I Seriously Wish I Had Stayed Connected Here.

[AS1975]

This is why I am thinking maybe emotional abuse in itself should become a topic. Abusers are very good at using words to hide what they are doing. Good idea! Do you include therapy gone wrong?

And the fact that they have CHOSEN to enter a field which enables them to abuse others, really ought not be the surprise we all find it to be. Take a good hard look at who and what abusers are, often they are intelligent, manipulative, scheming individuals, with the capacity and capability to make it through University/College. I've often wondered just how many people are working their warped psyche on the most disadvantaged and susceptible people in our community, think about it, being paid and respected for their work, despite using their position to harm those in their care.

 

[p-no]

You are very right, AS1975. My ex-husband is one of them. He switched from physics to psychology and is almost done with his specialist studies of psychotherapy. It makes me sick every time I think of it.

 

[Pencil]

Some therapists are no doubt narcissistic and/or sociopatic, but there is another category: the incompetent ones. Some may be simply inexperienced, although their hearts may be in the right place. But then there are those who probably have little patience with people, much like grade school teachers who end up, after 40 years of teaching, actually hating kids.

 

[safenow]

This is why I am thinking maybe emotional abuse in itself should become a topic.

I think that is a very good idea.When I'm searching for a new therapist, I have a list I ask them to read on the first visit, or even before we have that first visit. I interview them rather than them me. LOL

It's the least understood abuse and the worse damaging since it is set to destroy what makes the person that person.

I have found that so many therapist do this while they are suppose to be helping you. I'd rather be without a therapist than to deal with a bad one. I have had good ones, and I know the difference. A bad one can set you back years in recovery, while a good one will help you find ways to cope with whatever the situation may be. When a good one doesn't know the answer to a question, they tell you they don't know, but will study it out and find out for you. Either that or refer you to someone who has the answer.

 

[Hashi]

Welcome back.

It's the least understood abuse and the worse damaging since it is set to destroy what makes the person that person.

I'd like to ask you, as gently as I can, to reconsider saying that emotional abuse is the worse damaging. It's extremely damaging, and so is all abuse. I think it's helpful not to make any kind of comparison between one type of abuse and another, or one type of trauma and another. All of them take away from us and who we are. Maybe each person's trauma is, for them, the worse damaging. I don't think traumas can be compared to each other, and trying to do that could make some people feel invalidated or that their trauma isn't "bad enough" to justify them being here or getting help.

I completely agree that emotional abuse goes deep and affects us very badly. I think a thread on emotional abuse would be very helpful to a lot of people, and hope it would be for you too. I'm sorry that you had such a horrible and damaging experience.

 

[winterose]

Hashi,

I would never be as arrogant to say someone's trauma isn't important or not relevant nor compare one trauma over the other. SO Ill retract the statement for those who would think I would even think of doing such things.

 

[winterose]

SO, let me now rephrase my statement. I think emotional abuse is the hardest to heal from. The common link when I worked not only with domestic violence but being on this side(therapy), was one statement that stood out for me the most. That statement was I can take the hits and stuff but it's the words he/she said to me. I also heard this many times working with the kids we worked with. I am also seeing it in my brothers grandaughters life now since she is a bullying victim at school. Which that is an entire topic in itself for me to talk about.

 

[Sailorgal]

It's hard when you can't show a distinct injury or evidence to point the finger on someone. When it's emotional, people just see us, not our internal scars and it makes it extremely frustrating.

I endured psychological abuse and you know what, I didn't know I was abused.

 

[winterose]

I grew up with that song stick and stones will break my bones but words will never hurt me. Bullcookies they didn't. Im working on this in therapy now. The screwed up thing is that the words get implanted to such a degree the abuser doesn't need to be around to say them.

 

[anni]

Oh, I don't know. Apples and oranges, with physical abuse being an apple hiding an orange inside the core. I'd have to say tougher to spot, although it's a pretty singular physical abuser who doesn't also have the whole psychological warfare poisoned arrows in his lovely arsenol. I take that back- bet it's not tougher to spot, it's tougher to prove, hence making the victim feel even more powerless, if possible. A LOT tougher to help the abused person, too, since how the heck do you call 911?

It's possible, just slower. Truly. Document everything, tell only key people, not every, single person you know. It's just toooo frustrating trying to illustate your abuse for the sceptical plus I think Dr. Phil is correct when he says these emotional abusers are only one swing away from crossing the line into violence. Any consequences of the invisible abuse has to be written down somewhere also, but do not talk about the journal. ( This is for anyone trapped in this, not just this thread. ) If you back a sociopath into a corner, it's tandamount to messing with a brain-damaged pitt bull.

My parents were victims of this, 'invisible' abuse. They had unspeakable acts of emotional abuse and terrorizing commited on them. There's a special place in hell for the shameful people who told them to get off the planet, it's selfish for them to keep living. ( true story ) My mother is still wearing the scars she should never, ever have received at the age of 81. I have to be careful what I write on the subject, would not if I did not have knock-down, drag-out proof AND a plethora of plain, old protection in the form of evidence and witnesses I've collected and shared with those key people over the last 2 years. Was there also physical abuse? Not like we'd define it, but through neglect, refusing to administer life-saving help, also true story. My sister hung a copy of my parent's DNR order on their refridgerator, forced them to look at it every, single day. She said it was so ambulance crews would know not to administer 'life' back into them, like crews wander around the house looking into kitchens while on call. This was a reminder to my parents to please go die. They knew, geesh- they'd been told, believe me. Everyday- my parents had to see this and the evidence that my sister did not want them here. Heartbreaking, and yes, I did take it down frequently, just re-appeared. First thing I did when made POA was burn the hideous thing. Emotional abuse? Tip of the iceburg.

 

[intothelight]

Hi Winterose,

Welcome back! :)

I am sorry you had such a negative experience in therapy. I copied a link to a thread that addresses the topic you brought up in your opening post: [DLMURL]http://www.ptsdforum.org/c/threads/emdr-lashback-when-emdr-goes-wrong.1388[/DLMURL].

EMDR can be effective but also dangerous. If the client is not stable enough or does not have the tools necessary to cope with the fallout from the session, it should be discontinued until they are able to manage. Personally, I was advised to not do EMDR as it would do nothing more than re-traumatize me.

Many people have had great success with this therapy mode, but success can also be achieved with other types of therapy. It is not a personal failure on your part and I hope that you find peace and healing from the experience. Honestly, your therapist should have discontinued working with you using this type of therapy when she saw that it was doing more harm than good. I hope that you have a much better result in the future.

 

[NarcSis]

winterose, warm hugs, never any need to chastise yourself for something that someone else did to you, in therapy you are supposed to defer to an expert for guidance, unfortunately for us, not all experts are as expert as we would expect, in fact they're just as flawed and human as we are. People are people and titles don't change their personalities.

I rejected an EMDR therapist after an interview/intro session because I was unsure whether or not to listen to my gut instinct, I went back to my primary therapist and asked for her opinion, she was shocked and told me to terminate contact with the other therapist. In the end, recovery is ultimately on your terms and walking that line of feeling you're not pushing hard enough vs. pushing too hard is extremely hard to navigate. I've been there, so hugs.

Anni, your story broke my heart, you have to understand though, as a medic, I was trained to look certain places for paperwork and medications, especially when no one else was available and one of those locations was the fridge. Many people keep things there so that they can remember, especially in times of high emotional crisis when thinking doesn't come easy, but yes, I agree with you, perhaps a little more tact, like an envelope labelled EMS would have been sufficient. Where I'm from a DNR has to be the wish of the patient and unless that patient is cognitively incapacitated, only then can a power of attorney secure one on behalf of the patient, a DNR is a patient's decision and should never be entered into lightly or under duress. The hardest part for us is that a DNR can be revoked at any point - the patient could be resuscitated regardless of the paperwork if the family on scene insists, really sad situation for us sometimes, ethically, a highly stressful experience. :(

Hugs to both of you.