Loss of Consort

[lb_lee]

Rogan: Okay, so, in the "Summary of Legal Survey Data from the False Memory Syndrome Foundation" paper we talked about, we came across this contorted sentence:

"The most dramatic toll on families queried by the Legal Survey is loss of contact with children and grandchildren, loss of consort by non-accused husbands of wives who are developing images of parental child abuse, loss of privacy, injury to reputation, increased health problems and marital stress." (4)

Mori asked what the fuck "loss of consort by non-accused husbands of wives who are developing images of parental child abuse" meant. I replied that it sounded like "women dealing with memories of being abused don't want to fuck their husbands and that's so hard FOR THE HUSBANDS," but that sounded so over-the-top evil that even I couldn't believe the FMSF would say it.

Readers, I checked, and that's EXACTLY what it means. But why is this bad?

So, first of all, this is what the FMSF chooses to focus on as "the most dramatic toll." Not getting fired, not becoming homeless, not losing jobs or money (which would be MY top concerns, as someone who became a couch-surfer due to this stuff). No, they choose to focus on, "our abused kids won't let us see THEIR kids, they're talking about us in ways that make us feel bad, and innocent husbands' boners are sad because their abused wives won't fuck them due to abuse memories coming up."

I've had sexual partners (and been one!) who have flashbacks and trauma around sex and sometimes cannot bone me due to it. Readers, when this happens, my concern IS FOR THEM. Not my sad boner.

When my lover suddenly freezes up, starts crying, or goes into a flashback, I might feel a fleeting flash of disappointment, which is then drowned out by the far more pressing concern of my lover's well-being. I try to bring them back to their body... or get the hell out of their way if they tell me to. Readers, my sexual frustration is far less important than that.

I do not think that my behavior should award me Lover of the fuckin' Year. I consider it common decency. What kind of marriage doesn't have room for even this amount of care for one's spouse?

And if my lover's agony was created by an unscrupulous therapist, then my anger would be against THEM, not my partner. I would be furious about a therapist causing them totally unnecessary suffering! I wouldn't be whimpering and whining about "loss of consort" or "a child [who] is laboring under false memories, has chosen to disregard historical truth and is unwilling to discuss developing beliefs rationally." That makes it sound like my lover is just being a stubborn pain in my ass trying to make my life miserable. It makes it sound like it's THEIR fault for getting taken advantage of, and that I'M the wounded party.

That one tortured clause of one long sentence says a lot, I think, about how the False Memory Syndrome Foundation members saw their children, grandchildren and wives. It says that these folks aren't people who are hurt, or who are being hurt; they are possessions being taken away, possessions whose JOB is to be available and fulfill the FMSF member's desires. (And this is ASSUMING the abuse accusations aren't true, which... that's a big assumption right there.)

When I found out that yes, "loss of consort" meant exactly what I thought it meant, I had to go and scream into a pillow. Because I've had to deal with whiners like that. It was those experiences that, when I got together with Mac, made me think I would be OBLIGATED to be non-monogamous, because I was such a sexual burden that nobody could be expected to survive monogamy with me. It was a shitty feeling, guys! It felt terrible to think I was so incapable of filling a partner's sexual needs that I NEEDED to insure they were met elsewhere!

I just want to make this post to say, if you are where I was back then, feeling like a sexual burden... there are kind, understanding people to partner with, and it's not some terrible dealbreaker from hell. Stick it out to find those people. You are under no obligation to act as sexual vending machine, and sad boners are best taken care of by their owners.

Yeesh. What a bunch of whining candylanders. When I got pedojacketed, I was out five grand and had to couch surf in Boston winter. They... got sad boners. Christ.

Comments

[wolfy_writing]

When my lover suddenly freezes up, starts crying, or goes into a flashback, I might feel a fleeting flash of disappointment, which is then drowned out by the far more pressing concern of my lover's well-being. I try to bring them back to their body... or get the hell out of their way if they tell me to. Readers, my sexual frustration is far less important than that.

Yeah, feeling a degree of sexual frustration because sex you were hoping for is not currently an option is reasonable, but "You're having significant trauma symptoms due to terrible things someone else did to you, I am not getting laid as much as I want, clearly I'm the one with the most important problem here" just screams entitled creep.

And if my lover's agony was created by an unscrupulous therapist, then my anger would be against THEM, not my partner. I would be furious about a therapist causing them totally unnecessary suffering!

Again, having come at this primarily from an angle of therapy harm, it's shocking how little compassion and concern the FMSF shows for people who, according to them, are suffering serious psychological harm due to manipulation by a mental health professional. I've read accounts from people such as the victims of the abusive practices at the Castlewood/Alsana eating disorder treatment center, and it didn't lead to me judging the clients as choosing to disregard historic truths. I was concerned and outraged that mental health professionals were taking people struggling with a serious mental health issue and putting them in an isolated environment where they were subject to deeply disturbing manipulation and control. (I'd like to note that on the Castlewood Victims United website, a lot of people sharing their stories are inaccurately generalizing about repressed memories and DID. Like I believe the former patients about their own experiences, but also I think a lot of them grabbed really hard onto the side of the Memory Wars that made it easy to push back against the abuse by mental health professionals they'd been subjected to, and don't have the most nuanced picture.)

"I think my loved one is being subjected to abuse and manipulation by someone in a position of power, which is taking a severe toll on their mental health and warping their sense of what's real, and the worst part of this is that they're not giving me everything I feel entitled to" is very telling.

[lb_lee]

Rogan: In a way, it was actually REALLY NICE when I reached a point where I WASN'T the one having the episode right on the verge of coming. It meant that I was able to experience, firsthand, that no actually, even when I'm at my most het up, that frustration is NOTHING compared to the, "oh no, my lover!" feeling. It's not like that's the last orgasm I'm ever going to get! It's fine!

it's shocking how little compassion and concern the FMSF shows for people who, according to them, are suffering serious psychological harm due to manipulation by a mental health professional.

YES. It really shows what a paper-thin mask their "concern" is, so often! Herman Ohme's banging on about how happy he was to totally ruin his relationship with his daughter by running her therapist out of town TWICE, and how he doesn't care because by god, he got his REVENGE, and I am just like, "you are a sad, raisin-souled man."

it didn't lead to me judging the clients as choosing to disregard historic truths. I was concerned and outraged that mental health professionals were taking people struggling with a serious mental health issue and putting them in an isolated environment where they were subject to deeply disturbing manipulation and control.

Yes! Like, during my whole Cultiples thing, I got badgered and harassed by cult followers because: cult. And sometimes I got mad. But a surprising number of them apologized to me afterward, once they were out, and I realized that these people were taken advantage of. They were under intense pressure to go after me, and I just couldn't stay mad at them after that. And that was stuff like getting banned from cons, not, "they won't let me talk to them anymore. :("

I'd like to note that on the Castlewood Victims United website, a lot of people sharing their stories are inaccurately generalizing about repressed memories and DID.

I am not really surprised by that. It's to be expected, honestly.

[wolfy_writing]

YES. It really shows what a paper-thin mask their "concern" is, so often! Herman Ohme's banging on about how happy he was to totally ruin his relationship with his daughter by running her therapist out of town TWICE, and how he doesn't care because by god, he got his REVENGE, and I am just like, "you are a sad, raisin-souled man."

Yeah, with some accused parents it's obvious that regardless of the accuracy of the more extreme abuse memories, their kids are better off without them.

It's to be expected, honestly.

Yeah, a lot of people latch really strongly onto the opposite of the thing they're afraid of, and with abuse by therapists, what a person's afraid of is often "The therapist was right and everything they were doing was for my own good, I need to just give in and take it until I react how they want."

[dismallyoriented]

I don't have much else to say, just firmly shaking hands on the "it's just common decency" part. Being blocked from sex due to trauma is something that can complicate relationships, but a good partner will love you, and that means making the space for you when you're triggered or otherwise "inconvenient" for lack of a better word. Not everyone will be compatible but that is not the traumatized person's fault, nor does it take a saint to extend compassion in this way

[sorcyress]

Here to 100% echo the "there are kind, understanding people to partner with" line. I still get trauma-echoes sometimes from the ex who raped me when I was seventeen. None of my partners since have reacted to those echoes with anything other than decency, dignity, and wanting to help me feel safe and loved.

~Sor

[multiple_altiple]

...it's shocking how little compassion and concern the FMSF shows for people who, according to them, are suffering serious psychological harm due to manipulation by a mental health professional

This is a really good point that I hadn't even thought of but now that you say it I'm like yeah?? Even if we take the FMSF totally at their word, the accuser is STILL AN ABUSE VICTIM, it's just therapeutic abuse instead of parental! The FMSF is one of those deals where there's SO MANY things that are overtly, insanely wrong getting tossed at you all at once that you're liable to miss a few.

[multiple_altiple]

Yeah, citing this as one of the worst effects is insane. If this was included in a comprehensive list of negative effects, that could be fair... but it should be phrased in a way that implies BOTH spouses are suffering. Something like "long-term loss of intimacy in marriage." The way they phrase it (A) frames sex as something the wife is doing for the husband, and (B) presumes that the wife is not also suffering for the loss of it!

(But of course, there's an unspoken assumption here that this is all something the wife is DOING. When in reality, flashbacks to traumatic memories—whether true or false!—are something that is HAPPENING to her. But if we view the wife as the agent of all this, then of course she must be fine with her new (lack of) sex life—because if she weren't, she'd just stop choosing not to have sex.)

[lb_lee]

Yeah, a lot of people latch really strongly onto the opposite of the thing they're afraid of, and with abuse by therapists, what a person's afraid of is often "The therapist was right and everything they were doing was for my own good, I need to just give in and take it until I react how they want."

Exactly. And man, making these posts and reading/writing the comments has made me realize just how much of my life and interactions with the mental health profession is influenced by all this. We have a list of rules of things we will not do in therapy, include have episodes, specifically to avoid not just therapeutic abuse, but also third-party lawsuits from people like the FMSF!

[lb_lee]

Yup! It's not hard to dig into the FMSF stuff and find their utter DISDAIN (if not outright anger and disgust) for people they insist are "playing victim." It REALLY stands out in things like Smiling Through Tears.

I've yet to see real sympathy or compassion on that subject with them. People who are abused by their therapists are just used as beating sticks. It's shameful.

[lb_lee]

Rogan: Exactly. And there are ways to work with these blockages that can make a relationship come out stronger! For instance, even though sex would often crap out on me, I could still TOUCH, at least sometimes, part of the time, and it could become a means of intimacy to seek and find where I was "thawed," what kind of touch I could still give and receive and enjoy. It didn't have to be this, "oh noes, I cannot bone, FOREVER DOOMED" thing! Turns out there are lots of nuances of touch, eros, and intimacy that you can get creative about! Mac and I would make erotic art together, or cuddle, or do ASMR dates, or I'd do a shitload of service-topping!

If you are able to treat it as a challenge, to be taken up with creativity and imagination (and kindness), there's often more flexibility than first appears!

[lb_lee]

You have great partners, Sor. <3

[lb_lee]

Rogan: Yup! Meanwhile, I know at least FIVE people (headmates and corporeal) who I knew absolutely HATED getting blocked by this! It's not fun! It's really annoying! Probably one of the hardest things about it is to resist the urge to just try and force your way through it, because that makes the problem WORSE!

[wolfy_writing]

Yeah, I've seen a small number of instances where former patients say that their memories were distorted to create false abuse memories, and they describe disturbingly controlling and abusive behavior, including false information presented under medical authority, misuse of medication to keep them in vulnerable mental states, extensive use of hypnosis, and classic coercive control tactics. If someone I care about is going through something like that, I'm going to be worried about them, not acting like they're just choosing to be difficult for no good reason.

[sploosh543]

jesus, the fact this is the worst thing to deal with for them sure says a lot huh! anyways i hope they all got divorced hard and get rocks thrown at them on the street

[nightforest]

Hey quick question: what the actual FUCK. Who seems their partner in pain and trauma and is like "but the seeeeeeeeeeeex"??

These fucking people sometimes...

-Daniel

[lb_lee]

“Ugh, look at my wife, getting abused and ruining my boner. The nerve of her! Time to join a lobbying group about it!”

[lb_lee]

Rogan: yup! And stuff like this is why I’m a feminist! (The FMSF were also of the “feminism: has it GONE TOO FAR?!” type.)

[lb_lee]

Mori: whinyboys, apparently!

[writerkit]

I mean, I dated someone like that once, although there were no repressed memories involved on either side, and the only thing I can figure is that he was getting off on the pain and trauma. Given that these people were presumably Like That long before the memory work came into the picture, perhaps it's similar.

[lb_lee]

Rogan: I am so sorry. And also know what that’s like. Yech!

[synecdoches]

"Sad boners are best taken care of by their owners." 100% and well said.

The more I hear about the FMSF, the more it sounds like a bunch of conscious, aware abusers, accompanied by the people they manipulated into agreeing with them. "Your wife's traumas make her reluctant to have sex? She must be faking. Isn't that so hard on you?" Good fucking god.

[lb_lee]

Mori: I mean, there’s a reason we call them the abusers’ lobby! They began because the founder was privately accused of abuse by his daughter, so he and his wife (also his stepsister, funny story) created an organization devoted to discrediting accusations of abuse, lobbying for government policy change in the accused’s favor, and also they tried to ruin the daughter getting a promotion at work. Totally healthy human behavior!