Taking it out on your body - exploring possible roots

[womanformallyknownaswoman]

This post emerges from a conversation started on another thread about the possible links between various conditions involving hurting one’s body, that I have called collectively “taking it out on your body”.

I thought a useful backdrop to this discussion is this:

The essence of radical feminism is the highlighting of the subjugation and marginalisation of women, by frequently consigning them to roles defined by men. This can mirror enslavement. This socialisation of women starts very early - I would contend in utero. It can certainly start early in the family and is fostered at societal and cultural levels and now is very heavily fuelled by social media.

These remarks are taken from Sheila Jeffreys at the recent Inconvenient Women WNTT event:

It is on the basis of sex that women are oppressed and on that basis that women rights are founded. It is in international law that sex is the basis of the granting of women’s rights.
..

The idea of gender arises from the oppression of women and cannot exist without it. Gender comprises behaviour and appearance norms required of men and women. Femininity is one half of gender and is the enforced behaviour of the oppressed, that is women. It includes humiliating clothing norms such as high heels, decoration, body exposure, body covering as well as the restriction of body movement, for example not taking up much space and so on.

It is based on the notion that women’s brains are somehow different from those of men, in ways that make them suited to such behaviour, make them rightfully subordinate and suited for doing the housework

The sparking comment on the other thread was this one:

user1499173618 Thu 14-Jun-18 08:43:48
BowlofBabelFish - the common thread between anorexia, bulimia, self-harm, trichotillomania, nail biting, gender dysphori (and, perhaps,tattooing, piercing) etc is deep-seated failure of recognition and denial of emotions. Human emotions are very real things but the gaslighting by society at large of human need and emotion causes immense confusion that results in people turning on themselves when they are not equipped to deal with the onslaught from the world at large.

To which I responded:

Emotional and psychological abuse targeting women, at family and societal level and now pervasive on SM, denies, discounts and coerces women away from their rightful autonomy and freedom of thought and being. This abuse can be somaticised by many women into blaming themselves, as the only tolerable, psychological alternative at an early age. This can lead to various manifestations of self harm and/ or taking it out on one's body. That is not women's fault but the environment they were raised in, where abuse is normalised and they are scapegoated.

From that point it was decided to start a separate thread.

The mental health industry has a dreadful history of victim blaming. In the 1960s my mother worked at the luxury Swiss psychiatric clinic that had had Zelda Fitzgerald as an inpatient. It was full of the “undesirable” (homosexual, drug addicted, hysterical etc) members of super rich families. A sort of internment of scapegoats.

I don't subscribe to many of the labels given to abused women eg borderline, which would fit under Cluster B - I think the recommendation nowadays has moved away from that label.

I use Cluster B as it rightly should be used, to describe male abusers - from NPD to psychopathic. Most abusers never get a diagnosis and the legal system would further excuse their behaviour if they did, as they could claim to not be mentally fit to stand trial etc

So if I use it, it's to describe a particular category of aggressive abusers who set out to not just harm but destroy women and children.

I recall the poster you mentioned - they seemed to target AAK. I felt sad if the complainer felt the borderline label defined them. It probably helps gets scarce help, as many labels do. I personally find it hard to understand how any abused woman can be diagnosed as a cluster B - it doesn't make sense, to me

Thank you woman and Beyond

By shit, I mean that they are not really healthy for me, I’m not passing too much judgement on them.

You are right that being alive and able to string a sentence together means they are working, that is a more positive way of looking at it, thank you

The problem is the assumption that the problem always lies in brain chemistry or emotional resilience rather than examining whether material conditions are objectively intolerable

Yes there isn't a diagnosis for "fucked over by family and the system repeatedly"

or "I'm doing my best stop but you keep taking my legs out from underneath me and thus fucking me over"

to all

or "stop this fucking groundhog day - I wanna get off."

I'm on a roll now....

Women are clearly expected to cope with the uncopable. Full time job in line with education , husband, children, housework, cooking, everyone healthy, happy and developing Fully in line with their potential? Woman, if you aren’t making all of that happen you aren’t coping as you should!

The body keeps the score by Bessel Van Der Kolk is good. I often think, though it is focussing on the link between the body and trauma in treatment it is also interesting in relation to why people in distress frequently seek to damage the body.

A sort of internment of scapegoats.

What an awesome description - sad but descriptive

It feels like my life has become that - except the fences and guards of my internment camp are invisible

Women are clearly expected to cope with the uncopable. Full time job in line with education , husband, children, housework, cooking, everyone healthy, happy and developing Fully in line with their potential? Woman, if you aren’t making all of that happen you aren’t coping as you should!

That's the catch 22 all right - set unreasonable expectations, keep em so busy they haven't got time to think about themselves and when they stop from exhaustion, replace them and throw them away

I've gotta go - be back later alligators - so much wisdom on this thread - awesome to experience :)

Indeed, woman. I know far too many women in mid-life who are shattered and running on empty from trying to meet other people’s expectations for so long and who are then criticized for “letting themselves go”, abandoned by their husbands, impecunious and only with one another to socialise. They “overcoped”, they were good girls who didn’t rebel or let others down.

That book sounds great Offred, I will look for that.

My house is often a shit tip and it feels like a barometer of how well I am coping. But actually, in order to cope, I don’t do housework. So my messy house is about coping, not not coping, if that makes sense

To everyone that’s coped with this.
I think the link with intolerable conditions is really important to talk about.

It’s a relatively minor thing in comparison but I left teaching some years ago due to the way I and others were treated. It was like being in an abusive relationship - there was gaslighting, nothing was ever good enough, pushing the blame onto me ‘if you only did this, I wouldn’t have to...’, systematic destruction of self-esteem and feeling of competence. It was vicious and in many cases, malicious. The worst was feeling that there was no-one to turn to as it was the person in a position of power doing this. I watched it destroy other teachers before it turned on me.

The desire to ‘medicate’ those feelings away was very strong. To me, it seems that alcohol is also a socially acceptable way to self-harm. The temptation to drink to ‘drown my sorrows’ was very strong.

Yes to alcohol.

Over exercising, orthorexia

I have NC for this.

I have no idea how this thread came about but I am all up for it. I have spent the last 7-10 years trying to explore my reasons behind my issues and have made some headway. I will try to explain.

I am almost 40 years old. Since 14 years old I have struggled with sex, drug and limerance issues. I am heavily tattooed and 4 stone over weight. I have been diagnosed bipolar and also have PTSD. I am unable to stick to routines for more than 4-6 weeks and self sabbotage massively. I struggled to make serious long term healthy relationships until I met my husband. Despite him being awesome in every way, I had several flings during a break down triggered by the revisiting of childhood sexual abuse. We patched things up and now I focus on being as healthy in my mind as I can.

What do I think has led to all of this? I have been exploring this with my therapists and by writing for the last 7 years.

I was born to a single mum, one of my first memories was her telling me that as a baby i did not have a bed. I slept in a drawer. Thats fine, poverty is not a crime. But by the time I was 4 I knew that my dad was not just my dad. I was the product of a very messy affair and my step brothers resented me massively. My parents were not any good at providing consistency, They were often drunk of a night but we always had food on the table etc.

I was raised to believe that admitting you are wrong is to admit a mistake, and that is unacceptable. Affection that was free flowing one day was withdrawn the next and my mother could not take responsibility for anything. she still can't. My father told me was proud of my just once, when I was 19. He was very very sporadic in his affection and I have just 3-4 happy memories with him in it. My grand parents raised us through the summer holidays, that is our happy times.

As a teenager I babysat for a friend of the family. I woke up in bed in the morning to find the dad had climbed in behind me, put a hand over my mouth and focred himself on me. This happened repeatedly. After a while i told my parents, they refused to believe me. Even blamed me.

I went crazy, drink drugs. ended up in a horrible relationship where I was beaten black and blue. He went to prison. I started trying to rebuild my life and met my husband the first week in uni. I treated him awful. in hindsight i was trying to push him away before he got chance to leave me but he stuck to me like glue and helped me to deal with it all. I put it in a box and tried to heal. In my late twenties the girl I baby sat for found me. The family friend was in prison, convicted of raping her daily from age 7-17. My life collapsed, but I rebuilt it.

Now. I smoke socially and I drink a lot. Not as much as I used too as I find the more I learn, the better I deal with it and the nicer I am to myself. If I know I have an important meeting or deadline on say, Tuesday AM I get steaming pissed on the Monday and screw my chances before I even get started.

I over eat while thinking about how nice it would be to be slim and not all aches and pains.....then have another cake and tell myself that it doesn't matter. BUT I have kicked my cocaine addiction and while i still have an addictive personality it is only a damage to my own pocket.

I drive too fast despite knowing the risks AND one of my biggest fears is having a crash.

I am desperate to get a mortgage but am chronically unable to save and waste 400-600 a month on total shit.

I get tattoos as I like them, but it is also a test of physical endurance. It puts me in control as I can stop it any time and end the pain but instead I choose to keep going and feel bulletproof at the end. I get an adrenalin rush, get horny as hell and is probably the only time I actively want sex these days.

I was incredibly promiscuous when I was younger, full blown sex addict. But sex means absolutely nothing too me. It's like shaking hands or making small talk at the bar while you are waiting to get served. In hindsight, this was because i was desperate to make a connection but did not know how as my emotions were fucked up and locked away in a box so I could survive. I am cured of this now but did lapse briefly when the abuse resurfaced.

I am doing better now as I own ALL my behaviour. I apologise freely if it is due but it took me 30 years to learn. I do not blame shift if I have made a mistake. I practice self soothing instead of relying on drugs and promiscuity to give me a boost. I can vocalise my feelings and am not scared to say no even if my family are in my head telling me I am rude and impolite. I say exactly what is on my mind.

My circle is small, but amazing.

Come to think of it, overeating.

We are hardly ever taught to listen to our bodies’ responses and fully feel our emotions. It took me years to understand what I needed to do to fully enjoy having sex (sorry if TMI) and that was when I was recovering from anorexia and spending most of my waking hours analyzing my feelings.

Women are clearly expected to cope with the uncopable. Full time job in line with education , husband, children, housework, cooking, everyone healthy, happy and developing Fully in line with their potential? Woman, if you aren’t making all of that happen you aren’t coping as you should!

Yes to this. Definitely.

X post
fatwa, so much of that resonates

Welcome, fatwa.

fatwatastic ♥️

I agree with this. I'm autistic and the daughter of an emotionally abusive, addict parent. My early teen years were characterised by self-hatred and self-harm. Constantly told that I needed to 'toughen up' and 'fit in' by people on the outside, and much, much worse by my parent.

Of course I blamed myself for everything. I also didn't recognise most of my emotions. Up until my mid-20s I was adamant that I had never experienced anger - I had plenty to be angry about, but I turned it all inward. And as a young teenager I was very aware of gendered socialisation, in a very black-and-white way. I could be a valuable little girl by being clever. A valuable woman was a sex object - which I wasn't, but I tried to be, and felt inadequate for it.

I'm so glad I discovered radical feminism at 15. It didn't make everything better, but it showed me that the values that had been pushed on me weren't the only one's possible.