Childhood Trauma Validation

[Iam]

I was asking my mom questions last week about the dr's exam for an infection that I had when I was 7. I was trying to place my age of the rape. I told my mom that it was the rape that gave me the infection. She started crying, saying she felt so bad about what happened and how guilty she felt, but that she knew she couldn't be with me all the time. It felt good to be validated like that. Although she let us roam the streets from toddlerhood on and she has never owned up to that. Still....she did validate what happened and how awful it was.

Yet when I told my father.....his response was that 33% of women have been sexually abused. Who the F cares????? I am not a statistic and told him so. That statistics don't remove the damage done. At least he apologized for his calloused comment.

 

[Nicolette]

My mother is the same way. Now that my father has died, she's successfully put everything bad at his feet, absolved her own sins (neat trick if you can do it) and walked away from everything to do with the past. Unfortuantely I don't have her skill set.

My mum did this while my dad was alive....she cheated on him, had a child to someone else while still married to him, got a divorce to him when I was about 6 years old and from that day forth he was the one who was to blame and I "should have been grateful that an abusive man took me in"...hello? Who did the wrong thing in her marriage to my father, wouldn't let us see him very often, used him for money and had him pay child support for 16 years for a child who wasn't his??? Then when he died she still kept going on. I though that after 26 years that she would have gotten over it but she still dragged him to the ground. It was only after my dad died that I found out my mother even threatened my father with sexual abuse allegations to stop him seeing his two children if he didn't cough up the money for three kids and do what she wanted. I hated it when she made us either ring or write letters asking for money at the age of 10 onwards.

Nicolette says to mother: "Sorry mum, but my dad was the better person and the only reason he stayed away was because you made him"..she stole my right to get to know my father who ended up being a man who was blood relative whom I really didn't know. Even that was terrible let alone the abuse at home.

 

[Nicolette]

Far out just typed a whole lot of stuff to Lisa's other post above and the stupid computer rebooted itself for no reason...........argh!

 

[Nicolette]

Ok...take two with a system restore prior to today's Windows update! I just wish I could remember verbatim what I wrote before :doh:

So I live in the absolute moment whenever I deal with her (to keep myself somewhat more sane) and forbid talk of the past even though it's always pushing at my back whenever I even think of her.

While I agree with your reasoning Lisa may I ask you one question......do you realise that no matter how often or not you have contact with your mother that you the past will always be brought into the present even if not spoken about?

Reason I ask is this.....I did what you speak of for about 6 years. Kept mum at arms length and tried to only discuss the present. The phone calls got too much as I couldn't deal with the childish lectures and I even got told that unless I spent an hour on the phone not to bother calling as she liked to talk for that long. So ok, you win mum, I won't call as I am not going to spend a hour of my day doing something I dread, to be treated like a child, tried to be controlled and/or manipulated as I would rather just have a cheery chat and say hello and share good stuff with you. So then we reverted to emails....the odd joke, the odd couple of lines and all was ok. Then a sibling caused an issue which pushed me too far this year and I stood up and said enough - "please do not contact me anymore" and briefly outlined a few points in response to the disgusting and attacking email I had which was trying to drag Anthony into their festering little world. I spoke of one home truth which has haunted me since the age of six as my reason, wished them well and said goodbye.

It was not until after doing this that I felt the relief. That little voice in my head which used to question all that I did asking "what if mum finds out, what will mum think of this, will this cause me problems with mum, how do I avoid this with mum??????" had disappeared. My head cleared and the heaviness on my shoulders has lifted.

I still respect my mother as my mother and am not abolishing her out of my life; she now has the choice that if she wants to be in my life she has to face the past as I have lived it, she has to come forward and just say at least sorry and she has to make the effort if I mean anything to her. It is not a test, just a fact. I cannot live by her code anymore. My peace was gained through this act so I know in myself it was the right thing to do. For 6 months my therapist was trying to get me to face my mother and I wouldn't dare as I was petrified. I did however end up doing it my own way via email and I got a result as like the therapist say "all that matters is me saying my bit and not her reaction". It was also said that "her lack of response and non attempt to make contact speaks volumes in itself".

I am not telling you to cut your mother out of your life....I am however saying there may be a way for you to find peace without having to wait for her to die first. The most empowering thing for me, even though not courageous due to being by email, was to actually say what hurt me the most and that their treatment of me was not acceptable by me. Anyway, just sharing my experience.

My husband is close with his parents, has a good relationship with them and enjoys their company. A part of me jealous of that but a larger part of me has no idea what to do with it. It's so unknown to me that I feel lost even contemplating it.

I get what you are saying here Lisa and I have a similar experience but with parent and child relationships. I am petrified of how to act when a parent and child are loving and affectionate towards each other to the point it creeps me out somewhat emotionally as it overwhelms me as it is nothing to what I have known or experienced....weird to me/unnatural to what I know.

I know I did a much better job than my mum and tell my son I love him often and he gets hugs and kisses on the cheeks but at a therapy session he once said I don't do it enough for him. I told him I had none growing up and I was doing the best I could but it was something not natural to me. I did tell him that however he could help me learn by coming up to me when he wanted a hug and he would always get one back.

With Anthony's boys, who I love dearly, I still struggle to say I love you to them as I'm not sure of my place and the risk of the consequences is very real to me so I tread carefully. I give them lots of hugs and they know I care for them dearly but love has 90% of my life come at a great cost so I back off. If they tell me they love me I can say it back but will not initiate it. How screwed up is that?!

 

[Cthulhu]

While I agree with your reasoning Lisa may I ask you one question......do you realise that no matter how often or not you have contact with your mother that you the past will always be brought into the present even if not spoken about?

This is SO true... I struggle since 10 years trying to break up with my mother. One problem is that I don't want to break up with my father but can only quit communication with both or none of them. Because SHE controls it. I tried to write a mail especially to my father- she held it off and read it- then she phoned me about what I had written there... Just like in my childhood... grml. I know I'll just have to wait until she dies to really be able to speak to my father. We just can't when she's sitting beside us and she always does when they or I visit.

The other is that I am not able to 'keep my negative emotions' for as long as needed (we phone once a week because SHE wants to and begins her old 'Well, I can kill myself then, I know you won't care'- game everytime I try to stop it and write emails instead or just phone once a month (because we really have nothing to say to each other once a week)). And (because of a very bad experience) I don't wanna be responsible for something like that... Even if I know so well that she just uses it to blackmail me. I just lose contact to this active emotion of hate and willingness to break up... Because the next contact will be in 7 days and I can't call her before, particularly when I'm in an aggressive mood.

But I know that a complete break-up is the only way to get "free". At first I thought only phoning and 1-2 visits a year would be OK but they aren't... Not really...
Subconciously I always hope that she'll make me so angry the next time that I'll finally do it. Ill, isn't it? It would be ok if she eventually started to act like a normal human being, but today she's behaving exactly in the same way as she has done in my childhood. I told her many times, but her "input-filter" really is the thickest and biggest I've ever seen.

I get what you are saying here Lisa and I have a similar experience but with parent and child relationships. I am petrified of how to act when a parent and child are loving and affectionate towards each other to the point it creeps me out somewhat emotionally as it overwhelms me as it is nothing to what I have known or experienced....weird to me/unnatural to what I know.

Wow, that's exactly the same in me. It almost makes me run away when my partner and his parents interact in a... So normal, loving, affectionate way. As you said, it seems totally unnatural to me because I only know a parent-child-relationship in a VERY distanced, artificial and overdrawn way. Like watching a bad soap-opera with me in it.

With Anthony's boys, who I love dearly, I still struggle to say I love you to them as I'm not sure of my place and the risk of the consequences is very real to me so I tread carefully. I give them lots of hugs and they know I care for them dearly but love has 90% of my life come at a great cost so I back off. If they tell me they love me I can say it back but will not initiate it. How screwed up is that?!

I know that well, to. I lived together with my ex-partner and his boy for some years. I really liked him very much, I tried to act like a 'real' mother would have done, but in a distanced way because I just can't do it differently. I really can't show affection, to nobody... Not in a normal way.
It wasn't because he wasn't my biological son, it was just the same problem I experience in all my relationships (of all kinds)- I can't show anybody my true feelings and my inner self.

 

[Marlene]

do you realise that no matter how often or not you have contact with your mother that you the past will always be brought into the present even if not spoken about?

Oh, yes. It pops up at the most inconvenient times. But I do feel this link with the past through my mother. Stronger when she occupies my thoughts - like around my monthly guilt-induced phone call. But it never really goes away. Just gets smaller when things are good for me.

That little voice in my head which used to question all that I did asking "what if mum finds out, what will mum think of this, will this cause me problems with mum, how do I avoid this with mum??????" had disappeared.

I'm at a point where it's just easier to not deal with the fall out from laying it all on the line and ignoring her most of the time. If I were honest and told her about the rapes and sexual abuse, it would be circled back to me as my fault. Not being paranoid. I just judge future actions by past actions. Whenever my brother has been involved, my parents believed him without question (Why? who knows) and disbelieved what I said. I'm really not in the mood to have what my brother did turned back on me as my fault. That would probably kill what feelings I have left for my mother. It's one of those damned if you do, damned if you don't situations. One day I might be able to some sort of disclosure and closure of my past with my mother. Not now, though. But I have done things for myself, my mental health and my own sanity protection that I thought I'd never do. Cutting some family members out of my life, telling the truth about what happened to me and dealing with the past...those things still blow my mind. This isn't who I used to be. I was always the peace-making, emotion-stuffing good girl. Now I'm becoming the strong person I need to be to heal.

I do understand feeling weird when normal, human emotions and interactions take place. My husband horsing around with the girls makes me uncomfortable because it brings back times when I was a kid and I never knew when that finger-snap of time needed to turn things from fun to horrible would happen. Plus there wasn't any play like that and I just don't know how to play like 'normal' people do. So I shy away from it.

Thanks for your words.
Lisa

 

[bluecat]

Thanks Nicolette,

thank you for posting that. I've always felt that being a soldier and seeing your comrades mutilated and overpowered by things they can't control (weapons and bombs), is on par with seeing your siblings mutilated and overpowered by things they can't control (their parents).

The first one may be more intense in the sheer newtonian sense of force, but happens to trained adults over a limited period of time. The other one, while not as forceful, happens to still developing children (sometimes babies) in the hands of their supposed protectors over the most vulnerable parts of their lives. There is nothing worse in my mind, than to be hurt by the people you trust and love.

Its probably not a coincidence that the two groups of people most likely to develop PTSD are soldiers and survivors of domestic violence. (J. Herman, Trauma and Recovery).

I noticed this is a 3 year old post, but it rings true now and will always ring true and brought tears in my eyes.

I know I am not a whiner, in fact, I probably suck in more than I should, but until I came to this forum, there was no way for me to ever talk about my experiences and have other people understand that I am a soldier at heart. That I've lived through some tough shit and that I didn't let it break me and that it counts for something.



My heart goes out to all survivors, soldiers and survivors of domestic violence alike.

Txs,
Bluecat

 

[Sammy]

As an infant, my mother was ill. My younger brother was born with a heart defect and all the family energies went into him and her. I simply did not exist. I was the only physically healthy member of the family so, I was left to my own devices basically from birth. I was mocked, antagonized, teased, physically hurt by my siblings for showing any weakness. I was never allowed to show anger, hurt, fear. I was expected to be perfect and without emotions. At some point, my family was told I had a high IQ so from then on it was "You are the smart one, why can't you do it" Or, "You are the smart one, figure it out." Nothing I did was good enough. I played school concerts and would receive a critique in the car on the way home. I didn't get an A in an advanced class and I has hassled for it not being better. I watched my father beat my brother and wondered when I was next. Sometimes, I almost wished I would be because then I would know I existed. I was sexually abused by a teacher for almost 3 years and then another one for 3 months and could not tell anyone. It didn't matter. I did not exist. Through all this, we were repeatedly told, "your family is the only people you can trust. They are the only ones who will be there for you." It has seemed to apply to everyone, but me. I don't exist.

When we have family gatherings, I get to hear all the "good times" stories. I don't remember many good times stories that do not end in something awful. I want to yell, "And do you remember terrorizing me? Do you remember being curled into bed and listening to Mom and Dad yell at each other? Do you remember being told how inadequate everything you tried to do was? Do you remember having nightmares every night as a small child and being too frightened to go to a parent for comfort? Do you remember hiding at every opportunity?" Of course not. They were asked why weren't they more like me. Because I hid, I stayed in my room. I said nothing. I felt nothing. I did as I told and then disappeared as best I could.

My Mom passed many years ago. My father has dementia and barely knows one day from the next. There is no confronting my family. There is no point - they are probably as injured as I am. So, I still pretend and I stay out of it as much as I can. I pretend my family would be there if I needed them. But, know they wouldn't. No one will be there.

Childhood abuse? I wasn't beaten. So, it wasn't so bad. I simply didn't exist. And people wonder why I shake and sweat when someone tries to tell me I matter or I have value. People wonder why I do not reach out. I do not ask for help. I do not go to the doctor until I am in so much pain I can hardly move. I do not take care of myself as I should. It terrifies me to believe I matter. It terrifies me to trust. I sometimes tell people about the trauma and the PTSD because it makes them go away. They don't want to know it exists. They have as much trouble understanding growing up traumatized as I have understanding love and trust. It just seems a bad idea.

Wow. I didn't realize how much this thread was effecting me until I started a comment. I am glad there are people who "get it." Being traumatized does horrid things to a developing brain. For me, nightmares every night are normal. Being alone is normal. Expecting nothing from anyone is normal. Trust and hope are bad ideas. Anyone who believes "children are resilient" has no idea what that early trauma does to the mind.

Of my soapbox.

 

[bluecat]

Hi Sammy,

it sounds like it brought a lot out for you, I am sorry you know this too. Neglect can be just as deadly as other forms of abuse. I've head my share of it as a child as well, though in different circumstances, but in the end, it comes down to the same pain. In my experience, neglect hurts just as much as bodily harm and its consequences are the hardest to figure out, because it can look so inocuous. In the end, there are no bruises to show for it, just a lot of invisible pain.

Take good care of yourself,
Bluecat

 

[Sammy]

"Invisible pain." I like that phrase. That is exactly what it is. I often feel like I do not even deserve to be angry or feel hurt. Neglect and verbal abuse are insidious and erode your self-esteem, trust, ability to love, and on and on. As you well know. A bruise, black eye, broken bone - they are proof. The recent rash of young people who have committed suicide for being bullied has been difficult for me. It has made me wonder how many have been "bullied" in our own homes and simply didn't even realize we were being bullied! My heart breaks for those children. At the same time, I can't resist reading the stories. I guess I feel blessed I survived!!

I am so grateful for this forum where there are people who "get it" and are willing to fight to heal. I am fighting to heal.

 

[anni]

I've thought for a long time now that all domestic abuse is just plain bullying, with children most vulnerable. Bullying on all levels is endemic in the US at the moment and getting worse, so can't imagine what's happening behind all the closed doors. Perhaps respect for others is at a higher level in general in other countries, I can't tell.

It's an awfully good post across the board. Thank you.