Healing from sexual assault isn’t easy

    When a person is the victim of sexual assault, there rarely are any outwardly signs or symptoms that they have been assaulted as there are in other types of assaults.
    Friends and family likely won’t see any bruises, bleeding or even broken bones. The injuries sustained are much deeper and harder to see and easier to hide from others. If injuries were able to be seen, they would look something like shame, guilt, depression and fear.
    Healing from sexual assault isn’t easy. Often victims hear “time heals all wounds” or similar adages; however, in the case of sexual assault, this rarely proves true and only adds to the shame, guilt, depression and fear.
    In fact, statistically sexual assault survivors are three times more likely to develop depression, four times more likely to think about suicide and 13 times more likely to attempt it. They are also 13 times more likely to have problems with alcohol and 26 times more likely to have problems with drugs. These statistics are daunting and eye opening.
    How often are survivors told to just get over it, or do friends and family get annoyed when weeks later the survivor is still struggling?
    When looked at deeper, there is a biological reason survivors don’t just “get over it.” When someone survives a trauma there are physiological changes that occur in the brain. Stress hormones are released that directly affect memory — not just of the event either — they affect all short term memories!
    In an effort to protect the person, the brain also makes generalizations about the trauma so that it’s not just the perpetrator wearing a red shirt that is dangerous but maybe now it’s anyone wearing a red shirt. The survivor is likely living in a constant fight (angry), flight (always looking for ways out) or freeze.

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