I have a friend who tells the story about shopping with her mother when she was a young girl.
Her mother was walking a few yards ahead of her and as Jenny entered Dayton’s Department Store a woman was walking out. She looked down at Jenny and said, “Honey, don’t look so sad, it can’t be all that bad.”
Jenny wanted to scream “IT IS ALL THAT BAD!”
Her mother was sexually abusing her and Jenny didn’t know how to make it stop.
When ever an adult gave me a big smile when I was little, I said to myself, when I get big, I’m going to smile just like that. It gave me a little hope that my life would get better when I got big.
A smile will do a lot more for a child that is being abused than to tell her, “It can’t be all that bad.”
Saturday, June 12, 2010
Friday, June 11, 2010
My Quality Life
This is a portion of a speech I gave not too long ago.
I want children who are afraid to go home to receive the same help and attention that Christian Charities have given to poor families around the world, what animal activists have accomplished in preventing cruelty to animals. That’s a big goal to achieve and it won’t be reached until the violence that is happening in our homes is brought out into the open, children are rescued and families get help.
I want to see a TV commercial of a bully beating up a smaller classmate and in the next scene we see the bully at home being kicked around the house, picked up and thrown across the room by his dad. The caption at the bottom of the screen reads Stop Violence in our Homes.
Growing up in my violent home, I was fortunate that I repressed some of my bad memories and was able to disappear at times.
I was unfortunate that confusion, distrust and extreme low self-esteem became my reality.
At the age of 45 those repressed memories started to surface. I immediately went into shock called shutdown mode, and had to find help in order to function again.
Middle age is often the time when repressed memories surface? Because…
1. We are farther removed from the time of the abuse.
2. We are in a better place, more in control of our surroundings. Or
3. The abuser has died.
Many of our states are revising their laws for reporting childhood sexual abuse increasing the statue of limitations. Our governments are responding as we move forward and understand better the complexities of the human mind and how repressed memories work.
I was told in therapy if I did the hard work to heal, my life could be of better quality than of someone who was never abused.
And that became my goal.
I worked hard to heal. I went to therapy 2 times a week, every week for 3 ½ years. Group and individual therapies.
I read the book Courage to Heal by Ellen Bass and Laura Davis and listened to the advice that felt like a good fit for me.
I ended a bad marriage.
I faced my fears and allowed the past to come forward.
I confronted my father about the sexual abuse. I told him, “Dad, childhood memories have surfaced about you sexually abusing me. I love you and all I want is for you to say, “I’m sorry" and we’ll be fine.” His response was, “You ungrateful daughter for bringing that up now.”
Our children are being harmed violently and some will repress their bad memories and some will disappear into a fugue state as needed.
Many of the children who are acting out in school showing violent behavior and bullying their classmates are being hurt themselves at home.
Our jails are filled with adults who were tormented by their parents as children.
We have men and women surviving with the aid of alcohol and drugs trying to hide from their childhood memories.
We have Charles Manson and Ted Bundy.
We have wounded adults having babies without a clue how to love or care for them and the violent cycle continues.
There is no cure for growing up in a violent home but there is life changing healing.
At the age of 50 I started seeing me as the person I was meant to be.
I felt proud.
I saw how strong I was to survive my childhood horrors and I see how strong I am today for being able to face those horrors.
I stopped being fearful of people and started welcoming new experiences into my life.
Today, there is no stopping me when I set out to accomplish a goal and I love the challenge.
Last year I was turned down by a literary mentor because she didn’t feel my book was publishable. The day after she said no to working with me I received word that I came in second place in a national writing contest. It was the same story I had sent to the mentor.
Four months later I received a contract from a publishing house to start negotiations.
They wanted to publish my book.
I have confidence in myself and I listen to my voice first when something pertains to me.
When I first moved to MN, 22 years ago, I was deep into my job hunting when I received a phone call after one of my interviews. Mr. Frank said to me, “Do you know what your former boss is saying about you?”
I said, “No, what?”
“He’s saying everything that you touch turns to gold.”
I have to offer the position to the person who is given that referral.
After doing the hard work to heal, I can now do for myself what I did for others.
My life is of gold quality.
The children who are not rescued from their violent homes while they are still young will suffer a lifetime from their abuses.
Some will suffer in jail later in life, others with alcohol or drugs, never finding peace.
And some who are lucky will repress their bad memories, disappear from life, begin healing at middle age and hopefully start living a quality life at 50.
The earlier we rescue our little ones the better chance they have to live a normal, healthy, happy life.
I want children who are afraid to go home to receive the same help and attention that Christian Charities have given to poor families around the world, what animal activists have accomplished in preventing cruelty to animals. That’s a big goal to achieve and it won’t be reached until the violence that is happening in our homes is brought out into the open, children are rescued and families get help.
I want to see a TV commercial of a bully beating up a smaller classmate and in the next scene we see the bully at home being kicked around the house, picked up and thrown across the room by his dad. The caption at the bottom of the screen reads Stop Violence in our Homes.
Growing up in my violent home, I was fortunate that I repressed some of my bad memories and was able to disappear at times.
I was unfortunate that confusion, distrust and extreme low self-esteem became my reality.
At the age of 45 those repressed memories started to surface. I immediately went into shock called shutdown mode, and had to find help in order to function again.
Middle age is often the time when repressed memories surface? Because…
1. We are farther removed from the time of the abuse.
2. We are in a better place, more in control of our surroundings. Or
3. The abuser has died.
Many of our states are revising their laws for reporting childhood sexual abuse increasing the statue of limitations. Our governments are responding as we move forward and understand better the complexities of the human mind and how repressed memories work.
I was told in therapy if I did the hard work to heal, my life could be of better quality than of someone who was never abused.
And that became my goal.
I worked hard to heal. I went to therapy 2 times a week, every week for 3 ½ years. Group and individual therapies.
I read the book Courage to Heal by Ellen Bass and Laura Davis and listened to the advice that felt like a good fit for me.
I ended a bad marriage.
I faced my fears and allowed the past to come forward.
I confronted my father about the sexual abuse. I told him, “Dad, childhood memories have surfaced about you sexually abusing me. I love you and all I want is for you to say, “I’m sorry" and we’ll be fine.” His response was, “You ungrateful daughter for bringing that up now.”
Our children are being harmed violently and some will repress their bad memories and some will disappear into a fugue state as needed.
Many of the children who are acting out in school showing violent behavior and bullying their classmates are being hurt themselves at home.
Our jails are filled with adults who were tormented by their parents as children.
We have men and women surviving with the aid of alcohol and drugs trying to hide from their childhood memories.
We have Charles Manson and Ted Bundy.
We have wounded adults having babies without a clue how to love or care for them and the violent cycle continues.
There is no cure for growing up in a violent home but there is life changing healing.
At the age of 50 I started seeing me as the person I was meant to be.
I felt proud.
I saw how strong I was to survive my childhood horrors and I see how strong I am today for being able to face those horrors.
I stopped being fearful of people and started welcoming new experiences into my life.
Today, there is no stopping me when I set out to accomplish a goal and I love the challenge.
Last year I was turned down by a literary mentor because she didn’t feel my book was publishable. The day after she said no to working with me I received word that I came in second place in a national writing contest. It was the same story I had sent to the mentor.
Four months later I received a contract from a publishing house to start negotiations.
They wanted to publish my book.
I have confidence in myself and I listen to my voice first when something pertains to me.
When I first moved to MN, 22 years ago, I was deep into my job hunting when I received a phone call after one of my interviews. Mr. Frank said to me, “Do you know what your former boss is saying about you?”
I said, “No, what?”
“He’s saying everything that you touch turns to gold.”
I have to offer the position to the person who is given that referral.
After doing the hard work to heal, I can now do for myself what I did for others.
My life is of gold quality.
The children who are not rescued from their violent homes while they are still young will suffer a lifetime from their abuses.
Some will suffer in jail later in life, others with alcohol or drugs, never finding peace.
And some who are lucky will repress their bad memories, disappear from life, begin healing at middle age and hopefully start living a quality life at 50.
The earlier we rescue our little ones the better chance they have to live a normal, healthy, happy life.
Wednesday, June 9, 2010
People of Like Minds Find Each Other
Many years ago I sat in a pew listening to the preacher’s sermon, “People of like minds find each other.” Although I enjoy the story telling part of church, I don’t believe everything I hear. His comment intrigued me. People of like minds finding each other. My parents found each other. They were of like minds. This made sense to me. We don’t hang out with people we feel superior to and we don’t like feeling inferior being with people who have it more together than we do, so we fall into comfortable relationships with people who are just like us.
This can be a good thing if you are at the top of the totem pole. You surround yourself with caring, compassionate mortals who are self confident and do well in life and in relationships. They make good sons and daughters and they are strong, loving supportive parents. They continue to grow in strength by surrounding themselves with people who are just like them.
This can be a bad thing if you are at the bottom of the totem pole and surround yourself with people who think the same as you. Your low self-esteem continues to plummet as you feed each other with negative reinforcements. We fail at taking care of ourselves and haven’t a clue how to support each other. We look for Mr. or Mrs. Right never to be found because we find people just like us instead.
I married many times trying to find my happy marriage. The problem was I married men who were wounded just like me. The only guarantee for our relationship, we will not find love and will constantly let each other down, being a disappointment fortifies our low self-esteem.
I write for those who are living sad, damaged lives, who suffer from depression, rage and low self-esteem. I write for those merely surviving, those who are doing the best they can to live each day. Those wrestling with the question, why?
In the second chapter of my book Fugue (soon to be published), I wrote about my love affair with the ocean. My literary mentor who was helping me prepare that book for publication was adamant that I change the wording. “A six year old does not know about love affairs.” I could not agree with her on that one and kept the wording. I have no memory of not being sexual. Whether or not I understood what I was doing, I was sexual. I was sexual with my father before the memories of my life were formed and I was sexual with his friends. I learned how to lie down with a man as easy as another five year old learns how to tie her shoes which was something else I learned to do at that age.
It was so deeply engrained in me that the reason for my being here was to please men sexually until the repressed memories surfaced and I saw my childhood clearly through adult eyes.
I have empathy for that child who was sexually abused and I feel empathy for the child molester. I loved my father, but he was sick, confused and narcissistic. A person that sexually abuses another whether it’s a child, adult or spouse is mentally ill. My father was five years old when his father died from falling out of a second story bedroom window in the middle of the night. How many people do you know died from falling out of a bedroom window in the middle of the night? It’s easy for me to believe his parents were fighting after his mother found her husband in their son’s bedroom and during the fight he accidentally fell out of the window.
My mother experienced violence in her home with death as the outcome also. She was 13 when her 17-year-old brother died from falling down a flight of stairs. He was fighting with their father throwing punches at each other when he lost his balance and fell to his death.
Both my parents grew up with family secrets, married each other and started their own family secrets. People of like minds finding each other.
This can be a good thing if you are at the top of the totem pole. You surround yourself with caring, compassionate mortals who are self confident and do well in life and in relationships. They make good sons and daughters and they are strong, loving supportive parents. They continue to grow in strength by surrounding themselves with people who are just like them.
This can be a bad thing if you are at the bottom of the totem pole and surround yourself with people who think the same as you. Your low self-esteem continues to plummet as you feed each other with negative reinforcements. We fail at taking care of ourselves and haven’t a clue how to support each other. We look for Mr. or Mrs. Right never to be found because we find people just like us instead.
I married many times trying to find my happy marriage. The problem was I married men who were wounded just like me. The only guarantee for our relationship, we will not find love and will constantly let each other down, being a disappointment fortifies our low self-esteem.
I write for those who are living sad, damaged lives, who suffer from depression, rage and low self-esteem. I write for those merely surviving, those who are doing the best they can to live each day. Those wrestling with the question, why?
In the second chapter of my book Fugue (soon to be published), I wrote about my love affair with the ocean. My literary mentor who was helping me prepare that book for publication was adamant that I change the wording. “A six year old does not know about love affairs.” I could not agree with her on that one and kept the wording. I have no memory of not being sexual. Whether or not I understood what I was doing, I was sexual. I was sexual with my father before the memories of my life were formed and I was sexual with his friends. I learned how to lie down with a man as easy as another five year old learns how to tie her shoes which was something else I learned to do at that age.
It was so deeply engrained in me that the reason for my being here was to please men sexually until the repressed memories surfaced and I saw my childhood clearly through adult eyes.
I have empathy for that child who was sexually abused and I feel empathy for the child molester. I loved my father, but he was sick, confused and narcissistic. A person that sexually abuses another whether it’s a child, adult or spouse is mentally ill. My father was five years old when his father died from falling out of a second story bedroom window in the middle of the night. How many people do you know died from falling out of a bedroom window in the middle of the night? It’s easy for me to believe his parents were fighting after his mother found her husband in their son’s bedroom and during the fight he accidentally fell out of the window.
My mother experienced violence in her home with death as the outcome also. She was 13 when her 17-year-old brother died from falling down a flight of stairs. He was fighting with their father throwing punches at each other when he lost his balance and fell to his death.
Both my parents grew up with family secrets, married each other and started their own family secrets. People of like minds finding each other.
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