- Post starter
- #13
Promicarus
Silver Member
@Brucielucy
Thank you so much for your reply-your obvious diligence in addressing posts in detail provides the reassurance of sincerity that only such a devotion of time and effort can guarantee.
Yes, exactly. I realize that's it's much more common than not for those with a history of trauma of any sort to feel this way--for the sense of fundamental, inherent corruption of one's very nature to convince each of us that we are infinitely incomprehensible.
and therefore uniquely and irretrievably alone in the world.
However-and unfortunately-despite the fact that we may be intellectually capable of recognizing this phenomenon as a common "symptom of the condition", in itself--thereby signifying implicitly that we are not, after all, alone...
...I think most of us eventually come to understand that such abstract intellectual acceptance goes not very far towards offsetting a lifetime of personal experience.
The experience of being accepted can only come from the actual experience, of course--of one instance of another of one reaching out rather than closing down, one block of it set upon another over time. And in order to change one's experience from the former to the latter in any lasting sense, we must "put ourselves out there" as you have so accurately observed--just as we are--with the newly adjusted internal orientation of attitude which shifts the the previous "habit of experience" of having failed due to the disapproval of others, to one of internal success at having even sincerely tried at all, regardless of whatever rejection we receive from others as a consequence.
Hopefully, as you mentioned, over time, that will the building process of experience I find here. At this point, it is really my only hope of establishing that trend, and overcoming an expectation of rejection which, in itself, of course becomes a self-fulfilling prophecy in face-to-face interaction., especially as the stroke's affects to my face, and eye-contact, are prohibitive to experiencing anything but disgust and rejection in direct interpersonal interactions at this point.
A heart murmur, or "Atrial Fibrillation", is the leading cause of stroke. Of course, the risk does depend on the specific nature, in each individual case, and as you mentioned, in some cases it is relatively benign. I'm very glad yours is.
The risk of stroke in Atrial Fibrillation is mainly a function of stress. And I returned to my parent's home in order to provide 24hr. care for my father during the final stages of his struggle with Parkinson's Disease, for 5 years. The stress can't be described, except to say that it can only be even comprehended by those who provide care to a family member with Alzheimer's, Parkinson's Disease, or another neurodegenerative condition.
During this time my mother "uninstalled my safe place" as I put it--during this period she went from having previously been my greatest advocate and close confidante...to a merciless persecutor, heaping scorn upon my head at every opportunity and without a single word said in anything but an outright attempt to cause pain. She saw me as a threat to the inheritance, I realized later and attempted to block my every attempt to become close or share any kind of relationship or even basic exchange with my dying father, to both of our amazement, chagrin, and miserable recognition of a side of my mother which we realized had been kept hidden from public view all our lives. She pressured him relentlessly , in private of course, to sign over power of attorney, becoming violent when he refused her attempts. At one point he came to me on a rare occasion when we were allowed to be alone, and begged me to go to a family-friend, an attorney, and have papers drawn up leaving his entire estate to me. I was forced to decide between my mother and father. If I had consented to his wishes, my family would have been destroyed, obviously. But his appeal to me as his only and best friend, and couched in terms of the final wishes of a dying man, was heartbreaking. Not to do so would have been a fundamental betrayal, and indication that I had finally and forever "chosen sides" against him, and professed loyalty to an evil oppressor, now in the person of my mother. I could not do it. The look on his face was indescribably. He never forgave me. He never looked me in the eye again. I had doomed him to spend the last remaining moments of his life under the unbreakable grasp of an abusive, emotionally brutal fiend.
It was sometime during that period that I began experiencing what I now know to be a series of small strokes which finally resulted in my current condition. At the time, I was nearly insane, however--the stress was overwhelming and the heartbreaking drama of the nightmare my family had become played out on a continuous basis, every moment of every day.
But if that weren't enough, I'd been prescribed Effexor by a general practitioner as an anti-depressant. Little did I know at the time that, as primarily a norepenephrine reuptake inhibiting medication, it would blow the lid off of the repressed pain, terror, and bewilderment I'd kept walled off and tightly repressed from childhood. As my symptoms worsened, progressing to near constant fits of uncontrollable weeping, dangerously fragile and overt hypervigilence bordering on paranoia, and a continuous, driving agitation (all common responses to norepinephrine by those who have been sensitized to adrenaline by early PTSD--C-PTSD, especially--norepinephrine being closely related to adrenaline and serving many of the same functions, neurochemically)...he continued to prescribe more of the same, until I was eventually taking over twice the recommended daily dosage. My circumstances at home were so extreme that I attributed my symptoms to that, alone. But at the time, due to the medication, I now realized, I did not have a single wit about me, so to speak. I was raving, completely submerged in a medicated state that ensured I was continuously experiencing a state of mind identical to being in the height of close-quarters combat. Even all previous knowledge of medicine and the need for research into one's own medication regimen deserted me. I was unable to sit still long enough even to read or for that matter comprehend and process information, much less be capable of interpreting any sort of scientific information. I'm amazed now, to realize what a state I was in at the time. I'd spent a good deal of my life up to that point doing hard-science medical research to that point, just in my spare time (I was a pre-med Biology student at University). But I was so frenzied, so affected that it did not even occur to me at the time.
When I made the previous post, I admittedly failed to include the details of the mentioned interactions with therapists, in the interest of "staying on point" and communicating the bigger picture, as main goal of the post.
The specifics require a great deal of explanation. For example, in every such instance when I was confronted with this behavior, I did actually answer the question honestly and immediately. On several occasions, I replied "just listen". In others, I was more specific, replying for example, "I've had a great deal of trauma, I've never been able to relate to my peers...".
However, as we all know, it's not nearly as much what's said, as it is how it's said--and in each of these instances, the question was asked challengingly, as though to say "I'm in charge here, don't act like you are". And in around 6 instances, I was immediately interrupted before I could even finish my reply, it was obvious that it was not a question ask out of legitimate and constructive attempt to discern my goals for the process.
In each of these instances, my attempts to answer was met with an ever more agressive repetition of the question, until the therapist was literally shouting it into my face, while staring at me intently, and aggressively. In two instances, the therapist literally rose from his chair (these two were male) and began shouting "HOW CAN I HELP YOU!!!!" until I fled the room.
In short, all of the mental health care practitioners I saw were Americans, and by that point, Americans were my sworn enemies. I'd never had any experience other than rejection from an American, up to that point--most especially American males (most were near -violent, and many actually physically violent)--and these therapists all happened to be Americans, causing me to-out of unconscious habit, adopt a posture obvious to anyone as that of one declaring "It's me vs. you, and you will not break me".
However, as I mentioned, that was most, not all of the therapist I saw. I admit that not all reacted in this way. One said, after I'd told my story, and explained my predicament, "You know, I'm not surprised that you've had problems, at all. You have an extremely unusual way of speaking." He was referring to the same thing that I've been attacked for all my life--I speak LIKE a Latin American--but I have neither the accent or appearance to legitimize it by putting it into the correct context. I no more understand how to speak, act, or interact like an American than I do an Eskimo or Pygmy. I wasn't raised by Eskimos or Pygmies...and I wasn't raised by Americans, either.
As any potential therapeutic alliance must be based on trust of one's therapist, of course, these interviews were not only doomed before they started by my by that point unconscious, but automatic posture of enmity toward Americans. Evident in every aspect of my interaction with these therapist was an unspoken "it's me vs. you, and you will not break me" attitude plainly obvious from everything from my tone, to nonverbal cues, obvious especially to a trained eye.
So I no less than guaranteed not only my own rejection, but provoked their attack. I was in an approach of "attacking the enemy before I could be attacked", even though at the time it was unconscious. Like most of us, I think, I avoided self-analysis, or any opportunity for insight, any idea of "looking within", at all costs. When it's you against the world, you can't stop to consider your part, after all. That might be taken for weakness or indecision. And if I looked inside I would risk consciously seeing what I only knew at that point to be an unnamed dread to be walled-off. If I were to look, I might become consciously aware of it, and so become unable to continue to portray "the act" with enough confidence for it to remain effective in convincing the world that "it's not me, it's you".
At the time of these few, unusual instances--of finding a tdoc/pdoc who was even slightly receptive to such a not only seemingly culturally inappropriate but antagonistic display, or at least not confrontational in response--in those few instances I have to take responsibility for not being at all a good candidate for treatment in the least, myself. I'll now be the first to admit that.
So these good souls who were attempting to be receptive, or at least not shout me from their offices, were still implicitly "the enemy", according to my committed habit of posture, even if that habit had by that point become automatic, and so unconscious, it was deeply a part of my "operating procedure". I operated on the fundamental assumption that "Not only are they are incapable of understanding, at all--so why try"... but "you can only expect attack". So come out strong.
As many may know, the therapeutic process is seen as useless without emotional engagement. This is, in fact, why members of what's now labeled "traditional cultures" are considered to be "refractory to treatment", by many if not most therapists--in "traditional cultures" (again, almost every developed civilization other than the U.S.) it is, in fact, antisocial to emotionally engage immediately--to have no "reserve"--it's considered a lack of appropriate restraint, childish, overly familiar, and so an invasive failure to show common respect for another's boundaries out of courtesy. In other words, their culture sanctions an avoidance of "opening up immediately" and exposing an unadulterated, uncontrolled view of the emotional processes underlying your communication.
"The recitation of facts without the accompanying emotions is a sterile exercise, without therapeutic effect. As Breur and Freud noted a century ago, 'recollection without affect almost invariably produces no result". (Trauma and Recovery-Herman)
This is refractory to treatment, because therapists must have emotional engagement, as I mentioned, even if they have to FORCE it. The process is useless otherwise. I now realize that this is what these shouting therapists were attempting to do.
However, in traditional cultures, this is seen simply as unjustified aggression, and justifiable cause not only for resistance to the attempt, but for counterattack--as it runs contrary to commonly accepted social norms of "formal" interaction, i.e courteous respect for others boundaries.
While there are not many therapists willing to work with members of a traditional culture, for that reason--i.e. protocol dictates setting an early precedent of emotional engagement, to set the tone for the rest of the process--among other factors--there are nonetheless some willing to do so. That is, if the individual has a legitimate claim on membership in such a culture. There would be no point in doing otherwise, after all, as the person's reaction would be negative, and so counterproductive to establishing the therapeutic alliance.
But in my case, I had no apparent legitimate claim on such a "composed" style of interaction, which in the context of an American of my generation, is interpreted as detachment--a lack of emotional engagement. So they followed their protocol, and attempted to "break through the shell", to forcibly make me engage Add to this the fact that the "piercing gaze of the Latin American", for example --which is taken into consideration as a cultural characteristic when seen in one who is clearly Latin---when the rest of the identifying markers of accent, etc. are not there, the same quality of eye contact is seen therefore as an American who is attempting to "stare someone down", in order to establish dominance. And these therapists were responding, therefore to that, in their aggression.
Members of every culture have certain means of recognizing their own kind, almost on sight, or at least upon being confronted with another member. Eye-contact may be one of the most powerful phenomenons in the universe--it is to communicate wordlessly, after all, in essence. It is to connect with another's soul. And it happens to be the most important element of communication among Latin Americans. It's vital. Principal. And the acceptable quality of eye-contact between Americans could not be more different from that of the eye-contact expected between members of Latin culture. I still don't understand American's eye-contact. Of course, I shouldn't be expected to--I wasn't raised in an American home.
As I said, it took me a long time to put all this together. But now that I understand the premise of the behavior, my resentment toward the individual therapists has been cleared, as well as that towards the institution. It was a simple misunderstanding.
I could go on for reams about how and why Latin traits and style of communication are considered violently antisocial and unacceptable in the context of an apparently American male, but that's for my longer story, which I'm working on currently.
Were it not for the factors related to "cultural confusion" I mentioned, I would agree entirely. And thank you for calling my attention to the fact that, all too often, having experienced rejection/victimization, and experiencing ourselves as worthless, we expect exactly more of the same, falsely reading rejection into others reactions to us when it isn't there. I admit that's been a lifelong tendency. And it's a self-fulfilling prophecy, of course..the "Art of Expectation".
Unfortunately, as you mentioned, eye-contact is fundamental to the therapeutic process. And I can't establish eye contact at all--not anything like real eye-contact, which is representative of an interior emotional state...not with my eye-lids twitching and quivering, as well as the muscles around my eyes doing so, contorting my view of any face--and then my face following suit--at any attempt to focus on a face before me. As you mentioned, "unbroken" eye-contact is usually required by therapists as fundamental to the therapeutic process.
It's the most difficult thing. Without question. It's torture. As for whether or not it's permanent, it's difficult to say, at this point. I've checked into eyelid surgery, and it appears as though it affords some hope. However, there was some damage to the quality of my vision--my eyes themselves--as well. But it's impossible at this point to tell to what extent my eye-contact will be affected purely in terms of visual acuity, at this point--as due to my eyelid dysfunction, it's impossible to establish even the slightest eye-contact whatsoever, so as to get some idea. But I think it may be o.k. While my eye's aren't focused "near-field", as intently as they are when looking at someone's face, my vision is only slightly blurred, and a little cloudy. I'm hoping for the best.
When hanging over a precipice, dangling over the abyss, your fall and certain death prevented only by your firm grasp on one small branch...you don't hang on because it's easy. You hang on because it's all you have.
Thank you so much for your post. It warms my heart.
Thank you so much for your reply-your obvious diligence in addressing posts in detail provides the reassurance of sincerity that only such a devotion of time and effort can guarantee.
Yes, exactly. I realize that's it's much more common than not for those with a history of trauma of any sort to feel this way--for the sense of fundamental, inherent corruption of one's very nature to convince each of us that we are infinitely incomprehensible.
and therefore uniquely and irretrievably alone in the world.
However-and unfortunately-despite the fact that we may be intellectually capable of recognizing this phenomenon as a common "symptom of the condition", in itself--thereby signifying implicitly that we are not, after all, alone...
...I think most of us eventually come to understand that such abstract intellectual acceptance goes not very far towards offsetting a lifetime of personal experience.
The experience of being accepted can only come from the actual experience, of course--of one instance of another of one reaching out rather than closing down, one block of it set upon another over time. And in order to change one's experience from the former to the latter in any lasting sense, we must "put ourselves out there" as you have so accurately observed--just as we are--with the newly adjusted internal orientation of attitude which shifts the the previous "habit of experience" of having failed due to the disapproval of others, to one of internal success at having even sincerely tried at all, regardless of whatever rejection we receive from others as a consequence.
Hopefully, as you mentioned, over time, that will the building process of experience I find here. At this point, it is really my only hope of establishing that trend, and overcoming an expectation of rejection which, in itself, of course becomes a self-fulfilling prophecy in face-to-face interaction., especially as the stroke's affects to my face, and eye-contact, are prohibitive to experiencing anything but disgust and rejection in direct interpersonal interactions at this point.
A heart murmur, or "Atrial Fibrillation", is the leading cause of stroke. Of course, the risk does depend on the specific nature, in each individual case, and as you mentioned, in some cases it is relatively benign. I'm very glad yours is.
The risk of stroke in Atrial Fibrillation is mainly a function of stress. And I returned to my parent's home in order to provide 24hr. care for my father during the final stages of his struggle with Parkinson's Disease, for 5 years. The stress can't be described, except to say that it can only be even comprehended by those who provide care to a family member with Alzheimer's, Parkinson's Disease, or another neurodegenerative condition.
During this time my mother "uninstalled my safe place" as I put it--during this period she went from having previously been my greatest advocate and close confidante...to a merciless persecutor, heaping scorn upon my head at every opportunity and without a single word said in anything but an outright attempt to cause pain. She saw me as a threat to the inheritance, I realized later and attempted to block my every attempt to become close or share any kind of relationship or even basic exchange with my dying father, to both of our amazement, chagrin, and miserable recognition of a side of my mother which we realized had been kept hidden from public view all our lives. She pressured him relentlessly , in private of course, to sign over power of attorney, becoming violent when he refused her attempts. At one point he came to me on a rare occasion when we were allowed to be alone, and begged me to go to a family-friend, an attorney, and have papers drawn up leaving his entire estate to me. I was forced to decide between my mother and father. If I had consented to his wishes, my family would have been destroyed, obviously. But his appeal to me as his only and best friend, and couched in terms of the final wishes of a dying man, was heartbreaking. Not to do so would have been a fundamental betrayal, and indication that I had finally and forever "chosen sides" against him, and professed loyalty to an evil oppressor, now in the person of my mother. I could not do it. The look on his face was indescribably. He never forgave me. He never looked me in the eye again. I had doomed him to spend the last remaining moments of his life under the unbreakable grasp of an abusive, emotionally brutal fiend.
It was sometime during that period that I began experiencing what I now know to be a series of small strokes which finally resulted in my current condition. At the time, I was nearly insane, however--the stress was overwhelming and the heartbreaking drama of the nightmare my family had become played out on a continuous basis, every moment of every day.
But if that weren't enough, I'd been prescribed Effexor by a general practitioner as an anti-depressant. Little did I know at the time that, as primarily a norepenephrine reuptake inhibiting medication, it would blow the lid off of the repressed pain, terror, and bewilderment I'd kept walled off and tightly repressed from childhood. As my symptoms worsened, progressing to near constant fits of uncontrollable weeping, dangerously fragile and overt hypervigilence bordering on paranoia, and a continuous, driving agitation (all common responses to norepinephrine by those who have been sensitized to adrenaline by early PTSD--C-PTSD, especially--norepinephrine being closely related to adrenaline and serving many of the same functions, neurochemically)...he continued to prescribe more of the same, until I was eventually taking over twice the recommended daily dosage. My circumstances at home were so extreme that I attributed my symptoms to that, alone. But at the time, due to the medication, I now realized, I did not have a single wit about me, so to speak. I was raving, completely submerged in a medicated state that ensured I was continuously experiencing a state of mind identical to being in the height of close-quarters combat. Even all previous knowledge of medicine and the need for research into one's own medication regimen deserted me. I was unable to sit still long enough even to read or for that matter comprehend and process information, much less be capable of interpreting any sort of scientific information. I'm amazed now, to realize what a state I was in at the time. I'd spent a good deal of my life up to that point doing hard-science medical research to that point, just in my spare time (I was a pre-med Biology student at University). But I was so frenzied, so affected that it did not even occur to me at the time.
When I made the previous post, I admittedly failed to include the details of the mentioned interactions with therapists, in the interest of "staying on point" and communicating the bigger picture, as main goal of the post.
The specifics require a great deal of explanation. For example, in every such instance when I was confronted with this behavior, I did actually answer the question honestly and immediately. On several occasions, I replied "just listen". In others, I was more specific, replying for example, "I've had a great deal of trauma, I've never been able to relate to my peers...".
However, as we all know, it's not nearly as much what's said, as it is how it's said--and in each of these instances, the question was asked challengingly, as though to say "I'm in charge here, don't act like you are". And in around 6 instances, I was immediately interrupted before I could even finish my reply, it was obvious that it was not a question ask out of legitimate and constructive attempt to discern my goals for the process.
In each of these instances, my attempts to answer was met with an ever more agressive repetition of the question, until the therapist was literally shouting it into my face, while staring at me intently, and aggressively. In two instances, the therapist literally rose from his chair (these two were male) and began shouting "HOW CAN I HELP YOU!!!!" until I fled the room.
In short, all of the mental health care practitioners I saw were Americans, and by that point, Americans were my sworn enemies. I'd never had any experience other than rejection from an American, up to that point--most especially American males (most were near -violent, and many actually physically violent)--and these therapists all happened to be Americans, causing me to-out of unconscious habit, adopt a posture obvious to anyone as that of one declaring "It's me vs. you, and you will not break me".
However, as I mentioned, that was most, not all of the therapist I saw. I admit that not all reacted in this way. One said, after I'd told my story, and explained my predicament, "You know, I'm not surprised that you've had problems, at all. You have an extremely unusual way of speaking." He was referring to the same thing that I've been attacked for all my life--I speak LIKE a Latin American--but I have neither the accent or appearance to legitimize it by putting it into the correct context. I no more understand how to speak, act, or interact like an American than I do an Eskimo or Pygmy. I wasn't raised by Eskimos or Pygmies...and I wasn't raised by Americans, either.
As any potential therapeutic alliance must be based on trust of one's therapist, of course, these interviews were not only doomed before they started by my by that point unconscious, but automatic posture of enmity toward Americans. Evident in every aspect of my interaction with these therapist was an unspoken "it's me vs. you, and you will not break me" attitude plainly obvious from everything from my tone, to nonverbal cues, obvious especially to a trained eye.
So I no less than guaranteed not only my own rejection, but provoked their attack. I was in an approach of "attacking the enemy before I could be attacked", even though at the time it was unconscious. Like most of us, I think, I avoided self-analysis, or any opportunity for insight, any idea of "looking within", at all costs. When it's you against the world, you can't stop to consider your part, after all. That might be taken for weakness or indecision. And if I looked inside I would risk consciously seeing what I only knew at that point to be an unnamed dread to be walled-off. If I were to look, I might become consciously aware of it, and so become unable to continue to portray "the act" with enough confidence for it to remain effective in convincing the world that "it's not me, it's you".
At the time of these few, unusual instances--of finding a tdoc/pdoc who was even slightly receptive to such a not only seemingly culturally inappropriate but antagonistic display, or at least not confrontational in response--in those few instances I have to take responsibility for not being at all a good candidate for treatment in the least, myself. I'll now be the first to admit that.
So these good souls who were attempting to be receptive, or at least not shout me from their offices, were still implicitly "the enemy", according to my committed habit of posture, even if that habit had by that point become automatic, and so unconscious, it was deeply a part of my "operating procedure". I operated on the fundamental assumption that "Not only are they are incapable of understanding, at all--so why try"... but "you can only expect attack". So come out strong.
As many may know, the therapeutic process is seen as useless without emotional engagement. This is, in fact, why members of what's now labeled "traditional cultures" are considered to be "refractory to treatment", by many if not most therapists--in "traditional cultures" (again, almost every developed civilization other than the U.S.) it is, in fact, antisocial to emotionally engage immediately--to have no "reserve"--it's considered a lack of appropriate restraint, childish, overly familiar, and so an invasive failure to show common respect for another's boundaries out of courtesy. In other words, their culture sanctions an avoidance of "opening up immediately" and exposing an unadulterated, uncontrolled view of the emotional processes underlying your communication.
"The recitation of facts without the accompanying emotions is a sterile exercise, without therapeutic effect. As Breur and Freud noted a century ago, 'recollection without affect almost invariably produces no result". (Trauma and Recovery-Herman)
This is refractory to treatment, because therapists must have emotional engagement, as I mentioned, even if they have to FORCE it. The process is useless otherwise. I now realize that this is what these shouting therapists were attempting to do.
However, in traditional cultures, this is seen simply as unjustified aggression, and justifiable cause not only for resistance to the attempt, but for counterattack--as it runs contrary to commonly accepted social norms of "formal" interaction, i.e courteous respect for others boundaries.
While there are not many therapists willing to work with members of a traditional culture, for that reason--i.e. protocol dictates setting an early precedent of emotional engagement, to set the tone for the rest of the process--among other factors--there are nonetheless some willing to do so. That is, if the individual has a legitimate claim on membership in such a culture. There would be no point in doing otherwise, after all, as the person's reaction would be negative, and so counterproductive to establishing the therapeutic alliance.
But in my case, I had no apparent legitimate claim on such a "composed" style of interaction, which in the context of an American of my generation, is interpreted as detachment--a lack of emotional engagement. So they followed their protocol, and attempted to "break through the shell", to forcibly make me engage Add to this the fact that the "piercing gaze of the Latin American", for example --which is taken into consideration as a cultural characteristic when seen in one who is clearly Latin---when the rest of the identifying markers of accent, etc. are not there, the same quality of eye contact is seen therefore as an American who is attempting to "stare someone down", in order to establish dominance. And these therapists were responding, therefore to that, in their aggression.
Members of every culture have certain means of recognizing their own kind, almost on sight, or at least upon being confronted with another member. Eye-contact may be one of the most powerful phenomenons in the universe--it is to communicate wordlessly, after all, in essence. It is to connect with another's soul. And it happens to be the most important element of communication among Latin Americans. It's vital. Principal. And the acceptable quality of eye-contact between Americans could not be more different from that of the eye-contact expected between members of Latin culture. I still don't understand American's eye-contact. Of course, I shouldn't be expected to--I wasn't raised in an American home.
As I said, it took me a long time to put all this together. But now that I understand the premise of the behavior, my resentment toward the individual therapists has been cleared, as well as that towards the institution. It was a simple misunderstanding.
I could go on for reams about how and why Latin traits and style of communication are considered violently antisocial and unacceptable in the context of an apparently American male, but that's for my longer story, which I'm working on currently.
Were it not for the factors related to "cultural confusion" I mentioned, I would agree entirely. And thank you for calling my attention to the fact that, all too often, having experienced rejection/victimization, and experiencing ourselves as worthless, we expect exactly more of the same, falsely reading rejection into others reactions to us when it isn't there. I admit that's been a lifelong tendency. And it's a self-fulfilling prophecy, of course..the "Art of Expectation".
Unfortunately, as you mentioned, eye-contact is fundamental to the therapeutic process. And I can't establish eye contact at all--not anything like real eye-contact, which is representative of an interior emotional state...not with my eye-lids twitching and quivering, as well as the muscles around my eyes doing so, contorting my view of any face--and then my face following suit--at any attempt to focus on a face before me. As you mentioned, "unbroken" eye-contact is usually required by therapists as fundamental to the therapeutic process.
It's the most difficult thing. Without question. It's torture. As for whether or not it's permanent, it's difficult to say, at this point. I've checked into eyelid surgery, and it appears as though it affords some hope. However, there was some damage to the quality of my vision--my eyes themselves--as well. But it's impossible at this point to tell to what extent my eye-contact will be affected purely in terms of visual acuity, at this point--as due to my eyelid dysfunction, it's impossible to establish even the slightest eye-contact whatsoever, so as to get some idea. But I think it may be o.k. While my eye's aren't focused "near-field", as intently as they are when looking at someone's face, my vision is only slightly blurred, and a little cloudy. I'm hoping for the best.
When hanging over a precipice, dangling over the abyss, your fall and certain death prevented only by your firm grasp on one small branch...you don't hang on because it's easy. You hang on because it's all you have.
Thank you so much for your post. It warms my heart.
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