Incest and child sexual abuse leave profound and lasting effects on survivors, shaping their emotional, mental, and even physical well-being in ways that can be difficult to comprehend for those who haven’t experienced it firsthand. These experiences create deep wounds that often remain hidden, impacting trust, self-worth, and the ability to form healthy relationships.

I know this all too well because I’ve lived it. For years, I acted as though I was fine, burying the pain and pretending it didn’t affect me. But the truth has a way of surfacing, and I eventually realized that healing meant facing the wounds I had tried so hard to ignore.

This section is dedicated to fostering awareness, compassion, and understanding of the complex and far-reaching impact of these forms of abuse. Whether you’re a survivor seeking to make sense of your experiences or someone who wants to better support a loved one, my aim is to provide insights and resources that shed light on the profound effects of these traumatic events, and the hope that healing is possible.

By sharing my journey and what I’ve learned along the way, I hope to break the silence that so often surrounds these experiences, challenge the stigma, and empower survivors to begin or continue their own path to healing. Healing begins with understanding, and understanding starts here.

At Holey House, we focus on incest because it’s not only deeply traumatic, it has been identified as the most widespread form of child sexual abuse with a highly significant capacity to damage the young person, yet it remains shrouded in silence. This abuse often occurs within the family by someone meant to protect the child, and is shrouded in lifetimes worth of secrecy, shame and denial, compounding the betrayal and long-lasting harm.

Incest: A Hidden Epidemic

Incest is the abuse we least want to see, the violation that happens within the very walls meant to keep us safe. It’s a hidden epidemic, a silent wound that cuts deep and leaves lifelong scars. And yet, it’s the most common form of child sexual abuse, a reality we’re afraid to name, much less face.

The numbers speak for themselves: upwards of 10–15% of the population report having been sexually abused by a family member. Some estimates reach 20% for women. The majority of perpetrators, more than 70%, are not strangers; they are fathers, stepfathers, grandfathers, uncles, brothers, or other close relatives. This means that the danger lies not somewhere “out there” but within the very circle meant for care, protection, and trust.

This is what makes incest a hidden epidemic, its ability to blend into the everyday routines of family life, its power to erase a victim’s ability to speak up, and its pervasiveness across generations. The result? An avalanche of survivors forced to carry their trauma in silence, ashamed, doubting their own reality, wondering if there’s something flawed or unworthy within them.

At Holey House, we illuminate these truths. We break the silence, honoring survivors’ stories, validating their struggles, and dismantling the misconceptions that enable abuse to flourish in the dark. We know there’s nothing hidden about their pain, it’s a raw, vulnerable reality that deserves compassion, understanding, and healing.

The Silence That Kills

Incest survivors suffer two levels of enforced silence:

1. During the abuse: Threats, manipulation, and isolation keep them from speaking out.
2. After disclosure: Many are met with shame, denial, or minimization by family, friends, and society, further silencing their pain.

This silence deepens trauma, intensifies shame, and cultivates isolation.

The Severity and Long-Term Impact

Incest cuts deeper than other forms of abuse. Studies show that parental incest leads to more severe psychological harm, often causing:

• Dissociation, complex PTSD, anxiety, and depression
• Difficulties forming relationships, trust, self-worth, intimacy
• Chronic health issues, substance misuse, suicidality
• Repeated victimization and unexpected triggers even decades laterd

Healing isn’t linear. Survivors are often caught between the shame-driven pressure to “just get over it” and societal silence that denies the gravity of their experience.

The Lonely Road to Healing

Survivors of incest bear a unique loneliness. They wrestle with:

• Invalidation – being told others have “it worse,” or to “move on”
• Shame – for something they didn’t cause
• Isolation – from both abuser and well-meaning yet uninformed outsiders

At Holey House, we aim to uncover the silence. We validate survivors, create community, and provide tools to heal complex trauma. We’re not asking survivors to “get over it,” we’re giving them the space and support to truly heal in their own time.

There are wounds that don’t bleed. Wounds that hide behind smiles, high-functioning lives, and quiet shame. Incest and child sexual abuse carve holes in the soul, deep, echoing voids that many spend their whole lives trying to ignore, outrun, or patch with perfectionism, people-pleasing, or silence. But pretending we are okay doesn’t heal us. It keeps us trapped in the trauma.

The truth is, the impact of these violations is not just emotional, it’s spiritual, physical, relational, and generational. It shapes how we see ourselves, how we love, how we parent, how we cope. It teaches us to disconnect from our bodies, to question our reality, and to carry burdens that were never ours to hold. And if we don’t face it, it festers.

This section isn’t here to retraumatize you. It’s here to name what so often goes unnamed. To bring light to the darkness you may have carried alone. To help you see that what happened to you has likely influenced how you’ve lived with yourself. Not because you’re broken, but because you were trying to survive.

Here, we will unpack the many layers of impact, from dissociation and shame to chronic illness and emotional isolation. We will name what trauma stole and begin to reclaim what is rightfully yours: your voice, your truth, your wholeness. This is not about blame. It’s about awareness. And awareness is the first crack in the wall trauma built around your heart.

There are wounds that never bled, but they broke us all the same. Wounds that were hidden under silence, stitched shut with shame.

If you’re here, reading this, I want you to know, you are not alone. And you are not broken beyond repair.

This chapter is not just about healing what was done to you, it’s about reclaiming who you were before the harm, and becoming who you were always meant to be.

Incest and child sexual abuse leave behind more than just painful memories. They carve holes into your identity, your body, your boundaries, your beliefs. They distort the way you see love, safety, and even yourself. These are not just traumas of the past; they become ghosts that haunt your present, whispering lies that you are dirty, unworthy, too damaged to be whole.

But I am here to tell you: that is not the truth.

The truth is, you survived something that tried to silence your voice, your power, your light. And healing is how you take your voice back.

In this section, we’re going to walk together through the raw and sacred terrain of healing from incest and child sexual abuse. Not with quick fixes or shallow platitudes, but with honesty, gentleness, and the kind of radical self-compassion that survivors are rarely taught to give themselves.

We will face the grief. We will untangle the guilt that never belonged to you. We will break the toxic loyalties and rewrite the story shame tried to author.

This work is not easy. But it is holy. And you are worthy of every ounce of freedom that waits on the other side.

For the Days When Survival Is the Only Thing You Can Do

When the body remembers what the mind tried to forget, when the past crashes into the present without warning, coping is how we survive.

For many of us who lived through incest, coping wasn’t a choice. It was a necessity. We did what we had to do to get through the day. To feel safe in unsafe places. To carry unbearable truths in bodies too young to hold them.

This section isn’t about judging the ways you’ve learned to survive, it’s about honoring them. Even the ones that feel messy. Even the ones you wish you didn’t need.

Because every coping mechanism, no matter how self-destructive or confusing it may look on the surface, began as an act of protection. And you deserve to know that. You deserve to be met with compassion, not criticism.

Here, we will gently unpack the patterns you may have picked up along the way, emotional numbing, dissociation, people-pleasing, hypervigilance, shutting down, overperforming. We will explore what these strategies are doing for you, not just to you. And from that place of understanding, we will begin the slow, sacred work of transforming survival into intentional healing.

I will share tools and practices that have helped me reconnect with my body, regulate my emotions, and create safety from the inside out. These are not one-size-fits-all solutions. These are offerings, pick them up, try them on, see what feels right for where you are.

This is not about being “healed.” This is about learning how to hold yourself gently in the middle of the storm. It’s about finding your breath when the walls start to close in. It’s about knowing that even in your worst moments, you are still worthy of love, still capable of healing.

You made it this far. That is no small thing.

When the Past Shows Up Uninvited

Sometimes, it happens out of nowhere— a sound, a smell, a glance, a word— and suddenly, you’re not here anymore.

You’re back there.

Back in a moment your body remembers all too well, even if your mind can’t make sense of it.

This is what a trigger feels like. An invisible tripwire, buried in your nervous system, set off by something that seems harmless to everyone else.

But for survivors of incest, triggers aren’t just emotional flare-ups. They are time machines. They can hijack your breath, your voice, your sense of safety in an instant. And they don’t always come with warning signs.

This section is not about learning how to “just get over it.” It’s about learning how to listen— to your body, to your fear, to the part of you that’s still trying to protect yourself the only way you know how.

Together, we’ll begin to understand what triggers are, why they happen, and what they’re trying to tell us. Because your triggers are not signs that you’re weak or broken. They are evidence of what you’ve lived through. They are messengers. And if we listen with compassion, they can lead us back to the places in us that still need tending.

I’ll walk you through tools and practices that can help you ground yourself when your system goes into overdrive— ways to soothe the panic, regulate your breath, and come back to the present with gentleness.

Managing triggers isn’t about control. It’s about building trust with your body again. It’s about slowly teaching yourself that this moment is not that moment— that now is safer than then.

You are allowed to take your time. You are allowed to pause. You are allowed to feel what you feel without shame.

This is how we start to reclaim our power— one trigger, one breath, one brave step at a time.

• What Are Triggers, and How Can You Manage Them?
• Potential Triggers Leading to Emotionally Explosive Responses in Incest Survivors
• How to Identify and Overcome Triggers Related to Incest and Sexual Abuse
• The Role of Sensory Triggers in Survivors of Incest
• How to Create a Safe Space to Manage Emotional Triggers
• The Connection Between Child Sexual Trauma and Specific Triggers in Daily Life
• Managing Triggers When They Come from Family Members
• How to Avoid Toxic Relationships While Healing from Incest
• How to Use Mindfulness to Navigate Triggers from Sexual Abuse
• The Power of Grounding Exercises to Combat Triggers
• How to Build Emotional and Physical Safety in Your Environment

Learning to Tend to the Self You Were Taught to Abandon

If you were abused, especially by someone who was supposed to love you, you probably learned early on that your needs didn’t matter. That rest was selfish. That saying no was dangerous. That comfort, care, and safety were luxuries you weren’t allowed to have.

But I want you to hear this with your whole heart:

You deserve softness. You deserve care. You deserve to be held, even if, for now, it’s only by you.

For survivors of incest and abuse, self-care is not about bubble baths and candles (though those have their place). It’s about learning to give yourself the things no one gave you when you needed them most. It’s about re-parenting the wounded child inside you who still flinches when life feels too good. It’s about choosing, day by day, to believe you are worth showing up for.

In this section, we’ll explore what real, radical, trauma-informed self-care looks like. Not the performative kind, not the kind you have to earn, but the deep, foundational kind that nurtures your nervous system, protects your peace, and honors your healing pace.

We’ll talk about boundaries. About learning to rest without guilt. About feeding your body with love. About finding joy without fear. About learning how to say, “I matter,” in a thousand small ways.

Because healing doesn’t only happen in therapy sessions or breakthrough moments. Healing happens when you choose to make yourself a priority in a world that taught you to disappear.

This is where we begin to remember: Self-care is not indulgence. It’s resurrection. It’s how we gather up the scattered pieces of who we are and whisper, “Come home.”

You are worthy of that kind of care.

Laying Down the Weight That Was Never Yours to Carry

Shame doesn’t shout. It whispers. In the quiet moments. In the mirror. In your relationships. In your thoughts.

It tells you the abuse was your fault. That you should’ve known better. Said no louder. Fought harder. It convinces you that what happened to you says something about who you are.

And if you grew up with incest, that shame runs deep. It didn’t just grow from the abuse itself, it was sewn into you by the silence, the confusion, the betrayal. By the love that hurt. By the hands that held you wrong while calling it right.

Guilt and self-blame become survival strategies. Because when the person hurting you is someone you depend on, it feels safer to believe you were the problem than to face the truth that the people who were supposed to protect you… didn’t.

But let me say this as clearly as I can:

You were never to blame.

Not then.

Not now.

Not ever.

This section is about unlearning the lies. It’s about turning on the lights in the rooms of your soul where shame has lived too long. It’s about understanding that shame was given to you, but it does not belong to you.

Together, we will name these emotions for what they are: Protective, powerful, even if misplaced. We’ll explore how to move through them without drowning in them. We’ll practice self-forgiveness, not because you did anything wrong, but because so many of us are still holding ourselves hostage for surviving.

You are not dirty. You are not broken. You are not to blame.

You are sacred.

And your healing is a rebellion against every voice, internal or external, that ever tried to tell you otherwise.

Learning to Let Love In Without Losing Yourself

When someone who was supposed to love you crossed a line that never should’ve been touched, it rewired the way you see the world. The way you see people. The way you see yourself.

Incest doesn’t just steal innocence, it steals safety. It teaches you that love is dangerous. That closeness comes with a cost. That even the people who smile at you can cause the deepest harm.

So you build walls instead of bridges. You protect instead of connect. You stay quiet, guarded, always half-expecting betrayal, because somewhere deep inside, you’re still bracing for the next break.

But what happens when you want to trust again? What happens when your heart begins to long for closeness, for connection, but your nervous system still screams “danger”?

This section is for that in-between space, where the fear of being hurt again collides with the ache to be seen, held, and truly known.

Rebuilding trust after incest isn’t about forcing yourself to be open. It’s about learning how to feel safe in your own body first. It’s about creating boundaries that honor your healing, not barricades built from fear. It’s about understanding the difference between love and control, affection and obligation, safety and silence.

Together, we’ll explore how to slowly, gently reconnect, with yourself first, and then with others. We’ll talk about identifying safe people, practicing vulnerability without self-abandonment, and how to listen to your intuition when it speaks, even if it whispers.

You are not unlovable. You are not too damaged. You are not doomed to a life of loneliness because of what was done to you.

Love is still possible. Safety is still possible. Real connection, the kind that respects, honors, and uplifts you, is still possible.

And you don’t have to rush to get there. You just have to keep choosing yourself, one boundary, one breath, one brave yes at a time.

Letting Someone Walk With You Where You’ve Always Walked Alone

There comes a point in the healing journey where the weight is too heavy to carry by yourself anymore. Not because you’re weak, but because what you’re carrying was never meant to be held alone.

If you are a survivor of incest, you’ve likely learned how to be your own protector, your own comfort, your own everything. You had to. When the people who should have helped became the ones who harmed, trusting anyone else felt impossible.

But healing wasn’t meant to be a solo act. And therapy, when it’s safe, trauma-informed, and aligned, can become the sacred space where you finally get to lay it all down.

This section is an invitation to explore what professional support can look like on your journey. Not as a fix, but as a partnership. Not as someone telling you what’s wrong with you, but as someone holding space for what’s happened to you, with compassion, with skill, and without judgment.

We’ll talk about how to find the right therapist for you, someone who understands the complex, layered impact of incest and abuse. We’ll break down the different types of therapy that can support your healing, from somatic practices that help your body feel safe again, to inner child work, EMDR, trauma-focused talk therapy, and beyond.

This isn’t about choosing a path that others expect you to walk. It’s about finding what resonates with your soul, your story, your needs.

And if you’ve had painful experiences with therapy before, if you’ve felt dismissed, misunderstood, or retraumatized, I want to acknowledge that. That harm is real. But that doesn’t mean all support is unsafe. It means you deserve better.

Therapy is not the whole answer. But for many of us, it becomes the beginning of a new kind of relationship, one where we are believed. Where we are allowed to feel. Where we are no longer alone in the remembering or the repairing.

You deserve that kind of support. You always have.

Finding Light in the Darkest Places Within

When trauma lives deep inside us, especially the kind that comes from incest and abuse, it can feel like our very soul has been fractured, lost, or stained beyond repair. We may question everything we once believed about love, safety, and the divine. We may wonder if we are still worthy of grace, forgiveness, or even connection to something greater than ourselves.

But here’s what I’ve come to know: Healing is not just about the mind or body. It’s also about the spirit, the quiet, sacred part of us that holds our true essence, even when the world tries to silence it.

This section is an invitation to explore how spirituality, whatever that means for you, can become a refuge, a source of strength, and a path toward wholeness. It’s about reclaiming your relationship with the sacred in a way that honors your pain and your power.

You don’t have to believe in anything you don’t want to. You don’t have to fit into any religion or dogma. Spirituality here means connection, to yourself, to the earth, to the universe, to love beyond human hands.

Together, we will explore practices that can help you find moments of peace when chaos feels overwhelming, rituals that can honor your journey and your resilience, and ways to listen to the wisdom that your spirit still carries beneath the trauma.

This is not about erasing your pain or pretending everything is okay. It’s about learning to hold your suffering and your hope at the same time. It’s about remembering that even in the darkest holes, there is light.

You are not alone. You are held. And your spirit is waiting to guide you home.

Turning Pain Into Power: Claiming Your Voice and Your Story

For so long, incest taught us to be silent. To hide in shame. To shrink ourselves smaller than we are, because speaking out felt too dangerous, too raw, too impossible.

But healing is not just about surviving quietly, it’s about thriving. It’s about stepping into the power that trauma tried to steal. It’s about reclaiming your voice, your story, your truth, not just for yourself, but for those who still feel trapped in the shadows.

This section is a call to courage. To recognize that the very wounds you carry can become the source of your strength. That your experience is not just pain, it is wisdom, resilience, and a roadmap for others who need to know they are not alone.

Empowerment means learning how to set boundaries that protect you. It means choosing when and how to share your story on your own terms. It means finding community with those who see you, believe you, and stand beside you.

Advocacy means turning your healing into action. It means using your voice to challenge silence, stigma, and injustice, to create spaces where survivors are heard, supported, and honored.

Together, we will explore how to cultivate that power without losing yourself, how to hold your healing gently while becoming a fierce protector of your truth.

You have every right to be angry, to be heard, to be seen. You have every right to demand justice, not just from the world, but from yourself.

Your story matters. Your voice matters. And the world needs both.