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The Survival Paradox: How Sexual Violence Hijacks Our Most Ancient Protection System and Why Victims Comfort Their Abusers.

Last week, New York Magazine published a deeply reported, exceptionally well-written, and profoundly unsettling article by Lila Shapiro detailing credible allegations of sexual assault and rape against Neil Gaiman, the acclaimed author of science fiction and fantasy books and other properties.

I am choosing not to link to the piece or the author here, but you can easily find it. This newsletter aims to offer glimmers, not triggers.

I met Neil ten years ago at his house in Bearsville, where I'd come with a new friend for a weekend writing retreat. I wasn't familiar with his work—science fiction and fantasy aren't my genres—but I found him genial, if prone to mansplaining, like many white, cis-het men of his generation.

That weekend became an open invitation for others, and I spent months there over the years, writing in the quiet of his property. I became friendly with Caroline Wallner, one of his accusers, who lived there with her daughters.

The allegations in the New York Magazine piece painted a picture I never witnessed firsthand, yet one that made terrible sense of the unease I'd occasionally felt—those moments when I chose not to be alone with him, sensing something in the power dynamic that made me uncomfortable.

I share this not to obscure or equivocate but to be transparent: despite never witnessing overtly abusive behavior, I believe the women who have come forward. I believe them not merely because they are women but because their stories illuminate patterns I recognized but couldn't quite name during my time there.

The story left many readers grappling with what seemed like an impossible contradiction: multiple women accused a beloved author of rape and sexual assault, yet in the aftermath of these alleged, terrifying, assaults, they had sent him warm messages. They had expressed their hunger to see him again. Some offered comfort when he was distressed by their allegations.

They agreed to his terms, which, in retrospect, didn’t match their experience, specifically that the relationship and the cruelty were consensual.

I believe them because I understand trauma responses, and can recognize, in all the material provided in the article, the hallmarks and symptoms of the specific trauma response I want to address today—fawning, a survival mechanism similar to appeasement, which employs abandoning the self, personal boundaries, and a reliance on people-pleasing to remain safe.

Fawning is a typical trauma response often seen in people with Complex PTSD, and it’s most often missed.

After the jump: Why Stockholm Syndrome offends, an overlooked pioneer in the Trauma world, and what happened to Neil Gaiman’s victims.

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