Here is an oldie I avoided before.... opinions?

[Izzy_*now*]

When I was quite young, perhaps 3, something happened that has never left my mind, as in, that it is only in the back of my mind.

I mentioned it once here, a long time ago, and someone asked me to elaborate on this, but I didn’t.

My mother was in hospital having another baby which could have been my brother, who was born when I was 3yrs and 4mos old. My next eldest sister was 1yr and 8mos older. (.. the now N)  This would be in 1942.

The aforementioned sister and I were sitting side by side in a ‘little red wagon’ behind the garage on our desolate farm. About a mile away in the dusk, explosions could be heard with the building of a new Highway in Ontario  (later named Hwy 400) between Toronto and Barrie (and is now far further extended.) At the same time as the dynamite was being set off, a storm was brewing and we tried to discern between dynamite and thunder. Dad came and told us it was bedtime, so we went to bed.

Dad and I shared a room. Why?

Next was a nightmare that I had about a big furry bear having a grip on me, smothering me, scratching my back, and I couldn’t do anything, then after that it was….and still is, a still photo of being outside my body and seeing this as from the doorway.. Dad with me in his arms, one under my shoulders and one under my knees putting me into my cot, that was in the same room as where he slept in a double bed, alone, and if I asked anything (I don’t know) his answer was, ‘You fell out of bed’.

When I awoke in the morning I had a scratch on my back, and that always baffled me, because of the hairy bear in my dream.

I have never told anyone this as I am not sure if it means anything….but why do those ‘still’ photographs stay with me after some 68 years?

Does anyone think this is a true memory of abuse, that I haven’t really acknowledged, because of my age at the time?

Where did my 2 older sisters and the younger one sleep, when there were 3 bedrooms upstairs? I suppose I will never know if there was anything untoward, except that I compartmentalize?????

P.S. My Dad had a very hairy chest and it repulsed me in later life, but my 'husband' had only 2 hairs on is chest, as a Native Canadian, and I loved his 'smooth, hairless body', (yet hair where it counted below was all, to prevent friction.         )

[Nonameanymore]

Hi Izzy,

Don't know what to say.
I have a similar memory when I was 3 as well that I haven't fully explored in therapy yet because I wasn't ready and I also struggle to remember if the incident (single incident gladly) took place or not.

I guess you can find out with hypnotherapy??
Just an idea.

P

[Hopalong]

Jesus, Izz.

I don't know honey, but it does not make sense to me that you and your father shared a bedroom, unless the best thing I can imagine is, you shared it with BOTH your parents. That's not so, right? And if it were, it's odd, as one would expect it to be the very youngest who shared a room with parents for a while. Was it a cot that various kids were brought to? Maybe you were particularly afraid of storms? So that night, you got the "protection"?

Just you and he? Hairy bear dream? Scratch? Remembering him lifting you BACK to your own bed? Disturbs me.

Maybe it's so. Maybe you did fall out of bed from a deep sleep or nightmare--or maybe he was lifting you from the floor while you were still night-maring, and him=bear became part of the nightmare.

Or maybe it is as bad as you fear and your father abused you and your mind buried it. You have said he was abusive in other ways. Beating the kids. What is your sense of who he was? Were you just a female object to him? What was his attitude toward females generally?

My grandfather arranged his daughters' sleeping quarters. The one he wanted access to he put on a cot on a landing, rather than in a bedroom with her sisters. So she was out in the open, alone, and uprotected at night. Bastard. And then he preached on Sundays. As an adult, she was institutionalized for depression off and on for years.

So I have so much "vibrating" around the issue. I hope it's not true, Izzy. But if it was, you have survived, so long since done MORE than survived, you have triumphed. You became an amazing, imaganative, courageous, enduring woman who has inspired me over and over again.

And maybe there is the answer in your memory. Probably beneath the detail is a memory. And maybe it's actually a safe memory, that you were there since you feared storms, you had a nightmare and fell and got the scratch on the edge of your cot as you fell, and your father was just lifting you. And if it's the other kind of memory, maybe you'll know that one day.

I hope it's the right one, a father lifting a fallen child. What does your deep instinct tell you? Some violent men who hit their families never ever do anything sexual to a child. Other violent men, do it all.

love to you,
Hops

[teartracks]

Dear Iz,

I grew up having what I now think were flashbacks that manifested in the form of about a half dozen still pictures.  All my life I wondered what they could mean and why they presented themselves unbidden by me.   I never expected to examine them  or for that matter make sense of them.  My experience up to then was that they were a part of who I was since the flashbacks came and went at their leisure.  Then early in my recovery I read Dr. Phil's book, Self Matters.   In that book, he outlines what in the psychological community is sometimes referred to as emotional archaeology.   I found his book very helpful.  It appoached the process using an outline that encouraged going back to as many memories (good and bad) as you have available and re-experiencing them using all of ones senses.  On finishing the examination, the memory could be categorized as a keeper or a throw away.  The thing was that the pictures I had held no attached memory.  Because of that, I can't say whether living in them as an adult was based in an actual event of my childhood or not.  I've read the opinions of psychs  who say that they may be  imaginary, and based in nothing more.  

Anyway, the book prompted the thought that it might be possible to make sense of them as well as shed light on other life issues I was facing at the time.  This all took place in the early stages of my recovery.  So I retreated to a hammock in a small woods in back of my mother's home where I had enough privacy to wail and wallow to whatever degree necessary as I connected to the 'picture' memories and the other conscious memories and their effect on my life.  I started with the earliest 'picture' and as far as I can tell, that was my earliest memory as well  (I could tell it was the earliest because I was about 8 months old in the picture).  

I added an additional element to Dr. Phil's outline.  It was that I invited God to be with me as I reviewed my life, including these still pictures.   I had been walking with God many years at this point.  Including Him in this was the most natural thing in the world.  I could tell the story  of how the meaning of each still picture came to light, but that's not where I'm going with this.  I just wanted to say that where my stills were concerned, they revealed very specific and poignant, even disturbing detail to my early life.  Not one of them was a blank.  However, had I been left to guess their meaning, I would never have assigned the meaning that was revealed to me.  The first one gave me a look at the first time I feared abandonment by my mother.  The second one showed me the very moment when all of my life coping strategies began.  It was as clear as daylight.  Were these memories real?  I don't know if it's possible to know for certain if the detail revealed to me was factual or true to an event where the still picture was snapped.  

The stills I carried were just that.  So how did my mind take a picture of what was happening to me and if it did, how did my mind become a camera, allowing me to stand outside of the event snapping a picture of what was happening to me at that moment?  If my mind did take a picture using me as a view finder, then why didn't it come out with more detail?  I expect there is a psychological explaination, but I don't know it.  The thing is that whether the stills were based in fact or some childish coping strategy, the outcome for me in living in them long enough to understand them as an adult lying in that hammock was beneficial to me.  Very beneficial in helping me make sense of my early years, how I perceived those years and how they impacted me throughout life.  By the way, I can now recall those pictures at will, but they no longer manifest without warning.

I can't tell you whether to push for revelation of the hairy bear dream or its recall.  Just wanted to tell you a little of my story where still pictures are concerned.

tt

PS  Back in the day, people didn't place the same, sometimes negative emphasis on a child sleeping with a parent (father or mother of the opposite sex) as they do today.  That isn't to say that bad things didn't happen.  My own mom slept with her father until she was 8 years old.  I never heard anything from her or anyone else that would cause me to question my grandfather's parenting skills where his three daughters were concerned.  My mom adored him.  






    

[Izzy_*now*]

Thanks Persephone,
I don't think I am hypnotizable, as I maintain control of my own mind too closely and no one has succeeded yet!

and Hops
I was never afraid of thunderstorms, so didn't need comforting.

Mom and Dad never shared a bedroom that I remember. Later Dad would share one of the three, that I never slept in, with my brother who was born at the time of this event I mention.

I shared another room with Mom and my eldest sister at one point, and shared this room with my next eldest sister at another point, and I have no memories where my younger sister (the one coming to see me) slept when we lived at that farm.

Yes, Dad beat his children and the animals, but I don't know if he ever laid a hand on Mom, except to impregnate her 7 times, one miscarriage and the youngest was a boy who died at 6 mos.

There was a huge dresser, 5-6' tall, painted green against the wall beside the head of my cot and on the other side was where Dad would dress in the morning, out of my sight. His bed was kitty-corner to my cot.

Yes these details raise questions in my mind, and I recall only what I said, and don't really want to know the answer if sexual abuse were there. I've never said anything to anyone, until now, and, like you, find it disturbing anyway, at the possibility.

He rather replused me and other than beatings with the razor strap, I don't remember any other time, when little, that he attemped to touch me. He was not a loving man, but when his chest hair showed over his shirt top, I disliked it.

After he was diagnosed with cancer, I had no pity for him. A bunch of us where at the house one day, and I came in on my crutches. He started toward me as though to maybe hug and give me a kiss, but I dodged him, in front of everyone, as I didn't want that, as well as a move like that could throw me off balance.

When he was finally hospitalized (3 mos) I went only once, to have him sign his Income Tax Return and didn't stay. He came home for his last 3 mos and I went to see him the day before he died, but by now he couldn't speak, just stared out of a skelton body, while Mom guarded his door. I don't recall what I said, but then left and he died at 4:30 the next morning. I never cried. That was 1986 and I was 47 expecting my first grandchild.

If something happened and my mind buried it, then that could have been the beginning of compartmentalizing pain from abuse. I understand that regular pain, like from a broken leg does not compartmentalize.

Mom and his 4 girls were 'farm slaves' and my little brother got off easy. I know his mother was a hateful old bitch...an N....who dressed him as a girl until he started school at age 6.

It's only the smothering furry bear that makes me raise this question, plus the mark on my shoulder/back, a scratch as I tried to escape...in my dream... to find it there in the morning.

If I were much younger I might pursue the matter, yet when I first saw a therapist, at 19, and sporadically throughout my life, I've never mentioned this, as I heard of false memories being implanted.

Maybe ignorance IS bliss.

Love
Izzy

[Izzy_*now*]

Hi tt,
I suppose I was typing when yours was posted.

I have a number of still shots and most are from my eyes seeing what a camera would pick up, and maybe 'only my feet' would be in the still.

The one i just mentioned was as though I had seen it from the doorway, and another (I have two of this one) is when my mother was washing up and I asked where she was going. she said 'I'm going crazy', yet was on the way to the hospital to have another baby. ('Crazy' I didn't know, but I needed an answer so I decided it was crawling into the chicken coop in the back garden.)

I have a still of the two of us, 1.) a side view of my looking up at her as she was drying her arms and asking, as though someone else saw it for me and 2.) another of only her in front of me, drying her arms.

(I have a still of my little pajama-clad knees hurrying downstairs to the xmas tree, and another of my arm across a falling pie plate, saving it from falling off the table and saying, 'Funny funny, very funny. Very funny, indeed!)

I have no idea about these still shots, captured as though on a camera I am holding, and no 'motion picture movies'.

One day I would like to get into my mind but I'll bet it's a scary place to go alone.

xx
izzy

[sKePTiKal]

Hey Iz, maybe it'll help if I ask you a question my T asked me, when I was "remembering" those still-shot memories...

were you afraid (without reason) of your father? In my case, it wasn't my dad I was afraid of - rather my mom. My real "issues" were with her. And my Dad was clearly an N!! But my mom was truly "crazy" and not much saner now. That was MUCH scarier.

The "outside your body" types of memories, I understand to be dissociation. There is a big range - daydreaming being a mild version of it. We all do it, when we "tune someone out". But it is considered to be a "protective" technique of our kid-brains to see something happening to us - with "us" being someplace else.

[Izzy_*now*]

hi PR

I suspect my entire life was based on 'fear', so I compartmentalized young. I feared my father and beatings, and if I messed up at school I feared recriminations, from both parents, but back then teacher didn't report to the parents.

(When I was 5, in Grade 1, I wrote all over the cloak room walls with coloured chalk, (rebellion?) and the teacher gathered all the girls to ask 'who  did it?' Shirley looked guilty and I didn't, I don't think, but my hands were behind my back, covered in coloured chalk dust. However, the teacher made Shirley clean the walls and asked me to help. Boy! I was frightened, but parents didn't find out.

Disassociation is different levels, I believe, as DID was called MPD, but I have only one personality that doesn't feel things as deeply as others, so there is a pain section of me and an emotional section of me.

i.e. when my computer lady was setting me up and we talked about transferring files, I pulled up my emails and address file, and told her it was ready  She said, sternly, 'Izzy, PLease. I don't need that now'. Immediately my feelings were 'hurt' like a chastised little girl, then I immediately felt that hurt go away. I can remember it, like other emotions but never relive them fully, only as a fact.

I think I am always in 'survival mode'.

xx
Izzy

[Gaining Strength]

I hope for you that these images are the beginning of a whole new level of healing.
Do you remember the question you asked when you first came here?

The answer to that question is, NO.

It is never too late.
Healing is never easy but it changes more than you.
I have such hope for you.
These images may open up pain but on the other side is peace, a peace that you deserve.

[Izzy_*now*]

Yes GS

Isittoolate was my handle and everyone agreed after a while I required a name chage, so I am Izzy_*now*

There has been a lot under the bridge since then and I also just found out, from my daughter, that the sister, coming to see me tomorrow, knows about her 'orientation'. That  was something I had to drag out of D., and now I won't be having to guard my speaking, should she come up in the following week.  (D. still hasn't used 'one of the words', gay or lesbian in reference to herself.)

I sensed from my sister's emails that she might know, but I had to hear from D. first. Maybe that is just me, but I felt better that way than asking my sister and letting the 'cat out of the bag'.  A sense of relief and another load removed from my shoulders.

Our learning never ends.

Love
izzy

[sKePTiKal]

LOL, Iz... it's pretty clear there's only 1 of you!

And you're right: Dissociative Identity Disorder (DID) is the extreme in the range of dissociation. At the other end of the scale tho' - is "daydreaming", "preoccupation", and "tuning out" - sort of like sensory "blinders". It's like we only have X amount of "attention" and when we turn that inwards to think deeply about something, or concentrate on something - then we "miss" and are oblivious to the things going on around us. A good example would be writing something with TV or radio on - and completely not noticing what was on. (That "we" doesn't have to include you!)

But there is another kind of dissociation altogether. One that is impossible to approach mentally, emotionally to study and look at and try to understand. It's a kind of psychological last-resort protective mechanism that happens sometimes, when in a life/death situation - or something else, that is that level of terrifying. Along with fight/flight responses - there is this sort of "consicousness checking out of present moment" type of dissociation that helps protect people, including young children, from being aware of extreme pain or being aware of something so awful (being eaten by a bear ranks up there I think), so "offensive" to what we believe is the natural order of the universe... and there are rarely any actual memories in that space; any memories there are more like a waking dream.

Anyway, the reason I brought it up, is because the ability to be able to do this or experience it, sometimes does show up in "out of body" type memories, at other times. And of course, I went through one of these spaces and when my repressed/suppressed memories came back I also got back the (limited) memory about that space. Wanting to know more about it I kept trying to peer into it, feel it, make it happen again even... so I could "hold it" and understand what was going on. Well - after a few frustrating years of this, I've realized that it's simply not possible EXCEPT under those life/death conditions. (At least, I still hope so in case I ever find myself faced with that again!)

I think it's like the ultimate "If, then - else" statement that's built into people's firmware programming. Don't want to de-bug it, because it's there for a very good reason!

[Izzy_*now*]

Thank you PR (from all 1 of me)

You are talking my language, as far as realizing the possibilities there are regarding how I 'operate'.

This visit with my sister, already in the air on her 2000 mile way, is what I hope to get across to her in person. I cannot seem to do it in emails, and I can tell because of certain questions she asks, as though I am 'normal'.

I am sure there are things I have forgotten, but in the long run what is available to me, only as a reference, like using a dictionary to learn the meaning of the word, use it, then set it aside, maybe to remember again if ever used, maybe not, and just as bland as reading a dictionary!

I might have a chance when she is here to come back online, but she leaves early in the morning on the 30th, so we have 7 full days starting tomorrow, even though she arrives later tonight!

[Portia]

Amber: It's a kind of psychological last-resort protective mechanism that happens sometimes, when in a life/death situation - or something else, that is that level of terrifying.

Just been pondering this. The only emotion I can identify with my one out of body experience is pure rage. I can see/feel my rage through another's eyes in that moment, i think...but, I guess there has to be terror before that rage. Rage by itself doesn't make sense. But as you say, I don't imagine that will ever be accessible to me, for good reason -not that I've been looking for it. I haven't considered what happened the moments before the OOB thing. At least I've moved on from 'what had I done?' to 'what had they done?'. It was probably more of a case of 'what hadn't they done': i.e. listen/respect/protect/acknowledge.

Maybe being able to associate the feeling of total out of control rage with the OOB is something in itself,it says something, it is at least a feeling to pin to the experience. Although I'm not sure that the rage came before, or after the OOB. I think before....but am not sure. Interesting topic.

[Hopalong]

Hey Izzz,

I hope you will find yourself more enjoying the PRESENT with your sister than anything else, for all the inconveniences. Just having someone there who wants to be with you. She does care. And that fateful loss and horror of so long ago...she didn't do it on purpose. And may never grasp it in full. Still, she is here. This is happening now, she came...all that way.

I so hope it goes mostly well!

I hope it's sunny and you can enjoy the balcony and some talk and movies, and feel just fine about retreating to take care of your needs.

Whatever talk about the past that you wind up having, I hope it can knit broken bits of story together, and past mistakes will take their proportion. And you both will just be humans, mellowed by years and fates, together.

I hope there is comfort and love and relief, in connecting with her. I hope a new and long, long friendship comes.

love to you,

Hops