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Sexual abuse and fragmentation clinical-cultural reflections: A single case study

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Page: 374-379

Ashis Roy (Centre of Psychotherapy & Clinical Research, School of Human Studies, Ambedkar University Delhi, Delhi)

In the Indian context, the question of female sexuality, subjectivity, desire and sexual abuse have been studied by psychologists and feminists. A large number of female patients who come for psychotherapy, report experiences of sexual abuse during their developmental years. For many of them to recognise being abused is a long process. Often this process is lonely. The defense mechanism of dissociation, which involves a simultaneous existence in a state of awareness and non awareness, governs their subjective experience and dissociation is also used in their familial environment. In the development of women who have faced sexual abuse, the process of recognition of being abused takes long and has a severe impact on the identity of the victim, in the spheres of comfort with emotional and sexual intimacy, in their capacity to trust relationships and in their ability to differentiate between sexual desire and their experience of abuse. In patriarchal familial systems, the acknowledgment of the experience of abuse is filled with shame and guilt. The sexual abuse of the female child also gets tied with the family’s shame and honor. The silence and shame around sexual abuse adds to the experience of being unwanted that the girl child faces in Indian society. Psychotherapy often becomes the context where women are able to revisit and speak about their experience of abuse in a safe environment. This paper captures the experience of a victim of abuse and the confusing relationship that she has to navigate between her sexual abuse, her sexual desire, and familial honor. The paper has been written in a narrative form to preserve the experiential content.

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Page: 374-379

Ashis Roy (Centre of Psychotherapy & Clinical Research, School of Human Studies, Ambedkar University Delhi, Delhi)