The power of breaking silence

One of the cruellest things about abuse is that somehow the perpetrator manages to transfer all the shame and guilt onto the victim.

This is true whether the perpetrator is an individual, a group of individuals, or an institution: it’s us survivors who invariably end up feeling wretched about ourselves.

I vividly remember how for years I was convinced I deserved to be unhappy.

Convinced I deserved to suffer because I was a bad person.

Once me and my partner went to see a relationship counsellor to help resolve problems that had arisen between us.

There was something about the man that made me trust him, and after our joint sessions were over, I saw him as an individual a couple of times to see if he could help me.

I remember how shocked and angry he was when he heard about what had happened to me at school.

“You were abused” he told me, and that insight helped me so profoundly begin the process of healing.

Because I understood that it was not all my fault.

What brought all this back was a profoundly moving article in last week’s Guardian by Patrick Sandford, where he writes so very powerfully about the abuse he suffered as a child, his determination to overcome its effects, and his desire to help others do the same.

This article moved me all the more profoundly because me and Patrick worked together years ago when he directed my “Tchaikovsky and The Queen Of Spades” at Pitlochry in 2002.

We became friends, and years later he revived the play with a Russian cast for the Nuffield Theatre in Southampton and we travelled to Moscow together find the cast.

Even though we knew and we liked and we trusted each other, it was still hard for him to come out to me and tell me he had been abused.

And then I remember some years later still when he very diffidently read an early draft of his beautiful play. Groomed, to me.

It was in my old flat, I remember us sitting round the kitchen table. And how hard it was for him to read it.

I hope I managed to help.

I hope I managed to convey something of how beautiful and important and necessary a play it is.

I mention all this because I know how much courage it would have taken to write that article; and how important it is that he wrote it.

And how much it will be a power for good.

It’s such a simple truth: that it’s not us who’s bad. It’s what happened to us.

And we couldn’t stop it, and we’re not to blame.

There’s such power in that truth.

And although it’s very simple. it’s also very hard somehow.

So thank you, dear Patrick, for reminding us it’s true.

You can find the full article here https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2022/oct/26/a-teacher-abused-me-speaking-out-help-other-victims-truth-project