Posted by AuntieMel on March 23, 2006, at 10:08:00
In reply to Re: But I don't *want* to have been an abused chil, posted by Racer on March 22, 2006, at 22:52:59
I get you.
My big breakthrough came when I spent weeks (literally) in sessions just listing all the different instances of abuse.
I had spent years wondering what was so wrong with *me* that these things had affected me so much.
The thing was that any one of those instances alone would be no real big thing - hurtful, but not harmful.
It was the sheer numbers of them that made it abuse. So for weeks I just listed them, no repeats, no interruptions, no elaberation. Just a list. And I could have gone on for weeks more.
That was when it dawned on me that it really was abuse - of the most insidious kind. The kind that other people don't understand because each individual act *wasn't* heinous.
Fact - you and I were abused. We didn't *allow* it because we had no choice. For that matter, we probably at the time didn't even realize that other families weren't that way.
And for "To understand all is to forive all" - that's a load. It really doesn't help forgiveness a whit to understand that my father was just a self-centered sadistic <insert f word>.
I tried, and I tried. I kept all lines of communication open - just in case he ever decided to be a father in the supportive sense of the word. And knowing I would feel guilt forever if he died and I had cut him off. (That's a me thing.)
I even had a few too many a couple of times and *told* him how lousy and mean he was. A total waste of breath and good scotch.
It never changed. And he's dead now and it won't change.
I came to realize after those weeks of listing things that all *I* really can do is try to not let it affect me forever, and to not pass it on to the next generation. That's the only thing in my power.
And, for me at least, that means getting hot-blooded screaming ranting p*ss*ed off about it. Because I didn't do anything to deserve that treatment and I have a right to be hot-blooded screaming ranting p*ss*ed off.
And *nobody* can take that away from me.
poster:AuntieMel
thread:623482
URL: http://www.dr-bob.org/babble/psycho/20060312/msgs/623626.html