Healthy Boundaries

Mommy Dearest,

When you came to stay with me last year, something happened... something unlocked inside of me. My mind & body were hijacked with memories of the last time we lived together. Secrets were revealed, things that happened to me, ways I was abused and molested by one of your family members. Either you knew about it and did nothing, which makes you an accomplice. Or you were so absorbed in your own world that you could or would not see or care about what was happening to me, which makes you an unfit mother.

Now that I remember and know these things, it has become very difficult for me to maintain a relationship with you. I can no longer pretend that these things did not happen, for pretending only perpetuates the secrecy, silence, and shame. It is this shame that has ruled my life for 25 years. I crave liberation from it and will stop at nothing to get there.

I thought for many years that it was my responsibility, my duty to take care of you. To keep you alive, provide for you. I felt it was my obligation to infuse life into you; that's why I took you on vacations like Disneyworld, to give you experiences that made you want to live. This was the unhealthy role reversal of me trying to give you life. I felt for many years that these things were forced upon me, that I was trapped. I now realize that all of this was in fact my choice. And in this realization I have found great freedom.

You see, I thought that by fixing you I could also fix me. I thought I was doing all of these things because I love you, but in reality I was trying to get you to love me. I now understand what was done cannot be undone. The damage I have suffered by and through your hands cannot be repaired. I see clearly now that you are not the life raft. We are both on the same sinking life raft, and I can only save one of us.

And so I am choosing differently. I am changing how I choose to invest my time and my heart. I am making better and wiser choices about how I invest myself for my own healing. For my own survival.

You've never truly felt the consequence of your choices when it comes to me. I've always been there for you. I'm the one person who never left you throughout your sickness. You never thanked me for that, just like you never thanked me for spending my entire life savings on the condo in which you now reside. I can only draw the inference that you do not appreciate that for which you express no gratitude.

I will continue to provide your basic needs and keep you safe. I will make sure you have a place to live, enough money to eat and have a safe existence. I will do for you what you were unable to do for me, but nothing more. I need time to heal, time to think, and the freedom to do so without having to pretend. And since I always feel I am pretending when around you, I need to do all of this away from you for some time.

This will not be forever. Perhaps someday we will be able to talk about this, perhaps not. I only know that this is what I need right now in order to heal. I am so very angry, and I need time to understand and process these feelings before I can have a healthy relationship with you if that is even possible. 

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This is nearly verbatim the conversation I had with my mother two months ago.  At the same time, I constructed a privacy fence between my house and the unreasonable neighbors whose dogs killed my cat (outlined in my post The Spiral). The parallelisms and real-time metaphors in my life sometimes astound me. These were the healthy boundaries that I needed to put in place in order to create the necessary space to heal, and both have been extremely helpful in my journey.

For months I have felt disproportionate anger toward my mother (see On Rage). I was aware of my inability to separate my anger towards her and my anger towards The Wolf. I needed to parse out my feelings and specific wounds from these two very different experiences, which has been inordinately difficult because they were happening at the same time. Speaking my truth was a critical first step.

This conversation with my schizophrenic-abandoning mother was not easy. It was not cruel, but it was painful - because the truth hurts. It was high time I erected the fence I needed to feel safe and be true to my needs. In reading Dr. Henry Cloud's book Boundaries, I feel confirmed in my desire, need, and ability to do this for my own sanity.

Survivors of childhood sexual abuse often have a blurred sense of boundaries. The lines are crossed physically, emotionally, mentally, and spiritually. This violation leaves the victim in a boundary-less state, diminishing the ability to set future boundaries. As an adult, survivors of sexual abuse often struggle in setting boundaries in nearly all of their relationships. This has certainly been true for me from work to family to friends and most appreciably with my ex-husband (this will be discussed more in-depth in a later post called Married to Crazy).

For me, difficulty in setting boundaries came from an inability to process my own anger. Dr. Cloud speaks of anger as the internal communicator, the warning sign that your boundaries are being violated. In order to survive the abuse, I dissociated from my body which cut me off from all feelings. As an adult, I could not speak up when anger arose. In fact the mere appearance of anger would elicit a host of inappropriate internal responses such as fear and shame. I never learned how to express, own, or even recognize my own anger likely because it was precipitated by abusive situations over which I had no control. I was conditioned to feel my anger was the source and cause of why I was being mistreated.

Now, I welcome my anger. I am learning to acknowledge, understand, and listen to it. This is helping me to find peace and a balance in my life that was sorely lacking. No longer does my anger sway from one wide pendulum swing (no anger at all) to the other (complete and total rage at my mother). It is only within this balance that I am able to unravel the rage. I am no longer projecting my anger about being sexually abused onto my mother. Already I can recognize the absurdity of the two categories in which I placed her - an accomplice or unfit mother. The reality is she is likely neither of these extremes. But I had to let myself feel and acknowledge this anger before I could diffuse it.

I am now able to aim the anger I have about the abuse towards the real perpetrator. In this there is great progress for me. I am still angry with my mother, but it is for things that she did. Until my anger was clarified and focused on the rightful target, it could not be processed. For months it has been hanging around me like a hazy, red cloud; I have been irritable and unpredictable. Much of the time this anger gets focused inward and turns into depression. I am hopeful that processing all of this anger will abate those symptoms as well.

Learning to identify unhealthy boundaries and set new, appropriate ones is a necessary part of the the healing process. During the past two months I have experienced the fruits of these healthy boundaries in profound ways. I am discovering the difference and multi-dimensional uniqueness of my sorrow related to being abandoned by my mother versus that related to being sexually abused. More abuse memories surfaced, which helps to further clarify my pain and how to heal from it. I honestly do not think I would have had these memories without first setting boundaries; they have been painful but necessary.

Perhaps the most important positive outcome from setting healthy boundaries is that I feel safer. I am beginning to realize that I am in charge of my life. For the first time, I am in control! That feeling was stolen from me long ago along with myriad other things such as my innocence and my sense of self. Feeling in control means that I am beginning to trust myself in my ability for self-care. Consequently, I am beginning to feel whole. There is a part of feeling whole that is painful, for the whole me is a war-torn picture of abuse and neglect. These facts bring sorrow, but they also bring a sense of full knowing. And with this knowing comes acceptance and grace.

Dee says that one day I will feel joy in the full knowing of myself. It could come in an instant, like a lightbulb. I will wake up and realize that there is nothing more to discover, nothing more to remember, that I will know all there is about myself and this will bring peace. I am not there yet, but I await this day with great anticipation and hope.

The Essence of Integration

Frau Wolleh with Children by Gerhard Richter

I recently visited the Art Institute of Chicago. The collection is largely Impressionist, most famous for their sole ownership of Seurat's Sunday Afternoon de la Grande Jatte. I was excited to revisit this Seurat and indeed spent a good amount of time admiring it. However, I was most captivated by this piece by Richter. I stopped, I stared, I wept. It is the perfect depiction of my struggle with fragmentation this past year.

Each time I was subject to an abuse event, I left my body so that I wouldn't feel and could pretend it wasn't happening. Now that I am revisiting and processing these memories one by one, I have a mental image of my dissociation. It feels like each time I dissociated, a part of me left and did not come back. They are each floating up above my head in ether-space like white, wispy smoke. Those parts of me are frozen in time (age, appearance, maturity level) and chose not to come back into my body. It's not safe in here. Each time this happened I became a little less myself, a little more fractured, a lot less whole.

Those lost pieces of me are my true essence. This is why I feel fragmented, damaged, and unwhole. As more and more of my essence gathered and lingered outside, I became less Me. A shell of my former self. At the point of mass fracture - The Terrible Awful (about which I have yet to write) - my frozen inner self curled up into a ball, a small and tight 13 year old version of me. Adult Me has grown up around her: hiding, pretending, shielding, overachieving. But she remains unloved, abandoned, closed off, and alone.

My essence continued to escape, one white wisp at a time. All the times I subjected myself to unhealthy situations. All the times I failed to erect healthy boundaries. All the times I entered and stayed in unhealthy relationships (I will discuss this more in a later post called Married to Crazy.) And each time I was revictimized, as it turns out that survivors of childhood sexual abuse are 2-5 times (sources vary) more likely to be subjected to sexual assaults later in life.

The boundary-less situation with my mother only served to perpetuate the escape of my essence. Last fall when I realized the true nature of that relationship and finally acknowledged that I had lost her many years ago, the last of my essence escaped. Adult Me wound up small and tight like a perfect mirror shell of small and tight Little Me inside.

This past year I've been trying to unwind. Stand up. Be erect. Move around. Let go. Loosen up. Be real. Face the truth. Reconnect Little Me and Adult Me. It's painful. Muscles have atrophied. We are stiff. Robotic. Unpracticed. Vulnerable. Rigid. But we are standing! Except now we realize we are empty. Upright, but utterly hollow. The essence of Real Me still floats above, outside. Not in. Not integrated. Not full. Not whole. Not real. Not really living.

I wish so badly to reconnect with those parts of me which were forced out because it was not safe. I can't live without my essence any longer. I won't survive. Being and feeling whole are integral to being me - the whole me, the Real Me. And so much of my efforts this past year have been to show my essence that indeed it is safe to come back in. I will care for each of these lost parts, protect them, name them (discussed in a later post called A Bouquet of Me), accept them, love them, allow them to be playful. Entice them to come home.

The Richter painting is me, Adult Me standing with pieces of lost Little Me just outside. Within my grasp but not inside. It pained me greatly to see an artful representation of what I felt. It still hurts when I look at this painting. Sometimes, maybe even often times, pain is necessary to produce change. I am on a journey towards integration and every little step that gets me there is critically important.

Coincidentally (or perhaps not), though Wolleh is a proper German name it is strikingly similar to the verb wollen which means "to want." I desperately want to integrate all of the lost pieces of myself. I venture to say it is vital to my overall healing.

If ever there were a song to describe the message I am sending to my lost Essence, it is best articulated in Drifting by Sarah McLachlan....

Please come home.



Puzzle Pieces

January to March 2013 was a hazy shade of winter. My mental and emotional states were capricious at best. I oscillated between extremes of feeling 1) terrified of my memories and appearance of The Black Oil, 2) frustrated and angry with myself for not being able to figure things out faster, 3) ashamed of my story and embarrassed about my healing process or 4) overwhelmed by my negative inner monologue which tried desperately to convince me none of this was real.

I journaled feverishly between therapy sessions. Often I would practice in my head how to share revelations with Dee, never knowing how my sessions would go nor what EMDR would produce. Some sessions were full of nausea, shaking, gagging, tears, and headaches. Others would leave me in a stupor or a near-dissociative state. It was hard work that required courage and tenacity, and above all a great deal of self-care. I had many bubble baths, massages, chiropractic adjustments, sessions of retail therapy, and cups of Sleepytime tea throughout these precious, fragile months.

At times I felt that all of the memories had surfaced and that I was well on my way to complete healing and transformation, only to be set back by days or weeks of blackness. I could feel equally hopeful or hopeless; two sides of the same coin tossed in the air each day, and I never knew which one would land face up. Managing time was complicated, and I was frequently late for work. I was usually in the parking lot on time but stepping out into the world would often require a 20 minute pep-talk and a bucket of tears. I learned to keep boxes of Kleenex in the car and to only put on make-up post meltdown.

One morning just after the obligatory pep-talk/meltdown, I barely made it into my office and closed the door before collapsing into tears. It was nearly impossible for me to look people in the eyes as I was terrified they would see right through me. Afraid they would know I was depressed, would somehow know my disgusting past, would recognize that I was disgusting. I made a note to discuss this personal revelation with Dee.

While journaling my mind drifted to an encounter I had with Em a few weeks earlier when she revealed one of her trauma secrets to me. I remember distinctly that my first reaction was "I bet she is lying." This produced a strong sense of shame within me. Why would I question her like this? It's not even that I did not believe her; I instantly did - I know this because my immediate second response was to be filled with love, comfort, and empathy for her. That initial reaction was autonomic, uncontrollable, and I questioned its origin. Is it that deep within my own subconscious I want to believe all stories similar to mine are untrue so that I can perpetuate the lies I told myself for years? Pretend it didn't happen, that you are a liar, that you are bad, that you are the source - for all of these untruths are infinitely easier to digest than the real thing.

I was reminded of a time when I had done something similar long ago; I questioned a close friend in her revelation of a closet eating disorder and it destroyed our friendship. I never understood why I had done this and was sorry and regretful ever since. I remembered how old I was when this happened and that, in fact, I was much younger than my previously assumed abuse timeline. In the moment that I remembered this occurrence a number of other memories, events, and revelations surfaced in my consciousness. It was as if a million puzzle pieces came shuttling in from all angles and connected together in instantaneous snap-lock fashion.

- I remembered running errands and visiting mother's friends and family, and her shuffling me off with the abuser so she could have alone time with them.
- I remembered what movies he took me to see in The Theatre.
- I remembered feeling sick when receiving a Nintendo for Christmas that year. I felt bought just like when he took me to the toy store afterward to buy my silence.
- I remembered becoming overly sexual with boys at school and the start of my bout with self-mutilation.

I recalled more about my cutting episodes than was previously available to me. I had always been aware of my tendency to stab my fingernails - either with other fingernails or by jamming objects like paperclips up inside the quick until it bled. I vaguely remembered another form of cutting though never understood why or when or how often. More puzzle pieces. We never had razor blades in the house but fingernail clippers were always at hand. I would clip sections of my arms and legs and sometimes my stomach; big craters which made ugly scabs that I would then pick at for weeks. One time I clipped all of my knuckles in an attempt to sever the tendons which tighten when you make a fist, rolling over the bone from right to left and snapping across at just the right moment. I remember thinking that if I could sever my hands - the part of me that touches and interacts with the world - then somehow I would be separate from and immune to it. I still have scars to this day from that cutting incident. I never wanted to kill myself, only to hurt and have something to pick so that I could feel. I think it helped me snap myself back into my body at times. I now understand that cutters often do so because physical pain is easier to deal with than emotional pain, of which I was obviously in a great deal.

Up until the puzzle pieces I thought the sexual abuse had occurred after my mother "became sick." Her first suicide attempt had become the marker in time where everything was either Before or After, like Steinbeck's Pearl. I had placed the abuse events in the After bucket. When the puzzle pieces snapped in, I now had access to an accurate timeline. This puts the abuse episodes a full year earlier than I had previously placed, which I found both comforting and upsetting. If I were younger then it was somehow less likely to be my fault. Yet the hazy gaps in my memory create an emptiness that can scarcely be explained. It is a hollow feeling to be searching for clues in your own life; I've never really felt whole because I do not have access to all that is and defines me. As a result, I both relish and fear the puzzle pieces. Furthermore, if this happened in the Before bucket then my entire definition of mother's sickness was now in question. If this occurred while she was still intact, what did this say about her part in this story? (I will elaborate on this topic in a later post called The Liberation of Choice.)

I could never make sense of my living situation amidst this timeline before the puzzle pieces. Mother and I would not have been running errands and dropping in on friends if I were already living with father and it were our 'visitation hours.' I was beyond shocked to learn that the abuse happened while I lived with mother, though it makes sense now that this is why sharing residence with her the previous summer triggered the Breakthrough Crisis. This is also an explanation of why I froze during her first suicide attempt the following year and my EMDR from those memories indeed includes remnants of the physical manifestations of my dissociative state.

I spent approximately 90 minutes gagging, shaking, crying, and stabbing my fingernails in my office while the puzzle pieces connected. I had been trying not to do the fingernail stabbing thing but I gave myself permission that day; these memories were too painful without a reminder that I was alive, that I had survived. I received the memories dumbfounded that I had not previously made these connections but that everything seemed to make sense in an instant. I spent much of this 90 minutes staring out my office window but somehow had worked myself under the desk. Once I came to, I realized what a fright I would be if someone were to walk in; I am grateful and lucky that no one did.

I went home and called Dee for an emergency appointment. I spent the next 2 hours waiting for our allotted time in a surge of panic attacks and bouts of dissociation. I didn't have much control over my body and could not get up for a drink or the bathroom though I desperately desired both. I found that rocking back and forth helped soothe the shaking. Dee tells me that this shaking symptom is much like when an animal quivers during a thunderstorm; it isn't that they are cold, it is that there is an incredible amount of adrenaline and cortisol flowing in their bodies and that these hormones meant for action have to come out in some physical way. If you're not running away then you are shaking out the fear.

The ASCA Survivor to Thriver Manual talks about the fact that the healing steps are not always linear. Once the initial breakthrough crisis has released, there can be many smaller crises that look, feel, and seem the same. It is a cycle, a circle, a spiral that is unique for each survivor. My step of acknowledgement came when I first began to talk about the abuse with Dee; the day of puzzle pieces was a point of no return along my commitment to recovery (step 3). The Manual defines this commitment as "a moment in time when the desire to change and the hope of a better life overcomes the wall of denial and resistance."

I have never felt as crazy as I did the day the memories and events snap-locked. What happened to my body was undeniable and uncontrollable. In fact I was so out of control, Dee and I briefly discussed hospitalization. I was afraid for my sanity, afraid of the memories, afraid of myself. When I think back on that day I can easily reconnect with the fear, pain, disillusionment, panic, and terror. Because of what I experienced both internal and external - and Dee witnessed it all - I no longer had any doubts that my story, my memory, and my process were anything other than real. I was finally ready to stop denying the truth for the hope that someday I would be set free.

My brush with puzzle piece insanity happened on a Monday. I did not have time for a hospital. I had an interview for a new (now my current) job on Friday. How in the world I ever survived that week I will never fully understand.

Someone does. Her name is Prudence, and I will introduce you to her very soon.

The Spiral

I am a firm believer that the universe brings you repeated situations - new players and details but the theme remains unchanged - until you learn the intended lesson. This provides an opportunity to learn, grow, and apply new skills in a familiar, albeit sometimes uncomfortable, scenario. I've come to call this The Spiral and I am living one right now.

A year ago (see recent Anniversary post) I found myself in a circumstance where I did not feel safe at my home. I had arranged a few months' reprieve from work travel in order to spend time with my mother during her temporary stay. But as the days and weeks went on, the unfolding of my Breakthrough Crisis rendered me feeling inexplicably and extremely unsafe. I clammered for and even forged a couple of hasty business trips simply to escape my at-home exhaustion. I hated the speedy pace of business travel but was desperate to get away from the house and my mother. It did little to assuage my discomfort. As it turned out, I did not feel safe anywhere.

This year, I am in a different city and a different house with a job that requires very little travel. The last four months I have concentrated much on creating a peaceful and safe surrounding to aid my healing process. It has been working out swimmingly until recent events of death, dismemberment, and harassment ensued. It seems there is no pause button on life in the midst of one's healing journey.

My neighbor's dogs viciously attacked and killed my eldest cat in my own front yard a week ago. The experience was traumatic to say the least; picking up parts of his body, feeling his broken spine, noticing his missing pieces, and taking him to the vet for immediate euthanization. I grieved the loss for several days; he was a good friend to me for 17 years.

My youngest cat has been missing for 2 months; I no longer have hope that he will return as I suspect he met the same fate. I contacted Animal Control to get the scoop on local laws, and in fact there is one prohibiting free roaming dogs. In talking with other neighbors I now know that there have been multiple killings in the last year including cats and chickens. This is an epidemic but everyone has been reticent to communicate with the responsible neighbors. Now I know why.

I waited several days to talk to them so as to communicate in a calm, orderly manner. I relayed the sad story of my kitty and sited the ordinance which requires them to keep their dogs contained on their property. The conversation did not go well. They exploded in anger, proceeded to defame my character, denied all responsibility (despite the eye witness account) and ended the exchange with threats of property damage. Later that evening they retaliated in a number of ways with bright lights and noise which prevented me from getting any sleep.

This feels strangely like last year when, in a state of hypervigilance from unsurfaced abuse memories, I could not sleep in my own house despite all efforts. I felt/feel trapped. I felt/feel victimized. I felt/feel both helpless and hopeless. Again I am clammering for some reason to travel, a way to flee the situation with which I cannot deal. This is the point at which I would normally zero out and dissociate for days or weeks.

Instead, I am trying to see that I am simply in the spiral. It is continuous and it is virtuous. It can be my friend. Each time I revisit a place that feels familiar, I can only hope to be at a higher level of understanding and consciousness because of the previous completed cycles. I am more aware, have a better sense of self-grace, and an increased ability to comprehend and deal with the circumstance. Though the situation feels the same, I am different. It's not easy. It can be very frustrating and painful, for I viewed the most recent healing spiral as possibly the last one. It always feels like the last one but the truth is it never ends. That is what brings out my hopelessness, but it doesn't have to. My response to each event is infinitely more important than the event itself.

And so I have decided to view this as an opportunity to change, to respond differently, to transform. This is my moment to be brave! Instead of hiding, I will stand up for what's right. Instead of running, I will confront my fears. Instead of suffering in silence, I will reach out for help. After all, I have an army of loyal supporters now. I am not a princess who needs to be saved. I am a soul who has suffered loss and needs love and strength from willing participants. And oh how my army is rallying.

I see this cat/neighbor ordeal as a microcosm of the macro potential of sharing my abuse story. The memory (death) has surfaced, the perpetrator (dog) has been identified. The time for speaking truth is at hand. The neighbor ordeal has made me feel stronger in standing up for myself and others who have suffered the same loss. I have already addressed it with authorities and feel very empowered in my ability to procure my own sense of safety. Simultaneously, I am working on a plan with my wonderfully supportive brother that will unearth our family secret as a necessary step in my healing journey. It isn't easy, and it might be some time before I am ready. We often don't know when the time isn't right for something so big, but we almost always know when it is. I will be ready. More importantly, I will be supported and loved through it.

I am so much stronger than I was a year ago, and I have the spiral to thank. Scientists say a spiral appears in nearly all things in nature from honeycombs, seashells, the human ear and bronchial lobes, pinecones, and flower petals, all the way to the formation of galaxies. This spiral, represented by the Greek letter phi and best understood through the Fibonacci sequence, is referred to as the Golden Ratio or the Divine Proportion. I like to think that my spiral follows the same celestial pattern and that my healing journey is somehow connected to the healing journey for us all. In this, there is purpose, there is meaning. And there is hope.

The Theatre

Memory repression is a condition in which details of an event are consciously blocked due to high levels of stress or trauma. Survivors of abuse and those who exhibit symptoms of PTSD commonly experience memory problems and sometimes even have damage in the hippocampus, the area in the brain responsible for memory storage and converting short- to long-term memory. Physical manifestations of repressed memories can show up as irritability, trouble sleeping, emotional numbness, and exaggerated response to surprises or trigger events that conjure trauma remembrance.

Even when memory is repressed by the conscious brain, experts believe that body memory can help recover hidden psychological memories and details. Through therapy, these details can be collected and reprocessed, thereby freeing the rememberer from seemingly inexplicable physical and emotional suffering triggered by reliving subconscious trauma. There is often a memory sliver - a breadcrumb so to speak - that can help elicit and open the door to full remembrance of traumatic events. For me, that sliver was The Theatre.

I always knew something bad happened in The Theatre. Nary a moment did I suspect invalidity of this occurrence though I did not have conscious details of how far it went. I had vivid contextual memory - who I was with, my relative age, transportation to and from, seating arrangement, body position, the fact that we visited the toy store afterward so he could buy my silence, but most importantly the moment when the touching became "not ok." I had no detail beyond that. What I have learned through the course of therapy is that the reason I had no detailed conscious memory is because this is the moment I left my body.

I remember making myself sit perfectly still, thinking that if I were compliant then it would be over faster. I convinced myself that if I could somehow turn into a stone statue then it would be better because stone statues don't feel. And if I didn't feel it, then it wasn't really happened. I was playing a lot of Super Mario Bros. 3 at the time and used the visual of Tanooki's stone statue which Raccoon Mario can turn into at will after he grabs a feather. I remembered this, but what I didn't know was all of the definable steps leading up to the stone statue nor how they related to my dissociation stages.

In the face of trauma, the human mind-body has three possible responses: fight, flight, or freeze. I chose the latter. In fact that is what most children who are being sexually abused do, because there is seemingly no other choice. We are small with little or no strength to fight; he was a 40+ year old man, how could I possibly ward him off? We are reliant upon the care of others; if I fled, where would I go? We are taught to respect authority and obey adults, which too often results in the inability to say no even when we know something is wrong. We are also taught shame from a very early age, which I would soon discover was a significant contributor to my frozen state.

It took me a long time to tell Dee about The Theatre. Seven therapists in 13 years and I had never breathed a word of this to any of them. I never felt comfortable and, quite ironically, I never thought it was relevant. Or perhaps I hoped it wasn't. In some ways the knowledge of this sliver was like a fly buzzing around my therapy sessions. I knew it was there, its appearance and persistence annoyed me at times, but I was able to shoo it away enough to focus on what I considered the real reason I was in the office. (I elaborate on the irony and subconscious functionality of using the masking event of my sick mother to hide the true root cause of my trauma in a later post called Goodbye Panda.)

It wasn't until after the appearance of the Black Oil that it became glaringly apparent something was lurking beneath, a dark demon of shame that was bigger than the problems with my schizophrenic-abandoning mother. Dee and I spent many EMDR sessions focusing on the Black Oil; sometimes I was able to look at it but most of the time it simply forced me out of my body. Those sessions exhausted and depleted me. I lived a hazy existence for weeks, barely functioning at work and in a near zombie-like state around my family during Christmas 2012.

The ASCA Survivor to Thriver Manual lists a series of general steps in the healing journey from child abuse; step two is Acknowledgement. On January 2, 2013 I finally acknowledged that I was sexually abused. During many months of therapy with Dee, she inquired no less than three times about the possibility of abuse during my childhood. Each of her inquiries would produce a dreamlike state wherein I could not form a coherent response. It was as if my lips were buttoned and no words would come out. All I could say is that I had gaps in my memory, that I had an inkling that something happened in a movie theatre, but I wasn't sure if it was real and it made me feel crazy to think about, much less talk about it.

After Dee's third inquiry (which came at the end of a session - ding, ding, time is up!) I went home in an out-of-body state. I trusted her and was ready to talk about it, even if it led to nothing significant. Even if it had no bearing on our work related to schizophrenic-abandoning mother. I had never written about this topic in 25 years, though I have dozens of journals documenting my personal growth. I could not bear to see this story in my own hand writing. And so I typed it out as a draft email with no intended recipient.

The next week on my way to see Dee I had sufficient resolve to share my story. Except I also had an incredible amount of "body stuff"... headaches, nausea, and heavy arms which made it difficult to drive. I even passed her office though I had been there at least 20 times. My mind-body did not want reveal. I had also been doing a lot of fingernail stabbing that week. This is one of my methods of self-injury. I shove my fingernails so far up inside the thumbnail on each hand that they bleed. The pain is satiating in a strange way such that it grounds me and almost feels good, and I have done this for decades in moments of stress. (I write more about my other tendencies for self-injury in a later post called Puzzle Pieces.)

I had been stabbing so much the week leading up to my session with Dee that squeezing a lemon in my Perrier brought me to tears. After talking with Dee, I now know that children are most likely coaxed and/or threatened to keep the abuse secret in ways that get planted in their psyche so deep that they don't even realize it. Likely this stabbing behavior was a way to secretly and subconsciously punish myself for what I was getting ready to do: violate my promise to him that I would never tell.

And so I told her. I think Dee knew for many months that this is where my therapy was headed. She is incredibly insightful and also infinitely gentle; she was patient until I was ready to reveal but in her own way let me know that she also saw the buzzing fly in the room. We later discussed the fact that my symptoms - these dissociative tendencies - are not something that would likely blossom from moments of abandonment, which can be deeply traumatic but not in the freeze variety; nor was this a response to attempts of suicide, which calls for action not a frozen state. It turns out childhood sexual abuse is one of Dee's areas of specialty; I did not know that when I sought her out but the universe did. She had much experience in the arena of dissociation and even shared stories with me (anonymously, of course) about some of her other patients' tendencies and the kinds of modalities they used in therapy sessions to uncover truth and release pain. I was ready to do both.

We began to use The Theatre as our trigger event for EMDR. Progress did not take long. At first I was not able to be "in" the theatre seat for it was much too painful. And so we constructed a visual exercise where I would pull up a comfy brown beanbag in the favorite room of my house and I would surround myself with trusted supporters so that we could watch the "movie" of my trigger event together. It was unsettlingly ironic that we were watching a movie of me watching a movie; it reminded me of the surreal dual reality in Being John Malkovich where people experience life through the eyes and body of another person. Using this technique I could observe and talk about The Theatre as if it were happening to or through someone else.

I had been studying and practicing tonglen, a Buddhist meditation technique, with Em for many weeks. Part of tonglen is gathering the image of people who are loving and supportive to help guide your efforts and energy throughout the practice. Like many meditative exercises, I did not consciously choose the visions and people who came to me; it is inner wisdom that presents exactly what is needed. In my case the figure of Christ is behind my right shoulder, St. Francis is on my left, and standing behind me are my two spiritual teachers Gyandev and Diksha who reside at an ashram in California that I have frequented in my yoga study.

At first when constructing the comfort zone from which to view The Theatre for EMDR, all 4 of my supporters joined me. But when we turned on the movie of my movie, I had to ask Gyandev and Diksha to leave. I was overwhelmed with the shame of what we were getting ready to observe and I could not bear for them to see it. It was ok for Jesus and St. Francis to stay because they weren't "real people" and henceforth it was always just the three of us.

I could write many details about what I know now about The Theatre and the variety of healing techniques Dee and I used to integrate this event. There are three things that are most mentionable here: the connection of The Theatre to the steps of my dissociative process, the arduous work and my body's response to repeated reprocessing of this event, and the ways in which I have been freed from the trauma through EMDR.

Through EMDR I came to understand that the details of this event are specifically and intentionally linked to each step in my dissociative process as witnessed by The Watcher in Israel's Key. It goes like this:

• At the moment of "touching not ok" my ears are flooded with the sound of my heart beating in sheer terror and panic. The throbbing is so loud that it deafens me to the point where I can no longer hear anything else.
• I become the stone statue so as not to feel the monster touching me. This survival mechanism allows me to pretend it isn't happening, but it also produces a sensation of extreme heaviness (stone is rather weighty, after all) and so first my arms and then my chest feel like lead.
• I am so ashamed of what he is doing to me. There are people in The Theatre around us and I am terrified that someone will see. I realize that if I am not careful, I will let loose a whimper or some sound of distress that might call attention to this horrid situation. And so I stop breathing so that I won't cry or make a sound. Please God, don't let anyone hear or see.

The set where I had this last revelation nearly did me in. In the EMDR state of dreamlike knowing and reliving, my body put up a tremendous fight. I gagged to the point that I felt certain I would vomit all over Dee's lovely green couch. This would happen several times over the course of the next few months but I am happy to report that I never actually threw up. (I share more on the subject of my body's keen use of nausea and vomiting as a coping mechanism for trying to "rid" myself of these demons in a post titled On Shame.) I shook, I cried, I held my breath, I curled up in a ball. I regressed to a childlike state of frozen terror. It was one of the most awful things I have ever experienced. I say 'one of' because there would be many more moments like this to come for it is a necessary part of the reprocessing and desensitization process. In all honesty, it is hell on Earth.

Gradually I was able to "sit" in The Theatre instead of watching the movie of it. I was able to relive, re-experience, remember, reprocess and then make peace with this trigger event. Once we peeled back the layers of this trauma onion I was also able to recover a great deal of detail about the scene - peripheral vision, position of people around me, what I was wearing, and the movie(s) that were playing because, as it turns out, this happened more than once. It took a tremendous amount of work and effort but it was both necessary and worth it. 

A wonderfully healing facet of EMDR is that through diligent practice, the survivor is able to change the trauma memory into something more comfortable, palatable, livable. It is through this event molding process that the survivor becomes empowered, protected, and safe. For me this happened when I was finally able to visualize my adult self - Big Me - coming into The Theatre, kicking my abuser out of his seat, sitting down with Little Me and covering her up with a blanket (so as to be safe, warm, protected from harmful touching) while we proceeded to watch the movie together complete with popcorn and Twizzlers. This initial introduction of Big Me and Little Me would become a powerful healing tool that Dee and I would call upon again and again in the months to come.

Similar to my EMDR success with mother's suicide attempts, I am now able to talk about The Theatre without mind-body trauma symptoms. Well, almost. I am still haunted by the truth of this memory and I grieve its occurrence, but I am able to acknowledge and speak about it without being overcome by it. This process took many weeks, some with 2 long EMDR sessions and emergency phone calls in between to help me get a grip. During this time I was still traveling for work and wearing the face of success, which felt a lot more like a heavy shield. Life. Was. Exhausting. But all of this was critical for my healing journey. Though I did not know it at the time, unraveling The Theatre was only the beginning of recovering full memory of the abuse I suffered. A breadcrumb indeed.

The Pursuit of In-Bodyness

For many years I have been drawn to a variety of modalities that would allow and even elicit the sense of being fully inside my body. My first great love was yoga.

I remember my very first yoga class and how it produced a feeling of being simultaneously energized and relaxed, an unlikely combination. This class was at a YMCA which, in typical Western style, was geared more toward physical fitness than true mind-body-spirit connection and philosophy. Still, it unlocked something in me that was deeply craved; it met a need so strong and yet so veiled that I was taken aback at the sheer power of its effect on me. As I ventured to and then began a regular practice in an actual yoga studio, my fascination with this pathway to in-bodyness blossomed. Though I did not recognize it at the time, yoga enabled me to feel fully embodied for the first time since the onset of my dissociative tendencies.

An added benefit of yoga for ASCAs is shavasana, the end of yoga practice where the instructor uses guided meditation to induce a sort of wakeful sleep known as yoga nidra. These 5-7 minute exercises would produce a feeling of safety the likes of which I had not experienced since before being abused. In fact, it was the only time I felt safe and protected while in the very vulnerable position of lying down with eyes closed. It was nothing short of blissful.

I went on to become a certified yoga instructor and keep this treasured activity as part of my wellness practice, although somewhat estranged from it during the deepest valleys of my healing journey. I did not fully understand my pursuit of this amazing technique of in-bodyness until after my Breakthrough Crisis. I am fully aware now.

There is an insightful program from On Being on the usefulness of EMDR and yoga by the renowned PTSD expert Bessel van der Kolk. Dr. Kolk asserts that these alternate healing modalities may be the only way to access and relieve repressed pain and trauma. I highly, highly recommend listening to his interview with Krista Tippett entitled Restoring the Body.

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My second love is running. There is something precious and priceless about having the body in full motion, full engagement, focusing only on this step and this breath. It is impossible to be anywhere else - including outside your body - when running. It requires absolute concentration and proprioception, the ability to move through time and space with mind-body functioning as one.

Running is magical for me. Aside from the numerous physical and psychological benefits, it allows me to move alongside my demons - healing from them while not consciously focusing on them. Puzzle pieces come together, connections are made, all the while I am virtually unaware of this occurrence. I affectionately refer to this phenomenon as 'background processing.'

There have been times when I have overused running and in fact abused my body in the process. (I will elaborate on this more in a later post called A Bouquet of Me where I will introduce you to my anorexic self.) One year I ran 3 consecutive marathons which resulted in a host of injuries that took more than a year from which to heal. During that year of recovery I had to sit still with my problems which, at that time, was infinitely harder than running with (or away from) them. I have had to learn in many (all?) aspects of my life that moderation is the key to balance.

Currently I am in a phase of establishing balance by not running. In an effort to listen to my body more (which requires also being inside of it more often!) I am honoring a deep-seated desire for stillness. Thus all of this blogging. As the sun grows dimmer and the seasons grow colder, I suspect running and I will find our way back to each other. I will post more about the partnership of running and trauma recovery as it has played an absolutely integral part in my healing journey.

Israel's Key

In November 2012 I traveled to Israel on a spiritual quest. My close friend Jet came to see me off from Newark. Jet and I had been on and off friends/lovers/friends/enemies - rinse and repeat - for a couple of years. Relationships are not easy with an ASCA, so I admit to being 50% of the problem. The same is true for my failed marriage and the wake of destructive relationships I left trailing behind me before that. The nature of this friendship with Jet is pertinent because the dissociative button is often easily pushed by someone approaching intimate closeness.

Jet and I got into an argument in the middle of EWR. A series of no-fault events had left us stranded for the night with no place to sleep and me with an international departure in the morning. Jet blamed me for the incident and proceeded to explain the nature and extent of his anger in this crowded public place. I was feeling very upset at being blamed for something that was not my fault. And then it happened. I began my typical dissociation tailspin with one exception this time. The Watcher remained conscious, nonjudgmental (because the rest of me is constantly judging myself all the time), and secretly documented everything that happened for later mental retrieval. This is how it goes:

• First I lose my hearing. I can see people's mouths moving, but everything is muffled. I can't talk either. I usually don't have anything to say because my brain is short-circuiting, but even if I did it is like the muscles that surround my lips are frozen.
• Next my arms feel heavy like lead. I distinctly remember sitting at the airport, laptop open, wanting to google hotels but I literally could not mobilize the muscles in my left arm up to the keyboard. It simply wouldn't move so I just sat there staring at it. Arms completely stuck at my sides, meanwhile The Watcher's running script documented the words 'like rigor mortis.'
• Next the heaviness from my arms moves into my chest, and then my whole body goes numb. I feel myself exit through my head; it sort of feels like the top of my head coming off. This is not like the near-death experiences I've read where people talk about being able to see themselves from above. It is difficult to explain; it's more like being behind and slightly above myself, though not exaggeratedly so like hovering around the ceiling. I'm close to my body, I'm just not in it.
• Then I stop breathing. I did not know I was a breath holder until The Watcher revealed this to me. This part is actually quite scary. While watching myself from above/behind I begin to fear that I will suffocate. My journal entry for this reads "I honestly don't know how oxygen is getting into my blood because there is no air passing in or out of my body. If indeed I am breathing I cannot feel it at all, no matter how hard I try." I remain in this breathless state for some unknown period of time until something zaps me back in. Then I either go through the round of ears-arms-numb-breathless state again or stay in and move on to the next tortuous state.

When I come back into my body, then the pain begins. I suppose this is why I dissociate for as long as possible because I fear the pain of being human (as opposed to the stone statue). The mental chatter is maddening, hyper self-critical, and the emotional pain that comes with it is nearly unmanageable. Whatever the situation is, I catastrophize it to death. "This is the worst thing ever." "I can't deal with this." "I'm not strong enough." "I have to get out of here." If dissociation is the mental/emotional flight response, then my last stage of dysfunction here is physical flight. I start to concoct all the ways I'm going to end the relationships, the circumstance, the problem, etc. so that I never have to face or feel this again.

It was fascinating to observe myself go through all of these stages with such a clear minded Watcher. I am a psychologist getting to study the human psyche from the inside. Jill Bolte Taylor speaks of her similarly fascinating experience of being a brain scientist studying the human brain from the inside while she had a stroke in her TED talk called Stroke of Insight. I can so relate. I was in there too.

Jet had no idea I was experiencing my dissociative cycle. To the outsider it looks like I am ignoring and punishing them with silence. They couldn't possibly know the whirlwind of turmoil and pain that is happening inside of me. How could they? These are normal situations; people get mad when things don't go well and there's nothing wrong with that. You fight, figure it out, make up, and go on with your day. At least that's what happens for normal people (I'm guessing). I bet this is one of the major reasons being in a relationship with an ASCA is so difficult. From the outside it looks like we make a big deal out of everything. The truth is, on the inside everything IS a big deal. Everything looks, smells, and feels like trauma. 

It gets worse. Not only are my responses to seemingly small events disproportionate in the moment, but then I can remain in a robot-like state for hours, days, or even weeks. This looks like more punishment to the outsider, but inside I am dying. I can't feel. I'm not Me. I criticize myself for how I reacted in the moment and am left wondering what the hell is wrong with me. On the outside it looks cool and dry, but that's only because I don't know who I am or how I feel. My theory here is that every time I dissociate, a part of me stays outside and does not come back in. I am left feeling less whole, less integrated. As the severity and frequency of these cycles increase, I end up feeling completely robotic and not like Me at all. My ex-husband used to call me Ice Princess. In his defense, I never shared any of this with him because I had no language for it, nor did I understand the origin of my dysfunction. I imagine that many ASCAs can relate to this experience in relationship, both the dysfunction within and the ultimate painful demise.

Jet is sweet and he apologized in the terminal. I came to. We found a hotel. When we got there I went into the bathroom to freshen up for a dinner and I experienced the dissociative cycle again, and all stages were documented by The Watcher. Then it happened for a third and final time in the bathroom. There was no trigger per se, except that I was pondering the fascination of it all. Perhaps The Watcher needed more detail for the script, the one I was writing internally for Dee so that we could use it in my EMDR sessions. 

Fortunate for me, the flight to Tel Aviv is 14 hours. I had plenty of time to journal about my newly understood dissociative cycle in great detail. I had a wonderful time in Israel, but much work was to be done upon my re-entry. The Watcher had found the key.

The Mindful Watcher

Mindfulness meditation is all about coming to a full knowing of one's true essence. It is understanding that you are not your thoughts, you are not your emotions, you are simply the gap in between. It's about being in the present moment and ceasing to identify with the mental chatter (the ego) who tries to tell you who you are instead of letting you experience it. Once you separate Who You Really Are from what you think or how you feel in any given moment, your true essence becomes apparent. You simply are.

Mindfulness is not something you do, it is a way of being. The beauty in this way of being is that when life's tumultuous situations arise, you can remain centered in your essence. You are not numb to the pain that is life, but are instead able to separate yourself from being identified and defined by it. You become The Watcher - able to observe what is happening inside and around your Self without being absorbed into it.

I have practiced many forms of mindfulness for over a decade without truly internalizing its true meaning. I understood it academically, but left brain's logic is altogether different from right brain's knowing. After months of working diligently on this skill with Em, I actually experienced The Watcher while in a dissociative state. Only then did I fully comprehended the power of mindfulness. I truly believe that without this experience, I would not be as far forward on my healing journey today.

I've mentioned in previous posts that my dissociative tendencies have rendered me dysfunctional in a number of adult life situations. These circumstances are not trauma related, but for the ASCA dissociation makes no distinction. It's a handy-dandy little trick that my brain learned at an early age to cope with trauma, and now it uses dissociation whenever it feels like it to zero out whenever things get difficult. I never recognized, understood, or even had a name for what was happening to me. I simply felt overwhelmed, confused, numb, and crazy. Then I would often go hide in the nearest closet or bathroom, lose time, and endure all the body stuff until it was over. (The "body stuff" will appear in later posts - Israel's Key, The Theatre - and this hiding behavior will be explained in The Terrible Awful.) This went on for 25 years until The Watcher gave language to my dissociative experience.

This happened in the airport, of all places.

The Breakthrough Crisis

Hypervigiliance is an enhanced state of sensory sensitivity accompanied by an exaggerated intensity of behaviors whose purpose is to detect threats. It is also accompanied by a state of increased anxiety which can cause extreme exhaustion. Other symptoms include:

• abnormally increased arousal
• high responsiveness to stimuli
• constant scan of the environment
• high alert to be certain danger is not near
• obsessive behavior patterns
• difficulty with social interaction and relationships
• losing connections with family and friends
• difficulty getting to sleep or staying asleep

Hypervigiliance is a symptom of post-traumatic stress disorder.

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This is precisely what happened to me in August 2012 in response to a minor change in my life: my mother came to live with me. She had come to visit me on many previous occasions, so I had no reason to believe this would be a negative experience. In fact, I was looking forward to it. The arrangement was to be temporary (less than 3 months) while she transitioned from one home to another. However, it only lasted 4 weeks. In a state of utter despair and desperate for relief, I moved her to a residential hotel for the remainder of her transition.

At the time I was mistakenly blaming my suffering on her snoring and late-night meowing cat. There is also the part about her being schizophrenic, or more accurately having schizo-affective disorder (because her bouts of delusions and catatonia are sprinkled with a fair dose of severe depression including multiple suicide attempts), rendering her disabled and now under the financial and legal care of yours truly, but that is another post for another day. Even so, a part of me knew there was something more going on with my state of unrest. Much more.

This was my Breakthrough Crisis. The ASCA Survivor to Thriver Manual describes this experience as a time when "something happens to release a flood of old memories, feelings and even physical sensations of the abuse. Although this crisis does not necessarily destabilize all survivors, for many it can be the most harrowing time in recovery, and it often provides the impetus to finally face the past."

The Manual goes on to say this experience, albeit terrifying, is quite normal for survivors of abuse. It can leave you feeling liked a frightened child without any adult control over your life. Feelings of powerlessness, disorganization and agonizing fear hijack your mind-body. In fact you may very well think you are going crazy. I certainly did. 

I experienced prolonged periods of suicidal ideation. I was barely able to function at work especially while juggling a busy travel schedule. I immediately sought therapy and, for the first time in my life, made a few failed attempts to cycle on and off different anti-depressants. The side effects were debilitating for me, as I have a job which requires me to be en pointe in social settings. I opted to take the non-medical route, upon which I elaborate in a later post entitled Unstuck in Tibet.

You may be wondering, as did I, why a long visit with my mother brought about my breakthrough crisis. It would be many months later before I would discover that the major abusing episode(s) occurred during the last time I shared residence with my mother 25 years prior. While living with her again as an adult, I was simply re-experiencing the panicked state of hypervigilance I must have donned during my childhood. Always looking over my shoulder, expecting someone to attack me like a creature in the night. Because he did.

It's enough to say for now that I did survive both the original hypervigilance and its reliving. It felt like hell, but it was the beginning of a wonderful pathway to eventual freedom. During this time it is noteworthy that I found great comfort in this blogspot from Hyperbole and a Half. It was nearly the only thing that made me smile for nigh 2 months. Thank you Allie!!

An image from Hyperbole that epitomizes precisely how I felt during the Breakthrough:

The End of the Beginning

My story starts in the middle, as it is still being written. In fact I'm quite sure this will be a life long endeavor. As an ASCA (adult survivor of child abuse) there are many twists and turns along the healing journey required to evolve from victim to survivor, and then hopefully to thriver.

I've lived most of my life outside of my body, thus the chosen domain name for my site. The human mind-body (I will often refer to these as one entity because, contrary to Western thought, the two are inextricably intertwined) basically has three options when faced with trauma: fight, flight, or freeze. When a child experiences trauma, especially in the case of sexual abuse, the most common response is to freeze. There is no escape; there is only endurance. At the hands of a so-called trusted adult, the shock and agony of betrayal is too excruciating to bear in real-time and so the child creates a false escape from painful reality by leaving the body. This is called dissociation.

Dissociation is an altered state of consciousness wherein a person, in this case Little Me, detaches from physical and emotional experience. During the times when I was molested, my chosen path for dissociation was to pretend I was a stone statue. I distinctly remember thinking that if I could just remain perfectly still, not breathe, and not feel, then somehow it wasn't happening. This allowed me to withstand the unnatural, confusing, and shameful acts of violation that were being committed. Through blissful dissociation, those things were happening to my body, but not to me. The real Me was drifting somewhere outside of my body, waiting for it to be over so that I could return to myself.

Dissociation is a survival mechanism that served me well from ages 5-13, from the time the abuse started up to and including when I was locked in a basement and raped. I am convinced the only reason I survived those insidious attacks with any fortitude is because I was fully dissociated. The problem is, once the mind-body latches onto dissociation, this learned behavior becomes ingrained and automatic. And as an adult, it is quite dysfunctional in typical life settings. Many non-traumatic experiences would trigger my dissociation, at times rendering Big Me nearly incapable of handling normal life. This lasted for 25 years.

I had little to no memory of the experiences that produced my dissociative reaction. (A single memory remained intact which I write about in a later post called The Theatre.) Consequently, I have spent most of my life in a state of disillusioned pain, unable to deeply connect with others or have a trusting, intimate relationship. That is, until I cracked.

In August 2012 I experienced what I now understand was a Breakthrough Crisis. This was a tumultuous time - almost 3 months - of confusion, hypervigilance, and suicidal ideation the source of which I could not comprehend. It has taken me this long to make sense of what I was and am still going through, thanks to the help of some wonderful therapists, resources, and supportive friends and family.

I'm happy to say that even though this breakthrough-meltdown-breakdown-spiritual awakening process had been inordinately painful, I am grateful that it happened/is still happening. Without it, I would not have the hope of integration, the process of bringing all the pieces of my dissociated self back into my body and becoming fully Me. I'd like to say that I am there, but the truth is it may be many years before that happens. Thus the journey, thus the blog, thus the hope that my story and my healing journey can be a source of comfort and inspiration as others have been for me.

Winston Churchill's famous End of the Beginning speech was delivered soon after it appeared that the Battle of Britain in WWII was going to be won. He wanted to communicate hope, but also a realism where the country was on its journey toward winning the war. My intentions are much the same for my audience. I had to wait until I was ready and able to communicate coherently about my journey. It is far from over, but I have learned enough to share something of value. In this I find great healing and great hope. For there is always hope.

Now this is not the end. It is not even the beginning of the end. But it is, perhaps, the end of the beginning.