Posted by antigua3 on April 1, 2008, at 13:47:45
In reply to Homework, posted by Daisym on March 30, 2008, at 0:30:57
Oh Daisy,
I'm so sorry you are feeling so badly. You know I've been there, and am still there, so please know I'm sending good thoughts your way.Telling my mother was harder than the anticipation and not knowing how she would react. If you're thinking of telling her be sure to work through the whole range of reactions you might expect, and then fortify yourself tenfold to be sure that you can withstand whatever happens. I'm not saying she may take it badly, or not in the way you want her to (do they ever really?), but that you have to protect yourself as best you can.
It has been a year since I told my mother. It's not exactly a topic of conversation, but it kind of floats around the edges and imbues our everyday talk with a sort of "uh, oh, we keep ending up in this very dangerous area." it's like the harder you try not to talk about something, or see somebody, you see them at every corner. You can't escape once the cat is out of the bag, and you need to be prepared to live with it, however it goes.
My mother doesn't choose to talk about it and has never asked me any details. I'm fine with that. i don't feel the need to punish her so much anymore. I just didn't want to hold the secret from her anymore--the cost to me was way too high.
I went to see her earlier this year and I told her that I forgive her. She didn't ask for the forgiveness, but we were having a conversation that ended up on the topic and I just told her that she had given me many wonderful things in life--my life for that matter--and that I chose to not go there with her. But the funny thing is that now she tells me things that help fit the pieces together. She told me the other day that when I turned two, I became a worrier and had desperate fears about the world. She doesn't know how valuable that info was to me, because exactly at aged two--my birthday in fact--her father molested me when my brother and I were sent to live with our grandparents for two months while my mother waited for my younger brother to be born.
Bingo Mom. I was afraid, terribly afraid. And my grandmother caught my grandfather and never told my mother. My mother was busy with a new baby, and I was pushed from the nest, and she had five children now. I didn't have the capacity to tell at that age; all I really needed was the love and comfort from my mother, but she was otherwise occupied. I think that's why when my father started abusing me I just thought there was too much at risk to tell her. She seemed so fragile, but at the same time I felt shamed because I was taking my father away from her (twisted, I know).
I could write about this for hours; there are so many different aspects to it. Was my mother abused? I think so; she exhibits all the signs/feelings,adulation about her own father that I did about mine until memories started to come forth. I've never discussed it w/her, and I never will, unless she brings it up. If she was abused, she chose the course of closing her eyes to what was going on around her by being so self-absorbed.
I'm glad I told her. I feel closer to her now, and as I said, our conversations often yield bits of information that help with healing. I'm lucky in some ways that my parents divorced and my mother to this day will never, ever say a nice word about my father. She still hates him with a passion for all the terrible things he did to her and us.
All that said, my mother probably would take me on her lap if I asked (sounds kind of ridiculous, doesn't it?), but instead, I choose to consciously comfort my littlest girl myself when things get really tough and I feel angry, hurt, upset or shamed by what happened. I comfort her in the way I wanted to be comforted and it's the best I can do, and it helps.
My father is dead, and I do think that makes it easier somehow.
All my best,
Antigua
poster:antigua3
thread:820633
URL: http://www.dr-bob.org/babble/psycho/20080321/msgs/821015.html