal ideation.
As stated in the previous blog, “Defining sexual trauma”, one of the most significant barriers to healing from sexual trauma is the silence that often surrounds it. We as a society don’t tend to talk about sexual trauma, although that is slowly changing. In this blog, we aim to normalize the effects sexual trauma can have in our daily lives. It isn’t all in your head, there is nothing wrong with you, you are not broken, things happened to you that are not your fault.
As mentioned above, individuals who suffer from sexual trauma have a higher chance of meeting diagnosis criteria for mental health disorders. This still doesn’t mean there is something wrong with you nor does it mean if you experience some of these symptoms you have that diagnosis. Here is a non-exhaustive list of common mental health symptoms of sexual trauma:
Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD): Intrusive memories, recurring nightmares, feeling hypervigilant,
Depression: Feelings of sadness, hopelessness, suicidal ideation, and a loss of interest in daily activities.
Dissociation: Feeling disconnected from one's body or environment. Emotional numbing
Anxiety: constant worry, feelings of dread and panic, avoidance of situations or objects that induce distress, racing thoughts
It can be common that there is overlap of the symptoms described above. It isn’t a formal diagnosis, yet, but that can sometimes be called Complex PTSD.
These difficulties can include
Self Perception: helplessness, shame, guilt, wrongly blaming themselves for the traumatic event, a sense of being completely different from other human beings.
Emotional Dysregulation: persistent sadness, bursts of anger or inhibited anger, feeling like too much, mood swings that feel uncontrollable
Impact on Relationships: Difficulty trusting others, fear of intimacy, and challenges in forming and maintaining healthy relationships.
Sexuality: Low desire, inability to get sexually arousal, pain during sexual interactions, low sexual satisfaction, avoiding sexual or intimate contact
The effects of sexual trauma are complex. The effects differ in intensity, duration and frequency from person to person. If you feel that any of this matches with your experience of living with sexual trauma, you are not alone. It is possible to heal from sexual trauma. Here at The Wave Within, we see you, we are here for you.
Resources:
National Resource Center on Domestic Violence: The Psychological Consequences of Sexual Trauma
National Center for PTSD: https://www.ptsd.va.gov/professional/treat/essentials/complex_ptsd.asp