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Monday, December 12, 2016

It's been a while

It's been a while, but I plan on starting to post more regularly again. These days, I think I need to. For my own peace of mind.

I wrote a book, spent a lot of money with editors to help me with both the manuscript, synopsis and query letter. But I have yet to find someone interested in the manuscript. So far, only refusal. Which breaks my heart, because I love my story.

I am not giving up on it yet, and even started working on two new projects. One is the continuation of that book, another is a memoir.

But that worries me, too, you see. Because, although I have lived a great deal of things in my life, I don't think what I have lived is so amazing. So is it worth writing about it or will I get a lot of rejections, again?

I am writing about how, in my 20s, I searched for love. And instead, came face to face with questions about rape, my sexual orientation, my sexual preferences, open relationships, 'closed' relationships, porn, prostitution, etc. Those are all questions I think many people are asking themselves.

I am poorly discussing this, but that's because I don't want to give too much details just yet. This was just a bridge to the thing that bothers me most right now: my sister.

My sister doesn't bother me. That's not it. It's what she's been saying lately.

My sister has been having a hard time with dating lately. I understand that. I have, too. That's what I'm talking about in my book.

She meets guys online on dating website, and meets them. And well, most of the times it's a total disaster. Lately, she met with a guy and the guy was insisting a lot to have sex with her. He started touching her in an inappropriate manner.

So she went to the police (it's not the first time something like this happens, and in the past I had told her to go to the police). The police registered her complaint and that was it. But she is very distraught by it.

So she told me about it. And having gone through sexual abuse myself, I didn't want her to go through the spiral of dark thoughts I went through. The first time I was raped, I didn't know what had happened to me. I wasn't sure it was raped, because the guy said he loved me, and so I wasn't sure how someone who said loved me could do me wrong -- it was all very confusing. I cried all the time, and stopped eating.

It took me a year before I finally managed to talk about it to someone, my aunt, and then I told my mom (although I waited until she was drunk and wouldn't remember it, just because it was easier for me). I even told my sister, but she told me: "a rape, but you wanted it", which hurt me a lot. She was referring to me starting to wear different kind of clothing when I started to hang out with that guy. Even my mom had told me then: "Don't tempt the devil," meaning that if I dressed in a provocative manner, I was tempting guys to do things with me, things I didn't want.

So basically, it was my fault. And for a long time, I thought it was. So obviously, I didn't want my sister to go through the same feelings of guilt. I told her, "yes, you're a victim, but don't let it affect you -- don't let it bring you down."

I was saying that because she started having very dark thoughts, about men and life in general, and I found it dangerous that she was generalising. I said it extensively and never meant to say that she wasn't a victim and that she shouldn't talk about it....which apparently she understood as such.

That hurts me. How can she think I would tell her she is not a victim? All I wanted to say is that I wanted her to stay positive, to stay strong.

It's really hard to talk to her, because lately she seems to think everybody is against her. She wants to talk to people about what happened to her, and I understand that. If she can talk about it, it can only do her good. But she feels the family shuts her down when she talks about it.

I tell her it's not because the family is against her; it's because sexual aggression in general is a difficult topic and it leaves people uncomfortable, so they might not want to talk about it. I suggested she finds someone to talk to, a shrink maybe, or if she needs to talk to the family about it, then tell the family that this is important for her to talk about it as it makes her feel better.

She understood it as me telling her not to talk about it, and resents me for that. What???

I know she is emotionally unstable now. Because of the shock she went through. And she has some sort of paranoia that makes her twists my words around.

I really don't know how to deal with her anyway. How to help her. Suggestions?

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