Active discussions

Meet the Other Phone. A phone that grows with your child.

Meet the Other Phone.
A phone that grows with your child.

Buy now

Please or to access all these features

Talk
AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

Original poster

Why does my childhood trauma feel like it is MY fault and make me so ashamed? Aibu?

37 replies

fuckanxiety · 01/08/2023 16:54

I have a whole mixed bag of trauma, from some difficult life circumstances mashed up with some deliberate cruelty. It just doesn't seem like it was bad enough to have impacted on me but it did and I'm so angry and ashamed of myself?

I have had one abusive relationship and then another not quite abusive but murky relationship. Both a long time ago now. Pleased I got away. Again though I feel so angry at myself for getting involved with those people and for what happened?

I have a good relationship and life now, am great at self care and doing enjoyable things for myself. The problem however is I cannot feel compassion for my small child self and young adult self, I just feel embarrassed I was so pathetic. I am so angry at them (me) for not being clever enough to be somehow better at life back then and now I'm stuck with awful memories of it all Sad

Aibu? Am I just weird and broken? Why can't I emotionally accept things were just a bit shit but they weren't really my fault? I need to stop being angry at my younger self. The anger is corrosive.

OP posts:
Original poster
fuckanxiety · 01/08/2023 18:45

If someone else had gone through the same thing, I would be telling them (and truly believing) that it wasn't their fault and that they were the victim and the only person at fault is the abuser - so I really don't know why I judge myself more harshly than I'd judge anyone else. But I think it is not unusual.

Exactly this, @ManateeFair

Why is it so much harder to do this for ourselves? When as you say, it is easy to feel genuine compassion for others and simply know they weren't at fault?

OP posts:
Whataretalkingabout · 01/08/2023 18:47

Hello OP@fuckanxiety , may I add this bit of advice?
Read about Internal Family Systems, by Dr Richard Schwartz who talks about Parts work and healing the inner child and allowing the true Self to express itself. His system explains we all have multiple personality parts and we can learn to get them to communicate in a healthy manner just like a healthy family. I think this may resonate with you.

FuppingEll · 01/08/2023 18:48

I get what you are saying OP. I had a very abusive childhood and I don't talk about it at all, I think a part of me is afraid people would be like 'well I don't blame them' or wonder if I was defective somehow and that's why my parents couldn't love me. I just go for the shove it all in a box and dont think about it method of coping. I'm sure it's not healthy but it's all I have.

Lucinda7 · 01/08/2023 18:49

JokerAndTheQueen · 01/08/2023 17:39

Because you haven't passed the shame or blame on to the perpetrators. You were a child and the perpetrator made the choice to inflict what ever they did on you. If they were an adult they had s responsibility to look after you not traumatise you. Same with you being a young adult. You were not and are not responsible for their actions. You were a vulnerable adult and they are to blame.

The shame and blame is theirs and you need to pass that on to them and away from yourself. Be kind to yourself as hindsight makes us believe situations could be or should be different but when you are in the moment it is not that easy

Joker has explained it exactly right. I was abused as a child but I must admit I never blamed myself. I was still angry and still get angry with certain triggers. I hope you see for yourself that you were not to blame OP nor were you weak.

scatterolight · 01/08/2023 18:53

Have you seen Good Will Hunting? This clip might speak to you. It's not your fault.

Clarinet1 · 01/08/2023 19:49

I’m not by any stretch of the imagination trained in therapy or counselling but it sounds to me as though your inner “parent” (much like, by the sounds of it, your actual parent) is getting the upper hand over your inner “child”. This may
be something to discuss if you do go into some kind of counselling or therapy.

JokerAndTheQueen · 01/08/2023 20:42

@Chickenkeev I am sorry to hear you were traumatised by someone who should have protected you. The blame and shame still lies with him even in death. You were the victim and it was never for you to "protect yourself". He should have been a better human and a better father. I suspect one of my abusers is dead and the others I will never see but my therapist still helped me shift those feelings. Any time you doubt whether you could have done things different or feel shame change your thought process to shame on him and he was the one to blame never you. He should have been better and he wasn't.

Chickenkeev · 01/08/2023 21:10

JokerAndTheQueen · 01/08/2023 20:42

@Chickenkeev I am sorry to hear you were traumatised by someone who should have protected you. The blame and shame still lies with him even in death. You were the victim and it was never for you to "protect yourself". He should have been a better human and a better father. I suspect one of my abusers is dead and the others I will never see but my therapist still helped me shift those feelings. Any time you doubt whether you could have done things different or feel shame change your thought process to shame on him and he was the one to blame never you. He should have been better and he wasn't.

Thank you so much. I'm shedding a tear here with your very kind words x

Original poster
fuckanxiety · 02/08/2023 18:47

Whataretalkingabout · 01/08/2023 18:47

Hello OP@fuckanxiety , may I add this bit of advice?
Read about Internal Family Systems, by Dr Richard Schwartz who talks about Parts work and healing the inner child and allowing the true Self to express itself. His system explains we all have multiple personality parts and we can learn to get them to communicate in a healthy manner just like a healthy family. I think this may resonate with you.

I've heard of parts work and I like the idea in theory, it makes sense and is very interesting to read about. Unfortunately if I try to think of myself in relation to those ideas it makes me cringe myself inside out! I think that is part of the issue of having embarrassment or shame around trauma.

OP posts:
Original poster
fuckanxiety · 02/08/2023 18:50

FuppingEll · 01/08/2023 18:48

I get what you are saying OP. I had a very abusive childhood and I don't talk about it at all, I think a part of me is afraid people would be like 'well I don't blame them' or wonder if I was defective somehow and that's why my parents couldn't love me. I just go for the shove it all in a box and dont think about it method of coping. I'm sure it's not healthy but it's all I have.

Some of this really chimes with me. I think I do quite well with shoving it in a box and it is only when something really forces me to think about it and it escapes the box then it affects me.

I don't think it is particularly healthy either but in a way if it allows us to function and look after ourselves and others in a healthy way, there is value in that?

OP posts:
New posts on this thread. Refresh page