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Descending into the particulars

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I can see that none of the responses were attacks, and yet there we are.
yep
Because you were taught that.
Ya, I know, I've blah blahed about that already
But really --If you are a kiddo in a place where no one tries to help and you are taught from a young age that you are somehow wrong, then wouldn't anyone reaching out to you be suspect?
 
Alright J, I'm going to try this shit. I'm not sure how well it's going to go.

I quit posting my own stuff out on the open forum because it was, well, exhausting and as most of you know, it feels exposed.

Most people had gradually faded away from reading my diary and I've been left to bang at this mostly with just J and a couple of folks who still poke their heads in on my diary occasionally to make sure I've not gone off the deep end.

J (my T) knows that I post here and that I mod. He highly approves of and tells others in his practice about this site. Honestly, the site has been a useful tool.

A little background. We've exhausted most of the 'regular' talk therapy styles and decided that EMDR isn't possible at the moment. Late 2019 I guess, I stumbled on Casuistry.

Essentially: determination of right and wrong in questions of conduct or conscience by analyzing cases that illustrate general ethical rules.

Yeah, yeah, I already hear the furious blinking.

I was listening to Malcomb Gladwell a while back and he did a three part series on casuistry. What he talked about was 'descending into the particulars'. It appealed to me for some reason. The whole notion of taking something apart and looking at each case individually in context instead of using broad brush strokes made sense. The way I have been coming at this, I think that I thought I was going to prove to J that I deserved everything because he had not heard the particulars of each thing I did to deserve what happened. J definitely came at it from a different direction and it derailed me a bit

Fast forward to today and while we are still using Casuistry I am ... I guess I'm a bit stuck. Too close to the bark to see the tree, let alone the forest so to speak.
J asked me to trust him on something. Which is ... well I mean, he's a therapist. and generally speaking his whole thing is to make someone 'feel better' about the shit that they did wrong in their life.

God, just parsing this out enough so that I can get to the question is painful.

He wanted me to talk to the forum (not just my diary) about some of the things that I've gone through to establish whether I deserved them and if the things that happened to me were my fault.

Now before you just jump up and say "OH DES, 100% it wasn't! You didn't deserve that!" hear me out.
Descend into the particulars with me.
Descending into the particulars is painful for me but important.

I actually don't even know how to talk about this but I'll give it a go.
I don't think it serves much purpose to give the whole story (and in some cases I don't remember)so I'll give examples that can be used as a sort of base line for conduct and then talk about the particulars of if UNDER CERTAIN CIRCUMSTANCES the situation bids a different response that would otherwise be thought of as wrong.
Kind of following me still?
Yeah, it's ok, it's a little confusing to me too sometimes and this was my idea.


GENERALLY speaking, is it appropriate to put a kid in a closet ?
Now, in the particulars, if it is to protect the child from themselves or someone else, is it ok?
If the reason someone needed to protect that child is because they(the kid) kicked the shit out of that person's face?
If the reason is because the child is generally out of control and a danger to themselves or others?

I think I'm gonna stop there. It gets a bit more... I can't get more specific right now and this will either blow up and become more than I can deal with or it will sit and get lost in the annals of Myptsd history.
If talking, coersion, and reasonable consequences don't impact a childs behavior, and they are out of control, there are times you have to keep a child safe. If a child is so out of control that he/she will hurt himself or another, there are correct restraint/time out processes. A parent in this position would be doing the best he/she could in the moment. Some children become so angry and so strong from adreneline, that an adult can't manage them. In this case, a padded closet at home, without shoes/shoe strings, belt. and anything the child can use to hurt himself/herself while raging. At school, I had a child come to school and I was taught when the "monster" would come (that's the name the kid called it) to quickly strip the child's shoes and belt off when he was out of control and place him in the closet....and monitor until he regained control. This child would strip the rest of his clothes off in a fit of rage....so, there are times when this is a way to get a child back into control...sometimes, meds don't always prevent this level of rage....my student's mother had used crack when he was in utero and this rage was a part of it.

Likewise, if as a parent, you were afraid of your anger after your child intentionally kicked the hell out of you, and you put your kid in a closet to protect him from you.... ...you would have done it to keep him safe......even though he maybe didn't see it from your perspective. I think we do things that we wish we had better education or coping skills.....in the moment....parenting and all that goes with it is fly by the seat of one's pants and is so messy.....even at it's best.
 
if as a parent, you were afraid of your anger after your child intentionally kicked the hell out of you, and you put your kid in a closet to protect him from you.... ...you would have done it to keep him safe......even though he maybe didn't see it from your perspective.
This is what I’m saying in part, yes. I deserved to be there.
 
I think I mentioned on another occasion the client my T had who locked his kid in a closet because he was a single parent who had to go to work and he didn't know of another way to keep his kid safe. The way that worked out, he got reported, sent to see my T, and together they figured out a better plan for the kid. (Nice neighbor lady who would watch the kid with no money involved.)

The closet itself isn't really the point, the way I see this. It's the end result that's the point. In this case the end result was a person who seems to think she'd inherently bad and never should have been born. That is NOT a desirable end result. If Mom locking you in the closet had resulted in a little girl who saw closets as a sign of love, safety, and all things positive, things would be fine. That's NOT what happened. And it doesn't really matter what Mom's intent was either.

You know I've got a dog who had serious issues with coming when he's called. You also know I ultimately decided that using a shock collar was a better idea that having the dog get his silly self killed by running off. Shock collars are pretty extreme, can be used for torture, and definitely aren't my first choice. But, things worked out. He doesn't need the shock collar, he comes when he's called, and he can run around and play with his bulldog brother when we're out in the yard. Because the shock collar was used carefully. If Mom had used the closet carefully, to problem solve, life would be good and we wouldn't be HAVING this conversation. It's not the closet, per se, that's the problem. It's how & why it was used and the end result that's the problem.
 
If a child is so out of control that he/she will hurt himself or another, there are correct restraint/time out processes. A parent in this position would be doing the best he/she could in the moment.
Ok this makes sense. Imperfect parenting but makes sense.

My parents didn’t believe in mental health help. Those people were just ‘crazy’. Yeah lots of shaming of mental health issues. No surprise there. So they were unlikely to go try to find help for an out of control Desi.

Fuuuuuuuuck now to find the line.
she was right to put me in the closet when I kicked. Probably right when I was generally out of control.

What does that say about the other times?
The time I was left in there and the police arrived and everyone left?

The time I DIDN’T bring home my packet of math papers for them to sign and was put in there.

and the attic I m not sure about the attic that it juat happens a lot
Stopping
 
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