Amnesia - Did You Find That The Person That Harmed You Was Different To Who You Thought?

[Abstract]

That's pretty much it. Was it who you thought it was or was it someone else? Did it become clearer as more information came up? Did you never figure it out?

 

[Seasounds]

With your question, I'm wondering what is your experience?

Me? As I had my suspicions-due to being aware of my lack of body comfort and my lack of affections, I didn't know for sure, for about a decade. In developing the courage to see, and the courage to know more about my early childhood trauma, the 'foggy' flashbacks, eventually, became clear.

 

[Whirlwind]

Generally yes, much as become clearer during therapy but something(s?) remain hidden, I just have hints so far.

There are big holes in my memory but plenty remain so I am clear on immediate family. Other memories have coalesced during therapy and revealed some acquaintance/stranger abuses. I don't remember it perfectly but plenty enough to now know what happened.

However, I have some other memories which have surfaced and don't seem to have meaning yet for a time I was ruminating over them....and some other unfortunate memories which are not traumatic but their implication is. I believe some of it came through but I had sort of black out, I remember "remembering" something but what it is I honestly cannot get it back. My therapist said my brain threw a protective circuit breaker so to speak.

So in summary, I know a lot but not all. I don't know if I ever will and if I ever want to...why burden myself with more bad memories/realizations? I just cross my fingers that if it is going to stay buried, it is permanent, if not, I'd rather get it "over with"...I do have a clue and if I don't have to go there....fine with me!

Lastly, the big shift for me is that I have had frequent intense nightmares my entire life but the last 2 yrs...they have faded dramatically. I think maybe I have purged enough stuff and I can let the rest lie.

That's my hope anyway. Whirlwind

 

[Dee Morris]

No, I've always been clear on who but I do forget things like timeline. For example, a memory of an event that occurred say in the same year but I couldn't tell you if one event happened before or after the other. Does that make sense?

I have found over the years as I allow myself to address certain memories that I am discovering abuses that I had either not realized were abusive or completely forgotten about. Meaning inappropriate relationships, Inappropriate age differences etc. Remembering event's or conversations previously forgotten that tell me that certain people were aware of what was going on and failed to protect me. All of those things I look back on now as a parent and recognize as abuse but just didn't realize it in the moment because it wasn't as extreme as the violent sexual abuse that had already traumatized me at a very early age.

 

[Lost Pup]

Great question. Yes, dramatically so. Not as much in my memory as in my talking about it, if that makes sense. When I was first in therapy, I began by saying I thought my ex-girlfriend might've been molested by her dad and slowly over time revealed I was speaking of myself.

 

[Lost Pup]

PS. I think this is part of why people buy into the notion that "false memories" of CSA are in any way prevalent. When you're dissociative, memories are often disconnected and the information is stored wrong in your conscious mind. The process of re-associating correctly can be messy and you really can mis-connect things in the process of sorting it out. It's actually a good argument for therapy and having the safe space and time to do so correctly, IMHO.

 

[Deleted member 1860]

No amnesia here. My only issue is with timeline. I have to use contextual clues to figure out the order of things sometimes, and even then I'm sometimes wrong.

 

[Abstract]

Thank you everyone. Appreciate it.

 

[radicalgratitude]

I definitely had amnesia. For the better part of a decade, I thought it was my brother who abused me when I was a small child. But the memories were foggy at best. When my dad sexually violated me last spring, the fog began to lift. It wasn't my brother...it was my dad. All of a sudden, memory after memory came to the surface...and they are still arriving.

 

[Abstract]

@change, this is still new to me in many ways. I am still struggling to hold onto reality with things I know for sure. This probably didn't happen and I have little information. Just partial flashbacks and emotional flashbacks. I can't really say more but it is over the period of time I have an almost total bank in my life. There is little to no information about the whose and the exactly whats. Only a vague sense of who. Saying more is too painful.

With other stuff I suppose I don't doubt who it was or what happened even if it is all very disjointed.

 

[radicalgratitude]

Abstract, if you have partial and emotional flashbacks, then someone abused you. You can have confidence in that. The body remembers.

 

[Abstract]

big holes in my memory but plenty remain so I am clear on immediate family.

I think this is how I am in some respects with the stuff I know. I have to say even that is behind these steal doors. I know what is there in terms of facts. Or a basic label. But nothing more. No normal memories.

have coalesced during therapy and revealed some acquaintance/stranger abuses.

Does this mean that you did not know who at some point?

e some other memories which have surfaced and don't seem to have meaning

Do you mean you don't know what exactly or who or something different? Only if you don't mind answering. Thanks.