Confrontation=Secondary wounds, Forgiveness
Sorry so long, this is my first contact with Humanity in nearly a Year, I found this site via Mike Lew:s second book and hoped to find some kindrid spirits. SECTIONS as follows:
Background (brief, but Light Triggers here),
Intrusive Thoughts
Long Term Effects,
Family Confrontation and
Forgiveness
Future?!
Background=======Light TRIGGERS in this section only========
As 3rd consecutive non-ballerina born to a woman expecting a daughter-ballet successor as the price for giving much nurturing, daily life growing up was a torure chamber wherein my 4-years-older brother was free to add torture techniques with impunity, my mother saying *you:re only asking for it, sometimes* ALL the time. This was a protective device to shield her from the effects of her nervous breakdown she had when I was three and becoming an active child the father was/is Old School and thinks he should have no responsibility for the emotional rearing with his 2 sentence *I remember my brother hit my arm until it was black and blue. But when I finally outgrew him I got him back good one time and never took a beating again*he even trotted these two sentences out for a trot one last time after I confronted him with the sexual abuse aspect of my abuse 4 years ago now. For years I didn:t even know what to call what was done to me, calling my brother:s thumb going in-thru-my-out-door, playing with the dog and exposing himself, except an *Extended Melvin* a Melving being pulling someone:s pants up between their buns. By 11 years old I had Shell Shock, me throwing up my hands in the air and ducking from my passing brother passing me in the house hallways in the inevitable Twacks (hitting the skull) and abuse-potpourri. I did, however, retain one last .22 caliber bullet from dad:s rifle in case I decided to off somebodyit would be another 20 years of mindlessly carrying around this bullet from Los Angeles to college in San Diego, back to LA then finally San Francisco before I fully contemplated the meaning of this bullet (and had my Viet Nam Sergeant roommate help me to disassemble/disable the bullet).
Intrusive Thoughts========================
Were it as simple as the original Events replaying themselves as exact Reruns, I would have paid attention to the Big Picture and pieced together all the effects of the abuse puzzle long ago. As it was, flashbacks related *merely* to (I now know) Shame-based-Identity of my daily events and it was only after 35 years I realized the small percentage of my daily intrusive thoughts were roughly the same Top Ten Flashbacks of the original physical (and later I would realize emotional and sexual) abuses; I now realize this mode of Flashbacks is not atypical.
Watching a TV show in my 31st year on rape of girls was a girl who had her father doing same thing brother did to me and I found myself screaming at her on the TV aloud, *the same damn thing happened to me and you don:t see me crying on the TV aboutRape?* I stopped dead in my tracks with the impossible realization this was the first time I had found a word beyond Extended Melvin that actually described what happened to me. It would be years more as I put together all the pieices of my abuse that had affected me multifold. Instead, as a dutiful lifelong codependent and caretaker of 2 parents who were themselves physically abused by older siblings, I did not press the family much nor come out with the new applicable word Rape, preferring instead to minimize another mild confrontation with them to *merely* the well-known physical abuse aspects of my upbringing with the slight new slant of my considering a sex change and general sexual confusion. Concurrently my failed relationship with my boss who gave me the 400 hours of emotional abuse (she clearly should better have been giving her becoming-Ex husbank) and boss also was driving my friend/coworker to a 20th floor suicide (he jumped in front of her office window) I suffered my first bouts of Adult fullblown Shell Shock, which I now know is the same PTSD Viet Nam vets have. At the time I was moving from Los Angeles to San Francisco and realized more than subconsciously I was moving to get away from my family, Distance in time and space.
Long Term Effects============================
Finally, after 6 years of an invigorating existence in SF, I found myself 6 years without any sex (now grown to 10 years without sex/yikes!) and realizing that as great as my Dotcom existence was, I still was isolated as hell emotionally and had come both to resent the opposite sex while also defining my happiness not in terms of how Good life was, but rather how Not-Bad life was. I should have been perhaps happy enough with this.
As a supervisor:s abuse/marginalization tended me at work, I also realized I was having Flying Dreams with LA as the locale I was flying from, together with nightmares of a sort of scary Tasmanian Devil phantom chasing me into bed at which time I would wake up thrashing in bed, struggling with the Devil who had caught me. Usually I would go back to sleep and forget these dreams, but I could no longer ignore them once I started injuring myself with these thrashes and said *Oh that injury is just from my..uh.repeatingNightmares?!!!* I had been having variations on these Devils since childhood when these dreams took the form of Nuclear Bomb explosions. Clearly even my 6 years of Elavil was not doing the job (prescription given for Internal Medicine Chronic Fatigue Syndrome.CFS sleep indications, not the usual Phychologist antidepressant indications) and for the first time ever I wrote down all my dysfuctions into a dababase and realized to my horror the incredibly long list of items I had for years traced to my abuse, but never really Inventoried, most notably Depression, Shame Based Identity, Sexual/Orientatioin guilt, confusion and eventually fear, Nightmares and Chronic Fatigue Syndrome, Obsessions, drugs problems, Flashbacks and concomitant Pot use and ultimately Victim Thinking. In short the effect of years of my own denial that I was from an abusive family.
Confrontation of Family======================
The decision to confront my family and deal with these myriad issues was not so much a decision, but a Drive. I had realized finally how much of my life had been lost to Abuse for 35 years, but I had no idea about the extreme effects of Secondary Wounding (from Trauma jargon) of unsympathetic and antagonistic family and friends would have on me. And this is the point I:m driving to.this Secondary Wounding seems to have destroyed the Remainder of my life. Of all the friends and family I Broke the lifelong Silence with, no one, not a one, asked if they could help me, find a doctor for me. The Family was/is clearly more concerned with keeping the Dirty Secrets (*airing Dirty Laundry*, as they say), than with my Health.
Eventually I asked for a departmental transfer at work and was instead *laid off* (really fired by the abusive supervisor). At the time my body was increasingly in deep pain even worse pain than my Chronic Fatigue Syndrome ever was. Even rotating 5 Variety:s of the world:s finest N. California marijuana was not numbing me much as I started the lonely process of sifting thru and defining my Issues without a doctor, no friends, no family, no booksjust logic and memory. Nearly everybody I disclosed this to went utterly silent. Regrettably, time was ticking and my then-Unique DVD career opportunities were passing me by as I took months off from work due to Exhaustiion and focused on my Issues. I was actually starting to re-write my personal version Mikel Lew:s book Victims no Longer, while repeatedly calling my Family in LA and confronting them over and over with the logical results of their abuse. Instead of the sympathy and help I expected I was greeted with what I had originally thought I would be greeted withdenial and self preservation. A mother who reads endless books about her emotional isolation with her own husband, did the same to me and then/now refused to read even a single book on sexual abuse because it doesn:t have the Spiritual Basis she needs to refer to. Dad just wants to say *I take full responsibility* and think that sentence is the End of the topic and Brother/perp is having his own Personal Boundary Issues having walked off the Disney set and ending his Director career. I didn:t know the Function of Confrontation was NOT to win the logical side of things and have the family say *You:re right, Bryan, these are Outragous Acts we perpetrated on you and we:ll follow thru on whatever it takes to make things right*. Clearly 4 years of logic has played no part in their Thinking and instead of Empowerment, I:m instead now residing in Japan having disassembled my once Contented SF existence and working as an English teacher, just because it:s a mindless way of Income that I can handle whilst I sift thru the tattered remains of my existence. Tens of thousands of dollars of hardware was lost to my now Ex-SF-roommate in my all-too-rapid move to Tokyo as my roommate had his own PTSD issues from Viet Nam triggered by the recent Bush Oil Warsand our PTSD:s conficted biftime. What little savings I had was depleted with Exhaustion TimeOFF and my once prized DVD pro chops are now ho-hum and outdated employment wise. In short, Dealing with PTSD has destroyed my life. Quite apart from the usual *I wish I had dealt with this all sooner* (which I have grieved for), I rather suffer from the Matrix:s *why didn:t I take the Blue Pill* and wish I had never dealt with theseor at least waited a year longer when DVD would have paid off Stock Options big time and allowed me 5 years of TimeOFF to deal with Issues, travel, get massages for body work, write songs, on and on. In effect I feel as though the Abuse has Won; not only screwing up my first 35 years, but left me unable to work (at a real job in States) and with a future of financial devastation. Instead of a bright future with tons of money salvaged by my careers, I:m in debt, no prospect of Retirement and a fun career in Dotcom all but destroyed. Apart from 8 mos of a SF psychiatrist and a few books, I have had no real Support for my conditions and daily feel the adrenalin surging in my veins with the Rage and Grief of a life destroyed both by the Initial but also the Secondary Wounding effects.
Forgiveness================================
SELF - This is hard generally. It seems impossible for me to forgive myself for *deciding* to deal with the abuse and the resultant life-disassembly, while ironically I find it hard to define my actions as *decisive*I simply was in massive pain, alone with my childhood training of Asking for Help means more Abuse, and felt I had no choice.
FAMILY while their behaviour and response is atrocious these 4 years, I miss those many years we had an *acceptable* relationship I had with them while I was in massive denial and nonconfrontational. Now I:ve allowed them so many opportunity to Fail in their response that Re-conceal-iation seems an impossibility given the numerous insensitities they:ve sent my way.
While I don:t suffer from some of the more *aggregious* forms of Sexual Abuse that some of my Brothers and Sisters out there have suffered from, together with the years of *Mostly* Physical and Emotional Abuse my life has been devastated, past and future. As a musician, it is painful even to hear any Music now, even with Japanese lyricsit:s the PTSD echo of a now-dead self. Mike Lew:s book with me now in Tokyo helps Validate my experience, but no word nor chapter can touch upon my FUTURE devastation. There:s not a single day I awaken without the thought of *Confrontation has ruined my Life irrepairably and forever* and it:s hard going forward when all I see is the shattered remains of my once-promising professional life and current bankruptcy, not to mention the eternal Sexlessness I:m stuck with even in easy0for-sex Asia.
My Future?==================================
This has been long winded and I apologize that my isolation has mandated a lengthy into. I have been browsing this site for weeks now thinking of what to say to you all, but if I were to Wait for the Right Words for me to say, historically this would mean I would never say anything and spin round and round the vicious circle of Wanting to Say, But Unsure of what to Say. As I write this paragraph I:m crying the tears of helplessness by a lifetime of InSecurities and unable to reach outs.
Although I wish I could forgive my family for their Excessive Limitations in Abuse handling, and forgive me for yielding for this Training and my destructive ways, neither can I simply remove/edit out the Intrusive Thoughts of Life Failure that come from the Future telling me you are forever destroyed. I cannot forgive anyone, least of all myself. 4 years on these Issues and every decision I make just seems to make Life worse, so I:m unable to make decisions any more out of fear it will get worse.
Ultimately, although my Issues are now well defined, my Ability to handle them seems diminished beyond all reason. I don:t really wanna be an English Teacher in japan forever, but neither can I image being a workaholic in the States, Catch22. If I had known Confronation and Secondary Wounding would be sooo destructive I would have decided not to Confront. I was, however, unwarned and unHelped. It seems to have now cost my life entirely and in some ways Intusive Thoughts are now more a part of my life than when I started. Overwhelmed is the watchword, but I don:t see 4 years of progress leading toward anything more than 4 or 8 or 12 more years of the same, given my massive dysfunctions. I guess it:s safe for me to expect nothing from you all, but I want to get back to a merely content life, happy seems unattainable and joyless is the present. Unfortunately I have no Clone to help address my massive issues, what hope have I?
Thanks for your attention for those brave patient souls having made it this far.
Background (brief, but Light Triggers here),
Intrusive Thoughts
Long Term Effects,
Family Confrontation and
Forgiveness
Future?!
Background=======Light TRIGGERS in this section only========
As 3rd consecutive non-ballerina born to a woman expecting a daughter-ballet successor as the price for giving much nurturing, daily life growing up was a torure chamber wherein my 4-years-older brother was free to add torture techniques with impunity, my mother saying *you:re only asking for it, sometimes* ALL the time. This was a protective device to shield her from the effects of her nervous breakdown she had when I was three and becoming an active child the father was/is Old School and thinks he should have no responsibility for the emotional rearing with his 2 sentence *I remember my brother hit my arm until it was black and blue. But when I finally outgrew him I got him back good one time and never took a beating again*he even trotted these two sentences out for a trot one last time after I confronted him with the sexual abuse aspect of my abuse 4 years ago now. For years I didn:t even know what to call what was done to me, calling my brother:s thumb going in-thru-my-out-door, playing with the dog and exposing himself, except an *Extended Melvin* a Melving being pulling someone:s pants up between their buns. By 11 years old I had Shell Shock, me throwing up my hands in the air and ducking from my passing brother passing me in the house hallways in the inevitable Twacks (hitting the skull) and abuse-potpourri. I did, however, retain one last .22 caliber bullet from dad:s rifle in case I decided to off somebodyit would be another 20 years of mindlessly carrying around this bullet from Los Angeles to college in San Diego, back to LA then finally San Francisco before I fully contemplated the meaning of this bullet (and had my Viet Nam Sergeant roommate help me to disassemble/disable the bullet).
Intrusive Thoughts========================
Were it as simple as the original Events replaying themselves as exact Reruns, I would have paid attention to the Big Picture and pieced together all the effects of the abuse puzzle long ago. As it was, flashbacks related *merely* to (I now know) Shame-based-Identity of my daily events and it was only after 35 years I realized the small percentage of my daily intrusive thoughts were roughly the same Top Ten Flashbacks of the original physical (and later I would realize emotional and sexual) abuses; I now realize this mode of Flashbacks is not atypical.
Watching a TV show in my 31st year on rape of girls was a girl who had her father doing same thing brother did to me and I found myself screaming at her on the TV aloud, *the same damn thing happened to me and you don:t see me crying on the TV aboutRape?* I stopped dead in my tracks with the impossible realization this was the first time I had found a word beyond Extended Melvin that actually described what happened to me. It would be years more as I put together all the pieices of my abuse that had affected me multifold. Instead, as a dutiful lifelong codependent and caretaker of 2 parents who were themselves physically abused by older siblings, I did not press the family much nor come out with the new applicable word Rape, preferring instead to minimize another mild confrontation with them to *merely* the well-known physical abuse aspects of my upbringing with the slight new slant of my considering a sex change and general sexual confusion. Concurrently my failed relationship with my boss who gave me the 400 hours of emotional abuse (she clearly should better have been giving her becoming-Ex husbank) and boss also was driving my friend/coworker to a 20th floor suicide (he jumped in front of her office window) I suffered my first bouts of Adult fullblown Shell Shock, which I now know is the same PTSD Viet Nam vets have. At the time I was moving from Los Angeles to San Francisco and realized more than subconsciously I was moving to get away from my family, Distance in time and space.
Long Term Effects============================
Finally, after 6 years of an invigorating existence in SF, I found myself 6 years without any sex (now grown to 10 years without sex/yikes!) and realizing that as great as my Dotcom existence was, I still was isolated as hell emotionally and had come both to resent the opposite sex while also defining my happiness not in terms of how Good life was, but rather how Not-Bad life was. I should have been perhaps happy enough with this.
As a supervisor:s abuse/marginalization tended me at work, I also realized I was having Flying Dreams with LA as the locale I was flying from, together with nightmares of a sort of scary Tasmanian Devil phantom chasing me into bed at which time I would wake up thrashing in bed, struggling with the Devil who had caught me. Usually I would go back to sleep and forget these dreams, but I could no longer ignore them once I started injuring myself with these thrashes and said *Oh that injury is just from my..uh.repeatingNightmares?!!!* I had been having variations on these Devils since childhood when these dreams took the form of Nuclear Bomb explosions. Clearly even my 6 years of Elavil was not doing the job (prescription given for Internal Medicine Chronic Fatigue Syndrome.CFS sleep indications, not the usual Phychologist antidepressant indications) and for the first time ever I wrote down all my dysfuctions into a dababase and realized to my horror the incredibly long list of items I had for years traced to my abuse, but never really Inventoried, most notably Depression, Shame Based Identity, Sexual/Orientatioin guilt, confusion and eventually fear, Nightmares and Chronic Fatigue Syndrome, Obsessions, drugs problems, Flashbacks and concomitant Pot use and ultimately Victim Thinking. In short the effect of years of my own denial that I was from an abusive family.
Confrontation of Family======================
The decision to confront my family and deal with these myriad issues was not so much a decision, but a Drive. I had realized finally how much of my life had been lost to Abuse for 35 years, but I had no idea about the extreme effects of Secondary Wounding (from Trauma jargon) of unsympathetic and antagonistic family and friends would have on me. And this is the point I:m driving to.this Secondary Wounding seems to have destroyed the Remainder of my life. Of all the friends and family I Broke the lifelong Silence with, no one, not a one, asked if they could help me, find a doctor for me. The Family was/is clearly more concerned with keeping the Dirty Secrets (*airing Dirty Laundry*, as they say), than with my Health.
Eventually I asked for a departmental transfer at work and was instead *laid off* (really fired by the abusive supervisor). At the time my body was increasingly in deep pain even worse pain than my Chronic Fatigue Syndrome ever was. Even rotating 5 Variety:s of the world:s finest N. California marijuana was not numbing me much as I started the lonely process of sifting thru and defining my Issues without a doctor, no friends, no family, no booksjust logic and memory. Nearly everybody I disclosed this to went utterly silent. Regrettably, time was ticking and my then-Unique DVD career opportunities were passing me by as I took months off from work due to Exhaustiion and focused on my Issues. I was actually starting to re-write my personal version Mikel Lew:s book Victims no Longer, while repeatedly calling my Family in LA and confronting them over and over with the logical results of their abuse. Instead of the sympathy and help I expected I was greeted with what I had originally thought I would be greeted withdenial and self preservation. A mother who reads endless books about her emotional isolation with her own husband, did the same to me and then/now refused to read even a single book on sexual abuse because it doesn:t have the Spiritual Basis she needs to refer to. Dad just wants to say *I take full responsibility* and think that sentence is the End of the topic and Brother/perp is having his own Personal Boundary Issues having walked off the Disney set and ending his Director career. I didn:t know the Function of Confrontation was NOT to win the logical side of things and have the family say *You:re right, Bryan, these are Outragous Acts we perpetrated on you and we:ll follow thru on whatever it takes to make things right*. Clearly 4 years of logic has played no part in their Thinking and instead of Empowerment, I:m instead now residing in Japan having disassembled my once Contented SF existence and working as an English teacher, just because it:s a mindless way of Income that I can handle whilst I sift thru the tattered remains of my existence. Tens of thousands of dollars of hardware was lost to my now Ex-SF-roommate in my all-too-rapid move to Tokyo as my roommate had his own PTSD issues from Viet Nam triggered by the recent Bush Oil Warsand our PTSD:s conficted biftime. What little savings I had was depleted with Exhaustion TimeOFF and my once prized DVD pro chops are now ho-hum and outdated employment wise. In short, Dealing with PTSD has destroyed my life. Quite apart from the usual *I wish I had dealt with this all sooner* (which I have grieved for), I rather suffer from the Matrix:s *why didn:t I take the Blue Pill* and wish I had never dealt with theseor at least waited a year longer when DVD would have paid off Stock Options big time and allowed me 5 years of TimeOFF to deal with Issues, travel, get massages for body work, write songs, on and on. In effect I feel as though the Abuse has Won; not only screwing up my first 35 years, but left me unable to work (at a real job in States) and with a future of financial devastation. Instead of a bright future with tons of money salvaged by my careers, I:m in debt, no prospect of Retirement and a fun career in Dotcom all but destroyed. Apart from 8 mos of a SF psychiatrist and a few books, I have had no real Support for my conditions and daily feel the adrenalin surging in my veins with the Rage and Grief of a life destroyed both by the Initial but also the Secondary Wounding effects.
Forgiveness================================
SELF - This is hard generally. It seems impossible for me to forgive myself for *deciding* to deal with the abuse and the resultant life-disassembly, while ironically I find it hard to define my actions as *decisive*I simply was in massive pain, alone with my childhood training of Asking for Help means more Abuse, and felt I had no choice.
FAMILY while their behaviour and response is atrocious these 4 years, I miss those many years we had an *acceptable* relationship I had with them while I was in massive denial and nonconfrontational. Now I:ve allowed them so many opportunity to Fail in their response that Re-conceal-iation seems an impossibility given the numerous insensitities they:ve sent my way.
While I don:t suffer from some of the more *aggregious* forms of Sexual Abuse that some of my Brothers and Sisters out there have suffered from, together with the years of *Mostly* Physical and Emotional Abuse my life has been devastated, past and future. As a musician, it is painful even to hear any Music now, even with Japanese lyricsit:s the PTSD echo of a now-dead self. Mike Lew:s book with me now in Tokyo helps Validate my experience, but no word nor chapter can touch upon my FUTURE devastation. There:s not a single day I awaken without the thought of *Confrontation has ruined my Life irrepairably and forever* and it:s hard going forward when all I see is the shattered remains of my once-promising professional life and current bankruptcy, not to mention the eternal Sexlessness I:m stuck with even in easy0for-sex Asia.
My Future?==================================
This has been long winded and I apologize that my isolation has mandated a lengthy into. I have been browsing this site for weeks now thinking of what to say to you all, but if I were to Wait for the Right Words for me to say, historically this would mean I would never say anything and spin round and round the vicious circle of Wanting to Say, But Unsure of what to Say. As I write this paragraph I:m crying the tears of helplessness by a lifetime of InSecurities and unable to reach outs.
Although I wish I could forgive my family for their Excessive Limitations in Abuse handling, and forgive me for yielding for this Training and my destructive ways, neither can I simply remove/edit out the Intrusive Thoughts of Life Failure that come from the Future telling me you are forever destroyed. I cannot forgive anyone, least of all myself. 4 years on these Issues and every decision I make just seems to make Life worse, so I:m unable to make decisions any more out of fear it will get worse.
Ultimately, although my Issues are now well defined, my Ability to handle them seems diminished beyond all reason. I don:t really wanna be an English Teacher in japan forever, but neither can I image being a workaholic in the States, Catch22. If I had known Confronation and Secondary Wounding would be sooo destructive I would have decided not to Confront. I was, however, unwarned and unHelped. It seems to have now cost my life entirely and in some ways Intusive Thoughts are now more a part of my life than when I started. Overwhelmed is the watchword, but I don:t see 4 years of progress leading toward anything more than 4 or 8 or 12 more years of the same, given my massive dysfunctions. I guess it:s safe for me to expect nothing from you all, but I want to get back to a merely content life, happy seems unattainable and joyless is the present. Unfortunately I have no Clone to help address my massive issues, what hope have I?
Thanks for your attention for those brave patient souls having made it this far.
