[The following may be inspired by recent events, but it's intended as a more general comment on survival. Please do not flood my comment thread with defenses for Judge Kavanaugh. I'm not interested.]
If someone's hurting, does it matter what others think about it? If you're hurting, you're the only one who knows what hurts, and how much. You are the one who knows what you can and can't do, what movements make it worse, and what brings you comfort. Each of us is the only expert on our own pain, and that's why I think pain is truth.
For example, I've never broken my arm. But I believe the people who have broken their arm, who tell me it hurts. I don't question their right to have that pain. I don't tell them they should be bouncing back quicker, or that they should stop complaining about itchy casts. Because I've never experienced it.
Why should sexual assault/abuse be any different?
Pain is not something anyone else gets to pass judgment on, because it creates its own truth for the person in pain. It's their real, lived experience. It's true whether or not the one who inflicted that pain admits or remembers it. It's true whether or not there's physical evidence. Pain is truth and it's truth that requires no one's corroboration.
To my skeptical readers, of course there are things like Munchausen, or psychosomatic cases, or other rare exceptions. Clearly those aren't the cases I'm talking about, and clearly those are a significant minority of cases. Just listen to what I'm saying. Consider the people around you who've been through some shit. And just stop arguing/defending. Just listen to the pain.
Because pain is truth. And when someone listens to you, and believes you, that's when healing can begin.
