Sexual abuse and sexual assault mean the same thing. It occurs any time you have a sexual experience with another person that you don’t want, but you are pressured, coerced, forced or threatened to participate.
Pressure can look and feel like many different behaviours, such as peer pressure to be ‘cool’ or pressure that ‘everyone else does this’. |
Coercion is when you feel as if you have to participate in something you don’t want to do, because the results of not doing what the other person wants would be worse.
In Rainbow communities we are particularly vulnerable to threats from abusive people because our communities can be small, we can feel as if we ‘know everyone’ and our sexualities and genders are already so stigmatised. |
Sexual abuse might have occurred when you were a child or a young adult. Research shows that young people who don’t conform to traditional gender ideas are more targeted for all kinds of abuse.
People will say things like “I’m doing this because you want it”, which can be confusing when you are still working out who you are. When this has happened, we can feel shame and guilt even though it wasn’t our fault. |
If you have experienced sexual abuse or assault, it is normal to have feelings about yourself and your life that are confusing or leave you feeling numb, frightened, anxious or depressed.
Sometimes people have flashbacks to what has happened, or thoughts that won’t leave. Talking about it with someone else helps understand and sort out these feelings. |