Regarding the 6 year old hero who fought off her rapist or whatever happened (there is no link to the story)…. I wanted to make another point. I have already made it but I want to make it again.
If you’re six, and you’re effective then I guess that is fine because you are cute and you make a good story. But if you are thirty-five and effective this is a different story.
Because now and then a rapist does pick the wrong gal to victimize. Like the gal I heard of when I took a self defense class. She had some training so with the intruder on top her, she reached down, grabbed one his balls and squeezed hard enough to pop it which cause egregious injury to a man. And that guy did not die but let’s say he did.
That would make her a women who had a man die in her bed! And can you see how everyone would take a step back?
2 women, equivalent in all ways. One of them has had a rapist die in her bed, the other has not. Who do you think the man is going to ask out? Can you see how the first gal might have fared better accepting the rape? She’s now marked.
The point here is you cannot win. If you are the type that carries the shadow then you are going to carry the shadow. Because let’s go back to the first gal and let’s say she did NOT pop the guy’s testicle. In that scenario it sounds like this:
“I don’t know why she didn’t pop that guy’s nut. She had a self defense class and she knew what to do. There was this 6 year old I heard of and even she knew better than to blah, blah, blah.”
And it’s back to Elvis Costello… “Nobodies fault, but we need somebody to burn…”
Who in your life wears your shadow?
Yikes, this is a rough topic. I can’t think of anyone who would think those things about rape victims, no matter what ages they are. Though who knows, many people would consider her “marked” and that makes me sad. People suck. This actually made me think of Lorena Bobbit, you know the woman who chopped off her husband’s peen and threw it in a field. I looked, she hasn’t remarried.
Me. I’m a little tired of it at the moment.
Do you think those of us who carry the shadow have more compassion for other shadow types? I think the more shadow I’ve experienced, the less willing I am to judge anyone else.
i try to wear it for myself. but i keep finding pieces i’ve tossed off here and there and trying to figure out how to unstick them, clean them up and fit them back into the rest of the patchwork puzzle.
it’s an endless process, really.
i think perhaps people like to ignore how senseless the world can be sometimes and so pretend something couldn’t happen to them by convincing themselves that victims somehow brought their wounding upon themselves.
in order to feel “safe.” “i’m a good person, that can’t happen to me.”
Elsa, I must admit I don’t understand your question.
I’m a shadow novice (furthermore Pluto’s been transiting my 12th House/Neptune and is now exact with my ASC, so let’s just say the Shadow is coming out of the woodwork. About time).
If you have the time to elaborate, I would appreciate it.
Much love to you and your kidlets.
I really don’t know who wears my shadow on a regular basis. I guess i get rid of people who wear it, since they are mean to me. Some time ago i decided all the shadow i see in the world, including the wars i see in the news and murders and whatnot are all me. the world i perceive is coming from me. This is a theory from What the bleep do we know. Still not sure it’s 100% true but some of it should be. So i’m still working on finding it in myself instead of being surprised with it on others.
with mars conjunct sun in the first house i’d love to have popped that man’s ball. i get exhilirated thinking about it. i wouldn’t want a man that would be afraid of me after it anyway.
I cringe thinking about it, its’s really violent but i know if i’d ever bee attacked and was impotent i’d be consumed with anger for a long time. I’d never ever prefer to be a victim to get spared prejudice from stupid people, because that’s what they’d have to be.
As someone who has kicked off 2 attackers in childhood, both family friends and one a school teacher at that, i carried the shadow that not all men are good or to be trusted (but grateful for my strong taurean legs). My sense of trust was damaged and future partners have suffered for this. The slightest sense of overpowerment and my mars/pluto kicked off in defence. I have made grown men cry which i’m not proud of but realise looking back that i was punishing them for something someone else did. Strange cos i get on with men great generally but can turn like the hulk if pushed. The survival at all costs associated with this aspect is triggered and i will fight(mars) to the death (pluto) if need be. Maybe the fact that they didnt get what they wanted has given me a strange sense of power, that you cant touch me, because my legs will win. I have a friend who was abused by her uncles as a child and i was fiercely protective of her through school (she has mars opp pluto). Neither of us has married (she’s now a lesbian after many failed hetero r’ships) and maybe it is because we carry this distrustful energy with us. I’ve seen her lay into men quite ferociously at times and people say whats her problem but i know what her problem is, where it stems from and i understand.
I didn’t quite know how to answer the question either, until I read Z’s response. I do the same thing, I’ve recognized it in myself. Distrustful of all because of a few. Knowing what you’re doing wrong is half the battle, I guess.
Z, I read your post and a similar thing happen to me when I was in college and some guy tried to rape me ( he was literally on top of me). I remember thinking I don’t want to get rape, so I’m going to fight hard I’m not going to let up. And he just couldn’t overpower me……
I also thought about my best friend who was raped by her uncle. She is now deceased (killed by her ex-boyfriend). She also had mars oppossed pluto! I knew how painful it was for her…. Anyway, I had to share this story…. which is so similar to what I read in your post.
Z, after reading your post, I thought I’d share this: I had a friend who was raped by her cousin when she was 15. She is now deceased (killed by her ex-boyfriend). She had mars oppossed pluto. When I was in college I met this guy who almost raped me. During the struggle I remember thinking how did I get myself into this situation. Now, I don’t want to get rape, so I’m going to fight hard and I’m not going to let up. Eventually he gave up because I was relentless.
Personally I’d much rather be “marked” than raped… I mean I wouldn’t try to -kill- someone (unless he was threatening to kill me), but if it happened by accident…
It just seems that the only people who should be put off by a woman’s unmanning (or even killing, although that’s different of course) of her would-be rapist are other would-be rapists. Or maybe just guys with overactive imaginations… or idiots. In any case none of the guys who’d be repelled by it would interest me in the first place so it wouldn’t matter.
Generally I’m not assertive at all but in the event of an attempted rape on my person the attempter would very likely leave with a mangled dick.
I love the re-posts on this topic. Necessary and always timely, sadly. I feel for any victim of sexual assault (attempted or not) and do not judge. No one has the “right” to say how they would have acted. They were not there. It was not their experience. They may have their own story, but it’s still different. I “fought off” a man when I was young but still don’t judge others. Sadly, blaming the victim is as old as violent acts themselves.
Off my soapbox now.
As I was 12 my mothers’s brothers tryed to rape me. I made it to escape it. But I m still resentfull at men.
I told it to my mothers years after, just to discover she was raped by him many times in her childhood. Sometimes I think:” how can a mother expose her daughter to what she as been trough?” She told me she had forgiven him and forgotten.
I blamed her for being so compassionate.
I just did not want to carry her shadow.