Emotional Abuse: Ashamed It Caused Trauma In Me

[Femke]

Today a somewhat new friend (we work together on a care farm) asked about what my diagnosis is and what the reasons for my trauma are.

I notice that I find it really difficult to talk about that. I know this friend is suffering from complex PTSD herself and has been through lots of bad stuff, bad childhood, among other things. I have severe symptoms (strong dissociation, lots of emotional turmoil, psychosis). But many people have been through things much and much worse than me. I feel really stupid and ashamed and weak that I broke down so badly over something relatively small.

I have been through some physical/sexual abuse incidents as a child and an adult, but the main abuse by the father of my child was emotional and very much invisible: crazymaking, humiliating, controlling, threatening, gaslighting, manipulating, witholding basic needs, bullying, stalking, inducing fear and paranoia. Bullying and threatening and endangering and witholding basic needs (sleep, food) from our newborn son. Things like that. I don't even know how to explain it to others. He was smart and really good at it. I was vulnerable to it.

It took me a long time to even recognize this as abuse and stop defending him. And then a long time to overcome my fear and quit all contact (he threatened to kill me, kidnap our son, convince the courts I am crazy and not fit as a mum, etc... if I didn't do everything he wanted). And then a long time to defend my choice against the rest of the world, with CPS defending the ex: "a psychopath can be a good father too!"

And now...I am still fighting majorly with the after-effects... and I feel really insecure about this. I feel like it wasn't so bad, only twice or so "real abuse" happened (as in: sexual/physical), so how can I have been so weak to collapse? Maybe he wasn't so bad and it was really me that was crazy, as he said?

I feel I have no "right" to have PTSD, because others went through stuff that is much worse... and I feel really ashamed to talk about this.

Does anyone recognize this? How do you deal with it?

 

[Deleted member 541]

One of the rules with PTSD..... NEVER NEVER Compare your trauma with anyone else. Your trauma belongs to you, you suffered through it and it belongs to you. All of us have our own trauma and yes, some maybe worse than others, but that doesn't diminish what we went through.

 

[NoWhereKnowWhere]

I think this is one of the reasons we try not to compare trauma on the forums. Trauma is trauma, it's hard enough to deal with all this PTSD stuff as it is. It's just not fair to ourselves to compare and say things to ourselves like it wasn't as bad as so and so's trauma. Trauma is trauma.

This is some horrific abuse your ex put you through and the point was to make you feel crazy. I know exactly what you mean about being unable to explain it. I too suffered from emotional abuse and it's not like it's one thing you can point to and say to people "look this is what he did to me" it's a million things all rolled up in to a crazy making nightmare. If it was just the physical abuse I think I could handle that better but the rummaging abound in my brain and making feel like I was loosing my mind that feels like it's impacted me more.

 

[lostforgottensoul]

I feel like it wasn't so bad, only twice or so "real abuse" happened (as in: sexual/physical), so how can I have been so weak to collapse? Maybe he wasn't so bad and it was really me that was crazy, as he said?

I know that feeling and thought process. I couldnt seem to see that my trauma was abuse or bad or wrong or anything besides justified because it was done to me. I was the bad one, not them. It took years for me to work through that and realize what it actually was. Though I still cant say it was "horrible". Not sure why I struggle with that word.

Your abuse was "real abuse"; all of it. It will take some time (along with a therapist I hope?) to work through that and see it for what it is.

I had to counter my thoughts, though I didnt feel it and felt like I was lying to myself, eventually it started to stick and I started to come to realize what it actually was.

Dont compare your trauma. It doesnt matter if it wasnt "as bad as this person's"; your trauma was indeed trauma and abuse and horrible!

Know that I understand that thought process well! :hug:

 

[Nessa7]

My therapist tells me that when I question myself like this that I should stop and think about it like I'm an outsider. As an outsider, I'm horrified by what happened to you. As an outsider, I'm also horrified by what happened to me. We judge ourselves more harshly than someone else would.

 

[Femke]

I am sorry for the late reply. I had a couple of weeks of not really being capable of writing about trauma-stuff. Thank you all for the acknowledgement and the sharing of stories.

I've always had a tendency to minimalize what happened or compare it to others who had been through worse. But I think you are right: I should stop that.

For 20 years I didn't admit to myself and others that I was sexually abused as a child... I just felt like it didn't count, because my uncle did all sorts of things except rape me. Only when I acknowledged to myself that it was abuse and it was harmful and wrong, I started to set things straight and heal. The abuse by my ex was even more difficult to wrap my head around. As NoWhereKnowWhere writes...he did a million literally crazymaking things. That all together were so destructive I ended up psychotic. And still I couldn't see it as abuse. Let alone explain it to others.

But I feel a little more secure now. Thanks for the help.

 

[lostforgottensoul]

My therapist tells me that when I question myself like this that I should stop and think about it like I'm an outsider.

So does mine! All of the time! But i seem to have an issue doing it...

For 20 years I didn't admit to myself and others that I was sexually abused as a child... I just felt like it didn't count, because my uncle did all sorts of things except rape me.

It most certianly "counts" and Im so glad you're able to see that! Thats hard to do and its a huge step foward!

 

[Femke]

It does count and it indeed helped me a lot to start seeing that. It might sound a bit stupid, but after 20 years I finally realised my uncle was at fault - and I wasn't.

That was when the healing started.

It was really strange. Only then I started to have the right interpretations and feel the appropriate emotions connected to those events and started to see the damage he did. I felt fear, anger, grief...which was actually a relief. And even physical responses, like trembling. It was a rather weird experience... 20 years late.

I also took action and finally asserted myself as I should have done back then. I wrote a letter to my uncle and broke contact with him. He himself informed his wife (which I would have done otherwise, because they were planning on adopting a little girl, which was one of my reasons for speaking up). He apologized sincerely... which was little & late, but still helpful. I think I succeeded in forgiving him, but I never want to see him again.

Telling my parents and brothers also helped me a lot. They finally understood why my behaviour changed at that time. They always blamed it on me being a "difficult child", telling me repeatedly how bad I was, which added to the trauma. I told them I wasn't a difficult child, but I went through something difficult, which is something completely different. My mother was still ambigious at first, wanting to keep the bond to her brother intact. But after some strong talks she did choose my side. My brother recently made a statement by asking everyone except my uncle to come on his wedding. This felt like acknowledgement from their side.

Anyway, thanks for listening...

 

[Nessa7]

If you are seeing a T, one thing that might be very validating is to ask them what they would have done if you had been with your ex when you began therapy with them. I had this conversation with a T yesterday, and it really helped me get more perspective. Hearing her say that she would have reported my parents if I had been in her office as a child was very validating to me.

 

[Femke]

Thank you for your advice! I have this new team around me at the moment, with a psychiatrist, nurse and social worker. I'll talk about this! I'll ask them!

When I started to first carefully question my ex, I had actually two really validating and good experiences. I really softly and doubtingly (probably not a word?) told my GP some of the things that happened. He told me I should think long and hard about this, because my fear was right and the situation seemed to be a lot worse than I admitted to myself. And I should never let my son alone with my ex anymore. After that I saw a psychiatrist. He told me my ex sounded like a psychopath, I was quite right to leave him and protect my son and my fear was a normal response to abnormal circumstances. They reported this to CPS too.

CPS completely denied everything that happened in their reports though ("a psychopath can be a nice father too!"), even all the things I could prove and pushed for visitation, but those first validating experiences were very important. They gave me the strenght and encouragement to really leave and not go back.

I'll talk about the things you mentioned with my T!

 

[aut555]

I feel like l was married to a psychopath hell bent on gas lighting me, lying, stealing, making me sick. You name it, this guy had it in his arsenal of tricks. First shock, that was tough for me. I have decided to skip the shame part of it. Why waste time, let's start healing and feeling better. I have spent time reevaluating some childhood abuse and trama and my shield is to love myself and not shame or judge myself. What we went through makes us uniquely us and we need to find outlets do deal with this energy of emotions. I took up a new hobby, and l spent a lot of time in self examination. Sadly my ex is not divorcing so l am just in limbo until he moves on.

 

[Sideways]

If someone else described being on the receiving end of the same abuse, and being effected by it the same way, how would you feel for them? When it's us, way to cope is to minimise, minimise, minimise. "It wasn't such a big deal in MY case because..." I could go on all day with reasons!

Thing with trauma, there's always (always) going to be someone out there with "worse" trauma, and sometimes they have nix symptoms compared with our own. And there's always going to be people put there with "less" trauma, and sometimes their symptoms can be even worse. Comparisons get you nowhere, except avoidance, denial, and minimising.

For what it's worth, my abuser threw sexual, physical and emotional/psychological abuse at me. The stuff that I'm finding hardest to recover from (by a long shot) is, easily, the emotional and psychological stuff.

You were abused. You have ptsd. Your suffering is as valid as the next persons, regardless of how you might internally be 'rating' your trauma. And you aren't trivialising anyone else's suffering by accepting that. Not even remotely.