How common is it to not tell the child?

I have memories of being sexually abused by my older brother when i was 5. If anything happened before that, i dont know, because no one in my family will open up about it. I have only had my mom confess once in my life that it happened. I am now 26. I have spent many years in depression and i blame early childhood trauma and lack of proper therapy. I have heard that sexual abuse victims have ptsd, and that it often how i feel.

I have observed that there are some families that talk openly about child sexual abuse, and it becomes their life. One of my friends said that she still "has an interest in the arts" because she follows her psychologist's advice from her early childhood abuse. Well, ob the flip side, my family and i kept my sexual abuse a secret, like something shove under the rug and try to forget about it. Its extremely frustrating to me that my mom always denies what happened to me, even though i have crystal clear memories of certain events. It almost makes me feel crazy, and sometimes i think thats her goal. Its like she would rather have a child (im 26) deemed crazy and "a bad egg" etc, than admit that she knows anything about it. Is it possible to take legal action?

So is it better to be open about childhood trauma or not? Is it common or uncommon to hide abuse from someone, even at an adult age? I would like opinions from people going through this. Please and thankyou..

mine wasn't sexual but it did begin at birth and last all childhood, i was being punished. And lots of physical, and nonstop emotional and psychological. And children also were allowed to have a go at me, with no punishment. And really no punishment on my sisters of ANY type. I got it all, even when they were at fault-blame or the what was irrelevant-only the who mattered in my family and somehow it was a gender war and my dad was just a flying monkey for a narc mom (who gave me that role, scapegoat) and controlled everything. I just put everything together and think i'd have had a better chance in a moses basket or foster home or truck stop. As anything is better odds than guaranteed daily abuse from mom and sisters and if I didnt smile about it-she's stop "protecting me" from my father who in reality she ordered every beating he gave me too.

I was disowned a while back, 6 years maybe-but notice, not really as they never really took ownership, i was never in.. to be tossed out. So from my perspective-what could I get from these people when she's obviously a psychopath to mastermind it and get off on torturing me by withholding everythng and just being on anohter team at all times against me... (4 to 1 as he WOULD protect the girls from me, but never protect me from anyone) and he is a cowardly flying monkey enabler at best...

If they didn't have the decency to care, even when I started self harming at 4 years old, or drawing violent and gender related artwork by age 5 and see no connection to the nonstop picking on me by women... every day and lots on sunday.... i can't imagine the reception of mentioning it.

I'm a little annoyed with my sister as I see her as innocent-she only beat me up and hurt me and did it all at school again and etc verbal abuse, stealing, nonstop allowed boundary violations on me and never could i get justice - or even stolen items back...she only did all that as taught and trained. by the head sadist... but she's an adult now and abused me countless times... and I'm disappointed I had to figure it out without any help as it's been 25 years since I even took more than a glance back and clearly I was blocking out looking for any common theme such as "but only I was ever punished". or "where was dad everytime?" etc.. I texted her but mostly to try to save her-she's STILL the golden child and still looking for more validation from the mother who is punishing her for not paying off as golden child. She only cares about that narc game my mom played to steal or twist our identities respectively and worse-freely entered her daughter in this demented game that ONLY the ref, the sick narc mother wins. She appears to be continuing with the flying monkey instructions she has - that i dont exist. So no answer expected and I think the complete discard was to have an excuse to avoid this discussion in case i ever DID look back and open my eyes-an 18 year planned abuse campaign by my "mother" for only one child. I never had any connection to any of htem other than, they were my keepers in hell and I would be tormented til i left.

I did one time mention to my dad organically (ie not a conversation, i simply didnt know he'd DENY it) but only about the beatings, i mentioned something about how "when he used to beat me" and he interrupted and postured all angry as though gonna hit me if I said it again, "I never beat you!" as he's about to beat me.... what do you do with that? I said, "Ok dad."



And my mother is much more covert and avoidant ... shes the narc behind it all. And I really am confident I would just get more of what I got when I asked as it was happening, rhetoric, mocking, laughing.. one time I recall still thinking it was just a big misunderstanding that I always got in trouble regardless of deeds, I recorded my sister babysitting-so I'd finally have the proof="See! I'm innocent, it's her, she's evil!" they wouldn't even listen to it, because it was no misunderstanding and it was my role to be punished regardless no matter what that tape might tell... I was clearly in denial that they were aware and it's confusing as my mother was my primary abuser yet... I've never even examined her until recently-the vampire dust,, the narrative, I repeated it on her behalf not realizing its a narrative to protect her-that states my dad was the abuser, clever as he was more obvious with only a simple yet horrible physical punishment. I knew she was abusive but until I started running through my injustice stories - that id quit examining so long ago, it was long before I was an adult, id buried them accepting that my life was unfair but i think i believed i was confused... Id tell a story and it always had a weird outcome, the injustice made no sense.. but theyre all like that.

My mother basically destroyed my identity and and I dont want anything from them... I dont want any more narc SOs terrorizing me.. now realizing why i choose them and they choose me, I couldnt be bloodier and ive clearly associated a mothers love which was never withheld as it was never given once and worse-shed tease me, set me all up to think i was finally gonna be treated good by her only to trick me and find an excuse to cancel that event just in the last minute to deny it once again. I just want to quit trying to mask that abuse, and that damage that remains... with relationships. THeyve been my highest priortiy in life since-to be loved. But it's only screwed me up worse as i chose more abusers just like my mom, which means, everything from silent treatment to murder attempts to frequent sadism... ya, I know how to choose alright, had me a tip top example I been following since the last one was nearly the end of me from severe narc abuse.

I may send a letter to my dad-im a bit pissed that not ONCE, the whole time never was anything too far where he stepped in on my behalf. My mom was nuts so that left ONLY him to potentially ever protect me. Not once. But im highly confident it will be used against me (pending divorce and my parents are funding and supporting narc wife! and who else... I'll always be the scapegoat until I resolve myself. SO I'm just focused on that and my children-not getting anything from abusers-what would they give me? More abuse.

I'm 'lucky' as if I hadnt woken up from my narc abuse for 12 years tht i thought was a "marriage" and all the triggers that happened... the total unfair tactics used by my wife and I recall prior to her discard phase, when my mom still was around at times-id get a repeat, if nwife and i were arguing, my mother would jump in and invariably be on wife's side-yet another red flag on empathy i missed-wife knew some hint of that, that i was always ganged up onl, that my mother never took my side, etc... (still not realizing the meaning of it all when id mention these things, til just recently-ie what level of nonstop abuse it really was, hidden til now simply by the narc's influence on my mind) yet my wife immediately enjoyed the unfair advantage-2 against 1 and my mom didnt even know the subject.. little things like that and then just the sadism of my ex toward the end when it got unfathomably nasty-recognizing that same sadism from only one other place-childhood. But 2 big NPD family epiphanies in less than a year... is wearing on me a little. (ie to realize my ex was an NPD and explained every question i ever had through the marriage, and then my own family of origin's TRUE disorder which was previously limited to a confsuing "my dad" that didnt quite cover it, but it had remained an accepted dead end til recently.