Month: April 2012

VICTIMS or NOT? (Part 1)

dmtorbi 12-step, ACoAs, al-anon, Alcoholics Anonymous, alcoholism, coaching, mental health, Problem-Solving, Psychotherapy, recovery, self growth, self-help , , , , , ,

HOW BAD WAS IT?
It’s hard for me to know!

PREVIOUS: Victims or Not?

REVIEW: “Feeling Sorry For….”

See ACRONYM Page for abbrev.

VICTIMs or NOT?  (V = victim , P = Perpetrator / abuser)
Victims can be of any age or gender & from any socio-economic level. While standards differ by culture, it occurs in every country. Because being a V. is often created at an early age, being abused (learned helplessness) is passed from generation to generation like a family disease, called the “inter-generational cycle”.

Victim’s reaction to abuse is great confusion. 
“Do I have a right to say, or even think, that what’s happening is really Abuse? I doubt it. After all, sometimes the other person is nice to me & fun to be with, says they can’t live without me, & tells me they’re sorry. And their actions aren’t always obvious to others, so I may just be making it all up!  Is feeling overwhelmed (self-doubting, drained, fearful, angry, frustrated, hopeless …) about what they are doing, or am I just over-reacting?”

ACoAs often get things backward: (S-H vs Truth)
OLD/NEWThe distorted logic of our self-hate says :
1. it wasn’t all that bad (although some part of us know it was)
2. they DID love us / they did the best they could
3. we were NOT really Victims – just annoying, needy, selfish, weak, bad, flawed kids – & will be forever!

Actually, sanity tells us the truth
✺ We did go thru a terribly painful, chaotic childhood – very real Victims of our home, neighborhood, school, religion, & playground.  We had no choice & very few options at the time. We were Vs then, BUT don’t have to be Vs any more.

YET, as long as we hold on to the S-H lies as our main internal reality, we’re stuck & can’t fully heal. Before Recovery – & sometimes long into it – ACoAs’ reaction to early trauma is either Perpetual Victim or Stoic.

a. Perpetual Victim:  Many ACoAs are still actively living in the old destructive patterns set out for us, & refuse to give up the V. role.
Their attitude is: “I was then & am forever a casualty of my family / school / church…..  I just can’t cope with life, so you can’t expect me to function. I can’t do anything differently now because I’m so debilitated by those experiences. Someone has to take care of me”….
We stay “sick” to stay loyal to our Parents, so we don’t have to:
• do the lifelong hard work of healing our wounds (feel the old pain, change CDs)
• fully take care of ourself as healthy adults, especially if we had to do that for a parent & siblings when we were kids. “Been there – done that”

The is one of many ACoA ironies:
🔶 we cling to deep denial – the abuse & neglect didn’t affect us!
BUT
🔷 we won’t try to heal & be comfortable because we’d lose the proof of what did happened to us back then! “If I get better, no one will ever know how bad it was, & I want everyone to see it & feel sorry for me!”.

This partially comes from a sad reality that most people in our culture assume that if someone ‘looks good / does well’ it means that :
the person is healthy, always had it easy, must have come from a good home, don’t have any problems & never needed to overcome anything.

So, ACoAs who desperately long for external validation for our trauma – from everyone – believe we can only get it if we stay miserable.
This keeps us torturing ourselves unnecessarily – a great shame. We DO need validation, from a few legitimate sources, but then it has to be internalized, so we always “know what I know” in any setting. (re. ACEs – w/ Tree)

re. Self-Pity – from John W. Garner (HEW Sec.)
“Self-pity is easily the most destructive of the non-pharmaceutical narcotics. It’s addictive, gives momentary pleasure, & separates the victim from reality.” For ACoAs – IT’S:
NEGATIVE: being perpetually immersed in the “poor-me’s”
POSITIVE: having deep compassion for ourself – not wallowing. (POSTs “Feeling Sorry for“).
We do have to mourn the loss of all the needs we never got met – a crucial part of Recovery, & the beginning of Transformation. (More…. re. image)

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NEXT: Victim or NOT (Stoic)  #2

Considering Abuse

dmtorbi 12-step, ACoAs, al-anon, Alcoholics Anonymous, alcoholism, coaching, mental health, Problem-Solving, Psychotherapy, recovery, self growth, self-help , , , , , ,

I’M SO UNHAPPY BEING WITH THEM
but it must be my fault!

PREVIOUS: Principles of    Character

SITE: re. Categories of abuse

NOTE: This series will have many lists of abusive behaviors, in many categories, & from different perspectives, so there will be a lot of over-lap in headings & examples. This is deliberate. As kids we HAD to ignore, trivialize or forget what was done to us, & then act out those self-destructive patterns in our adult life.

We must identify exactly what happened before we can change it, & repetition is useful in breaking thru our denial. Also, reading or hearing something in different wording & context can more easily get past our defenses. The main (but not exclusive) focus of these posts is on Emotional Abuse.

DEF : Abuse – are all the painful things done to us & around us as kids, & comes in each of 4 PMES categories,
and Neglect – are all the good things we didn’t get, growing up

ABUSE : In general, it’s any communication or behavior designed to control & enslave someone. In alcoholic & narcissistic families it was to keep us ‘in our place’, to prevent us from leaving home, to punish us for not being who or what the Perpetrators expected, or wanted!
It is & was done by causing continual fear, humiliation, intimidation, guilt, coercion & manipulation.

Its any form of intrusion into another’s psyche, including :
• a desire to to denigrate, to ignore, to causes pain
• financial, intellectual or spiritual tactics, ranging from mild to lethal
• ignoring or making fun of another’s basic needs & interests
• verbal, physical, sexual &/or emotional attacks
• not respecting privacy, being brutally honest with a sadistic sense of humor, consistently tactless, expect too much

⚙︎ Most people automatically assume ‘abuse’ only refers to physical harm – yelling, hitting, beating, broken bones …. so will firmly state: “I was never abused growing up”. However, because human beings are made up of 4 interlocking categories (PMES = Physical, Mental, Emotional, Spiritual) we can be wounded OR encouraged in many ways at each level.

Being abused can happen just once with someone, or when subjected to a bully for a short time. But usually it’s a long-term pattern of behavior by a severely damaged, cruel, angry &/or mentally ill person who uses their position (as parent, boss, teacher, mate, older sibling or friend, community leader…. ) to:
▷ intimidate others who have less personal or social power, OR
▷ take advantage of those who by nature or training are more accommodating, compliant & sensitive

While most people on occasion act unkindly, even cruelly, when provoked or under great stress, what we’re looking at here is ongoing attitudes & actions that tear us down, body & soul. Even when they seem intermittent, over time they wear at us !
Therefore ACoAs can honestly say that we were severely & regularly abused by our damaged parents (& other authority figures) , especially re. emotions (Es). Genuine Es are NOT widely recognized, valued or encouraged in our society, much less in dysfunctional families. So we ended up ignoring or minimizing them in ourself, as well as in others, especially if we didn’t get physically or sexually attacked as kids.

Most of us never felt loved but blamed ourself for the lack. Regardless of what our parents said or how they felt about us in their own mind & heart – their distorted way of treating us was not an expression of healthy Love.
So to compensate – as adults – we look for it everywhere we go, & from everyone we deal with.
This can make us vulnerable to a subtle form of abuse – being ‘over-loved’, needed & depended on too much, OR being over-protected & infantilized, OR controlled & used.

These are actually ways to treat us as an extension of the person who claims to love us, as an object rather than a separate being, or a means of their personal gratification. It’s never about what the way the ‘beloved’ really needs or wants.
BTW,
LOVE is the emotion with the highest energy vibration. IT:
🔅feels good, because it’s the absence of fear
🔅is an action, not just a feeling, so requires attention
🔅is unconditional, understands & accepts differences
🔅has empathy, no room for jealousy, has wants but is not needy
🔅means putting other people’s needs equal to, or before our own
🔅varies in how it’s expressed & accepted, which can include letting go, so doesn’t demand continuing a relationship that no longer works.

NEXT: Victims or not?