[quote SlipperTripper]@BloodinGutters, thank you for sharing. You genuinely have no idea how much your posts have meant.
I've read them a little shakily, you're absolutely right, thank god, that women like your mother are very few and far between. However we are due in court in not long at all (won't say exactly when, may be a bit outing!) to hear the sentencing of my DSDs mother and her partner, who has put them through a very experience to yours.
Everything you said about your mother, from the cult-like following, to the pristine house, good job (with children!) and power trip over people has rung true about theirs, you could have been talking about her, and I'm sat here crying into my tea wondering what the fuck is wrong with people.
Reading your words has given me some hope though. I look at my girls and my heart breaks, they are so emotionally upside down and some days it's hard to see how they'll every find a way though it. I worry constantly for their futures, and how this will impact them as they grow up, but I am so desperate for them to be able to realise that it was NEVER their fault, and that not everyone in the world is out to hurt them. It's just so hard to convince them of that at the moment.
I'm not quite sure how to say this without sounding like a total weirdo (sorry!), but you sound like you are LIVING despite what happened to you, rather than simply existing as they are at the moment, with a normal life and a lovely DH. That's all I am dreaming of for them and the thought that it could be in their futures is amazing. Counsellors, police and social service never really focus far beyond the end of a crisis point, as a parent I want to know what happens next!
Genuinely, thank you, and I'm so sorry x[/quote]
I’m sorry they’ve gone through that.
I don’t know if I have any real answers. I had a lot of therapy. Initial stuff wasn’t much help but private therapist I found as adult helped. Checking qualifications/background/phd dissertation of his helped me realise he was right for me.
I read bucketloads. Alice Miller, Jennifer Freyd and others. Spent a lot of time reading online and using online survivor forums and rl survivor groups at one point. That isn’t without risk either through and it’s something that worked as an adult when I could evaluate what felt right to me.
I never really got saved from it all, my own reckless behaviour as a teen, after the csa stopped once I hit puberty, meant I was taken away from her. But never told anyone the truth then.
I think I realised quite young it was her that was wrong not me, but I’m not really sure how I did that.
I think often social services and so on take the approach of not demonising parents in any way. I’m inclined to think that’s not helpful, that kids need to hear this was entirely wrong and that they parents who do this have no redeeming features. It can be hard to reconcile the memories of when they seemed nice and loving and normal to what I knew was true. But it’s a lot like how men who abuse their partners will sometimes act loving-it’s all just part of their game to control the women, to gas light them, to keep them victims. But they need to hear this was always part of the abuse and control and I’m inclined to think kids need to hear the same, or for those who hold onto an idealised version of abusers they need gentle support to feel safe enough to come to that realisation themselves.
I think Jennifer Freyds betrayal trauma theory is worth reading to understand how kids have to put aside what they know to be true to maintain their bond with their primary attachment figure as survival mechanism. Because after we’re safe that survival mechanism can be the thing that gets in the way of healing. The reality of the science behind why we forgot and remember later is interesting also, although it’s never been my experience, I always remembered more than enough and what I forgot of the extremes I have never remembered. But the process of putting it aside to keep the primary attachment as a survival mechanism necessary to humans can be really helpful as that doesn’t just disappear after and that mechanism is what gets in the way of moving forward often I think. Jennifer Freyd is the woman who came up with DARVO btw.
Also, I am living. I felt like I was drowning in the ptsd for a long time afterwards. And it doesn’t always feel like I manage it well, I guess I’ve mucked up plenty from the outside, and there’s still things I don’t manage well that others take for granted. But definitely not just surviving, definitely living.
I wish you and your girls the same xxx