Today in my little Episcopal church, which I now love, we talked about the blind man whom Jesus healed. We also sang “Amazing Grace” – “I once was blind but now I see…” And for once, I didn’t have flashbacks to the cult. It was amazing.
The thing about flashbacks is you’re “flashing back” to a time of traumatic experience. It’s as though the mind is trying to bring light to a horrific situation by reliving it. But in reality, flashbacks, as anyone who’s had one can tell you, only terrify. They retraumatize the survivor. That’s why it’s so tricky to write about violence and abuse.
The point in writing about trauma is to bring light into the darkness, not to overwhelm the reader….or the writer. Sometimes, when I talk about my book, I find myself once again consumed by the trauma I experienced. I find myself remembering painful things that pull at me like a surging undertow. In order to maintain my balance and see clearly, I need something greater than myself to hold onto.
It’s hard to survive reality on your own. I’ve found I need the spiritual support of a Higher Power. Because to God, “darkness and light are both the same” and Jesus is the one who made the blind see. When I “flash back” into the darkness, I now take the light of the Spirit with me like a great lantern. That way, I am no longer blind. I see reality for what it was and is and I can thrive.
Showing posts with label physical abuse. Show all posts
Showing posts with label physical abuse. Show all posts
Sunday, March 2, 2008
Friday, February 22, 2008
Victim Mentality Freedom
VMP. I just learned a new acronym. I always love learning new acronyms. This one sounds like a venereal disease. Actually, it stands for “Victim Mentality Propaganda.”
Now, what’s interesting about this “condition” is that it connects the word “mentality” with “propaganda.” Of course, there are people who are perpetual victims, who blame the world for their problems and take no responsibility for their lives themselves.
But those who WERE victims and have moved beyond it, have a story to tell. That is not propaganda – that is the survivor’s story, the cautionary tale. That is what my memoir is.
Unfortunately VMP comes precariously close to “BVM” or “Blaming the Victim Mentality.” This acronym (I just made it up) came in response to a book called "Blaming the Victim" about women (primarily) who have experienced sexual abuse or domestic violence. It answers the question of “Why didn’t she just leave? No one was putting a gun to her head.” In some cases, there was a gun. In some cases, just the threat of a gun was enough.
I can recall many times in my cult when I was threatened with death, destruction or maiming if I were to leave. I was convinced the devil would take me if I left and yes, I took it very seriously. I was under the thrall of mind control.
It takes a great deal of courage (if not desperation) to finally leave any abusive situation. But psychological or spiritual abuse is the most challenging precisely because there IS no gun. One can argue that “it’s all in your head,” like the “gaslight effect.” (If you’ve never seen the movie “Gaslight,” I highly recommend it.) But that is the essence of mind control – that you think it is all in your mind when it is not. There are outside forces at work.
Healing is a process from victim to survivor to thriver. As a victim, I was stuck in my abusive situation. As a survivor, I excaped. As a thriver, I now live and share what I have learned through VMP -Victim Mentality Freedom. But I am ever mindful of those victims who are still caught in their desctructive webs of abuse and are trying to break free. I pray that my story (not propaganda) may assist them in some small way.
Now, what’s interesting about this “condition” is that it connects the word “mentality” with “propaganda.” Of course, there are people who are perpetual victims, who blame the world for their problems and take no responsibility for their lives themselves.
But those who WERE victims and have moved beyond it, have a story to tell. That is not propaganda – that is the survivor’s story, the cautionary tale. That is what my memoir is.
Unfortunately VMP comes precariously close to “BVM” or “Blaming the Victim Mentality.” This acronym (I just made it up) came in response to a book called "Blaming the Victim" about women (primarily) who have experienced sexual abuse or domestic violence. It answers the question of “Why didn’t she just leave? No one was putting a gun to her head.” In some cases, there was a gun. In some cases, just the threat of a gun was enough.
I can recall many times in my cult when I was threatened with death, destruction or maiming if I were to leave. I was convinced the devil would take me if I left and yes, I took it very seriously. I was under the thrall of mind control.
It takes a great deal of courage (if not desperation) to finally leave any abusive situation. But psychological or spiritual abuse is the most challenging precisely because there IS no gun. One can argue that “it’s all in your head,” like the “gaslight effect.” (If you’ve never seen the movie “Gaslight,” I highly recommend it.) But that is the essence of mind control – that you think it is all in your mind when it is not. There are outside forces at work.
Healing is a process from victim to survivor to thriver. As a victim, I was stuck in my abusive situation. As a survivor, I excaped. As a thriver, I now live and share what I have learned through VMP -Victim Mentality Freedom. But I am ever mindful of those victims who are still caught in their desctructive webs of abuse and are trying to break free. I pray that my story (not propaganda) may assist them in some small way.
Tuesday, January 15, 2008
My First Existential Crisis
I had my first existential crisis when I was eleven. I was looking out my window into the vast starlit sky, and for the first time in my life, I felt my breathtaking insignificance. I was alone, utterly alone in an indifferent universe and so I started to cry. I mean cry. Sob. Howl.
I knew I was making a scene but I cried, hoping that someone in my family would hear and come to my rescue. But my mother was working at her desk in her office and had barely looked up to grunt “good night” to me when I went off to bed. And my father, as usual, was drunk in the basement watching repeats of “All in the Family.”
I watched the hands on the dial of my electric clock click from 9:00 to 9:15 to 9:30. Finally, the door burst open. The silhouette of my mother loomed above me.
“What on earth are you crying about?” She snapped. The annoyance in her voice made me cringe with shame.
“I’m all alone.“ I sobbed.
“ All alone? What are you talking about?”
“I’m all alone in the universe,” I repeated. “There’s no one there. Infinite just keeps going on forever and ever and there’s no one there.”
“Don’t be ridiculous. You’re not alone. We’re right here. Now go to sleep and stop making a fuss.” She closed the door and quickly padded down the hall to her office in her bedroom slippers.
A few years later, I found my way into a fundamentalist cult which promised to hold the answers to 95% of your questions about life and God or your money back. At fourteen, I had found what I was looking for. It wasn’t until I was twenty-nine when I left the group, battered physically, sexually, and psychologically that I renounced any belief in God or answers. And once again, I was alone.
It’s been over twenty years since I left the cult and I still don’t know even 5% of the answers about life and God. When I first left The Way, I remember lying on the ground one summer night, looking up at the sky. Tears streamed down my cheeks as I wondered once again if Anyone was out there. Again, I felt totally alone. My fists clutched at clumps of dirt giving me the only solid thing I could hold onto - earth.
Then something happened. A falling star made it’s way across the sky like a delicate silver thread. I realized at that moment that I was not alone. I was part of something wonderful, something beautiful, something bigger than myself. I was part of a Mystery. Sometimes I call it "God" for lack of a better word. "God" to me is just shorthand for this Mystery. Sometimes I call it the "Universe" but mostly I don’t know what to call it. Mostly I just call it "the Mystery." It's comforting to have a name for it even if I don't know what "It" is.
I knew I was making a scene but I cried, hoping that someone in my family would hear and come to my rescue. But my mother was working at her desk in her office and had barely looked up to grunt “good night” to me when I went off to bed. And my father, as usual, was drunk in the basement watching repeats of “All in the Family.”
I watched the hands on the dial of my electric clock click from 9:00 to 9:15 to 9:30. Finally, the door burst open. The silhouette of my mother loomed above me.
“What on earth are you crying about?” She snapped. The annoyance in her voice made me cringe with shame.
“I’m all alone.“ I sobbed.
“ All alone? What are you talking about?”
“I’m all alone in the universe,” I repeated. “There’s no one there. Infinite just keeps going on forever and ever and there’s no one there.”
“Don’t be ridiculous. You’re not alone. We’re right here. Now go to sleep and stop making a fuss.” She closed the door and quickly padded down the hall to her office in her bedroom slippers.
A few years later, I found my way into a fundamentalist cult which promised to hold the answers to 95% of your questions about life and God or your money back. At fourteen, I had found what I was looking for. It wasn’t until I was twenty-nine when I left the group, battered physically, sexually, and psychologically that I renounced any belief in God or answers. And once again, I was alone.
It’s been over twenty years since I left the cult and I still don’t know even 5% of the answers about life and God. When I first left The Way, I remember lying on the ground one summer night, looking up at the sky. Tears streamed down my cheeks as I wondered once again if Anyone was out there. Again, I felt totally alone. My fists clutched at clumps of dirt giving me the only solid thing I could hold onto - earth.
Then something happened. A falling star made it’s way across the sky like a delicate silver thread. I realized at that moment that I was not alone. I was part of something wonderful, something beautiful, something bigger than myself. I was part of a Mystery. Sometimes I call it "God" for lack of a better word. "God" to me is just shorthand for this Mystery. Sometimes I call it the "Universe" but mostly I don’t know what to call it. Mostly I just call it "the Mystery." It's comforting to have a name for it even if I don't know what "It" is.
Monday, January 7, 2008
Why Don't You Just Get Over It?
“It’s been twenty years, why don’t you just get over it? Stop dwelling on the past. Get on with your life.”
These are common sentiments of people who do not understand trauma. They are also common expressions used by perpetrators of the abuse. These words minimize the impact of trauma.
Trauma is a subjective thing. Why two soldiers go to war and witness the same atrocity and one comes back psychologically unscathed and the other riddled with PTSD, no one knows. But we do know that once a person has been traumatized, it is not just something they “get over,” as though it were a common cold.
Researchers have discovered that trauma is experienced first in most primitive part of the brain, called the amgdala. That is our “monkey brain” at the core of the cerebral cortex. It is the non-verbal part of the brain. Terror is experienced but unprocessed.
This is where therapy and support groups come in. Why do support groups for victims of rape, domestic violence and war have such power? Because in these safe places, people are allowed to verbalize the horror of what they experienced. In other words, the trauma is expressed but not relived. The power of expression is that the speaker now has control over what before was out of his/her control.
The point is not to relive the trauma but to excise the pain of the past abuse through expression. That is why I have written my book. For me, it was a very painful but healing, if not cathartic, process.
Through the process of writing, I came to understand what I had not understood before. I came to accept responsibility for choices I had made. And I came to forgive myself for things I believed were my fault but were not – such as the abuse.
Expression is an extremely powerful tool in healing from trauma. Judith Herman, in her book Trauma and Recovery speaks of “bearing witness” to the pain one has experienced. We all know about witnessing. We know about telling the story of the death and resurrection of our Lord.
My story is a witness to the death and resurrection I have experienced - both to the trauma I suffered at the hands of “believers” and to the power of understanding ears and hearts to heal. That’s how I have moved on. (And I have moved on.) But I couldn’t have done it alone.
These are common sentiments of people who do not understand trauma. They are also common expressions used by perpetrators of the abuse. These words minimize the impact of trauma.
Trauma is a subjective thing. Why two soldiers go to war and witness the same atrocity and one comes back psychologically unscathed and the other riddled with PTSD, no one knows. But we do know that once a person has been traumatized, it is not just something they “get over,” as though it were a common cold.
Researchers have discovered that trauma is experienced first in most primitive part of the brain, called the amgdala. That is our “monkey brain” at the core of the cerebral cortex. It is the non-verbal part of the brain. Terror is experienced but unprocessed.
This is where therapy and support groups come in. Why do support groups for victims of rape, domestic violence and war have such power? Because in these safe places, people are allowed to verbalize the horror of what they experienced. In other words, the trauma is expressed but not relived. The power of expression is that the speaker now has control over what before was out of his/her control.
The point is not to relive the trauma but to excise the pain of the past abuse through expression. That is why I have written my book. For me, it was a very painful but healing, if not cathartic, process.
Through the process of writing, I came to understand what I had not understood before. I came to accept responsibility for choices I had made. And I came to forgive myself for things I believed were my fault but were not – such as the abuse.
Expression is an extremely powerful tool in healing from trauma. Judith Herman, in her book Trauma and Recovery speaks of “bearing witness” to the pain one has experienced. We all know about witnessing. We know about telling the story of the death and resurrection of our Lord.
My story is a witness to the death and resurrection I have experienced - both to the trauma I suffered at the hands of “believers” and to the power of understanding ears and hearts to heal. That’s how I have moved on. (And I have moved on.) But I couldn’t have done it alone.
Sunday, December 2, 2007
A Christmas Story (an excerpt from "Losing the Way")
My husband and I have just arrived at the babysitter’s to drop off our one-and-a-half year old son. It is an early December morning and we still are fighting from the day before. We are going to “talk” and “start over.” We are always “starting over.” But talks escalate to shouts, and shouts to blows then blows to defeat. I was finally too tired to talk anymore. I had given up.
As soon as my husband is inside, I open the car door and start walking. I am so tired, I don’t care where I go. I walk to a playground nearby and the ground under the hollow playhouse seems so soft, maybe I could just lie down and go to sleep forever, out here in the cold and I wish it would snow but it never snows in Portland, only rains. Then I remember I have a baby growing inside of me and it’s okay for me to die but she deserves to be born so if I could just call somebody, get to the nearest phone and call somebody, anybody and then I start to cry – the uncontrollable kind of crying that just sweeps over you like an avalanche and you don’t care how you look or who sees you. You just stumble along like a pregnant corpse, sobbing.
I come to a main road. I’ve seen depressed people walking around one week before Christmas, just like I was doing. Their faces look as cold and lifeless as empty storefronts. Their eyes are frozen and they have forgotten to comb their hair.
There is a 7-11 with a pay phone on the corner. I thumb through the phone book with my stiff, red fingers. “Abused Women’s Hotline: Battered Woman’s Shelter.” All I see is the word “shelter.”
I call four different numbers, leave messages. I pace back and forth, waiting for someone to answer. My fingers feel numb. I try to keep my ski parka closed but my belly is too fat to zip it up. Finally someone calls me back. Was I alone, they ask. Did I have any money, any clothes, a car? I’ll have to take a bus to the other side of town and someone will meet me on a street corner but they couldn’t tell me where the shelter is for the safety of the women. And I’d be living in a room with seven or eight women and children. By the way, can you get your son? Is he in any danger? They’ll sign me up for Public Assistance after I get a legal separation from my husband so I can get on Medicare in time to have my baby. How soon can I get there?
I never did get to the shelter. It was too intimidating for me to take the first step. But my doctor was shrewd enough to have me admitted early into the hospital to rest and get help. In the hospital, I received counseling and found the strength to leave my husband and the cult. Other women can free themselves of abusive relationships if they are tired enough to let go and open enough to ask for help. Sometimes letting go is the only way to hold on.
As soon as my husband is inside, I open the car door and start walking. I am so tired, I don’t care where I go. I walk to a playground nearby and the ground under the hollow playhouse seems so soft, maybe I could just lie down and go to sleep forever, out here in the cold and I wish it would snow but it never snows in Portland, only rains. Then I remember I have a baby growing inside of me and it’s okay for me to die but she deserves to be born so if I could just call somebody, get to the nearest phone and call somebody, anybody and then I start to cry – the uncontrollable kind of crying that just sweeps over you like an avalanche and you don’t care how you look or who sees you. You just stumble along like a pregnant corpse, sobbing.
I come to a main road. I’ve seen depressed people walking around one week before Christmas, just like I was doing. Their faces look as cold and lifeless as empty storefronts. Their eyes are frozen and they have forgotten to comb their hair.
There is a 7-11 with a pay phone on the corner. I thumb through the phone book with my stiff, red fingers. “Abused Women’s Hotline: Battered Woman’s Shelter.” All I see is the word “shelter.”
I call four different numbers, leave messages. I pace back and forth, waiting for someone to answer. My fingers feel numb. I try to keep my ski parka closed but my belly is too fat to zip it up. Finally someone calls me back. Was I alone, they ask. Did I have any money, any clothes, a car? I’ll have to take a bus to the other side of town and someone will meet me on a street corner but they couldn’t tell me where the shelter is for the safety of the women. And I’d be living in a room with seven or eight women and children. By the way, can you get your son? Is he in any danger? They’ll sign me up for Public Assistance after I get a legal separation from my husband so I can get on Medicare in time to have my baby. How soon can I get there?
I never did get to the shelter. It was too intimidating for me to take the first step. But my doctor was shrewd enough to have me admitted early into the hospital to rest and get help. In the hospital, I received counseling and found the strength to leave my husband and the cult. Other women can free themselves of abusive relationships if they are tired enough to let go and open enough to ask for help. Sometimes letting go is the only way to hold on.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)