As I write this, I am on DAY 6 of feeling triggered thanks to my b@#$% mother/abuser’s unwanted contact by letter TWICE last week. FOR SIX DAYS, I have had a major headache, have felt anxious and out of control, and have been really irritable. Then, I feel so exhausted that I long for sleep, only to suffer from nightmares, including rapes and such. My heart is constantly racing. I am popping Xanax like M&M’s. I cannot focus on the work that I need to be doing in preparation for starting teaching NEXT WEEK. It’s all because of my stupid, f@#$king, self-centered b@#$% of a “mother” who is apparently incapable of following very basic instructions like, “Get the f@#$ out of my life!!!” Apparently even wording that forceful is too subtle for the idiot.
I hate it! And I hate her! I hate that after spending numerous hours and thousands of dollars on therapy, she still has this power over me. I have written tens of thousands of words on healing from child abuse. I have read thousands of pages on how to heal. And then, this stupid cow of a woman who devastated my entire childhood continues to have the power with one (or two) stupid cards to blow up my world again. It’s not fair! Where is the justice in that?
The fact that this idiot could procreate (something that, ironically, has been denied to me – oh, the ironies of life) does not entitle her to torture me for the rest of my life. I have moved hundreds of miles away. I have told her to go away many, many, many times. I have been very clear that I do not want to hear from her. My sister has been very clear to her that I don’t want to hear from her. And yet, none of that matters. How I feel – how she rips me to shreds inside by the simple act of sending a letter – is irrelevant to her. It doesn’t matter. I don’t matter. I am not even a person to her. I am extension of herself the she can use to “get off,” “buy” friends, and torture in any way she sees fit.
I have tried to view her as pathetic and weak, but she is just plain evil. She is an evil b@#$% who is apparently never going to leave me the hell alone until she is dead. To quote my husband, she will probably outlive us all, dying the day after I do.
I don’t know how to pull out of this intense triggering. Nothing is working – not exercise, yoga, talking about it, not talking about it, sleeping, waking, praying, or crying. I am hoping that writing about it will be cathartic.
Sorry not to be an inspiration today. I just want the b@#$% to drop dead and leave me the hell alone. Please … tell me … is there any part of what I just said that is unclear? I do know how to write, so the problem cannot possibly be my inability to express myself. Perhaps I should send this blog entry to her. Think that would penetrate her thick skull??
Remember when I sent her the message saying “Back the f@#$ off?” (Trust me – I did not filter that message.) I wrote about it here. That was in 2009. And still she continues to contact me. WTF??????
Photo credit: Lynda Bernhardt
Instead of opening her letters or cards, can you either file them in the garbage can or mark them Return to Sender or even Wrong Address and put them back in the mail to her. You don’t have to read them. Can you have your husband intercept the mail and not let you even know about them? Losing your peace of mind isn’t worth it. I can hear your hurt and anger. I want to take you in my arms and hug you and tell you it will be better in the morning but realistically I know that isn’t always possible. Sending prayers and healing light your way.
She is an abusive person, and so basically doesn’t think beyond her needs/ wants whims. She is pathetic.The only think I can say that once you find your way out of this, each
time she trys to invade your life she will have less and less effect. you are strong and powerful. She is weak and pathetic. It will work out. All the best.
I say rage on… It’s healthy anger and a vehicle to release some awful pain. I like the idea of not reading the letters but given the strong trauma bond that is complicated. you ate doing everything you can. The responsibility and culpability is hers, even if in her blind selfishness she does not accept it. Unfortuneately the burden us on you constantly to shove that responsibility right back where it belongs, exhausting as it may be. You’re doing the hard work and I admire you.
Faith, I relate so strongly to you. Even though my primary abuser was my ex and not a parent, what you are experiencing is so similar to what I endured. Even though he and I had been divorced since 1995 (after 20 years of “marriage”), except for the five years he was in prison, he continued to call me and leave messages on my Call Notes up until the day he died on March 11 of this year. This man was a monster — pedophile, violent, alcohol and drug abuser, you name it: really just a high-functioning psychopath. It took me days to get back to normal after one of his calls. The only thing that helped me was to talk about it and sometimes there was a friend to talk to and sometimes not. I often just had to wait it out, like a virus passing through my body. I think exercise, doing something constructive, talking it out, all these helped, but at least for me, just the passing of time helped most.
***hugs*** for you and please know these awful feelings will die back down, and you WILL be able to get back on track.
Just one thing: Have you ever considered getting a restraining order on her? If you did, then if she called, you could record it and she’d face the possibility of arrest.
What a nightmare.
I really don’t know if some people are incapable of seeing anyone outside of themselves or not. I am past the point of trying to figure that out. I go with they do not with me and that is what I work with.
Michael
I’m so sorry Faith. My heart aches for you. I can’t imagine what you are dealing with being forced to have this evil person in your life. I guess I’m lucky that way. My first abuser abandoned me, and I’ve never heard/seen from him since. My other abuser is dead. I don’t think I would be able to handle unwanted contact anymore.
I send my strongest healing thoughts to you. I pray you start feeling better soon.
I understand why you would be so angry with your mother. I would too.
However, what is coming to my mind is that perhaps in addtion to being angry with her, that you may be angry with yourself being so triggered. This may not make sense to you, but I did think of it and felt propelled to put it out here.
I hope you can find a way to soothe your self. Love is the opposite of hate. Be kind to you, if you can.
The rage is good. It is probably the best thing you can do for yourself right now. I get all confused about how to respond in a meaningful way about the situation when you’ve said she doesn’t remember the abuse. I’ve commented on that before though, and about how I have seen that situation before and the dilemma it causes. I’ve also seen it worked through though. I really want to be supportive and comforting because I know from your telling your story that the things she did and the things she involved you in were horrendous. I also know that it will only be when you stop caring about this that you will be free from it. It is that whole issue of addiction and aversion being opposite sides of the coin- with neither being freedom. Freedom comes from non-attachment. A verse from the Bhagavad Gita has been important to me. It is the concept of Nishkamakarma. “Do your duty with faith in God without attachment to the fruit of the action.” I have a plaque with that verse and a brief commentary on it on a plaque on my wall. The brief idea is trusting the universe in your commitment to your own personhood, then let go because the universe is trustworthy. Perhaps later I will provide a more full quote in case it is helpful. But right now it sounds like you just need to be really angry.
I suspect your rage is not just about your mom’s occasional ongoing contact, but on the fact it is continued violation of boundaries. I mean at a very basic level, how could you ever trust that she has even begun to change when she still violates you. A card or two may not seem like a big deal in themselves, but the issues is still a lack of respect for your boundaries so it gets the full force of all the trigger reaction.
I’ve known other people who simply refuse to ever allow a healing to take place because they need to find someway to hurt their abuser. It is like an entrenched position that says, “too little too late.” I just know that when I see that in other people, or find it in myself it is a hard cold place that ends up being very self defeating.
I read what you write. I know the tremendous path toward healing you are on, but I don’t know you. -And I certainly don’t know anything about your mom. But I do know that the only path toward increased freedom for you is not based on what your mom does or doesn’t do. It is totally about your letting go of whatever it is so important for you to cling to in relationship to this issue. You are the only one that can figure out what that is. I also know that as you make changes internally around this issue, it will free things up in your external environment to also change.
I’m sorry if my putting a philosophical or psychological spin on this doesn’t hit the spot for you right now, but you seemed to be not only talking about how you are triggered, but expressing frustration that this all has so much power over you. – So I was trying to respond to that too. I just know that changing external situations begins with freeing (unbinding) something internally first.
If you notice my thoughts lack cohesion- you are right. I just finished working a 12 hour over night shift and haven’t slept yet- so perhaps you will just find it more meaningful to delete this odd attempt at making a comment.
Sorry this is happening Faith. I have a stalker also, but not a family member. He thinks he is though.
I had to get a restraining order and he was not allowed to even contact me through the mail. Perhaps this is an option??
Other than that, maybe a session with your T is in order. You may be ready to tell your mom/abuser just what she’s done to you. I know part of you is scared to, but honestly whatever she does with that information is her deal. She is (biologically speaking–an adult) and what she did you, she did when you were not… not taking into consideration what it was doing to you. You would not be spiteful in this act, you would be freeing yourself and perhaps her too… maybe subconsciously she wants or even NEEDS to know what she did, so she can face her own demons, test her faith, or whatever….
I hope you tell her. I really hope you do, because I it seems as though as long as she is being enabled and stays in denial, I think she will never give up. Maybe your sis and your T could help out, like and intervention??
Whatever you do, I hope you feel better soon. I hope you don’t take what I said as a judgement, it’s not. I am sharing my observations and what I’ve put together of human nature. I am a little too passionate about this because I hate so much what she is doing and that you are suffering because of it. It’s like a big boil and I can’t help but cheer for you to lance it!
Stay well. I’m thinking of you,
mia
Faith,
I’m sorry that you are feeling so intensely triggered for so many days. I hope that it eases for you soon.
You apologized toward the end of your post for not being inspiring … yet for me this is a very inspiring post! You see, I don’t “do” anger (yet). I have so much anger and rage that is stored away inside of me – anger and rage that were not allowed to be shown for 20+ years, that the thought of it being in there makes me a bit afraid
So seeing you releasing anger and rage in this manner is inspiring for me. The world has not come crashing down because you wrote how you felt about your mother.
One day, perhaps I can do the same about those who harmed me.
I wish I could offer up some suggestion about how to physically feel better while going through this rage storm. Please know I am hoping peace settles upon you again very soon.
wtr
Hi Faith,
I read your blog daily and you have addressed so many issues that I also have. Thank you so much for sharing your journey through healing. I was sexually abused by my mother from age 2 1/2? through 12. After that, verbal and emotional abuse. I am early in the healing process; about a year and a half. I came upon your blog through MDSA.
My mother is 85 and declining, and calls upon me to help and care for her, which, at this point, I want no contact with her, but since we live in the same town, makes it very hard to manage the boundaries. I have a good support system to work through the healing, but just daily living with her so close gets challenging. When she steps over my boundaries, I react by getting angry, triggered, and either dissociate or physically run away out of town just to get away from her. If I don’t pick up her calls, she will keep calling. I can ignore the calls but she is very ill right now so I feel “pulled in”.
One positive thing that has helped me, and I gather from your writings, that you have a strong spiritual life, is drawing from Joyce Meyer. You may know that she was sexually abused by her father throughout her life at home, and she addresses in detail how she dealt with her father/abuser after she was married and moved away. Her course of action was very difficult to say the least, but ultimately it was the only way out. Her story, I believe, is on her website, at JoyceMeyerMinistries.com. Thanks again, for sharing your story so honestly, there are a lot of us who value your insights as you walk through to your healing. Hugs and prayers to you!
Punching things can be good. Swearing is definitely good. I’d burn any communications, personally. I hope writing this post was cathartic. We’re all here reading, and it helps those of us in similar situations. You’re always an inspiration, Faith, whether you’re being upbeat and composed or not. Your humanity shines through in your anger too.
Faith -
Your rage is inspiring. It reminds me that even someone so far along the path can still be triggered – and to forgive myself when I, too, am triggered and can’t seem to find my ground.
Your rage will work itself out. It will pass. I know that when you are in the middle of being severely triggered, it seems it will never end. That you are right back where you started. It’s not true. You know what it feels like to be grounded and centered – your power contained. I have faith in the power of all the healing work you have done.
She obviously is not respecting the very clear and concise boundaries you have set. IMO, this is her way of still abusing you. Maybe at this point you could start writing Return to Sender on all mail/correspondence you receive from her. It is not worth you being triggered and anxious. Maybe that will help you take your power back.
Thinking of you.
Dear Faith,
You ARE being helpful to others, even in this deplorable, pain ridden state. For instance you are showing me just how hard it is to break certain brain associations that are connected by severe trauma and then hardened year after year. You, who have made so much progress in your healing. You are validating to others… If I can try to explain this: it lessens my own shame for still harboring feelings that an adult “should” be able to not even have to begin with. It seems that this one is the Mount Everest for you.
You have written about your “good mother” alter. Where is she now? Can you ask for her to come and help?
I would suggest you have a designated letter interceptor who does exactly what you ask them to do for any unwanted mail.
I hope this will ease soon for you. I am sorry that you have been suffering so much this week.
I think telling a person like that to leave you alone may just trigger them to continue to interact. I think it’s best to just show all contact is stopped by stopping it on your end and ignoring whatever she does. Have you ever read Alice Miller? She wrote how adults can be triggered by their parents in ways they don’t understand. Of course she affirms it’s best to avoid bad parents completely.
I didn’t mean to write “bad parents.” Sounds kinda odd. I meant parents who were abusive in any way.
I’m so sorry Faith. It’s maddening that she won’t leave you alone. I hope it helps that we all support your rage and your right to have the space you need! It seems like she got the message but is too f*cked up to heed it. Is there some way you can “trump” her? I think everyone’s said all I’ve thought of. Short of changing your address or taking more extreme measures with her, not sure what you can do. Of course, you can always vent to us.
I have to ask, Faith, as this is honestly that only got my mother, one of my sexual abusers as well, to leave me the EFF alone as well…
when you have written her, have you given her specific details of your memories? Have you ever directly called her what she is and relayed memories back to her? For me/us (me and my insiders) doing this pulled the covers back off our mother in such a way that she was so ashamed she never even tried to refute it–
She tried getting family members to contact me, but i continued sending her the same letter, and adding new memories to it. Guess what? In our case, the truth, the UGLY, BLUNT, DIRECT, no longer beating around the bush truth let us free.
If you’ve done this, and she continues yet, wow. I have no words though. Keep at it, though. Keep fighting for your power.
us
Now that I am awake, just a further comment. I am impressed by your rage. That in itself shows a great deal of healing since most people after childhoods of such abuse can’t find their anger. When they do there is a lot of old stuff bottled up that needs expressed. I don’t know what is behind your choice to not tell your mom what she did, but you are not responsible for your mother’s mental health. That doesn’t mean you have to be cruel (karma and all that good stuff), but it may really be an issue of the “truth setting you free.” You’ve been working at your healing for a long time. It is your mother’s responsibility to work toward her own- if she so chooses. You have speculated that she might be dissociative too. As I was falling asleep today my thoughts went to the idea of -what if she was abused and programmed to inflict similar abuse, but not remember.
I’m not just saying this to you. You know how I struggle in my own personal pain because I do tend to see potentialities in all sides. “Splitting” can also be a wonderful defense, but I have trouble using it as a defense because I tend to find this odd compassion for the other side too. Being Quaker myself, we believe in the inward light of God within everyone. No more has this been a discussion between me and my Quaker friends that regarding current world issues and Osama Bin Laden. How does your mom compare with Osama Bin Laden? (that is a rhetorical question). You say your mom is evil. She may well be- but what has that got to do with you? Who she is and what she has done has nothing to do with who you are, or what you do.
You are not healed to the extent that someone else’s behavior creates this pain in you. I am not healed to the extent someone else’s behavior creates pain in me.- And we both know that I am not healed yet. But I know what healing looks like. Your rage is good, but then what’s next? A calm period before the next triggering? The only real work that is yours is to unhook from the trigger. See a really bizarre message you are getting from all this is that no matter how much you try to control your being triggered by keeping your mom away from you, it is an illusion. Because as soon as she is back, there is the trigger again. The only real freedom from this is by doing the work within you that is necessary. I am speaking to myself as well as to you. When something keeps showing up over and over again it can serve the purpose of teaching us to look inside at how to access our true power.
Just wanted to say, Elaine, that I found your comments here really helpful. I feel that I am, for the first time, dealing well with continued mail from my mother and it is definitely due to a change WITHIN rather than any change in my mother.
Over the years there have been restraining orders aplenty, arrests etc, however nothing has stopped the flow of mail. However, I haven’t ever confronted my mother with the truth of her part in things because I’m still figuring that out. In recent healing (last few years), alone and in therapy, I have recovered memories of my mother participating in some of the ritual abuse. My instinct is she was victimized and dissociative, made to do things, however, she has clung firmly to the myth of our family as perfect despite all I have told her that my dad did, total denial, so I doubt that my telling her what she did (and what it did to me) would change anything.
I’ve tried all ways of dealing with the letters: reading and being enraged/ terribly sad, not reading, getting someone to intercept them etc etc. Only very recently have I come to the position that I don’t care: I think that I have finally accepted that my mother was both a good and a bad person (to me); that she both cared for me well at times and hurt me so cruelly at others; that she was never emotionally available for me in the way I needed and never, ever will be; that there is going to be no reconciliation based on her healing; that I can’t rescue her from the dark world in which she lives, even though she doesn’t always know she lives there, that isn’t my job; that I can mourn the loss of mothering even as she is still alive.
I have been doing a lot of worrying about mothering to reach this point, being one myself.
Your words struck a chord with me, because in the past I was all about wondering how I could get my mother to respect my boundaries, or to change, to leave my dad, to listen etc. and now I no longer need that in any way from her: she’s stuck and she’s going to remain stuck and that is the way of the world. It brings a poignant tinge to my own healing, even though I often think I am not healing (even sitting down to write this, I was v self-critical and thought: am I just trying to look like the ‘good girl’ who follows all the lessons of therapy again – but no, it’s deeper than that; there’s a real change), I know I am healing because I don’t live in that world of denial, repression and I have more freedom and I yearn for even more.
[...] Comments « So F@#$ing Angry at Mother/Abuser [...]
Faith, I have been reading your blog for well over a year now. It has been a source of comfort, and like others, I am grateful for your honesty. I too was molested and brutally abused by my own mother. I actually left the country – to an extent – to get away from any reminder of her. I am now back, and am having a great deal of difficulty here. I realize we must face our demons, but being continents away allowed me to sleep in a way that I never imagined being possible. Your respondents also amaze me, and I am so appreciative of their feedback. I am in a loving marriage, but I actually wish to abandon it – I feel that I am too broken to be a good wife, and I am tired of being the one that is ‘sick.’ (Mind you, my husband doesn’t feel that I am sick – not in the least – but the burden is too much for me at the moment). I have lost all ties to my own family, and there isn’t a day that goes by when I am not thinking about my father, especially my father. Of course, he has made decisions, and that is to stay with my molester/abuser. Nevertheless, it pains me greatly, and only serves to suggest that it is me that is the problem. I know that’s not true, but as a victim who has internalized all the hatred from my abuser, it is hard to ignore. Hang in there, Faith. Please don’t stop writing. We NEED you – you are a source of support and inspiration. Funny thing is, I just wrote a short piece today about the necessity of integrating trauma. Ha. Today has been a huge trauma – I live through trauma hourly.
Hi, Octavia.
I would wait until Mother’s Day passes before you make any big decisions, such as about your marriage. It is quite possible that the triggers telling you to leave are linked to Mother’s Day and that you will feel differently after that day passes. It is only two more days out, so you can still leave next week if nothing changes.
- Faith
(((LittleFaith))) (hugs if ok)
Really?? She doesn’t get what she is done is criminal. I would write her one last time and get a post box. Change addreses on mail to PO and close your home delivery, don’t (of course) give her the new address so everything of hers gets returned.
When you write her be clear and consise as to the laws she has broken. Tell her that if she contacts you again you have evidence that will put her in jail the rest of her days. Tell her to forget you as you will her.
Stand up for Little Faith. She is getting stronger thus the anger. Anger is ok, displaced anger is not. Bless you through this rough patch.
Ax- I am glad that you are experiencing some of what it is like to no longer be invested in making your mom be different. What that all really amounts to is that you are reclaiming your power. That is always the key. When we have PTSD triggers it is because we are thrown back emotionally into a time when we felt very helpless. The source of my PTSD is different from most of you, but I have had several extended experiences of being traumatized. I seem to heal from each one of them, but if I encounter another trauma it is like all the helplessness from all the other times comes rushing at me. I finally learned to keep my mouth shut and not make major decisions when I am like that because they are coming out of that place of helplessness in me.
Your comment about the “family myth” with your mom- those are very powerful things. People actually need a sense of their personal story or myth. There is nothing wrong with that, but it needs to be open to new information being assimilated into it. If your mom hangs on to the myth, then she perceives she needs it at some level. On the other hand, I have seen people as they get older actually start to question that myth themselves, and sometimes they become open to some healing of their own.
The paradoxical situation of a person coming to a place that they “don’t care” anymore, and get let go of being triggered, actually becomes a point at which the other person has the greatest potential of changing. It is just some weird spiritual/systems dynamic. I think it is related to the whole issue of “loosing and binding” that scripture refers to- when you extract yourself from being bound by your history with your mom, it creates an opening for your mom to find increased freedom from her bondage too.
I have experimented some on this blog site with allowing myself to show more of my vulnerability. It is true that I am a therapist, but I wasn’t drawn to this blog site because of that. I was drawn because of my own injuries. I think I had just enough “regular” sort of trauma when I was young through illness, death, and being in a home that although loving could be very critical and unaccepting at times, that I grew into adulthood still very vulnerable. I spent 20 years involved in a “cult-like” mentality (not involving sexual abuse though) that turned my world upside down because it blew apart everything I believed in, and taught me not to trust myself, and ended up with me giving my power away so completely, I ended up deconstructing what little sense I had of a “self.” I found out what it was like to have no one understand what was happening to me, and either wanting to label me of invalidate me. I spent many years healing from that, and ultimately i did- although there were several smaller traumatizations along the way, which led me to take some steps backwards. By the time I became a therapist (pastoral counselor, and licensed clinical therapist), my passion was for those who have been misunderstood, invalidated and abandoned. Those are the clients I work with well because “i get it.” I have taken a fair share of blows from those around me though because those who don’t get what these people are going through certainly don’t get ME, and the fact that I do. My point in reaching my new PTSD was because I worked with an absolutely wonderful woman for years who had DID. I always saw her in her wellness. Yes, I saw all the behaviors other people thought was crazy, the PTSD reactions, the switching so you never knew who you were dealing with next, etc. But I say all her amazing giftedness. That other stuff was just part of the injuries she had endured. It was never who she was. The work between us was always amazing. It was so directed by God, and I just got to be present to see it happen. The work was going so well, and my belief in her so total that I committed to walk a path with her toward healing. I stuck to that commitment. Working with her gave me great joy, but it also brought me great pain and consequences because when you stand up and advocate for someone who other people think is crazy, people tend to assume you are crazy too. Most of the work I did with her was unpaid, and we developed a sense of friendship even though we stuck with the work of her healing. -And she became very well, and it was one of the greatest joys of my life. But then she decided I was the enemy and she has been cruel and harassing, and paranoid- saying really odd things to others about me that have no truth to them. This has nearly destroyed me- and even though it has been over a year ago, it again blew apart my belief in how things work. I mean you don’t love someone with all your heart, and stand by them no matter what, and have an amazing relationship with them of trust and respect, and then within a few hours of her “integration,” be rejected and villanized and scandalized by that same person. I mean it just isn’t supposed to work that way. I knew all 30 of her when she was multiple, and I can’t imagine any of them treating me this way, so I certainly can’t explain it now that they are supposedly all “together.” It is like I lost so much because I wanted her to have a life worth living, and then she/they turned on me too. I had believed that the work I did with her was sort of the result of everything I had become and everything I knew- that God had brought me to this point to do this one particular work- and it was done out of love. After she changed into whatever she is now I doubt everything, plus feeling like I had lost my best friend. And with my world blown apart again, and my confidence in doing the type of work I was doing gone, I am now left in a state of depression and PTSD with nothing to really believe in anymore. The world of DID seems second nature to me even though I don’t have it myself- I have lived deeply in it with others for so long, and yet I have been hurt in ways I can’t even describe by the person I loved the most and committed the most to, who had DID. So I came to this website trying to make sense of it all, and see if I could find some peace somewhere.
I’m sorry for getting into my long winded story. Besides wanting to share why I am here, I also wanted it to be heard that I too am trying to come to a place of “not caring” what this other person does or doesn’t do, so I don’t get triggered so much.
Hi Elaine
Though I don’t believe in God, I do understand the greater chance of my mother healing if I don’t care what she does. She was going to die a while back and I decided, even then, I would not contact her, a lot of people saw this as ‘wrong’ but I knew it was right because she would know on some level that I no longer want anything from her, her choice, even to live or die, was her own.
Hmm, this strikes me as a bit similar to your relationship with your client (I also work with abused and disbelieved people, by the way). I wonder if she felt that you wanted something from her: to make sense of your own experiences, or to take care of her, or even to love her more than others did? That might explain why she turned against you when the time came for you to let go of her, perhaps she feared you wouldn’t let go, which would be a hard feeling for any abuse survivor, and therefore dramatically rejected you? I don’t know, of course, and am sorry that relationship hurt you so much.
I think it would be great to have a therapist who takes the therapeutic relationship so seriously but it might make the boundaries (especially the boundary ending the therapy) more tricky.
I’m sure she will have taken away a lot of her healing journey with her, even if she seemed to change into a mean person at the end.
Ax- With my former client, it is an interesting paradox, because as she was getting better, I was preparing to “let go of her” as is appropriate in any therapy relationship, or as a parent lets go of a child as they reach adulthood. In fact she and I used to talk about this, and I would tell her that as she got better she would no longer need me the way she had, and she would want to move out into her own life more. She always protested that she would want me in her life too. I always told her that I would still be there, but she would find herself wanting to move more in her own directions too. So even though over the years we had sort of become friends, I knew that our level of closeness was not even natural for the best of friends- it was very much a product of the level of work we had been doing. So I was always in the process of releasing her and doing my appropriate grief that went with letting go of that level of relationship. Unfortunately i did not understand then what I understand now, and I didn’t realize that just because she went through an integration process that it didn’t mean she was completely well. I just thought she would be all well then, so I announced to her that it was time for our relationship to transition. Of course I didn’t mean that I was going to leave her, but that now we could transition into something more normal- a regular supportive relationship rather than an intense crisis oriented relationship. I’ve come to believe that because I did not understand that her healing was still in process that she experienced me as abandoning her, but instead what she did is reject me violently, accusing me of everything from trying to control her healing, to trying to get famous from working with her, to finally saying really paranoid things to other people about me like that I was using her social security number to steal from her (I don’t even have her social security number, and of course I would never steal from her anyway). But she never allowed any two way communication between us after that point to anything could be cleared up. And of course even though I was preparing to transition with her anyway, her total rejection of me with all the false accusations about me hurt me terribly because we had gone through so much together and I couldn’t even fathom her turning against me like this. So for awhile I did try to contact her to see if we could talk to get this straightened out. It only made things worse. That would seem to play into what you said about her fearing that I wouldn’t let her go. It is kind of a weird contradiction because on one hand I am the one that let her know it was time to transition, but her becoming so cruel toward me led me to want to at least find peace with her- which may have made it look like I not able to let go of her. Of course there is always the possibility there is an alter part that plays into this too, but that is something I just don’t know. This issue of “letting go” from her perspective seems mysterious to me though, and if you have any additional insights I would appreciate them. She did not break off other relationships because she had experienced integration (at some level). And it was me who was more than ready to transition into a normal level of relationship with her once she no longer needed me in the same way. I was totally exhausted physically and emotionally after everything we had gone through for years, and her integrating was as much an answer to prayer for me as it was for her. But when I “let go,” she became enraged, which led me to want to bring peace between us….. which has only left me totally confused. Because all I really want at this point is a peace between us. I don’t need for us to maintain a relationship. The crazy fear and paranoia just needs to end, and I would like us to both be able to have good feelings about the work we did together.
Ax- Sorry, but I have a follow up question. I re-read what you wrote and what you said about her thinking I might be wanting something from her…. in that sense you are right. I didn’t have any deep dark need from her, but I had lost so much in sticking by her and advocating for her- but the one thing I had was knowing that she believed in what I was trying to do to help her. At times it felt like it was “she and I against the world.” -Perhaps that is a little overly dramatic, but there were moments it felt that way. When she did turn against me I did lose belief in whether it had all been about anything or not. It blew my sense of reality. So at that point I did need to know that she still believed in the work we had done together.
Is that so unreasonable, to just want a person you have loved and worked so hard for to simply not turn on you?
It reminds me of some of those true life crime shows I see where someone has been falsely imprisoned or whatever, and someone realizes that an injustice has been done, and they then commit their lives to seeing that justice is done and the person is freed. You never see one of those newly freed prisoners turning on and becoming paranoid of the person who stood by them and worked on their behalf. That is why this makes no sense to me. What am I missing? And if I have inadvertently hurt her, how do I make up for it?
Believe me, there was nothing in my working with her that benefited me- except for the personal satisfaction of trying to help someone I believed in so much, and truly enjoyed as a person. There was no financial gain or fame, or anything like that. I had the joy of knowing her. I wasn’t even out to get any kind of undying gratitude from her or anything. I simply wanted to be treated decently- which is the general expectation I have of anyone in my life.
Hi Elaine
I’m afraid I have no further insights to offer. There might be a million and one reasons why your client left the relationship as she did and the same number as to why this has ‘triggered’ you so much.
You sound so sad and angry about it and refer to losses throughout the relationship not just the end, I only hope getting to know more about DID here maybe helps and that you have a really good clinical supervisor who was with you throughout that client’s therapy and still there for you.
Ax- the losses throughout the time were not from her. Our working relationship and sense of trust and respect for each other was always solid. The losses were what I experienced professionally by standing up for someone everyone else just wanted to mark of as a “throw away” person.
If it had been just a normal therapy relationship, I’m sure I would have felt some hurt, but we had continued to work together for years with no payment, and for me it was a commitment to her as a person, so my heart was very open and vulnerable. Essentially what I experienced was at the level of heartbreak and betrayal.
Yes, I have had some anger- but it is hard to really maintain any anger because I know something about this just doesn’t make any sense- it is an abreaction of some type, and is nothing like “her/them.” So mostly I remain confused.
And yes, there is depression and anxiety because it is like having my whole sense of reality blown apart, if it turns out that I can’t trust someone who I had always completely trusted with my life. It is like how can I ever know who I can trust and what i can believe in again? And then there is just lots of grief. Then there is the absolute feeling of devastation that if she has twisted things in her mind to see me as one of her abusers, then it totally invalidates the gift I tried to give her- and means it was all for nothing- for both of us. That may be the most painful of all.
Hi Elaine
I’m tentative to write more because what comes across from your posts is that your feelings are so raw about this break-up and I would just hope you feel better about it soon.
What you say about your professional loss is interesting, wonder if you have read Valerie Sinason/ Trauma and Abuse Group (UK) in interviews talking about the difficulties of working with survivors of ritual abuse because of lack of support from colleagues? Could help.
What seems to hurt you the most is that she saw you as an abuser at the end, that may be worth exploring further i.e. is there any part of you that sees therapy as abusive that you might be trying to reject/ do you ever fear being abusive/ are you angry at anyone else who said they were acting in best interests but were actually abusive?
I’m not going to post any more on this but I really, really hope that you yourself have a good therapist with whom you can discuss all of this. It is quite likely that your ex client will find a therapist to discuss and process what happened in the break-up with you, I’m sure you would hope she does so too, that’s standard practice I think, but the support for yourself in dealing with all of this seems crucial too, otherwise how are you ever going to support clients with DID again, let alone recover your sense of yourself (which seems to go beyond your sense of your professional self here)?
Take care,
Ax- I didn’t really expect you to keep posting on this. I just found myself wanting to clarify. My hurt is not raw at this point- just trying to find a place to put it at peace within me. Finding support for myself has not been easy because people don’t “get it.” I will check out the book you recommend. Yes, to your question of whether I have ever been abused by someone who said they were trying to help me. That is where some of my original PTSD came from. I have healed from that- it was many years ago. Therefore I made the commitment to never harm anyone and I focus greatly on never imposing anything on anyone or risking taking their power away.
Other issue for me is that I tend to always attribute fault to myself. If something wrong happens it “must of been my fault” so therefore I am constantly beating up on my own ego integrity. These are all things that I work on. My original intent in getting into this was just to gather info to try to see from the other person’s perspective.
Oh, Ax – and anyone else who has wondered about my line of thinking. The original question I had when I approached Faith over a year ago was concerning what could possibly happen a person goes through integration that would make them change from having a totally positive relationship with someone to hating and fearing them within a matter of hours with no contact between them during that time. So my original question was trying to understand how the process of integration would lead to something like that in someone.
I’m not expecting any more responses to this, just explaining what I was originally seeking to understand. I have a pretty good understanding of myself. I am just at a loss to understand the other person in this case.
The reason it came up during this blog feed was because listening to everyone needing to block communication with their abusers triggered me in a lot of ways because this former client so fears me that she changed her phone number her email address and moved so I couldn’t find her- even though I didn’t do anything to hurt her, and hours before she hated and feared me, she loved and respected me, with the only thing happening in between was her integration.
The reason it came up during this blog feed was because listening to everyone needing to block communication with their abusers triggered me in a lot of ways because this former client so fears me that she changed her phone number her email address and moved so I couldn’t find her- even though I didn’t do anything to hurt her, and hours before she hated and feared me, she loved and respected me, with the only thing happening in between was her integration.
[...] my blog entry entitled So F@#$ing Angry at Mother/Abuser, a reader asked me the following question: I have to ask, Faith, as this is honestly that only got [...]
Hi Faith,
Blocking my abuser out completely has worked nicely for me, I actually moved and didn’t tell anyone that would tell him where I was, which worked beautifully and felt great, freeing, safe.
Later, when I reported to the police, they put a no-contact order on him, which luckily he never violated, even though it must have run out by now, and I’m easier to find now. I read somewhere that the best thing to do with sociopaths like my father is to cut them off completely, since they enjoy messing with people, and if they don’t get any feedback or satisfaction, they move on to other targets. Seems to have worked for me.
If your mom does have untreated schizophrenia, and continues on being untreated, that could explain a lot about why she’s not getting your clear and obvious FOAD messages. It might be safe to assume she never will.
In light of that, have you thought about doing something a bit more drastic, like moving and de-listing your phone and such? She’s unlikely to be that resourceful in finding you. She’s older, and likely to be mentally disorganized and become more so as her illness progresses.
May you be free of her soon,
SDW
[...] This blogger talks about surviving mother/daughter sexual abuse. [...]