Scattered pieces

Please note that this entry might trigger due to the issues of child abuse and religion being discussed.

Over two years ago, I wrote the post Religion and Karma.  In it, I shared some of my confusion around religious concepts.  Since I wrote that piece, my confusion has, if anything, deepened.  Conflicted and distorted messages about religion, and my self worth, have driven much of my dysfunction over the last two months.  I have been bombarded with messages about being evil and not worthy of being here, or of this healing journey.

To give a bit of background as to where much of the distortions come from, my father is Roman Catholic and attended a Catholic school.  It was a strict (or traditional) school, with his left handedness being beaten out of him, and intimacy a taboo subject.  In contrast, my mother based her religious affiliations on which church had the best outdoor basketball (netball) team – Baptist won.  When they married, my mother converted to Catholicism and regularly attended church.  My siblings, and myself, were all christened, and my brothers confirmed.  The families pathway through Catholicism ended after my mother had me.  She was advised that if she had any more children, she would probably die in childbirth.  When the church heard of my mothers decision to use birth control, she was asked not to return.  As she was the driving force behind our going to church, this meant that none of the family returned.

This is what I now know of the families leaving the fold.  But, as I was growing up, my brothers told me that we were asked not to return to church because I screamed too much during the service.  Being a sensitive and trusting child, I took those stories, and internalised them.  I became convinced that I was the reason that the whole family was going to go to Hell for eternal damnation.

Later, I had several encounters with religion…  My sister attended an extremely devout and divisive youth group… I attended religious camps during the school holidays; where, along with John 3:16, we were taught Matthew 25:46 – my sensitivity meant that I took both as signs that I was a sinner…  I later joined Rally (similar to Girl Guides), which had a strong religious basis.  It was here that things became very confused, as I was old enough to be aware of the messages and expectations, but failed to live up to them.  I was told that I needed to pray for God to come into my heart, and I would know that this had occurred when I felt a warmth and peace.  Well, I was so disconnected by this stage, that there was no way I was going to feel any warmth in my heart, or anywhere else.  This was the final blow, and I turned my back on any further attempts to connect to a higher power.

Throughout all of this, I was being abused.  Some of the abusers used phrasing with religious connotations as part of the abuse.  I now realise that this had nothing to do with me, but I still internalised it at the time, and took it as further proof as to why God had turned his back on me.  I was evil and a sinner.  I was beyond salvation.

One of the system, W, has great problems with anything religious.  I had never really understood why this trigger was so big, when I had never been abused by a religious figure.  Then, last Thursday, Allison asked W what her role was within the system… her answer “to pray”.  To pray for forgiveness.  To pray for help.

When I was eight, I was abused by some teenagers in the school grounds.  The location of the event is significant, because on the rise, about 50 metres away, was a church.  About 3 metres away from the structure I was being abused in, there was a thoroughfare for pedestrians and cyclists.  It wasn’t busy, but there were usually some people walking by.  As I was being abused, W was created within my mind to pray to the church on the hill… to the God she had heard about… she prayed for help from the people walking by… she prayed for salvation from what was happening.  When no one answered those prayers, she saw it as proof that we were evil, and therefore not worthy of God’s help.

I was never really exposed to the positive side of any religion.  It was all doom and gloom… damnation… selfishness, and selfish acts.  My God was a very fearful, vengeful one, and he wasn’t pleased with me.

As I learned about God, I was getting hurt, as were millions of others in the world.  That didn’t seem fair, or just.  I never liked the overly simple explanation of free will.  I still don’t understand how such evil can be in this world.  Then, if you have evil, then surely there must be a counter balance to that; and what is that counter, if not a God?

As you can see, I’m still very confused.  I initially made this private because I don’t know if I can handle comments on this issue.  But, after a couple of people read what I wrote, I realised that maybe I need others reading this in order to challenge my thinking around all of this.  I still don’t know what I need to help me understand all of the distorted and confused messages in my head, but this post was one step in trying to sort it through.  I don’t know how much help Allison is going to be on this, as when she was questioned last week, there was a sense that she wasn’t firm in her beliefs, so therefore can’t be believed.

I do know that they seriously effect my self worth.  The messages about not being worthy of being here, are tied to the messages about religion.

I finish this post, not knowing why I wrote it, let alone published it on the blog.  Maybe to show you how bad I really am.

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Now playing: Sarah McLachlan – Angel
via FoxyTunes

As a child, it was often up to me to take on the responsibility of the destructive play of my siblings… if something got damaged while the four of us were playing, the others decided that, because I was the favourite, the father would be less angry if I took the blame.  This sort of blame game became so advanced, that I would often come home from school to find myself responsible for another broken vase, letting the chooks out, etc.  Because I was so much younger than the others, I took on the responsibility that the others gave me without question – I had little choice.

This scenario set me up for taking punishments which weren’t mine to take.  It also meant that when I really did something wrong, I thought the world was going to end, because I’d been punished for things I didn’t do, so how bad was the punishment going to be for the things that I did do?  I tried in very childish ways to cover up for any of my mistakes, and tried so very hard not to make any to begin with.  But, mistakes were inevitable.  My father is narcissistic, so often the mistakes were beyond my comprehension… spending too long with a friends family (“Do you like them more than your own family?”), reading too many books (“So you think you’re better than the rest of us, do you?”), and so on.

It seemed as if the goal posts which determined my mistakes, and what I was responsible for, kept changing.

This has lead to what has been described as one of my more annoying traits… the tendency to apologise for everything and anything.  I apologise like it’s my responsibility that someone else is having a bad day, and taking it out on you; when someone else makes a bad decision; that you got an B instead of an A for that assignment… you get the idea.  I realise that this is my co-dependency issues coming to the surface again… I’ll do anything to placate someone and ease a tense situation.  I don’t intellectually believe that I am responsible for these problems; but I believe emotionally that if I don’t apologise, something bad will happen.  The more I care about you, or the more I’m scared of you, the more I will apologise.

I’m not sure if it is associated with this trait, but I often don’t remember apologies from others.  I can be sure that someone else hasn’t apologised, to then find an email where they clearly state they’re sorry for a misunderstanding.  As I write this, I wonder if I don’t remember others apologies, because I don’t want to be in the role of a person doling out the punishment for the wrongs others have done.  I vividly remember my father saying that he didn’t want to punish me, but he had to because it was the only way that I’d learn.  I could be saying sorry, but it didn’t matter, the punishment had to be done.  So now, it’s almost as if I’m scared that by accepting an apology, I’ll be responsible for that person being hurt in some way, just as my father was “forced” to punish when he didn’t want to… so I block out the apology to avoid the consequences.

I often block out the misunderstanding as well, but not always.  This can create a situation where parts of me are feeling (rightly) agrieved about a situation; and while an apology has been forthcoming from the other person involved, other parts of the system have blocked the apology as an old self protection coping mechanism.  The knowledge that I can block out an apology leads to a situation where I doubt my own experiences and feelings.  I’m never sure whether I have a right to be upset about something, or whether it was sorted through at the time of the incident.  As a result, I tend to stamp down my feelings and keep on going.

As I heal, I’m finding that the stamping down isn’t as effective.  There is more tension around the issue of being hurt by others and apologies in general.  I get confused about when I should be offended, and when I deserve an apology.  It’s a whole other kettle of fish actually acting on any of those feelings…  I often miss the mark, and ask about a situation which I don’t fully remember, and has been worked through.  I’d like to think that it’s progress that I took the risk of asking… but in reality it makes me feel like a failure for not having the full picture.  I’ve learned to only do this with people that I trust, and are the least likely to be offended if I don’t remember the whole incident… like learning all things new, I’ve still got my training wheels on, and one of them is a bit loose.  Until I can fix the training wheel and get more confidence about what apologies mean to me, I’ll keep on apologising at the drop of a hat, and question those that let me land on a soft cushion when I get it wrong.

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Now playing: The Fray – How To Save A Life
via FoxyTunes

Two weeks ago, I was convinced that I had this Christmas thing sorted. I was feeling excited.  I was thinking of putting up a Christmas tree and decorations, there was even talk of presents!  When I consider the place I was in, at this time last year, that felt like a huge improvement.  But then, the stirrings of Christmas past started to come back to haunt me.  I have few memories of Christmas as I was growing up; but what I do remember, is full of pain, contradictions, unmet expectations and false hope.

What do you see when you look at the typical Christmas imagery?  Happy families, snow, Christmas trees, presents, togetherness, joy, peace, and so on.  These all help to build up expectations of what Christmas should be.  There is a huge pressure from society to meet these expectations; and it’s almost impossible for a regular family to meet them, let alone a dysfunctional family like the one I grew up a part of.

I remember Christmas as being a burden for the family… there was so much money needed for presents, food and alcohol.  The mother would save throughout the year in order to be able to fulfil the work and family commitments that were expected of us… we must keep up the illusion of the perfect family after all, mustn’t we!  Those commitments involved hosting parties where the Summer heat, alcohol and music lead to a lowering of inhibitions and an increasing level of raucousness.  I still have nightmares about the laughter from the parties.

Thinking about the presents we received, it was odd.  As there were two boys and two girls in the family, we often got the same presents, but different colours – my brothers would both get the same plane, but from different countries; the sister and I would get the same doll, but hers would be brunette and mine would be blonde.  I find that a little odd, especially as the sister is five years older than me.  Did she get inappropriately younger gifts, or did I get inappropriately older gifts?  I’m not sure why, but I get a sense that the gifts were another way different ones in the system felt that they “owed” the parents, and that we were disposable, or easily exchanged with the sister.  It seems like we weren’t encouraged to feel a sense of individuality or separateness from each other.

Don’t get me wrong, I am grateful to have received gifts, especially when I know that so many go without. I’m only trying to show how easily children can pick-up on undercurrents and implied messages.  I doubt that the mother was purposefully trying to invalidate any of us with the gifts, but that is what happened.  I have a feeling she did it in the interests of treating us equally, and it’s only with my now distorted hindsight, that I see it in this way.

Presents have always been a triggering and negative thing for me.  The act of someone giving me a gift immediately raises questions about the persons motivations… What do they expect in return?  What have I done that is worthy of receiving a gift?  What do I get the person in return?  What is appropriate to give?  What do I have to do to keep their respect, or is it all a game and they’re teasing me?

I’m getting better at accepting gifts as they were intended, but it’s still a struggle.  Part of me continues to go back to the old days where getting a present was a reward for being a “good girl”.  This is possibly why Christmas was always so difficult… different people would give me presents, and I couldn’t figure out what was needed to pay them back.  It’s for this reason that I like the change in focus away from gifts… which reminds me of an argument that I continually had with Matthew.  He was always worried about not being able to compete with his now ex-wife because she could afford to give the boys gifts.  I would always argue that his place within his boys life was secure as long as he provided them with love and safety.  But I don’t know if that’s true, I’d like to think it is, but peer pressure and societal expectations can be a great influence.

Sometimes I hate society.  Then, I’m reminded of the good it can do as well – Geek girls ACTIVATE! I know the first action was one of bullying, but the response was what mattered.  It reminds me that there is good out there too.

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Now playing: Falling Slowly – Glen Hansard and Markéta Irglová
via FoxyTunes

I learned from an early age that my family needed to be protected.  In my childlike way, I saw them as being unable to handle the secrets I held, or even to be able to deal with daily problems.  I saw the family around me, as being a swirling mass of chaos, and the only way to bring some control and calm to the situation, was for me to be a silent rock.

While this sounds very egocentric, it meshes with some of the basic principles of childhood development.  Dunn (1991, as cited in Claiborne & Drewery, 2010, p. 157), discuss how children as young as two attempt to comfort their mother when they see her distressed.  While Lewis (2002, as cited in Santrock, 2007, p. 340), talk about the development of shame and guilt for not meeting societal expectations in children as young as two and a half.  So it makes developmental sense, that by the time I was first abused at the age of three (nearly four), I could understand (in a childlike way) the implications of telling.  I could grasp the idea that it might either hurt someone else, or bring shame on myself for not meeting my mothers expectations – after all I was told at the event that it was “bad”, “dirty”, “wrong” and “naughty”… all very emotive words to a sensitive child.

Reading the literature on dysfunctional families, it also becomes clear that the need to protect my family meant that I lost sense of appropriate boundaries (Kerig, 2005).  It meant that I became enmeshed in the problems of some of my family (father, sister and one of my brothers) and held other members of my family quite distant from myself (mother and other brother).  Throughout the family, there was almost no boundaries where I was concerned.  My other siblings were able to create some sense of boundaries, but I seemed unable to do so.  This is possibly because of the age gap between us  – there is a five year age gap between myself and the next oldest child, but only four years difference between my other siblings combined.  It could also be because I was a difficult baby/child and I didn’t emotionally attach securely to anyone, with the associated developmental impact (Claiborne & Drewery, 2010, p. 49-51).

At this point, the intellectual part of me is happy with the theory as it helps to explain why we got where we did… the cynical part of me notes that we never had a chance… while the emotional part is screaming in pain…

So what does all this theory mean?  On one level, it helps to explain why we ended up in a dysfunctional family and were an easy target for abuse… we had no concept of what an appropriate boundary was; we were used to protecting others; and we didn’t really understand that it was wrong, because we didn’t understand where we ended and the rest of the world began.  On another level, there’s pain… total and utter pain… it doesn’t matter why it happened, it happened and it hurt.

In the midst of writing this post, I’ve seen the work place therapist.  In that one hour “talk” we did a sociogram of three people – my neighbour, the mother and sister.  It was incredible and awful…  On the floor we placed whiteboard magnets for each person in relation to myself…

First, was my neighbour, who was placed about 5cm from my marker… she was safety, freedom and acceptance.  But she was also shame and pain… I once overheard my neighbour, the mother, the sister and my neighbours daughter discussing how good it was that I wasn’t around because I was so annoying.  She was the safest thing I had outside of the teachers at school.

Second to be placed, was a marker for the mother, who was about 15cm away from my marker… she was not to be trusted, to be protected, consumed with the problems of my sister and joked about me being the mistake at the end.

Third to be placed, was my sister’s marker… this is where the lack of boundaries really showed… I told the work place therapist that she should be placed on the other side of the room, and on top of my marker.  There was nothing in-between, she was either invading my space or ignoring me.  She controlled many aspects of my life.  We shared a room for many years and she invaded my space so often, in so many ways.

This seemingly simple task brought up so much… W filled in the rest of the memory surrounding what happened after we overheard the discussion about us being so annoying – we got down off the fence and went inside the house to be hurt… We realised how young we dissociated, as we remembered getting a hug from a teacher for correcting a story; but we were depersonalised at the time, as we were so terrified that we hadn’t corrected the story “properly”.

Sophie cried… W was tough… Little Michelle stuttered…

Our work place therapist kept bringing us back to the emotions…

It was difficult, but not overwhelming.

What does all of this mean?  Well, for once I can understand the theory and associate some of the emotions with it.  Yes, I parented/protected those around me… I looked after my family’s needs before my own, I kept the secrets, all the while learning to cope and adapt through the gift/curse of dissociation.  I failed to learn and understand what appropriate boundaries were – physically, sexually, psychologically and emotionally.  I learned to lock away my emotions, and although these emotions hurt to look at and experience, they won’t destroy me – unless I let them (thank you to Meredith for today’s reminder regarding the truth of this statement).

My work place therapist said today that I was a strong child… Right now, that statement is enough for me to believe that I can heal and grow beyond the confined world I find myself in.

References

Claiborne, L., & Drewery, W. (2010). Human development: Family, place, culture. North Ryde, New South Wales, Australia: McGraw-Hill Australia.

Kerig, P. (2005). Revisiting the construct of boundary dissolution: A multidimensional perspective. Journal of Emotional Abuse 5(2/3), 5-42. doi: 10.1300/J135v05n02•02

Santrock, J. (2007). Child development (11th ed.). Boston: McGraw-Hill.

I am the youngest of four children. The mistake at the end. I was a difficult birth, and apparently screamed non-stop for the first six months of my life. I was told this many times as I was growing up. It was usually in a joking way, although how you can joke about a child being a “mistake at the end” is beyond me.  These stories and jokes chipped away at my self-esteem, to the point where I soon realised that I was worthless and an annoyance.

As I grew up, the father’s drinking became more of a problem.  Those parts within who believe he abused us, link his increased drinking to his abuse of us.  Those who don’t believe he ever touched us, link his drinking to alcoholism.  No matter what the cause, his drinking became worse over time.  This meant that it wasn’t safe to bring the few friends I had, to the house.

What does all this have to do with birthdays?  Well, this environment set me up to hate my birthday.  My birthday was a chore for those around me.  That’s if they remembered it.  The disadvantage of having your birthday at the start of the month, is people often forget to turn over the calender.  So often, people forgot my birthday.  My favourite grandparents never sent me a birthday card on time.  I was the queen of getting belated birthday cards.  Don’t get me wrong, I appreciated those cards, but a part of me saw this as being yet another way in which I was inconveniencing those around me by existing.

As I was growing up, I did have birthday parties (I don’t remember them, but have photos as proof).  Usually my two cousins who were of a similar age to me, and sometimes someone from school as well.  But a school-friend was always dicey, as if my father was home, he would be drinking.  I always tried to protect the people I knew at school from my house.  They didn’t need to see the secrets.

My siblings both liked and hated my birthday parties.  It meant they got to eat all sorts of good food, but it re-enforced the concept that I was the favourite child – especially for my sister.  My sister’s birthday is very near Christmas; that usually meant combined birthday and Christmas presents.  She always got a party as well, but she always hated my birthday parties.  Well, she just hated me.

As my self esteem was chipped away, I gave up on birthdays.  By the time I finished primary school, I hated my birthday.  But there were still some parts who secretly loved them.  I think they used to call out the names of those who was having a birthday in the coming week at school assembly, I remember a young one beaming when our name was read out – someone saw us, someone cared!

By the time I reached my teens, birthdays were actively hated.  They were a chore for those around us, and another reason for the sister to pick on us.  On my 14th birthday, my sister didn’t want to go out with the family for my birthday dinner, she wanted to go out with her boyfriend (who was abusing us) and her friends.  She first told my parents that she didn’t want to go, but they told her she had to ask us for permission to not go.  Of course, we told her to go with her friends.  Why force her to be somewhere she didn’t want to be?

Just before my 16th birthday I was assaulted.  This was the last straw in ever wanting anything to do with my birthday for the teen and adult parts of me.  The birthday become a traumatic anniversary.  It was decided that it was best to ignore it and move on.  Over the years this worked well, the mother would still send gifts and occasionally the rest of the family would remember as well.  It became a habit to have the week of my birthday off, as I knew my functioning around that time diminished significantly. Quite often the mother would come up for a holiday during that week, which forced a level of functioning within the system, as a way of self-preservation.

Which brings us to this year.  This year, the mother didn’t come up.  This year we weren’t forced to function, and things fell apart.  Leading up to the birthday, there was lots of lost time and dysfunction.  Then on the birthday there was pain, lots of pain.  Not from the adult ones, but from the young ones who needed some reason to keep on living.  On our birthday, we got a supportive email from a friend, a present from the mother, and a manipulative email from our sister.

Apart from the manipulative email, we appreciate the acknowledgements we received.  But what really hurt the young ones, was that we didn’t hear from either brother.  The brothers were idolised by these young ones.  At times they were an island of safety in an otherwise chaotic life.  This lack of contact re-enforced our belief that if we were gone, no one would notice.  The entire day was spent trying to fight those messages.

I realise that this all sounds attention seeking; but it’s about us trying to work through what happened and why.  It’s about us being more in touch with those young ones who were hurt by the people they care about, not reaching out to them – and yes, we do send messages and cards to those people.  It’s about being perceived as a bother and inconvenience to those around us.  It’s about not having an adequate support system around us.  It’s about not believing we have any right to a support system, and being terrified to try to build one.

It’s about not being worthy of… anything, everything???

Ok… so, the big stuff… the stuff I’ve been studiously avoiding for the last probably two to three weeks… maybe even that last couple of months.  I can’t analyse or reflect on them yet, but I need to write them down so that they lessen their hold over me.

Probably the most obvious, is the therapeutic rupture with Liz.  It destabilised me.  It re-enforced all the old messages about me being too difficult to cope with, and made me feel as if I would never heal.  I still don’t think that the new therapist will cope…  She says she’s one of the top therapists in the small city where we live; but then, Bob was one of the top clinical psychologists, and that didn’t turn out well.  We’re still not sure if ACC will fund us to see her; so until funding is established, we’re seeing her fortnightly.  I know that isn’t often enough, but we can’t afford weekly therapy.

Once you get past the obvious of therapy, there’s the other given… work.  We recently had a change to our union negotiated employment agreement.  The new agreement meant that we ended up with a negative sick leave balance.  We’d used up so much sick leave in the short time we’ve been there, that we’d used the equivalent of an extra years allowance.  This basically meant that we were going to have to go for over a year, with any sick leave being unpaid.  There’s no way we could afford that.  Our union is incredibly weak and unable to fight for the rights of the worker – if you wonder why I’m in such a weak union, librarians are traditionally left wing, socialists who believe in unions, and so there’s a great deal of pressure to join.

So, ignoring the union, we researched the law and questioned work on the validity of the negative balance, when according the the Holidays Act, each employee must have five days paid sick leave per year.  We sent through an email outlining the law, and asking what that meant in regards to our negative balance.  This resulted in a meeting with HR (hence the entry about the panic attack).  The meeting was mercifully quick and resulted in HR apologising to me for any distress caused.  They also gave me five sick days immediately, and another five in six months time.

We had been expecting a written warning about our excessive sick leave.  During the negotiations, our employer had been talking about “sick leave abusers”.  When we saw that negative balance, we immediately knew that we were one of the people being targeted.  We doubted all of the work we’ve been doing.  We don’t feel as if we’ve been performing to an even half descent standard lately.  So again, all our fears and inadequacies were thrown into the spot light.

The other obvious stress has been the divorce.  We got the papers served on the ex-husband, and immediately started to get hang up phone calls.  They were at odds times of the day and lasted for a week, ending only when we picked up the phone once and asked who was there.  This led to all sorts of flashbacks and activation of parts who used to deal with the ex-husband.

Which probably leads into the other issue I’ve been facing… increasing amounts and severity of self injury.  It’s been a really tough few weeks, lots of lost time and negative coping mechanisms being used.  I know I’m going to have to tell the new therapist about this, but it’s so shame inducing that I don’t know how.  I keep thinking that I should be “strong enough” or “healed enough” not to do those old coping mechanisms… but yet fall back into them when the going gets really bad.

Then there’s the last big thing which feels so awful and… just yuck.  I’m friends with the younger of my two brothers on FaceBook.  A few months ago, a photo was added to his profile.  It’s not an awful photo, it’s actually a really good one, which shows his body language as I remember it.  The thing that sends the system into chaos however, is that the lower half of his face is almost exactly the same as the fathers.  The mouth is the same… as is the chin.  It drives some in the system crazy.  My brother is now the age that the father would have been when we were in our early teens.  As I write this, I feel the dissociation coming.  I know this is a huge trigger.  I know that sometimes one of us looks at this photo of our brother as a punishment.

Far out… that’s all I can write… sorry, I know this doesn’t make much sense.  But I needed to get it out in some way.

In all the craziness, I’m reminded of the lines from Hymn to Her…

She will always carry on
Something is lost
But something is found

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Now playing: The Pretenders – Hymn To Her
via FoxyTunes

Dear young one,

First of all, you are young.  You are not a little adult, you are a young girl…  This alone should explain so much to you, but it won’t because I know you are fighting and struggling to make sense of the world you find yourself in.  You are strong, brave and stubborn…  You take on so much of the world around you, that it is hard to make you out as an individual identity.  But, please remember that you are a young girl…

I sense that you need to hear the words “I forgive you”, but there is nothing to forgive you for.  You did an amazing job holding it all together when those around you were hurting you and themselves.  I’m so sorry that you had to take on this burden of abuse.  This burden had nothing to do with how pretty, thin, attractive or loud you were…  there are no reasons why… there are excuses, but no reasons.  I’m not sure what will ease your sense of guilt and ownership over the abuse… I could quote you research about alcoholic fathers, absentee mothers, sibling rivalry and a society built around ignoring the child as an individual with rights, but I know that you will look for excuses within that research… You will look for any proof that the abuse was, and is, your fault.  So I won’t hand you that information to confuse you further, instead I would like to do what should have happened long ago… get down to your eye level, look you straight in the eye and say “It wasn’t your fault”.  You hold no blame for what happened, they were events done to you, not by you.  Even the events where you are sure you were the instigator, you weren’t.  You were trying to find new ways to protect yourself and ease the burden.

I stand in awe of what you accomplished through all of the pain of what was happening to you.  Do you know that?  I don’t know how you did it.  You have a strength I cannot fathom.  The amount of times you picked yourself up and kept on going… the amount of times you looked towards the pain and kept on going.  I’m so proud to consider that you are what I have come from.  You excelled in all that you tried – I have the reports which tell of your intelligence, I’m told you moved with grace and poise on the dance floor and you played above your grade in sports you enjoyed.  I know you consider these accomplishments nothing, and I wish you could tell them with pride.  But what really amazes me, is that you defended those around you whom you thought were being picked on.  Your sense of social justice remained intact, despite all of what happened to you.  Not only did it remain intact, but you actively found ways to defend and help those who were being victimised.  You couldn’t succeed all the time, but you tried… and kept on trying no matter what.

I’m not sure that I will ever understand what happened to you.  Looking back, I don’t know what advice I could give you that would ease your burden.  I could say “don’t trust people”, but then I wonder if you didn’t have some form of trust, whether you would still hold to that sense of social justice?  I could tell you not to go near the kindergarten playground, or near that woodshed… but I know that this wouldn’t solve the problems you faced.  I want to protect you from the pain you faced, but I know I am helpless to do so.  My only hope now, is to help you heal.  I’m not sure how to do this, and in this I need your help.  I need to know what you need, and when you need it.  I try my best to help you heal, but I know I make mistakes.  I hope you forgive these errors… I know this is asking a lot of you, especially when so many people have let you down in the past, but I again need you to be strong.  This is a different strength, this isn’t about putting up with more pain… this is about telling me when it hurts, telling me when you are scared, telling me when you need help.  We all need help young one, but it takes strength to ask and receive that help…

Thank you for all you have done for me, young one.  You have given me so many gifts, it is now my turn to return some of those gifts, if you will let me.  You will notice that I don’t mention the word “love”… I avoid using this word as we all know that I don’t understand the concept… instead, please understand that I respect and admire you.  I couldn’t have made it this far without you…

Yours sincerely,
M

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Now playing: Anna Nalick – Breathe
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The other night I watched Sunitha Krishnan’s TED India talk about her fight against sex slavery and Deliver us from evil: The Catholic Church lies, a documentary about clergy sexual abuse.  As a note: both the talk and documentary carry trigger and adult content warnings. I’m not familiar with either of these forms of abuse, other than what I’ve read and seen through the media, but both of these clips affected me.

Sunitha talked with passion and courage when describing the horrific stories of some of the people she has rescued. To see the smiling photos of the children who had been used so badly by society that they died of HIV/AIDS before their 10th birthday…  The main focus of her talk, was not to tell horrific stories, but rather to confront societies attitude towards the survivors that she and her organisation Prajwala have rescued.  She was challenging our intolerance, judgments and the cruelty directed towards this group of survivors.  Turning a blind eye to the abuse is not acceptable… Finding excuses not to employ these survivors is not acceptable…  Society shuns these victims and ostracizes them to the fringes, making it difficult to find employment and develop a sense of self.  Society refuses to open our minds and hearts to their plight…

Within my context, I know that my mental health issues would be treated with scorn, derision and skepticism amongst my co-workers.  I know this, because I have seen how they have treated students who have mental health issues – with one being labeled a stalker!  Because I had to take time off work after my ex-husband attacked me, everyone at work knew that I was a victim of domestic violence.  In the months that followed, I got sympathy and understanding from some people, but I also heard domestic violence jokes from others.  If this is the reaction within my small workplace to what is a relatively common occurrence, I’d hate to imagine how they would react to my full abuse history – would I hear child abuse or suicide jokes?

My situation cannot be compared to the situation of those rescued from sexual slavery.  I live in a relatively wealthy farm based city where homelessness and drug problems are considered the greatest blight on our landscape.  I will never know the horror of the sexual slave industry as experienced by those children; and looking at their stories of survival, I’ll never experience their strength.  The context and extremity of the situations is worlds apart, yet there is still a general theme regarding a lack of acceptance by society.  Both situations show how people can be stigmatised for being a victim…

The documentary, Deliver us from evil, affected me for several reasons – our family was asked not to return to the Catholic Church after the mother started using birth control, and we have been subjected to varying forms of odd Catholic based indoctrination by the father, youth groups and camps.  But, the single thing that affected me the most about the documentary, was witnessing the father’s pain at knowing his daughter had been victimised by one of the priests.  The priest was a man the family had welcomed into their home, and he had abused that trust on so many levels.  The images of this grown man crying and distraught over the pain inflicted on his daughter and his inability to protect her were so confusing for us.  Is this how an otherwise healthy family reacts to such an event?  When I told the mother that I had been raped by three teenagers when I was 7 or 8, I don’t think she shed a tear.  I know she told my oldest brother, but he hasn’t said anything to me about any of my abuse history…  I compare this to when my sister was raped by her boyfriend when she was in her late teens, and both my brothers were willing to track him down and beat him up.  They didn’t, but there was some emotional response.  Am I so worthless that I don’t deserve such emotions?  I don’t want anyone to be hurt because of what happened to me, but some sort of reaction would have helped me gain some form of validation that I am a person worthy of concern.

Again, I can’t compare what happened to me to those who suffered at the hands of the abusive clergy.  There can be no generalisations made that those who were victims of the clergy were from otherwise healthy families or that all parents were as demonstrative in their grief over what had occurred to their children.  The daughter of the man who was open with his grief had been abused for years, and the daughter had made a conscious decision not to tell about the abuse for fear of her father being sent to jail for killing the offending priest – basic questioning as a child had led her to believe this as being a very real possibility.  So again, there are some similar general themes, but the context is totally different.

Sex slavery, sexual abuse by the clergy and my own situation should never be compared in regard to their severity; but there are similar themes which run through all incidents – societies acceptance and reaction to the victim seems to be the most common.  Anger seems to be the another.  Sunitha mentioned that she trained her survivors in male dominated trades because they have the courage and strength to push through and succeed in that area – she mentions anger as being one of the drivers.  The survivors of the clergy abuse, openly and strongly voiced their anger.  I’m just starting to realise that I might be angry about what happened to me, and more importantly how angry I am at those around me at the time – the mother suspected something but did nothing, while my sister would’ve been blind not to notice.

The question for all of us is, what do we do with that anger?

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Now playing: Audioslave – Like a Stone
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