Coming to terms - Part 7 - dealing with toxic emotions
25/09/08 10:22 Filed in: Psychology | Child Abuse
I’m going to say only a little about the toxic emotions that are a legacy of child abuse here. I have no need or wish to revisit, remember or re-experience them now. I have moved beyond that a while ago, thankfully.
There was another step that for me, and I suspect for others too, that was critical in the process of recovery. I have alluded to it briefly here in passing but that’s all. I never recovered fully as a result of the process of recalling and allowing myself to feel the toxic emotions I had inside me. I needed to feel these emotions in order to understand and release them. There was another step for me beyond confrontation too, that as I will explain later was right for me, but it is not right for everybody since sometimes confrontation can present appalling and unacceptable personal risks. The final step was to forgive my father the abuse he committed against me. Only after I had moved through forgiveness was I finally free. It was forgiveness that finally relieved the burden of suffering I carried within me.
It wasn’t such a very neat parcel. I must say that too. Some of the legacy of abuse persisted in how I lived my daily life. There was a part of me, which wanted to see continuity in my life, which chose to build upon an existence founded in dysfunction. I should have made greater and more fundamental changes especially in my working life. I know that now. I made a mistake at the time.
Anger: I had a real difficulty in expressing anger. First, I had associated it with my father’s aggressive abuse, and second as an abused child it was never safe to express anger. Anger was connected to the things that hurt me too.
Suppressed anger is dangerous. Many survivors turn their anger inwards. Introjected anger may become depression, anxiety and self-loathing. Others may express it in inappropriate aggressive behaviour or withdrawal from social or personal relationships.
One of the great lessons in recovery is the release of anger, to do it safely and to direct it at where it belongs, to the perpetrators of abuse. Anger can be expressed safely and need not be overwhelming. We can turn it on and turn it off. We can also learn to control anger and express it appropriately.
All adults have feelings that are rooted in childhood development. Those left over from abuse may be very powerful, and sometimes destructive.
Fear and anger are both very natural responses to the threat or act of violence. Anxiety is related to fear and comes from not knowing what to expect within the family.
Shame and guilt are terrible demons and coming to terms with these may present the adult survivor with real problems, however, their presence should tell you that you still hold yourself responsible for the abuse in some way. You are not responsible, and you were a powerless, innocent child. Put these feelings back where they belong and that is with the abuser and not with you.
Adult survivors internalise shame when they identify with or idealise parents who abuse them, abandon them and fail to confirm or value them as people. Shame becomes part of a package of self-blame, self-destructive thoughts and self-sabotaging behaviours. During the childhood years this bundle of negative feelings evolves into a major part of the survivor's sense of self.
There may be other feelings of alienation and hopelessness that may result from too many disappointments or a sense that you are resigned to life and have lost any belief in its ability to be better. These feelings will always tell you something about yourself, do not try and ignore them; only when you have heard their message will they go away.
I don’t believe there are any shortcuts here. If you don’t reconnect with these feelings and see them for what they are, they will continue to haunt your adult life.
Whatever anyone says, I don’t believe you can skip this step either. I, and others survivors I have known, have used a number of harmful mechanisms to “numb out” these feelings when they get too strong. Some adopt a workaholic lifestyle in order to block out the feelings. Others try to “self-medicate” and anaesthetise their pain and strong emotions by using drink and drugs. Stifling anger and rage may simply mean that the victim expresses it as aggressive, anti-social and abusive behaviour.
I’m going to make a recommendation here. I don’t often do that. It’s about therapy. There are therapies and therapists I have known where they encourage their clients to engage in endless reflection. They don’t work! You get mired up in all that pain and it’s the therapist’s job to facilitate your finding a way out. But I’ll make one positive recommendation and that is that an appropriately qualified therapist can be of immense help. Dealing with all these feelings can be very confusing. Often they arise in an untidy and messy way. Often it is difficult to work out where they come from, what they mean and what belongs to where.
So here it is, I would recommend cognitive behavioural therapy (CBT) provided by an appropriately qualified therapist who has an understanding and knowledge of child abuse. I like CBT and find it immensely helpful. CBT maintains that the meanings that one attaches to one’s emotions, no matter how incongruous they might be, are within common sense and are accessible to one’s own cognition and understanding. I agree.
Very simply described, CBT is about discovering emotions, understanding them, their meanings and their context, and discovering where or to what they belong. It acknowledges that emotions and the meanings we attach to them may be sensible or not. It is also non-judgemental.
As the man who developed CBT, Aaron Beck, wrote, “(For the cognitive behavioural therapist)… eliciting a person’s cognitions (meanings) becomes important when we attempt to understand their relationship with incongruous emotional reactions. It is about discovering an individual’s emotions based on that person’s peculiar appraisal of an event or experience.”
What is great about CBT, in my view, is that it is entirely focused on healthy and constructive outcomes, on recovery, and that its administration usually covers relatively short treatment courses and time-scales.
Please note: Psychotherapy and psychotherapists are a matter of personal choice and selection. Should you be in or be considering psychotherapy it is best that you find the therapy most appropriate to your needs and personal situation. The views here represent only the opinions of the author.
There was another step that for me, and I suspect for others too, that was critical in the process of recovery. I have alluded to it briefly here in passing but that’s all. I never recovered fully as a result of the process of recalling and allowing myself to feel the toxic emotions I had inside me. I needed to feel these emotions in order to understand and release them. There was another step for me beyond confrontation too, that as I will explain later was right for me, but it is not right for everybody since sometimes confrontation can present appalling and unacceptable personal risks. The final step was to forgive my father the abuse he committed against me. Only after I had moved through forgiveness was I finally free. It was forgiveness that finally relieved the burden of suffering I carried within me.
It wasn’t such a very neat parcel. I must say that too. Some of the legacy of abuse persisted in how I lived my daily life. There was a part of me, which wanted to see continuity in my life, which chose to build upon an existence founded in dysfunction. I should have made greater and more fundamental changes especially in my working life. I know that now. I made a mistake at the time.
Anger: I had a real difficulty in expressing anger. First, I had associated it with my father’s aggressive abuse, and second as an abused child it was never safe to express anger. Anger was connected to the things that hurt me too.
Suppressed anger is dangerous. Many survivors turn their anger inwards. Introjected anger may become depression, anxiety and self-loathing. Others may express it in inappropriate aggressive behaviour or withdrawal from social or personal relationships.
One of the great lessons in recovery is the release of anger, to do it safely and to direct it at where it belongs, to the perpetrators of abuse. Anger can be expressed safely and need not be overwhelming. We can turn it on and turn it off. We can also learn to control anger and express it appropriately.
All adults have feelings that are rooted in childhood development. Those left over from abuse may be very powerful, and sometimes destructive.
Fear and anger are both very natural responses to the threat or act of violence. Anxiety is related to fear and comes from not knowing what to expect within the family.
Shame and guilt are terrible demons and coming to terms with these may present the adult survivor with real problems, however, their presence should tell you that you still hold yourself responsible for the abuse in some way. You are not responsible, and you were a powerless, innocent child. Put these feelings back where they belong and that is with the abuser and not with you.
Adult survivors internalise shame when they identify with or idealise parents who abuse them, abandon them and fail to confirm or value them as people. Shame becomes part of a package of self-blame, self-destructive thoughts and self-sabotaging behaviours. During the childhood years this bundle of negative feelings evolves into a major part of the survivor's sense of self.
There may be other feelings of alienation and hopelessness that may result from too many disappointments or a sense that you are resigned to life and have lost any belief in its ability to be better. These feelings will always tell you something about yourself, do not try and ignore them; only when you have heard their message will they go away.
I don’t believe there are any shortcuts here. If you don’t reconnect with these feelings and see them for what they are, they will continue to haunt your adult life.
Whatever anyone says, I don’t believe you can skip this step either. I, and others survivors I have known, have used a number of harmful mechanisms to “numb out” these feelings when they get too strong. Some adopt a workaholic lifestyle in order to block out the feelings. Others try to “self-medicate” and anaesthetise their pain and strong emotions by using drink and drugs. Stifling anger and rage may simply mean that the victim expresses it as aggressive, anti-social and abusive behaviour.
I’m going to make a recommendation here. I don’t often do that. It’s about therapy. There are therapies and therapists I have known where they encourage their clients to engage in endless reflection. They don’t work! You get mired up in all that pain and it’s the therapist’s job to facilitate your finding a way out. But I’ll make one positive recommendation and that is that an appropriately qualified therapist can be of immense help. Dealing with all these feelings can be very confusing. Often they arise in an untidy and messy way. Often it is difficult to work out where they come from, what they mean and what belongs to where.
So here it is, I would recommend cognitive behavioural therapy (CBT) provided by an appropriately qualified therapist who has an understanding and knowledge of child abuse. I like CBT and find it immensely helpful. CBT maintains that the meanings that one attaches to one’s emotions, no matter how incongruous they might be, are within common sense and are accessible to one’s own cognition and understanding. I agree.
Very simply described, CBT is about discovering emotions, understanding them, their meanings and their context, and discovering where or to what they belong. It acknowledges that emotions and the meanings we attach to them may be sensible or not. It is also non-judgemental.
As the man who developed CBT, Aaron Beck, wrote, “(For the cognitive behavioural therapist)… eliciting a person’s cognitions (meanings) becomes important when we attempt to understand their relationship with incongruous emotional reactions. It is about discovering an individual’s emotions based on that person’s peculiar appraisal of an event or experience.”
What is great about CBT, in my view, is that it is entirely focused on healthy and constructive outcomes, on recovery, and that its administration usually covers relatively short treatment courses and time-scales.
Please note: Psychotherapy and psychotherapists are a matter of personal choice and selection. Should you be in or be considering psychotherapy it is best that you find the therapy most appropriate to your needs and personal situation. The views here represent only the opinions of the author.
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