Alice Miller items which may be of interest to some

[Ami]

Dear James,
 As you heal, I bet that your shame will diminish. When you can see that it was NOT your fault,I think it will not have such a stranglehold on you. All that will take time and you are just at the beginning stages of facing your life.
 You are doing so well to be able to even talk about it ,at all.
 Many people can never face as much as you have already.
 Everything, such as writing your story, will come in time, as you are ready.It does not have to be forced or rushed. I am glad you are here, James. Keep sharing, as you feel comfortable                                 Love to you,   Ami

[papillon]

Hi James,

Wishing you a whole lot better life in the future than you've had in the past. With you taking control and being in therapy I'd say that you have a very good chance.

" It was just 6 years ago that my father out of the clear blue tried to choke me."
What a beast of thing to do. What a beast. It was criminal. Whether anyone likes that word or not, it's true. The guy should have been locked up for a few weeks or months or years.

" Not a single member of my family found this shocking"
Poor dumb foolish unaware people. They don't even recognize violence and abuse when they see it. How the heck would they know or even have the comprehension to understand if they themselves were being abused then? They weren't even shocked by a father trying to choke his son!!!!   I have this strange belief that fathers are meant to support, validate, respect and encourage their sons. Oh that's right, I just realized, it's just another one of my strange beliefs not reflected in most reality I observe.

"My mom just casually said "i don't know why your father does things that".
Great, just bleeding great. How apathetic can a mother get. An enabler as well. Just feigns "Oh I don't know..." coming on all victim like herself. Talking about her 'confusion' rather than helping you deal with a monster.

Sorry James, I'm not doing too much here but having a whine about your parents and family. Sounds like mine. Just keep going with the therapy and get in touch your inner bitch. That's my advice.

Forgive!!!! Don't even go there!!!!! I had religious forgiveness crap rammed down my throat for years. I forgave, and as a result I got ulcers in my stomach and arthritis. For years.

Then I un-forgave, got angry, moved on, understood them in their own hell. I managed to lose the hatred and anger that I had for them. But I don't forgive them. I don't figure I have to. If they were alive and asked me to, I may. But they aren't so I'm not. Even the christians God doesn't forgive willy nilly everybody apparently - Only when He's asked to.

I'm interested to read more from you, when you're up to it. Just remember, the shame thing, most of it belongs outside, it's from someone else's problem.

Hoping you can take it easy on yourself,

Papillon   


"Every time I close the door on reality  it comes in through the windows." 
Jennifer Unlimited

[James]

 Pappilon.....thanks for the booster shot I needed that about right now! your indignation on my behalf feels great.  James

[James]

Papillon............Alice posted a letter that i wrote today on her site "Nearly insane" if you want to read. It's pretty cut and dry, just a general overview of my last year or so. I left out the gore. I have corresponded and received letters back from her this year mostly in private.(meaning not published) Her knowledge has been of immense help to me. I've read mountains of material thru the years but nothing really gave me what I wanted till I discovered her work. The research of others was helpful but her's really grabbed me and i put it to the test a little over two years ago, using both her work and my therapist to help. My therapist knows her work well and is healed. It really works. The work of Arthur Janov was very informative and helpful  (your're down the road in recovery so most of his work might not be of therapeutic benefit at the moment but it makes for a fascinating read). I would not recommend primal therapy to anyone but during the course of standard therapy i started having lots of Primals. They just came naturally to me. They are beyond comprehension to most people. Alice considers this dangerous now and so do i. You can read her thinking on this in her "Communication to her Readers ". She went thru it also and was injured for a bit. I couldn't help what happened.... i guess my defense system was so leaky and holding back so much pain that when it burst it came down with a crash and i was lost for a good while in the chaos of my feelings. Too much all at once. Glad thats overwith!! I'm here with the intent of reintegrating back into the world of people rather than just standard therapeutic settings. I will finally get my story done with a lot of the gore. exposing it here will help a lot. It's not any worse than others i've read here. Just old fears kicking in a little. Some old dependency/helplessness issues getting stirred up a bit.  Overall so much better than i've ever been. My rage really is spent and i see my parents for who they are and know what really happened.   James

[Ami]

You sound really good ,James. You seem to be making the steps toward healing!!! You seemed to have come a long way, James.
 I will await your story, whenever you are ready.             Warmly,  Ami

[James]

Ami....perhaps you could help me out? I know where to post stories but can't seem to find instructions on how to do it. Is it me or is there something missing on instruction here? Mind you i'm one of those people who can never make sense of instructions on anything. Gettin this puter hooked up cost me several therapy sessions related to "instruction anxiety"  LOL  James

[Ami]

I know what you mean about the computer(lol).You just go to Member's Stories and then post on there , the same way you do on the regular board. You are doing so well, James !!      Ami

[James]

Ami........I looked yesterday but didn't find the right place maybe . I'll try again when i really want to use it. How is your feeling of being "alone" doing today? Is it against rules to post under this thread what i just asked? is that the way things are here?....thanks so much Ami for the help   if you still feel alone here's another hug and even if you don't   James

[Ami]

James
 Go under Members Stories.Some people mind when the thread veers a little and some don't,but see if you can post your story  in Member Stories. if you want.
  The hug is much appreciated. I think my aloneness is the "aloneness of the human condition" rather than a situational aloneness--bleh to BOTH of them(lol)     Ami

[papillon]

Hi James,

Well, you really are pro-active in getting yourself put right way up. I like your "if not me - who?" attitude. Just fabulous. I'm looking forward to going and reading your letter at the AM site.

I was reading somewhere earlier where you posted about the other therapist.  scarey. It's great that you have a healed one. So vital too.

You can post wherever you want, doesn't worry me, just that the member's area is just for you. Nobody interrupts or comments on your thread. It's just for you. That's good isn't it? You can go back anytime, add, edit, delete anything.


Primal therapy - not my bag. I think I thought if I got into it I might not ever come back out again. I used to be a big screamer in teen years, it was how I self-soothed myself to exhaustion to ease/numb the pain. Now I prefer to think/relax/think/feel/relax........................./

You seem to have a good understanding of a few therapies, and have a good grasp of the language. It's sad that we need to have all this information, isn't it?  But great that it's out there to be had.

Alice Miller's material on the ridiculous common absurd too-oft-replicated scenario of life - when babies and children come into a family, it is them who provide the unconditional love. They provide only unconditional love to the parents, whether the parent's are worthy of it or not. It's sad that so often too many people who have children just don't 'get it' and do it the other way round, the right way round. Parent's unconditionally loving the children, as well. 

Yes, it should have been the other way round for us, folks.

It's good chatting with you James. I'm slowly working my way through your posts, and I'll read your story when you post it.


Papillon

A happy childhood lasts a lifetime
Alice Miller

[James]

Papillon........you're right its very sad so many of us have to struggle the way we do in order to have something of a life. My therapeutic journey came close to being the central focus of everything i did because of overwhelming pain. Janov's work is perhaps some of the most important i've ever read as far as understanding the body/brain and how neurosis develops etc etc and is cured. His findings can be applied to easier forms of therapy in my opinion. It has very little to do with screaming. I'm sorry Janov named his first book using scream... scared a lot of people away and tarnished it's importance. It's a very quick way to open the unconscious. These experiences are hard to imagine for anyone who has never experienced it. Glad mine is over and it does work for some but there have been several suicides and people becoming psychotic after they found the realities that were repressed often in living color. sights sounds smells faces everything frozen in time just as it was....  repressed in the brain.........regards James

[papillon]

James, hi

Just wanted to pop off a quick reply to you, and let you know I'm very encouraged by your words to AM. I particularly felt the depths of pain in this:

"What I discovered based on my experience is this. The first and most important illusion shattered was my illusion of being loved. This realization eventually almost entirely imploded a defense system unconsciously constructed in childhood. Very, very painfully. From my experiences i believe every child conceived is hardwired for survival. True love and its expression is the mechanism on the part of the parents/caregivers to ensure this. The infant WILL KNOW if this is forthcoming. Any disruption of infant needs being met, or cruelty, can spark an unimaginable existential terror of death in the childs mind and due to it's helplessness the unconscious mind activates and tries to ensure survival as best it can. Illusions form, needs become perverted etc."

I agree very much with these words. I also think that this repeats itself, in relationships in later life, if left not dealt with and understood.

I think so much pain in adult relationships comes from the same type of existential terror. Illusions form, then disaster. Suddenly the results of a experiencing a 'reality check' when we realize we have 'adult enmeshments' rather than healthy adult relationships. This was my experience anyway. Most of my adult relationships either seemed, or were, illusory in one sense or another.

I sometimes think it would have been better to have the experience of 'raging' at my parents. This wasn't to be the case.

I've done other certain things that helped though to substitute. For example, I've changed my name.

I don't honor their memory in any way at all. I never talk about them if possible, I truly have no desire to. If I need to, it's in the briefest of detail. I most certainly don't honor the date of my birth. I've chosen another date for that which holds a very precious and special significance for me, and makes me feel like singing 'happy birthday' to myself.

My parents have faded into an ignominious nothingness in my current life. That's probably much more than either of them deserve.

After much expensive therapy, I think I'm mostly over them.

I've developed an art form of precluding their mention in my daily life. This was just a part of my own peculiar form of healing rage. It seems have acted as a type of purgative so far, along with a few other things. I haven't any disturbances within myself about adopting these measures. Although if some inner-disturbance does appear I'd see somebody. I know now that I have somebody reliable I can go to to talk about these things with.

None of that negates the importance of the fact that I had to go through a process of getting it all out, letting it all settle, and then lletting it all go first though. Then it seems as if the wounds were bandaged, and checked regularly, and kept clean.

I suspected your grasp of psycholgy had some study associated. It's extremely interesting that so many of greatest psychology theoriticians had severe emotional disturbances, which was what led them into that field of study and practice in the first place.

Thankyou for allowing me the opportunity to read your letter to AM. I was also greatly relieved to discover that your letter wasn't the letter by the other J, the correspondence in regard to 'fetish and healing'.

 
Papillon


The ideal condition would be, I admit, that men should be right by instinct; but since we are all likely to go astray, the reasonable thing is to learn from those who can teach”
Sophocles
 

[James]

Hi Papillon....thanks for the note. iIve had a crap day thought i had rid myself of a lot of baggage maybe i have and the next step is looming. I don't know at the moment I posted the sexual abuse thread thinking it might be a big step. It was but more like a hole. It released a tidal wave of emotions i wasn't prepared for. I wrote some of my story and posted . Some i doubt i will ever share. Maybe it isn't even important for my stay here. I had little emotion when writing just some of the facts. Been dealing with the other all day long too long. Interesting thing I thought my rage was spent. Fooled myself again.  Got a taste today of more and this is maybe bigger and deeper than the other.   PS... Changing my name has run thru my mind many times.... ..  James

[Ami]

This Alice Miller thread inspired me to face my rage against my M. When Ann told me that my M had stolen my core b/c my M wanted to stay safe and my core could be too smart and show her up, I felt rage.
 I called my M, today, and told her. Of course, she has an "answer" for everything,being a therapist(lol)
 However, I put the "wrongdoing" back on her, as the Alice Miller thread said. I feel more whole and more sane!
                        Thank you, Papillion for bringing Alice Miller to the board.              Ami

[Ami]

You know, parts of myself are clicking back in as I see my M as "bad" and NOT me. I was never "bad", but SHE was. I was normal and human. She imposed the concept of "bad" on me by excoriating me for normal emotions and feelings like taking care of myself(ie selfishness) .
                                                                                                        Ami