the little boy inside: query

[theo]

gentlemen,
i have only recently started to really get in touch with little theo in any real productive sense. looking back i can see that i have had encounters i actually recall before the memories started coming back last november. my query is basically sharing experiences of the little one within, if that is permissable. i know my experiences are highly personal, but for what can be shared i think it would help other men just starting.

my own limited experience with halfpint started with the imaging exercise last november that started the recall of the memories. i was directed to picture the child within reaching up to flip the light switch he could not reach and then picture me helping him with it. that started the flashback, the first of many. throughout the past year i have many more encounters with him, many were good, others were not. there is something so tragic about any frightened child, even more so in some respects when the child is within. i have had help in learning to communicate with little theo. my old therapist suggested using crayons and my left hand, but it just did not make sense. what i have learned is to start asking questions of little theo in my journal. there have been many times this has resulted in new recollections, but mostly the communication is indirect...a kind of feeling or intuition that i am really making contact. it is difficult to accept that there is an inner child at times. what does it mean? am i crazy or imagining such things? wishful thinking or some form of self fulfilling prophecy? i really don't know. what i do know is that when i respond to little theo in my journal new ways of looking at the past come to the surface, and for a time, i am content.

 

[Lloydy]

Theo

it is difficult to accept that there is an inner child at times.

I struggled with this for a long time, and many times I thought I was there, in contact with young David. And maybe I was a little bit, we certainly saw each other in passing more than once.

But over the last few weeks in our group therapy sessions we've been working hard at this, and there IS a young David, I'm convinced of that now.
I've nearly got him here with me, he's about two paces behind me and catching up fast.

It's something I was maybe a cynical about at first, but once I started to believe that I could return in safety, and trust myself to do it, then I started to believe.

It's hard and emotional, but worth it.

Dave


David

 

[The Dean]

Hi theo!

You have good points and questions.

I think that there are many ways we experience our inner child. I think I could nearly write a small book on that.

One thing that my T had me do that was really helpful was to find as many pictures of myself as I could find of myself as a child and youth. Then, I put them in one of those special albums where you can write on the page around the picture.

In the process of all of that I came to realise that my little Bobby--the name the used fro me--was not some cute little kid down the block, rather, Bobby is me. I am older now. But he and I are one.

Probably sounds incredibly dumb to you. But I really had seen my young being as totally spearate from me. I eventaulyy got angry at Bobby for not telling anyone and saving my a lot of pain in my life. The integration of Bobby and Bob was very healing for me.

Bob(by)

 

[theo]

i think i am going to have to stop with the "gentlemen" salutation, it seems too generic for the brotherhood here

dave,
i am very scared of getting in too deep. there have been the dissociative episodes in the last year that have been terrifying for both the content and the loss of control. there have been times in years past when i would dissociate and i had a panic atack in the middle of it (not pretty!). there have been other times when i would zone out in a rage and be just a shade shy of going truly ballistic (don't worry, these are extremely rare events and have to be triggered by something far too deep to be done haphazardly). the point is that i have spent all my life in such rigid control (i know, "preaching to the choir") that when these dissociative episodes happen i am not at all convinced i CAN come back.

bob(by),
quite the contrary, it sounds incredibly smart to me. at this point, i have to visualize little theo as a seperate person in order for me to make some kind of sense of the past. there is just so much that i do not recall of my childhood. i know the pros say that this is fairly normal, but when a person only has sporadic snapshots of memories of "normal" childhood events, but coherent chronological memories after age 11-12, that seems to point to something decidedly not normal. therefore, i have to approach lt as a seperate person in order to learn what he is able to show me. my old therapist also suggested the scrapbook. the only problem with that is all such pics are in the hands of the one who started this 33 years ago. confrontation is not an option at this point.

jeff,
the one dream of the man asking you over is a very compelling one. i had to pause there and just think of how that made you feel, it was profound. taking control of the images that haunt you is a wonderful step. i have to admit i kind of jumped a little when the teenage you jumped out but seriously, that is a great thing. finding the happiness within one's self seems to be the real challenge, i don't know if i can do that with any degree of integrity at this point in my journey. the only real breakthrough i have had with lt was finally realizing that he was the guardian of our innocence and sense of awe with the world. this started when i was journaling about the sad state of not being able to find anything of worth within myself. i have labored all my life to be the epitome of the good man i wanted to be, but always felt i had failed. everything i had done was a result of the past abuse, a reaction to it. how could a reaction be the "rel" me? it did not make sense. then as i was journaling on this i started asking lt questions and came to realize that he did not hide so much out of fear in one sense as he did to preserve the innocence and awe of a child. as children, we cannot comprehend the reasons why such horrible things happen to us so we respond in the only way we know how. i cannot tell you what it meant to me to realize that in one respect i never did lose that innocence and sense of awe of this wide beautiful world.

thank you all for respoding. this is definitely helping me out. you all take care.