I'm glad I brought this up, - even though it's (obviously) an uncomfortable subject and some people think I shouldn't have touched it - because I learned something.

Red_firefly and, I suspect, LW2 (as well as other victims of child abuse) were pretty much forced to "forgive" their abusers by people who didn't want them to rock the boat. That's the kind of thing I was talking about in my initial post. But for other former victims, the forgiveness is real: it's a way of putting the trauma behind you after you've accomplished all you can by confronting your abuser(s) and enablers.

I've also gotten the impression that for many victims, forgiving themselves is an important part of the healing process. People have a strange tendancy to consider themselves helpless in the face of things they can change, while at the same time blaming themselves for things over which they had no control. It's a tendency that's exploited and exacerbated by abusers. Forgiving oneself is a way of undoing some of the damage.

Not to say that all abuse victims get over their percieved fault that way. I guess it works for some people but not others.