selfcareafterrape:
For a lot of us, the names of those who harmed us often take on a life of their own. This can cause us a lot of pain or panic in our day to day lives, especially if their name is a common one. This is by no means a comprehensive list, but it does give a few suggestions for making abuser names a bit easier to swallow.
1. Give your abuser a nick name.
People who have followed SCaR for a while know I refer to my abuser as Fucker and my rapist as October. Both of them have relatively common names and giving them monikers means that both me and those in ‘the know’ can converse about them without everyone around us knowing who we’re talking about.
It’s helpful for a few reasons, I know if a friend comes up to me and says, “October is here” that nobody around us knows who we’re talking about- and thus can’t go up to him and be like “I heard ______ talking about you.” or let him know that I’m trying to avoid him.
It means I can say their real names without immediately thinking of them. They are more Fucker and October than they are M_____ and B_____.
2. Read about people with their names.
Benjamin is not October’s real name, but it starts with a B so let’s go with that. I would read about Benjamin Franklin and other famous people with the name Benjamin. Preferably in a safe place, while self soothing, and allowing myself to stop as often as needed.
What this does is two-fold. It allows you to build up a tolerance for hearing/seeing the name and it also means that your brain no longer has a direct path way from their name to your trauma. Instead it hears ‘Benjamin’ and has multiple options to go to. Even if it does eventually connect to the trauma, it will be a slower and less emotional impact.
3. If you’re in a class/work with someone with your abusers name- give them a nick name.
This works a lot more in terms of ‘instant gratification’. Making it so that you can mentally, and depending on your relationship to them, sometimes out loud as well- refer to them as something other than their name that reminds you of your abuser.
Sometimes it can help even to have the nickname just be their name with an adjective. ‘Nice M______’, or other relevant information ‘Juggler M______’, ‘Coworker M______’. This brings the focus off of their name and onto the first word instead.
4. Create stories about people with your abuser’s name.
This is extremely similar to number two, but instead of reading about other people with your abuser’s name, it gives you the power to give them whatever story.
Go people watching, see that old man in the park? his name is your abuser’s name. What is he up to? What is he doing? Is he a spy on a mission? Does he come and feed pigeons every day? Maybe him and his husband/wife/signficant other met here and he likes to come back to remember.
But don’t only do it once. Keep doing it. The little girl on the street has your abusers name. What’s her favorite color? What did she eat for snack today?
Fleshing out lives of people with our abusers names once again allows our brain to have another point to jump to rather than our trauma.
Remember:
Whenever you’re doing work around your trauma- to have self soothing and self care materials available. Do things in small doses and celebrate your progress and don’t think about how far you’re not getting.
By saying ‘yeah I did this for 5 minutes today, thats five minutes closer to my goal’ rather than ‘oh my god I could only tolerate 5 minutes of it I’m terrible and never going to get over this’ we reinforce the behavior of trying to get better rather than feeding the fires of ‘healing is too hard’.
Celebrate and reward yourself when you do good work. Even if that good work ends with you in tears, you have put in time and effort and that makes it good.