[writingwithink]

WTF does talking about it do? Regarding the abuse, T says, "You need to talk about it." WTF? Really? Now what's that going to do?

I just need to hear from others what happened when you did talk about it.

What will she think when I tell her, very calmly, what I did to animals when I was a kid. That my father nearly drowned me once. That one of the scenes picks up with my screaming brother at the bathroom sink with a cut arm, my father hovering over him and yelling to my mother to get the thread and needle... then blackness. That I "abused" my great grandmother. The ****ing call.

Really? What is talking about it going to do, especially if it comes out so peacefully?

What it's going to do is show her that I'm a ****ing monster!

[sanityseeker]

Hi... for me talking about it eventually restored my power. It took the pain away, ushered in foregiveness and empowered me to do better. Its a process towards healing.

You may be able to recount the horrors 'peacefully' because that is how you have learned to mask your true feelings. The process is intended you to feel authentically and move beyond the pain.

You may have done monsterous things but you are not a monster. You have the capacity to do different moving forward once you put your past in the past. It won't go there on its own no matter how much you want to think that.

She is your therapist. She will not judge you but rather she will guide you through the process. She will think you brave and totally get why you may be able to recount your stories without emotion.

If you trust her then go with her on this and believe you can be set free.

[Hunny]

Backing up just a bit...

just slipping a little out here is a start...remember you are learning to trust her...only telling what you are able...bit by bit...

Really, the telling is not the therapy part...for me/us...but it is a start...if there are words around it...if not I/we use a type of therapy. When the feelings start to be un-numbed, de-iced, un-stuck, or whatever you want to call it...that is a step in the right direction too...but just crying or yelling isn't the therapy either, but for me/us the part that helps is the actual therapy...let's see, so it kind of reconnects within the brain so that safety is felt, restored, or returned. Then there is a quiet time in order to be able to walk out the door. So, it is kind of the whole process, repeatd over and over with each part and each memory and it does get quicker with each part and each memory, well sort of.

Writing is not a monter, she was trying with all her might to survive doing whatever she could in order to do that.

...

If you want to get better, you have to show where it hurts. This means talking about it. This is hard to do at first, but when it's done, there's a giant weight off your shoulders.

**Caution** May trigger:
My father kidnapped me and my siblings, and threatened to drive us off a cliff unless my mother gave in to his demands. (Among them, that she should quit her job and stay home like a wife is supposed to, even though he wasn't working.) When he became aware that she wanted to leave him, he threatened to kill us all and then commit suicide, so we'd "all be together." He was a very frightening, violent man.

There are pieces of my childhood that I've blacked out as well. And I have also done things in reaction, that I look back on with horror now. But I would not do those things today, in a much different place than I was back then. I am not a monster, and neither are you. Both of us are abuse survivors, in need of healing.

[WePow]

(((( Writing )))) first of all - you are not a monster. You were a child who was acting out because of very terrible abuse. You are not flawed - not a monster. You were born an innocent life. Abuse changes a persons response to the world. Some of us did things to animals as children when we are in utter anguish because we want someone else to hurt as badly as we are hurting. For most of us, if we had not been abused, we would not have once even thought of doing those things.

Talking about it is a huge step in healing. It forces us to vocalize the facts. And that does something to he nerve system according to my last T.

Can you start off with picking one "story" of the past and telling it to T in third person? Tell it as though it happened to a stranger - not to you. If you are consciously doing this and T knows what you are doing, it may allow you to crack open that door without just throwing it wide. You know?

[Hunny]

We ask therapist to help us make 'new neuro pathways' in this process...talking is only a small part of process...emotional outburst only a small part of process...using a therapeutic way...is biggest part of process...reconnecting where splits, blackouts occured.
.

[Sannah]

How are you doing today?