Before I got to the assessment, my feelings towards the whole mental health care issue was at best ambivalent, at worse, downright pissed off with it. Then I got there and the assessment discussion took place. I admitted how I felt about the situation, that it felt like an exercise and that the professionals learnt this stuff, but did they ever experience it? Empathy is one thing, but going through the motions, following the scripts provided by the theories and the interpersonal skills used; paraphrasing, recapping and so on, are just tools - there is no actual way of taking away the damage done. The best we can hope for, those of us who are emotionally scarred, psychologically damaged as children, is to come to terms with what happened. I can't help feel that despite the intentions, the situation is hopeless, futile.
Everytime I think of child abuse, in my minds eye I keep seeing images of prisoners in concentration camps. The survivors from these camps physically regain their strength and generally show no external signs of what happened. However, they, like us, will carry the memories and psychological scars of what happened to them. When you look at a victim of child abuse, you wouldn't know it, but in our minds, we go through it daily, in one way or another, and life is a struggle for us to deal with. The damage is done, it will always be there, it displays itself in our behaviour and world view and how we view ourselves.
Again, I started recounting my childhood, some family background and what it was like for me as a child, how I felt, what I experienced and my emotional reaction to events and situations around me. I got to realise, as I do each time I recount being a child, just how much fear and terror I felt - in fact, some of it is so difficult, I cannot find adequate words to describe how I felt back then. I am left speechless, quite literally, at some of the specific memories.
Something I've begun to realise. Because I was terrorized and tortured psychologically by my father and in some respects, my mother, I became so wound up and uptight, literally a nervous wreck, expecting the worse, my fathers behaviour left me so scared that I would be hypersensitive to his tone of voice, body language and even a mere expression on his face would reduce me to a wreck instantly. This lead on to a defense mechanism to be able (or, more accurately, expecting) pick up on 'atmospheres' (because, at home, there was always that palpable emotional tension ever present in the home) and peoples behaviours and so forth. Yes, I'd be looking for the same things in other people outside the family, waiting for the moment when a threat would manifest itself.
I became timid, anxious and nervous as a child and that stayed with me for the rest of my life. Essentially, the whole world, every person was a potential threat and I had no sufficient coping abilities to deal with what they may do to me. Again, this has stayed with me and affected my world view and how I see other people - as potential threats. This has developed into a state of constant anxiety and preoccupation with expecting the worse of every single situation in life. This is paranoia in the sense that as a child, 'they' (be it sadistic teachers, bullying children or my father) really were out to get me. Only, in my case, it was true because it started in the home and as I went through life, situations occured to reinforce this idea.
During the assessment, I explained some of what happened to me during my life, including my breakdown last year, the divorce and the issues surrounding the marriage which made it a sham for both me and my ex-wife. One thing which came up was the affair and Her. That was the only issue I said I didn't want to discuss because it was - is - so painful and distressing that I couldn't deal with it there and then. I know I need to go back to it because there is a lot of unpacking of that/Her but also what the deeper elements mean; love, relationships, social anxiety, friendships and so on. Remember, it's hard for me to trust or be open with people, especially people I don't know, so interpersonal relationships are a big issue for me on all levels.
There was a lot more that came out of the assessment for me, Ben picked up on one phrase thats hung around me - 'not being taken seriously' which was a bit of a jolt because it's one of the internalised feelings I have, but when he said it, I felt a shock go through me - he'd pressed one of my buttons/triggers.
Every time I think about child abuse, my minds eye shows me images of prisoners of concentration camps and the horror they endured and suffered through no fault of their own. Comparing my own experiences to those who went through unspeakable horror is not even capable, but the similarities - being victims, especially children, of such situations is very real. My torture and abuse was psychological, not sexual nor physical and in that respect I feel like my own experiences pale into insignficance to what some of us have been through. The point though, is that we experienced it, it was personal and it left us damaged.
I see I've got a case of verbal diahorrea, so it's time to draw to a close.
It now looks like I'm going to be entering into pyschological counselling, at least tentatively, to explore what expectations and hopes and how useful it would be to continue.
That feeling of ambivalence and fear keeps coming back. I don't want to feel this way, it was forced upon me.
Everytime I think of child abuse, in my minds eye I keep seeing images of prisoners in concentration camps. The survivors from these camps physically regain their strength and generally show no external signs of what happened. However, they, like us, will carry the memories and psychological scars of what happened to them. When you look at a victim of child abuse, you wouldn't know it, but in our minds, we go through it daily, in one way or another, and life is a struggle for us to deal with. The damage is done, it will always be there, it displays itself in our behaviour and world view and how we view ourselves.
Again, I started recounting my childhood, some family background and what it was like for me as a child, how I felt, what I experienced and my emotional reaction to events and situations around me. I got to realise, as I do each time I recount being a child, just how much fear and terror I felt - in fact, some of it is so difficult, I cannot find adequate words to describe how I felt back then. I am left speechless, quite literally, at some of the specific memories.
Something I've begun to realise. Because I was terrorized and tortured psychologically by my father and in some respects, my mother, I became so wound up and uptight, literally a nervous wreck, expecting the worse, my fathers behaviour left me so scared that I would be hypersensitive to his tone of voice, body language and even a mere expression on his face would reduce me to a wreck instantly. This lead on to a defense mechanism to be able (or, more accurately, expecting) pick up on 'atmospheres' (because, at home, there was always that palpable emotional tension ever present in the home) and peoples behaviours and so forth. Yes, I'd be looking for the same things in other people outside the family, waiting for the moment when a threat would manifest itself.
I became timid, anxious and nervous as a child and that stayed with me for the rest of my life. Essentially, the whole world, every person was a potential threat and I had no sufficient coping abilities to deal with what they may do to me. Again, this has stayed with me and affected my world view and how I see other people - as potential threats. This has developed into a state of constant anxiety and preoccupation with expecting the worse of every single situation in life. This is paranoia in the sense that as a child, 'they' (be it sadistic teachers, bullying children or my father) really were out to get me. Only, in my case, it was true because it started in the home and as I went through life, situations occured to reinforce this idea.
During the assessment, I explained some of what happened to me during my life, including my breakdown last year, the divorce and the issues surrounding the marriage which made it a sham for both me and my ex-wife. One thing which came up was the affair and Her. That was the only issue I said I didn't want to discuss because it was - is - so painful and distressing that I couldn't deal with it there and then. I know I need to go back to it because there is a lot of unpacking of that/Her but also what the deeper elements mean; love, relationships, social anxiety, friendships and so on. Remember, it's hard for me to trust or be open with people, especially people I don't know, so interpersonal relationships are a big issue for me on all levels.
There was a lot more that came out of the assessment for me, Ben picked up on one phrase thats hung around me - 'not being taken seriously' which was a bit of a jolt because it's one of the internalised feelings I have, but when he said it, I felt a shock go through me - he'd pressed one of my buttons/triggers.
Every time I think about child abuse, my minds eye shows me images of prisoners of concentration camps and the horror they endured and suffered through no fault of their own. Comparing my own experiences to those who went through unspeakable horror is not even capable, but the similarities - being victims, especially children, of such situations is very real. My torture and abuse was psychological, not sexual nor physical and in that respect I feel like my own experiences pale into insignficance to what some of us have been through. The point though, is that we experienced it, it was personal and it left us damaged.
I see I've got a case of verbal diahorrea, so it's time to draw to a close.
It now looks like I'm going to be entering into pyschological counselling, at least tentatively, to explore what expectations and hopes and how useful it would be to continue.
That feeling of ambivalence and fear keeps coming back. I don't want to feel this way, it was forced upon me.