hi suzi, angel, smithfield and AN. I'm glad you are reading Alice Miller.
Smithfield, i can relate to you feeling upset by what AM writes and that you feel you are damaging your DC's. I felt exactly the same and also felt panicky about it. But i got through it. If you read everything AM says, it will actually make you feel better. She says that even if some damage is done to your DC's, it's effects can pretty much be eradicated, once you realise the truth about yourself and your own childhood. Because once you are consciously aware of how your own parents hurt you, you simply cannot repeat the pattern with your own children. It is only parents who have no awareness of the damage done to them in childhood who go on to repeat the same patterns with their own children. So just by the very fact you are on this thread means you will do very little damage to your DC's. Also you and i and everyone here have suffered a whole childhood and indeed adulthood of damage at the hands of our parents. Whereas, whilst i know i have done some damage to DD before i became self aware as i am now, she will not have to endure a lifetime of it as, like i have already said my relationship with her has improved so dramatically that i know i am already minimising the effect of any damage already done to her. I hope this makes sense to you, it's quite hard to explain.
suzi, i'm glad you mailed Alice, I have spent hours reading through the readers' mail section on her website and find it really interesting and helpful, in a way it's kind of like this thread, with real life people and stories.
AN, i totally agree with your interpretation of AM and think you're spot on. I cut myself off from my parents and sisters over 2 years ago (although i am now back in contact with my sisters) and i said in one of my posts a while ago that whilst it felt painful to know i had no family anymore, in fact all that had happened was my 'external reality' now matched the 'internal reality' i had always had in my head. ie now from the outside it looked like i had no family, but inside my head i had always felt alone and like i had no family for as long as i could remember.
I wrote a long post yesterday but it disappeared in a puff of smoke when i tried to send it, and i wish i had the energy to rewrite it, but it's just too hard.