I feel like I may be just being paranoid, but I thought I would seek advice from varied people with different opinions.

When I was about 6-8 I had a best friend and I would spend a lot of time at her house. When I was 8 I randomly decided to stop talking to her completely and cut her out of my life. I’ve always blamed that on just being a kid. A few years ago my mother mentioned something about her uncle living with their family for several years, including the years I was friends with that girl. She said that he was put in prison for sexually abusing children. I didn’t remember him at all. At the time I thought nothing much of it.

Recently I’ve noticed that I’m very strange about sex. I’ve been dating the same guy for over 2 years and always feel dirty, bad, slutty, and sometimes scared after having sex. I recently looked up the symptoms of child abuse/memory repression and I have 16/22 of the symptoms listed. Those include lack of confidence, low self-esteem, strong feelings of inadequacy, inability to trust, problem relationships, sexual dysfunction, panic attacks, phobias, illness, self-harm, sleep disturbances, depression, low risk taking, security seeking, aversion to make noise, and memory blanks.

I tend to block out bad memories over the past several years of bullying and they only come back when someone reminds me. I wonder if I blocked out a memory of child abuse and was never reminded so I never remembered. I remember having a few dreams over the years of being raped, but usually by someone my age or someone I know, so I don’t know if that would be linked.

I also remember the first time I started to feel depressed, isolated, alone, and have low self-esteem was when I was about 8. I don’t remember when my panic attacks started, I don’t remember having them but my parents have told me that when I was younger I would sometimes panic because I thought I couldn’t breathe. I’ve always had phobias so I don’t know how much of that could be connected to any sort of child abuse but I do remember my phobias picking up when I was about 8 or 9.

When I was about 8 or 9 I started wearing sweat pants and tee shirts and cut my hair short. When I was 10 or 11 I started dressing like a boy. I always said I dressed like a boy because I liked boys more than girls and wanted to fit in with them. But why wear sweat pants? Before that I wore dresses and cute girly clothes every day. I wonder if I started wearing non-attractive clothes to be non-sexual.

I don’t remember when it started, but I get really bad headaches. I started to cough a lot when I was about 10 and doctors don’t know why. I suffer from random aches and pains. Before I started dating my current boyfriend I would often find myself in relationships where the boy would use me for sex/sexual activities.

I have a memory (memory of a dream maybe?) where somone (my memory says my mom, but it could be anyone) shoved a sock in my mouth. Whenever any type of cloth touches my mouth I get very anxious. My mom definitely never shoved a sock in my mouth, ever. I wonder if my brain just tried to perceive it that way over time?

Sorry if this is a mess of thoughts…I feel like getting this out there more then anything. But what are your thoughts? Memory repression or paranoia?