When the Dust Settles:
The Impact of Boundary Violations on Sexual Agency
I often have a lingering question of my own during most Q&A sessions I host as a sexuality educator. Whether the topic is mismatched libidos, pelvic pain, or body image, I am often presented with people who have sexual dysfunction, shame, or disconnect. Although I don’t often outright address it, it seems unavoidable, and whenever someone comes to me with a problem with their sexual agency, this thought emerges from its dark corner and rears its ugly, scathing head.
Were you violated?
Did someone violate your physical boundaries, your emotional ones? Did someone claim to have taken something of yours you didn’t think was up for grabs?
Sexuality doesn’t exist as a skill set, a mood, or an entity with an off switch. It exists as we do, working in synchronicity with our other biological functions. It is in virtually all media we consume in some way, and it is even regulated by law and social norms. Sexuality is just as much a part of us as anything else- and with various statistics, all presenting unfathomable numbers of people who are impacted severely by boundary violations, is it any wonder I have questions regarding how many of us are being held back from our whole selves without even knowing it?
The problem lies not only in the number of us who have been violated, but the ways in which we must tiptoe around the violation as to not wake a sleeping beast. We become both the defendant and prosecutor within the violation; it will be used against us if we dare to enjoy our bodies in the future, and it will be thrown back in our face if we don’t get over it for the sake of someone else’s enjoyment. Almost as quickly as it becomes a part of us it becomes about everyone else: how will they react? How will they adapt? Within the aftermath, you become either a hero or a villain, defined by a binary as a victim while the violator is allowed to roam freely within the gray area.
Trust me- we’ve heard every iteration of the excuses and blame. Some of us will even rush to apologize for our own reactions to violations done to us, conditioned to believe we are somehow in the way of another person’s desire lest we dare say no. Every single advocate for the devil somehow picks the same script, every version of smug interrogation has the same intentions. God forbid we react or turn to defense, as we have already lost the second we become emotional… it is all a game to them, after all. Character assassination disguised as assessment.
It isn’t just the divorcing of our bodies that may take place, often our spirit is so broken we are forced to release a piece of us for the sake of seeming whole. Or, we build ourselves back up and believe that we deserve to make choices that serve and fulfill us, only to be told that since we now enjoy ourselves we must not have been that violated, to begin with. Every time someone asks me if it’s wrong to enjoy their sex life even if they aren’t fully healed, I ask the universe to give them an extra serving of joyful energy. I personally grant them an extra scoop of delicious self-adoration, one that the ghost of their violation can’t permeate, which often looks as simple as existing in peace for a day.
Violation of the voice, mind, body, boundary, identity doesn’t begin and end with a single act. As for the perpetrators, they come in every flavor imaginable. The lineup extends beyond the good ones in our corner, the outright hateful, public figures on the shoulders of their devoted fans, or rejects who want you to feel their pain. Perhaps they’re victims themselves, making an active choice to continue a cycle. Regardless of their methods, they’re held up by a system of bystanders, enablers, and perpetrators who claim they “didn’t know that counted” if they admit culpability at all. They may even grow out of a phase unscathed, leaving behind victims they see as former lovers, friends, subjects. They trivialize our desires, appearance, interests, to appeal to the idea that we asked for the violation.
If we seek justice we are met with a coin toss, and we hold our breath while hoping it lands in our favor. Our inkling of hope for a path to victory is quickly muddled, as they begin to kick up dust. Squinting, we realize our footprints have faded; their manipulation makes it unclear if there was ever a path to begin with. We’re expected to somehow rely on a system that upholds these tactics and then are blamed for not seeing results.
Although I rarely ask my audience, I’m aware that the answer to my lingering question is, in most cases, yes. Violations of any kind don’t exist in a vacuum- and yet, people have the nerve to tell me sex education isn’t political. As a sexuality educator, my very first step with clients is figuring out how much someone allows themselves to know themselves. Many people have blockades on the road to sexual liberation, and for good reason. Often, the brain deems it a wise choice to cut off a part of our journey in order to keep the rest of us ticking. Unpacking it all is terrifying, which is why many of us feel false contentment with keeping it under lock and key. This cycle of violence is the reason all of the sex therapists I refer clients to are specialized in trauma-informed approaches, as it is the root of so much of our sexual dysfunction.
Sure, it really is “not that deep” when you see it as a surface issue. I beg you to peek behind the heavy curtain we are burdened to pull back in our aftermath. I encourage people who haven’t been affected to be attentive to reality if they jump into problem-solving mode. I assure you, our lack of tenacity is not the reason for our boundaries being consistently violated. It is an unfortunate reality that violations occur, they’re enabled, and will continue today and tomorrow. It is a stark and sobering realization for many of us that some didn’t make it out alive. Our right to live, violated. Our right to breathe could be taken away. Some of us survive violations and feel forever doomed to counting our blessings.
I won’t divulge the moments in my life I’ve been violated in these ways because I shouldn’t have to for my point to come across. Too many of us are still feeling the effects of our violations, searching for a time before we knew this fate, an itch like a phantom limb, craving peace and sincerity from the world we once trusted. Although I’ll avoid generalizing about the violators of this world if the shoe fits examine whose foot it belongs to.
Of course, people are affected by things in such different ways as no two bodies keep the same score. For my students and clients alike I encourage self-compassion because often our biggest betrayer is our own internalized violator. It is our own responsibility to tend to ourselves, and making sure we have the right tools to do so is essential. It requires continuous checking in, and protecting ourselves without adding more harm- think garden hedges, not barbed wire fencing. It might look like just letting ourselves cry after an orgasm because the release is what we really needed. Perhaps it’s purposefully closing the door to discourse that doesn’t serve you. Maybe it is realizing that anger and self-compassion aren’t mutually exclusive. Self-care is all of those things to me, but maybe none of them to you- and that’s what is wonderful about taking control of our own agency.
I also believe true forgiveness of others is a rarity and not a requirement for moving on. I believe that in a system that upholds violations without regard for how we feel, we can’t waste all of our time forgiving others if we haven’t yet forgiven ourselves. If culture, language, and policies inflict continuous wounds, it would truly make sense to put on some armor. My hope as a sex educator is for people to realize that in a culture that often enables boundary violations, especially sex crimes, that your sexual liberation is still valid. Regardless of your perception of yourself as a sexual being, I believe that sexual agency is your birthright.
