I am currently reading the book Dragonfly in Amber, which is book #2 in Diana Gabaldon’s Outlander series. I wonder if the author is a fellow child abuse survivor because her books weave in some great advice for healing from trauma. I was struck by the wisdom of the following passage from Dragonfly in Amber:
Still, if I couldn’t do much for Rabbie, I could help his mother—or let her help herself, at least. Healing comes from the healed; not from the physician. That much, Raymond had taught me. ~ Dragonfly in Amber page 544.
There is so much truth in the line, “Healing comes from the healed; not from the physician.” I think this explains why two people with similar histories can wind up in therapy for different lengths of time. One person might work very hard in therapy and be ready to exit therapy after a year or two while another person might have been in therapy for seven years and still not really have scratched the surface. I think that the difference is not the therapist but the patient!
I am not making this observation out of judgment but out of empowerment. When we, as the wounded, have the power to choose to heal ourselves, the rate and depth of healing is completely within our own control. This is a concept I find very exciting!
Of course, a therapist can help you along the process of healing yourself or hinder the process. I was fortunate to have a therapist who never sought for me to be dependent upon him, and he pushed me toward independence at every step. He only let me see him weekly for six months and then strongly encouraged me to try to go two weeks between sessions as he weaned me toward independence. He explained that the real healing work was happening between the sessions. It was his job to guide and validate, but the work of healing was mine to do, not his.
I have learned along my healing journey that healing is a natural process with its own direction and rhythm. I don’t need to read a book or be tutored through how to heal any more than my skin needs a book or a tutor to heal itself. The process of emotional healing is built into who I am, and I naturally heal as I release myself into the flow of that process.
I don’t mean to discount the value of books (or blogs!) in the healing process. I found healing books to be very validating, which is why I added a Recommended Reading page to this site. However, I had no resources for integrating my host personality into my core, which was a huge leap in healing that happened on its own initiative with no instructions provided from any source.
I continue to work my way through the healing process, healing parts of myself that I have not read about how to heal. I am working on a book (in the very early stages) about what has worked for me, which I hope will be useful to others. However, the real answers are inside of you. The healing process runs its own course, and you are the one who chooses to heal yourself.
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Hey Faith,
With you on that it really the individual that does the work and in a real way all a therapist can be is someone who knows it is happening as best they can.
It is very lonely work.
I disagree that I the rate and depth of healing was completely within my control. If that was true I would have done it long ago. That did not happen until someone accepted that the type of trauma I experienced did exist in the world and that DID was part of there professional understanding. It took me 7 years to find such a person and I worked so very hard at it. Note: Do not call a therapist and say you were abused by cults and the CIA was involved if you are a 200lb male. You will be given a shot post haste.
I am not a professional therapy client. I told my therapist that today again. I get angry at the “pros” who do not heal as they do not do the work.
I do not do any reading of books on trauma. I did not really know this until right now. You see all of us do not read so to do so would leave out some of us.
Although processing trauma is intense expressive therapy is more so and I could not do that alone. I need to be with someone. Again they did not do the work it was that someone was there with me or I could show it to them.
There is no way to say that anyone has similar trauma. I do not think that there is a way to compare one persons trauma to another.
I feel you are being judgmental.
Hi, Michael.
I apologize if my blog entry came across as being judgmental. I did not mean it to be. My point was that we are the ones who heal ourselves (versus the therapist or whoever else being the one who has the power to “heal us”), which I personally find to be empowering.
– Faith
Hey, Michael.
I don’t know anything about expressive therapy. Can you share more?
– Faith
Tall order.
I think it is very very personal. For me it is not my art. As an example if I do a painting that is expressive and I even wonder if I can paint anything but a self portrait. That is not expressive therapy for me.
It is not a craft. I am taking a Glass Class and that is a craft.
Your writing here is expressive therapy. Perhaps think of what it would be like to write only to yourself and no one commented then it would not be expressive therapy rather a journal.
For me I need to do it with my therapist. It is much without words. I am totally self directed. It does not work for me to have someone give an instruction. That is art therapy and my intellect just takes over. That is not what I need.
My therapist had all sorts of things like puppets and a sand tray. Pretty much in the context of my relationship with my therapist it just happens. For me there has to be a very special relationship.
I do many things on my own. It is known that we will take them to therapy and they will be shown.
I would suggest that if you wanted to try it and do recommend it you should find a expressive therapist.
I tried to do it on my own with a inner child book. It was to intense for me. This was before any of the memories came into my consciousness.
In a way expressive work gives me relief and psychoanalysis gives me understanding.
If I am not mistaken you once described hitting a pillow that is expressive therapy.
I can do a lot with a box of 8 crayons and a piece of paper. Just happens. It is well not art.
Hope this helps and does not more confuse.
That did help. Thanks! :0)
– Faith
I feel that processing trauma requires another person to be with me on the journey, although not necessarily with me physically in the moment. I agree that it is the individual who does the work and the therapist is a guide and source of support and validation.
I think I have been in both camps, but I’m with Michael in disagreeing that the rate and depth of healing was completely within my control. I have had therapists in the past who were not experienced enough to help me and although I worked as hard as I could, without a competent guide, I just didn’t know how to effectively direct that energy. I’ve also had times when I really just wanted the therapist to do the work for me. Now I am fortunate to have a competent guide who has pushed me into realising that I will only heal when *I* do the work, which I’m now doing.
I do like the idea that healing is a natural process and I agree that there is some of that going on in my life, however, I think we need to be very actively working with a good therapist, to really get the pace going. I also think that we need to heal to a certain degree in the natural way before we are able to choose to actively heal.
Dawn
Hi, Dawn.
I did not always feel like I controlled my pace, either, but mine was from the other direction. My therapist described my first six months of therapy as a runaway freight train that blew through two years of therapy in six months. He kept telling me to “slow down,” but I simply could not. I cannot honestly say if this was by choice or not. On the one hand, the pace of my healing felt very much like it was running on its own momentum. On the other hand, I do remember thinking that if I was going to do this, then I was going to do it and get it over with.
I would not recommend the level of intensity in healing work I did in the first six months because it was physically and emotionally grueling. Also, I don’t think someone could hold down a job and do what I did. (I was a stay-at-home mom of a three-year-old who still napped and slept 10+ hours a night, which gave me time to “fall apart” for several hours a day.) I do think that there are outside factors, such as having to hold down a full-time job, other commitments, etc., that do influence the amount of time that someone has to focus upon healing, and that is going to affect the pace.
I really did not mean for this blog entry to be a judgment about people’s rates of healing. The point I wanted to make was that we are ultimately the ones who heal ourselves, which I find to be incredibly empowering. I do not want to have to rely on another person to “heal me.” I like knowing that I have the power to make it happen.
– Faith
Hi Faith,
Right now I’m in a place that allows me to see (re: your original writing up top) what you meant about empowerment and that we really must do the work ourselves as no-one can do it for us. At the same time, I can see how I would have taken it differently had I read the same thing in the past, even only a few months ago.
I’m glad that several readers have felt brave enough to tell you that your words seemed judgemental and that you are able to take that feedback and turn it into better writing for yourself, and your readers. Good on you!
I do find aspects of your healing experience to be vastly different from my own, and other aspects to be very similar. While everyone’s journey is going to be different, I think your process stands out as being rather fast / efficient. This may put you in an especially tricky situation when writing about how it’s done, as others may tend to judge their own process in relation to yours, even without you being judgemental. Just my thoughts; hoping an outside perspective might be useful 🙂
Take care,
Dawn
Thanks, Dawn.
I can only speak from my own experiences, and I can see where those that are unique to me or different from the norm could be an issue if others expect to heal in the exact same way. Thank you for that perspective. :0)
– Faith
Hello, this is my first time to your blog. My thought about the length of treatment being so fast for you, I wonder if it was because you mentioned that your therapist only “let” you see him once a week fir the first six months and then less so after. Gosh, I would have felt rushed or a sense that if I needed more he would not be available. In my head I would think that if I needed more I was somehow a lose, a therapy failure. It sounds like this was not so for you, but that was my initial reaction.
T
Hi, T.
My therapist was very in tune with what I needed. I never felt like he was not there for me. I do believe that different people heal at different paces and that you need to follow what is right for you. :0)
– Faith
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Hi, I feel so amazed by you. you have achieved so much in such a short period of time.
I feel that there is something I’m missing from the healing journey. My situation is not as serious as yours (Physical Abuse and subsequent rapes in adult hood). I find I’m one step forward and 2 back. I have a lot of problems trusting my judgement and am very unsure if I’m on the right path at all (i’m in therapy about a year). I am trying to be as honest as I can but I feel I’m not making progress at times. Have you any suggestions about how I can hasten my progress? Its only lately I have begun to look at my home situation, I started initially due to huge relationship problems and the rapes. I difficulty trusting others. I find it hard to look at my family and sometimes feel very guilty for talking badly of them. I also find it difficult to not blame myself and I just see my faults. On one hand I regonise years of beatings are a terrible thing but then I feel a lot of guilt when I start to bring it up. And also my trust in my self is low which means I wish I could get more direction at times about what to do or how to do it. How do I know I’m on a right path at all? I’m sorry to leave such a confusing message but you seem to have so much clarity and I feel very lost at times. any advice about how to help my progess along would be greatly appreciated.
Hi, Marie.
Please do not compare my abuse history to your own. ANY abuse is a horrible thing to endure. Enduring physical abuse and subsequent rapes sounds horrendous to me and deserves just as much recognition for being traumatizing as my own experiences.
I, too, feel like I am constantly moving forward and back, forward and back, forward and back. Then, something will happen that causes me to recognize just how far I have come. That is typically followed by more “back-sliding” that makes me feel like I haven’t made any progress at all. This is all part of the healing journey.
I am taking another stab at this blog topic on Monday in a way that I hope better conveys what I wanted to say without triggering some of my readers. (I feel really badly about having triggered people — I have received emails in addition to the comments posted here.) I do believe that the healing process is a natural one with its own rhythm but that our abusers’ lies cloud our ability to “see” or tap into it. Reading books on healing and blogs, talking with a therapist and fellow child abuse survivors, etc., helps us to begin dismantling the lies that stand in the way of “seeing” this natural rhythm.
The best advice I can give you is the big picture — Healing from child abuse is as “simple” as loving and accepting yourself, your history, and your reactions as “me.” It really is that simple, but “simple” is far from “easy.” The more open you are to believing your memories, voicing your emotions, and accepting yourself as you are, the sooner you will be able to “see” the natural healing process that each of us has inside of ourselves.
The more you “fight” yourself, the harder the healing becomes because your efforts are fighting the natural flow of healing. It is scary to let go and trust that experiencing flashbacks and feeling like crap is all part of the natural healing process, which makes it a “good” thing because it feels anything but “good.”
If you are looking for book resources, the Survivor to Thriver manual is an excellent resource that guides you through the healing process. It is applicable to all forms of child abuse. I have provided a link on the “Recommended Reading” page.
– Faith
Faith,
I like it when your posts create this kind of discussion…it really helps me to introspect and come to a better understanding of what it is that I think or believe. As a victim I was never allowed to have my own thoughts and opinions so now I am working hard on understanding what I really feel about things.
Anyway, thanks for the topics you bring up and thanks to your readers for expressing their thoughts….it all helps me a great deal.
barbi
Thanks, Barbi.
I think it is the Survivor the Thriver manual that makes the point that you know you are progressing in your healing when you disagree with your therapist. I think this applies to disagreeing with anyone on what you need to do to heal, whether it is me, a healing book, another blogger, your therapist, or whomever.
Believing in yourself enough to disagree with an “authority” on healing shows that you are tapping into your own healing process and that you know better than anyone else what you need to do to heal. I think it is great that people feel comfortable enough in their own healing journeys to disagree with me. :0) I am also glad that people take the time to disagree rather than just disappear for posting something that was upsetting to them. I would rather talk it through and get the feedback.
I actually feel badly about this one, though, because it appears that I triggered several readers who reacted as if I were judging their healing process and setting a “deadline” for healing, which was never my intent. I have taken another shot at this for Monday. Let’s hope I do a better job at conveying what I wanted to say without triggering people!
– Faith
Faith, I feel like I know you well enough to understand that you were not trying to criticize anyone with your post. You know, I think that people and their needs are all so different in some ways. A therapist who took pains to make sure I was not dependent on him or her would not work for me. I was born into the trauma and didn’t have even a small base of safety inside before the abuse started because it started immediately. It was never able to internalize any safe comfort and so I lived dissociated. A therapist who wanted me to be too independent would only end up making me feel retraumatized since I did not get the safe care and support I needed even as an infant. I need a lot of emotional support to face anything. And it is so tricky trying to get it from the husband because we have a sexual relationship. I absolutely NEED my therapist to let me depend on him sometimes. (I met a girl last night. She told me she lives in a peach colored room that the others built for her to keep her safe because they love her. There is no door in the room and the windows are very small so no outsiders can crawl through and hurt her. I don’t know who she is exactly, or how old, but she is very young. She said the others hid her because we would all die if she died. I have a vague recollection of the building of this room. I know it has white carpet and lots of soft and fluffy white bedding and that no one can get in. Except I think I remember going there before. I’m confused. I’m too afraid to tell anyone or post this on my own blog, so I will leave it here because I think you might understand.)
E.H.
Hi, E.H.
Thank you for your kind words. :0)
Yes, I do understand, and I will build a blog around your peach-colored room. I do something similar myself, and I am not sure that I have blogged out it yet.
– Faith
[…] 11, 2010 by faithallen On Friday, I published a blog entry entitled We are the Ones Who Heal Ourselves, which some readers apparently received in a different way than I intended. Please know that I […]
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[…] this phase of healing over the weekend, which is when I was receiving all of the comments to Friday’s blog entry in which some of my readers felt “judged” by my words. It hurts me to know that I have hurt […]
New here, found you while googling left/right brain healing stuff.
I want to say, I agree with this quote and your ideas about it (I haven’t seen the book you’re referring to): “You know you are progressing in your healing when you disagree with your therapist. I think this applies to disagreeing with anyone on what you need to do to heal, whether it is me, a healing book, another blogger, your therapist, or whomever.
Believing in yourself enough to disagree with an “authority” on healing shows that you are tapping into your own healing process and that you know better than anyone else what you need to do to heal.”
Yes! I asked a friend for help a couple of days ago, and he asked me what I needed. When I told him, he started to say that I didn’t really need that. I interrupted him and said, “T, you can tell me you don’t want to give me what I’m asking for, but you *don’t* get to tell me what I *need*.” Which stopped him, and he laughed (maybe a little uncomfortably – definitely some kind of authority/power issue going on there). So yes, my own experience mirrors what you’re saying, as that very recent example shows. Yay for standing up to authority, wherever it comes from!
And I’m so glad to find ‘validation’ of this idea – part of learning to trust one’s instincts comes from external validation, I think. So it’s tricky – learning to trust our gut enough to know which is validation and which is something you need to ignore or stand up against. I think of it as my internal yes/no compass, kind of like one of those old-fashioned ouija boards, but hopefully more reliable 🙂
Hi, new here, found you while googling for right/left brain healing ideas.
Your comment about ‘you know you’re healing when you start to disagree with your therapist’ really rings true for me, though I don’t actually use therapists – in my case, it’s a friend (or, multiple friends over the course of many years.)
In fact I just had that kind of exchange with a friend I’d asked for help the other day, to get me through a bad patch where I don’t have anybody to talk to. We talked for a while, and he asked me what I needed. When I told him, he started to say, “You don’t need that! What you need is blahblahblah.” I interrupted him and said, “T, if you don’t want to give me what I’m asking for, then say so. But you DON’T get to tell me what I need.” He laughed, a bit uncomfortably, but agreed to do what I asked him. So we’ll see if he follows through!
I also want to say, I think that *validation* is particularly important in getting one to the point where one can *trust* one’s own instincts (sorry for all the ‘one’s! Trying to use neutral language.) So it’s kind of a balancing act to be able to stand up to ‘authority’ figures – you have to challenge them, and they have to actually *give* a little before you can feel the strength that comes from having ‘won’ such a contest. I think what I’m trying to say is, it *doesn’t* just come from inside us, magically – it actually comes from a cumulative amount of experience with people actually *supporting* us in one way or another. Which we don’t always recognize – sometimes we get a ‘lift up’ from something that we aren’t consciously aware of. So to a degree it’s luck. And getting *aware* of what things are actually helping you and which ones are hindering can be kind of tricky. It’s not always the way we think it is! Fundamental Attribution Error, I’ve heard it called – the tendency of humans to take credit for things we didn’t do and to also blame ourselves for things we had no control over.
Sorry for double-posting and redundancy – thought the first one just disappeared into the ether, so tried to re-write it. Oops.
Hi, Grasshopper.
Welcome to my blog! :0)
New posts go to a moderator’s queue, which is why you did not see it until I approved it. :0)
– Faith
[…] 25, 2010 by faithallen On my blog entry entitled We are the Ones Who Heal Ourselves, a reader shared in the comments about expressive therapy. I confess that I knew very little about […]
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