Exploitation

Being trafficked for sex

Being sold, traded, or forced into sexual activity for someone else's financial gain. Through force, fraud, or manipulation. By a stranger, a partner, a family member, or someone who presented themselves as a friend or opportunity.

Survivors of trafficking often carry shame that was manufactured on purpose, by people skilled at making their victims feel like volunteers. Nothing about force, fraud, or grooming is consent. What you did inside it was survival, and who you are is not what was done to you. This fellowship holds that line without exception.

What can follow an experience like this

No two people carry the same experience the same way. These are some of the effects that people with this experience often describe. Having some of them, all of them, or none of them says nothing about how real what happened to you was.

PTSD After certain experiences, the brain can get stuck, replaying what happened through flashbacks, nightmares, or sudden intense reactions to things that remind you of it. Hypervigilance The nervous system that learned to scan for danger all the time. C-PTSD When trauma happened repeatedly, over a long time, or at the hands of people who were supposed to care for you, the effects go deeper than a single event. Trust issues Trust that was broken, repeatedly, by people who were supposed to be safe. Insomnia Difficulty falling asleep. Shame Not guilt about something you did. Depression Not just sadness. Identity disturbance Not being able to answer simple questions about yourself.

Nothing on this page is a diagnosis, and nothing here decides what is wrong with you, because nothing is wrong with you. Something happened to you. This page exists so that when you are ready, you can find people who understand it from the inside.

You do not have to carry this alone.

Bridge of Hope Recovery is a free, anonymous, peer-led fellowship for trauma survivors. Meetings run throughout the week by phone, by video, and in person. No cost, no waitlist, no one asking for your real name.

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