Can You Remember? Or Do You Want To?

[indiangirl]

Hi I don;t know if I have posted this in the right place? If not please tell me where to post it and I will delete it :)

I have A LOT of blanks in my memory I mean a lot. A part of me thought maybe thats my brain saving me , but now I'm worried will counselling make me remember or is it all lost? A part of me wants to remember what I know I am forgetting (weird how I write that I know).

Has any one else been in the same position?

Thanks x

 

[Me Myself and I]

Hello @indiangirl,

This was what used to scare me as well when I first started off my sessions!

What if I'd remember something I forgot? Something I supressed? What if things will come up again? Loads of IFs!

But then I thought, whatever I remember shouldn't be a problem, because at the end of the day I am remembering and not reliving whatever incident. I must say that it wasn't easy to convince my self at all at first, but then step by step I managed not to "worry" and just let it happen.

Because sometimes the only way for things to be properly processed and helped is by letting them out. Let them happen.

:)

 

[maryel42]

That's exactly how I felt during the first years of therapy. I wanted to know. I was afraid to know. I needed to know. I didn't know if I could bear it.

My memory was fried for a lot of years. Lost most of my childhood. I was still losing time at the time I started trying to remember. I didn't know if a gap was abuse memory or side effect of chemo or side effect of too many concussions, or (found out later) I was having silent seizures on top of dissociation.

I think that its a decision you need to make based on what you know now. Don't be afraid and don't force it. I know how impossible that can be. Desparate to know then heaving and heaving because you want to scrub it out of your head.

I am just now twenty years after I started chasing memories. I still find some here and there. It does get easier once you have more of the picture.

 

[scout86]

I have lots of blank spots in my memories too. I actually spent a lot of years remembering enough that I should have realized that I'd been abused. I "knew" the definition of sexual abuse and I knew what had happened to me, but somehow, in my mind, what happened to me was in some other, separate category. Kind of weird! But, I think it helped me survive.

My therapist tells me that he doesn't think your brain will do anything that's actually going to hurt you and that there are many things we do that are adaptive and survival oriented at the time, but that, eventually aren't so useful. It seems likely that "forgetting" things is part of the brain's efforts to help us survive, like you said.

Right now, you're at the beginning of the process of dealing with this. Don't worry too much about the details. You'll remember what you need to know, when you need to know it. Therapy can't really "make" you do anything you don't want to do. Things that "make" you do stuff are in a whole different category. Like "abuse".

 

[macca]

I've had this too. Wanting very much to know, but being afraid of knowing. Trying to know, by telling myself to dream about it before going to sleep, and having nightmares and flashbacks in response, but which didn't tell me anymore than I already knew. Obsessing over every symptom of having been abused, wondering if what fragments of memories I did have were somehow "made up". I think though, that in the end, our brain will only release what it wants to release, when it is ready. Something that ended up working for me a little bit was to ask myself to tell me more in dreams, but to tell me more gently than before. I know that sounds weird, but it did bring back a couple of relevant but less frightening details. Be gentle with yourself in trying to remember.

 

[Shan-Nav01]

I don't remember very much of my primary school days (11and younger) - I don't feel like I had anything traumatic happen then... But it would explain not remembering... (I'm in my 20s now so it isn't exactly that long ago)... I'm worried what I'll find of I go digging for memories, but at the same time I don't expect to find anything bad! It would be nice to know why I can't remember it though!

 

[y5L]

I have big chunks of my memory missing, too. I just started uncovering some vague memories a year and a half ago. I haven't remembered anything new lately, so I'm wondering if maybe I'm kind of "done" remembering. Or maybe that's just all I need to know for now. God knows it's plenty of material to keep me busy with the work of recovering!

 

[ghotiff]

Thanks for reviving this thread, I wouldn't have found it otherwise and this was exactly what i needed to hear.

I have not yet recovered any additional memories, but just the other night I took two clear memories and noticed the details and realised that they were in a different order than I thought...that the particular abuse memory was after I disclosed to my parents, not before. This has really devastated but enlightened me....it explains a lot (which is good) but now I know for sure that the abuse went for many more years than I had previously let myself acknowledge.

 

[BlackbirdSinging]

There are a lot of things I don't remember. Unfortunately though there are a lot of other things I do remember that I wish I could forget.

 

[Deleted member 12723]

When I first started therapy I wanted to know what happened to me in the gaps of amnesia. I started therapy in 1985. I was so afraid of finding out things too.

I remember the branding experiences of my abuse and have dealt with them, slowly and painfully.

Last year I had EMDR and it saved me.

Now I just accept the fact that my brain was protecting me.

I think this is a great thread to be revived.

I am doing so much better now. It has been a long hard road. I still have an anxiety disorder and I have to learn how to better manage my symptoms, but I am here now and thriving.

If more stuff comes up, I will deal with it.

I am seeing my psychiatrist and on medication to stabilize me and it is helping me so much.

 

[shell]

I have so many missing memories, but they are missing for a reason. I am told some will come back when I am ready, some already have, some were never encoded. Even being told about some of what I have forgotten hasn't made them come back.

 

[Lionheart]

After over a decade of therapy and healing work,I have recovered both traumatic memories and happy memories from my childhood, but even so, I still have some blank spots where there seems to be nothing there.