TW from here on.
I've wrestled with whether I wanted to write here about my background; what I'm healing from. I think I've realized that I need to talk about the abuse I went thru.
Part of my concern is that some readers may find it too much. Another concern is that some may feel invalidated. It's shocking, yes, but your stories are no less. And, I'm a little worried that some of you will think it's a product of my imagination. I've been accused of that before, as many of us have. In my head I know better than to suspect that of anyone here, but my heart still is wary.
The rest of my journal will contain details but I'll try not to be too graphic. The subject matter may contain (highlight for detail)extreme violence, including childhood sexual, physical, and emotional abuse and neglect; rape; and an event I can only describe here as attempted sex trafficking.
So here goes.
I was the second born child to a couple who lived the realities of WWII. My M was married before to her school sweetheart who came home profoundly changed by war. He went out drinking, and would come home and hit her. She grew tired of this treatment and, at their last encounter, defended herself to the point of bloodying him and escaped to her mom and step dad. He tracked her down but her stepfather, himself a large man and decorated WWI hero, protected her and told him to leave and never come back. A few years later she married my father, another man who was never the same after his service to his country.
I'll stop here for a page break.
sending you a warm hug filled with courage and love. :hug: i'm listening and i don't doubt you for a moment.
I understand your concern. I don't feel invalidated at all. Trauma is not a competition. It is all hurtful and significant to the person. I never compare my story to other's and I too have held back some, not to the extent you have. However, knowing a little more, I feel solidarity.
Talk...get it out, do what you need to do to relieve the burden. It's like being unable to breathe and hauling a bolder around with you every where you go. Unload!
My F had been in the Navy in WWII. His ship was bombed and he was thrown into a steel bulkhead in the explosion. There was a heap of life jackets there that wasn't usually there; if it weren't for those, he may have died in the concussion as they softened his impact with the bulkhead. He eventually lost his hearing as a result of this.
He told us war stories about his experiences and other events; and now that I'm an adult I can plainly see that he must have had PTSD and almost certainly a traumatic brain injury from that explosion.
My sibling was born four and a half years before me. Mom wanted babies desperately but had a couple of miscarriages, one before my brother. She injured herself during the pregnancy with my sibling, and was given medication for pain. This, coupled with a difficult breech delivery, was what she thought caused the differences in him. He was slow to develop, slow to learn, quick to lose his temper. He looked different than other babies, through the eyes - maybe a little impish. She adored him immediately.
When I came along, a nurse came out to the waiting room and announced to my F that he had a daughter. He told her that he hadn't wanted a girl, and that the nurse should put me back. I heard this story all during my childhood; he found the nurse's disgusted reaction hysterically funny.
And now, looking back, I can see that he was making a joke to try to handle his intense emotions and how pleased he was. But little girls don't know about that stuff, and so I always felt he thought that I should have been another boy. Maybe, a son that wasn't...different.
I'll stop here for now.
i hear you, 3roses. when i was born, they used a forceps to pull me out of my mother. a part of it cut the corner of my eye - i still have the scar. while i was growing up, i heard over and over that i was the ugliest baby my dad had ever seen. yes indeed, a little girl doesn't do anything with those 'jokes' except take them to her heart. i spent a lifetime trying to feel beautiful, and tho there were many men, only one knew how to actually accomplish that. i am forever grateful to him.
i admire your courage, 3roses, for bringing this out into the light. i certainly hope it helps you. your own pace, your own space. no judgment. only love and care. you're not alone, sweetie.
Just want to say I'm listening Three Roses. :hug: I believe you.
Three Roses, it's so good to see you trusting yourself enough to open up.
I'm here too.
:hug:
Lingurine
Me too, I'm reading. And I believe you. :hug: :hug:
I understand the fear of not being believed, because I have it too. But nonetheless I think to myself "Why wouldn't any of this that Three Roses is writing be believable? You're not writing that you were kidnapped by Martians after all.
And those 'jokes' putting down their little daughters to cover their own emotions... Heard them too. I feel for you.
I'm glad you're getting this down on 'paper' and partially out of your system at any rate.
Just want to say that I think it is a brave thing you are doing by writing your experiences down. I hope that sharing your story, or parts of it, will help you towards better days.
Quote from: Dee on October 01, 2017, 11:29:29 PM
I understand your concern. I don't feel invalidated at all. Trauma is not a competition. It is all hurtful and significant to the person. I never compare my story to other's and I too have held back some, not to the extent you have. However, knowing a little more, I feel solidarity.
Talk...get it out, do what you need to do to relieve the burden. It's like being unable to breathe and hauling a bolder around with you every where you go. Unload!
Wise words from you, Dee! Thank you.
Three Roses, I am proud of you for starting to write some of your experiences down. I understand you concern to invalidate people, because I too have had that struggle. Actually have watched it happen. This forum is a safe place though, and your story deserves to be told. I will be here to listen, and reassure you that I believe you. Warm, safe hugs if you want them :hug: there are some for little three roses too if she needs them after all of that
My brother never liked me. He was four and a half when I was born, and very attached to his mom. To this day, I have a hard time calling him brother. He is nothing like the definition of a brother. Even the word "brother" is a trigger for me now. I think of him as my sibling, my mother's other child.
I don't know how much detail to give, I don't want to trigger anyone, but part of me really wants to talk about all the details of all the things that he did to me. The physical abuse. The rejection. Later, the sexual abuse. The rape attempt. The attempt to trade me in a human trafficking kind of way. But I suppose that's enough detail for you to understand.
And perversely, there were good times, too. We laughed, we shared jokes, like siblings do. But underneath there was always a current of... Something, something that my little mind didn't have a word for but my adult mind knows is jealousy, bitterness, resentment. That ran very, very deep in him.
And, his rage was not only directed at me. He had many run-ins with other children and some adults. We were born in the 1950s, and I don't know what the thinking was back then, but my parents never attempted to obtain a diagnosis for him, to my knowledge.
And so this little female baby was born into a family that already had more than its share of problems. A father with a traumatic brain injury and PTSD. A mother who been physically abused by her first husband and probably carried the emotional scars of that into her current marriage, coupled with the pain of two miscarriages. An older sibling with enough of his own challenges, but then who also had to deal with our dad who would lose his temper at literally the drop of a hat.
I wish I could reach out and comfort little you. Being born into that left you no real chance for a normal upbringing. I am sitting here with you for whatever you need. As far as detail, go into whatever you need to Three Roses. Goodness knows several of us have put some detail into our journals. It is a safe place to put a certain extent of details, as it is your journal. Trigger warning of course, but you know that.
Warm, safe hugs if you want them. Sitting with you always if you need someone :hug:
I am seeing more and more clearly now in just what ways I'm different than people who've never been abused.
My reactions can be sudden, intense, and I blurt things out without thinking how they'll sound - almost like someone else is saying it but using my voice. These days I think it really has been someone else.
I worry obsessively all the time if I've hurt people, I go back and forth from not ever saying anything of any substance to telling myself I need to be honest, and I wind up offending someone without wanting or meaning to.
I'm so tired of this b.s. :fallingbricks:
TW
I was going thru some photos and came across a picture of my dad. He is grinning ear to ear, looking back at the camera over his left shoulder. He and mom were on a cruise and it looks like he is dancing to a marimba or steel drum band. I can't remember another time when I've seen him look so carefree. He would have been in his sixties, I think - around the same age I am now.
And when I looked at him, I didn't think "This is my father"; I didn't think he looked like he was happy; I didn't feel anger, or sadness; I didn't call him a name in my head. The only thing I thought was, This is a man who beats children, this is a grown man who would punch a child in the face. His own daughter.
And for the first time ever, I think, I caught a brief glimpse of just how seriously * up that is. I stared at that picture for a while, and just let the realness, the truth of what I was feeling spread all through me; like little drops of dye in a glass of water, swirling around until everything is blended and changed.
It can be both terrible and relieving when you come to see your parent(s) in that way... realistically, without their pressure or distorted views to influence your own.
QuoteMy reactions can be sudden, intense, and I blurt things out without thinking how they'll sound - almost like someone else is saying it but using my voice. These days I think it really has been someone else.
I worry obsessively all the time if I've hurt people, I go back and forth from not ever saying anything of any substance to telling myself I need to be honest, and I wind up offending someone without wanting or meaning to.
I really understand you there. Feel the same so much.
Have this if it helps: :hug:
*TW*
1/3
I've been going back and forth about how much I want to share, and the least triggery way to say it.
I used to think most of the damage came from my F. Thanks to recovering more memories, I now remember that I was in 4th grade before I met a grown up who was gentle and understanding to me. I had so much violence in my little life that I had a few rough edges. I fought on the playground at recess and was a weird little tomboy who didn't fit in anywhere. Needless to say, I felt quite alone and friendless.
F would literally flip out at the drop of a hat. He once backhanded me at lunch, knocking my spoon out of my hand and sending soup flying. I burst into tears and when my mom confronted him about it, he said, "She was blowing on her soup." She said, "She's just been to the dentist!" (I was trying to be careful not to burn my still-numb mouth on the hot soup.) All F said was, "Oh."
Punching me in the mouth, grabbing me by my arm, handling me roughly, wrestling me to the ground, sitting in the middle of my back and choking me - these things and more. The constant verbal battery, name calling, derision.
(Continued)
2/3
M would tell me angrily how stupid I was. She had her hands full with an out of control husband and a son who had developmental problems. Looking back I can see how overwhelmed she must have been, and how damaged. A rough childhood, an abusive first marriage and two miscarriages, all without professional help for her emotionally. Her response to me was cool, aloof, neglectful, and a little rough.
My "brother" started abusing me, picking on me physically before I can remember. M had to make cushions for my legs out of menstrual pads because he kicked me in the shins whenever he could. She tried to explain it away, saying to the rest of the family that I was clumsy. (As an adult, I learned from my cousins there had been doubt about this explanation.)
He made me walk to school a block behind him so no one would know I was his sister.
But the real abuse began when he reached puberty. He molested me and also my friends in our neighborhood, depriving me of the only friends I had because they then wouldn't have anything to do with me. I was about 9 when that started.
When I was 12, he tried to drown me. We were on vacation, and swimming in the motel's pool when I must have angered him. I was saved by a stranger who pointed out to my oblivious mother that her daughter was "in trouble". To this day I can't stand to see movies, etc where there is water over someone's head. I still remember it vividly.
When I was 19 he tried to trade me to his co-worker, who was what they called a "swinger", so that my B could have sex with the co-worker's wife. My B didn't have a gf to trade so he tried to trade me, his sister. The man saw that I hadn't been informed of the arrangement and refused.
3/3
I was also abused by two of my teachers. My 2nd grade T shook me so roughly that when she let go, I couldn't stand and the room spun. My 3rd grade T stood me in the front of the class and instructed the entire class to laugh at me, which they did.
I started using drugs and alcohol at 15.
My first sexual experience was more of a rape than anything. A bf choked me when I was 16, and at 17 I was raped twice.
(End for now)
I'm so sorry for the horrendous life you've had roses. As I read what you've written, I have my own memories that come back. And I can relate to some of what you've written quite well. But this is your space and not mine. So I will leave you with a message that I am thinking of you. And even if I don't respond to every post I will be here reading what you have to say to share in your experience to hopefully make you feel less alone.
Melodie
Three roses, I wish I had more to say but some of the damiliar bits have left me speechless.
Just know I am thinking of you, and little you. You both have a spot in a warm, safe hug if yiu ever want/need it. I have heard I give great ones.
I am sorry for all that you have been through, but glad you are able to share safely.
Much love, :hug: :hug:
My heart goes out to you Three Roses...
:hug:
Knew I was forgetting a big one - sibling also tried to rape me when I was 14, he was 18 and going into the military.
Did I forget it? Or block it out? I do that lot....
I believe you Three Roses and stand with you. It's brave and true to tell your story. I know the pain and relief of it myself when I finally told someone my whole truth (what I remembered of it) earlier this year. When they said they believed me I wept uncontrollable bittersweet tears. There are large blocks of time in my childhood I don't remember and I'm not sure I want to remember. Some have surfaced from my grief, and even if I don't remember all of it, the results are in....my body, mind and spirit was severely injured from abuse and trauma. We are all together in this truth. These things HAPPENED and they should NEVER have happened. I'm not triggered, I'm grateful I'm not alone and sad that I can't take your pain away. Thank you for your bravery and I'm so sorry for the years and years of abuse. Your recovery is inspirational. I hear you and will follow your story, it helps me to be brave with mine. :hug:
Hi Three Roses,
You are incredibly brave to be talking about these things, and I just wanted to say that I am also 'standing by you' and 'hearing you' and 'supporting you'. :hug: and wishing you strength with this.
Hope :)
3roses, my heart aches for what you've been through. i stand beside you along with everyone else, validating not only your story but your courage for speaking your truth. i believe you completely, at the same time i'm horrified at what you've had to endure.
your warrior spirit shines through every sentence. earth mother spirit embraces you, gathers you in as you relive your pain.
dang, woman, you are a miracle - don't ever forget that! love and a big hug filled with soothing warmth and compassion.
My copy of the new Pete Walker book, "Homesteading in the Calm Eye of the Storm", got here today. Felt like Christmas! :)
He describes a footrace down a step path where he arrives at the bottom, scraped and bleeding but exhilarated.
This part hit me hard: (pg 49)
QuoteAnd who cares if I won't be able to sleep tonight because of my injuries? I don't know it yet, but I am a trauma survivor. As such I spend most of my time in the frozen present. I am trapped here by a foreshortened sense of the future and a fear of my childhood misery catching up with me. When I am adrenalized and busy, I can distract myself from my underlying emotional pain. How I hate it when it percolates up without warning and engulfs me in anxious deadness and shame.
Just been reading the continuation of the abuse done to you. You are brave to write it all down. I believe you. Sending you :hug: :hug:
Ok...well, that covers just the first 18 or 19 years or so. Got a few decades to go still. I'm just getting started.
There's a term that's highly applicable to me -
QuoteRepetition compulsion is a psychological phenomenon in which a person repeats a traumatic event or its circumstances over and over again. This includes reenacting the event or putting oneself in situations where the event is likely to happen again.
I know I have done this, all my life. I see it very clearly now. More on this later.
repetition compulsion - interesting, but it certainly rings true for me as well. you're not alone here, sweetie. standing strong beside you. warm and loving hugs to you.
Theee Roses, I am excited about that book as well. I need to get a copy asap. So glad it is resonating with you so much. Those quotes are brilliant.
I will echo everyone else, in saying how strong it is for you to share. I am grateful that you are. You have gotten through a good chunk. I have only ever gotten mine written to about the time I was 12 (granted I have a bit less to fill in afterwards, as I am younger)
Thank you for sharing with all of us. Sending you a lot of warmth and comfort if you need or want it
I'm excited about his book as well. Thanks for sharing the passage, it was powerful. What I love about Pete Walker is his soulful writing and that he incorporates beautiful quotes and poems into his books. Thank you for sharing your life, you are a miracle to have come so far. I'm so sorry for all you have went through and stand with you.
I've spent the last few years in one of the most painful periods of my life. And the strange part is that it's also been the smoothest, most drama-free time I've ever experienced.
I feel respected. I feel the freedom to go where I want without worrying about possible consequences. These are things I kept from myself due either to personal fears or external pressures, but I take responsibility for both. This has been a painful revelation as I saw the depths of my own imprisonment, and that I always held the key to my own prison door.
It's also been a time of personal insight as the smokescreen and filters through which I'd always seen myself fell away. All the things I once thought I was, now I question. The certainty of my knowing what path to take, what words to say - gone. Who I was, who I am, as a person - also gone.
I see I've built a lot of my life on smoke and mirrors. Illusion. The illusions I created, the persona I decided to present to the world as the authentic me.
She never existed.
The smokescreen was a happy, well-adjusted woman. She may have had her struggles, but after all, who doesn't? She knew, life isn't perfect. And on those moonlit nights when she stared at the stars with an aching so deep it felt as big as the sky, she only thought she just wasn't thankful enough.
The mirrors were the compassion I genuinely felt and thought I communicated to others; but I either did not, or it was lost in the twists and knots of my inexplicable behavior.
Today, I clearly see the harm I've caused because of the damage and abuse I've been through. I feel confused as to why I didn't see things more clearly but I also don't spend a lot of time kicking myself. When the feelings rise up, I allow them, giving myself the permission to freely feel all of my pain, because unless I let myself feel, I won't be able to feel all the joy that's in me, either.
There is an art form called kintsugi. It's a method of repairing broken vessels using gold or silver lacquer, returning them to a fully functioning cup, dish, etc. The philosophy behind this is that even the once broken-ness of the piece is valued, and in fact showing the history of the once broken item without trying to hide it gives the piece its beauty - and is considered even more beautiful for having once been broken. A perfect imperfection.
QuoteNot only is there no attempt to hide the damage, but the repair is literally illuminated... a kind of physical expression of the spirit of mushin....Mushin is often literally translated as 'no mind', but carries connotations of fully existing within the moment, of non-attachment, of equanimity amid changing conditions....The vicissitudes of existence over time, to which all humans are susceptible, could not be clearer than in the breaks, the knocks, and the shattering to which ceramic ware too is subject. This poignancy or aesthetic of existence has been known in Japan as 'mono no aware', a compassionate sensitivity, or perhaps identification with, [things] outside oneself. "
— Christy Bartlett, Flickwerk: The Aesthetics of Mended Japanese Ceramics
Slowly I am learning to accept myself as I am. I am learning to embrace the cracks and not hide them. They are a message of how strong I am. And as this acceptance of myself grows, I am finding understanding for the ones who hurt me, for they've been broken, too. And in this way, I'm learning to truly leave them behind me.
Three Roses, I don't have much of an appeal for beauty as much as you do. But if it makes you happy, then I support it with my every being.
I've read somewhere that the greatest ally to battling shame is openness. Showing your true self and allowing people who truly care for you accept you. People may sometimes view the world and the people they know with only their ideas of what others are like — without ever acting to understand them enough, and so never connecting with the person outside the idea.
To be open to me is to rid all connections of inaccuracy and analyze my idea of people in the most precise rigorous detailed way as possible — but that's just me. I want to understand you.
Your dad may have not wanted you, but there are other people out there that care for you now. At least people around this forum do. I know I do.
You've been opening up. Your strength really is . . . beautiful.
Thank you, DR! I'm trying to be more authentic and its nice to know you see that. :hug:
wow, 3 roses, that's pretty deep. diving into something like that just shows the depth of you as a person.
very glad for you that you're coming out of the turmoil into a more peaceful place. you are beautiful. big warm, loving hug to you.
Quote from: Three Roses on December 11, 2017, 04:41:52 AM
Slowly I am learning to accept myself as I am. I am learning to embrace the cracks and not hide them. They are a message of how strong I am. And as this acceptance of myself grows, I am finding understanding for the ones who hurt me, for they've been broken, too. And in this way, I'm learning to truly leave them behind me.
:cheer: :cheer: :cheer:
Wow! To your whole post really. :hug: :hug:
I love the idea of kintsugi, never heard of it so just googled it and looked at some pictures for a long while. It got me thinking of you.
The gold/silver lacquer, if it's pure it must be flexible and soft, and allow the broken vessel to move and change position. So there isn't just way to be a whole vessel, but so many different interpretations to who we can be as we slowly put ourselves together again.
Whoever we end up being, without smokescreens. With pain. :yes:
And there's a true beauty to these vessels I saw, like they're saying "Yep, this is how it is." The gold/silver looks a bit alive... like the vessel was just an object before it broke and now it's real..?
Re. "brothers", I have one that's a bit similar to yours.
Quote from: Three Roses on October 04, 2017, 06:36:36 PM
He is nothing like the definition of a brother. Even the word "brother" is a trigger for me now. I think of him as my sibling, my mother's other child.
Yep. Precisely.
You're absolutely not alone.
And I can't imagine not believing you.
:hug: