Voicelessness and Emotional Survival > Voicelessness and Emotional Survival Message Board
What if you can't remember much of your childhood?
Anonymous:
Sjkravill – Good luck with your term paper! Hope you’re not up too late tonight.
I gather from your posts that you are in your early 20s. I’m older, but I remember my early 20s; I was still idolizing my mother, but at the same time I was unhappy and in therapy. I spent a lot of time talking with my therapist about why I was unhappy. I don’t ever remember her suggesting that my mother had N tendencies, nor do I remember having any doubts about my parents’ love for me, so if you’re thinking along these lines, it sounds like you’re way ahead of where I was at that age in terms of getting at the truth.
What eventually started me on the path to understanding myself was my parents’ behavior in the present (when I was an adult) – things like their invasion of my boundaries. That got me onto the concept of narcissism, and that started me looking back and reassessing my childhood – which is when I realized how little of it I remembered. If your parents have N tendencies, are there ways they behave now that trigger feelings of voicelessness in you? If you can identify those behaviors and understand what’s going on, perhaps it will give you some clues as to what might have happened in your childhood, and help you validate your feelings and then deal with them.
I hope you can work through this at an earlier age than I did, because unless you can nail down what’s really going on, you can spend years struggling with these issues. How much better to spend those years living a full life with a full voice!
Best wishes,
Guest
Wildflower:
Hi everyone,
This is a great thread! I feel like I need to spend more time reading all the posts here, but I just wanted to throw this out there - because I'm not 100% sure what to do with it.
I was telling my therapist that I was upset that I had lost so many of my memories about things I cared about because it made me feel how much I'd lost myself. My therapist said I'd never lost them, I just needed validation. I've been pondering this for a couple of days, and I think what she was saying was that when our feelings are validated we are better able to remember things - kind of an inertia thing. I dunno, though. Since this was a thread about recovering memories, I thought maybe someone else could use this - or even make sense of it (I intend to follow up with my therapist the next time I see her, though).
Wildflower
Portia:
Wildflower, you've got my curiosity going with:
--- Quote ---I had lost so many of my memories about things I cared about
--- End quote ---
I don't understand. You mean, you used to remember and now you don't? Or - your memory has changed because of new knowledge? Or - you want to remember things you have been told about?
I want to remember lots but don't know how to get to the memories. I can't get the filing cabinet inside my head open - it's stuck! Or maybe it's empty? I don't know! Anyone out there want a willing subject for hypnotism? (Any experiences, anyone?) P
sjkravill:
Just a quick note.
I am enjoying everyone's wisdom on this thread.
Thanks for the encouragement, Guest! I am in my early 20's... I sure hope I can resolve some of this stuff and start living a full life.
I did finish my term paper. No sooner than I turned it in and my computer died. So, I don't have as much access for a while! Probably better for me to focus on finals anyway!
Peace! sjkravill
seeker:
Hello Guest and everyone
Welcome to the board, new guest. Boy, your post touched on a lot of similar issues I am facing. Especially this part:
--- Quote ---I’ve noticed that she is behaving in ways that suggest the normal controls on her social behaviour are breaking down. I am faced with the prospect of my mother descending into senility (which could well exaggerate the worst aspects of her personality), while I’m in the process of digging up the truth about my childhood and dealing with my anger toward her. ...So at a time when her behaviour is likely to require the maximum in understanding and tolerance from me, I feel less and less that I have those feelings in me for her. This could well create conflict with the rest of my family, and I am feeling very confused about how to handle it.
--- End quote ---
I am wrestling with exactly the same thing. And like a few of the other posters here, there was little regard for my interests and I suffered a major lack of protection in the outside world (was dressed like a dork, ridiculed by my brother, and otherwise ignored.) As for childhood memories, I remember some, but it was basically pretty monotonous because we never did "family" things, and friendships weren't exactly encouraged.
So if anyone has advice on how to attend to eldercare while working through the unfinished business, I would love to hear it! S.
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