EFT And Tapping On Memories From Childhood

Reclaiming Our Days, Meditation for incest survivors, Helena See, A Fireside/Parkside Meditation Book, Simon & Schuster, New York, New York, 1993, page for April 1:

" 'There are many ways of crying.'
'Yes.'  My tears were hidden behind my grinning mask face.
'Yes, there are.' "
    - VERA RANDAL

"We have all spent a lifetime hiding our tears, our fears, our rage, and our pain.  We cover up our feelings from everyone around us and from ourselves.  It feels safe this way.  Safer to hide and be alone with the feelings deep inside.  So many years of fear and abuse taught us it was safer to die alone inside than risk showing ourselves to anyone else.

To heal we must start taking that risk.  It hurts, its terrifying, it requires concentration and effort to show our emotions rather than hide them.  It is a new way of life.  We can start off slowly, making absolutely sure that the person we choose to share our insides with will gently hold them in his or her heart.  Even with a safe person it won't feel safe or easy.  It is a risk, a risk we must take.

We will be surprised to find that a trusted friend is honored to see our pain, to be the recipient of our gift of honesty and openness.  We will find that a new world opens up for both of us, a world of being real, a world of intimacy.  We will find that this is a freer world, a world full of hope.  And we will find that we belong in it.

When I share my inner self I show my friends how much I value them."


In working with my Grief class and my EFT (Emotional Freedom Technique) counselor in the past few weeks, I have come to realize that I still am not aware of everything that I feel.  I am not aware of the anger in me except when the volcano in me is erupting and lava is flowing over me and whoever lit the fuse that started the explosion.  Most of the time that person with the match is my husband.  Why?  Because he is a safe person for me to get angry at.  I doubt very much that he appreciates the fact that he is a safe person in my world.  He is the one that gets to see all the many facets of my emotions.

I had my second EFT session on Thursday of this week.  We talked about me having a love/hate relationship with attention from other people.  What came to mind was a memory from the twelfth grade.


My dad controlled all of the money in our family.  He didn't let any of us, including my mother, work.  I never got to work after school or on weekends like so many kids do.  I never learned to handle money as a kid because the only way that I got money if I wanted to buy something was to skip eating lunch at school.  I bought birthday cards for my parents and brother and sister this way.  If I wanted to eat in town, off of the school campus, I would get to eat one day and go without the rest of the week.  This was the 1960's and school lunches were 25 cents a day. 

I didn't wear makeup like the other girls in school because my parents wouldn't buy it for me.  This was another way for my dad to keep me from growing up.  In the twelfth grade, I saved my lunch money for several weeks to buy some eye makeup.  One morning when I got to school, I went into the girl's bathroom and put on my eye makeup.  Nobody said anything about it all day long until I got to my Senior English class.  After the class, my teacher called my name and told me that I looked pretty with my eye makeup on.  I was so pleased with myself and her complement.  I told her thank you and left.  As soon as I got home that day, I washed the makeup off before either of my parents could see me.  I never wore makeup to high school again.

You might ask why when my teacher thought it was so pretty on me?  I loved the attention from the teacher.  I was terrified by the teacher's attention.  One minute I was happy about the attention from my teacher and the next minute I was terrified.  Why?  Because in my life, most of the attention that I got was sexual.  Except for this one day, I did my best to fade into the woodwork.  The only thing that I excelled in was school work.  I made mostly A's and B's with a few C's.  I loved school because it and books were how I escaped my world of abuse.

We discussed this memory and tapped on it on Thursday during my EFT session.  My counselor asked where I felt the terror from that day.  I told him my throat felt like it was closing up with the terror.  We tapped on that fear and releasing it.  Usually it takes more than one round of tapping to remove the memories from my body.  I start out each session feeling the fear in a body part, usually my solar plexus for anger or fear.  This time the fear was in my throat.  We tapped on "All attention is sexual attention."  Then we tapped on "All attention doesn't have to be sexual." 

Next we talked about the volcano of anger and rage that comes up and out all over my husband and me.  We tapped on the volcano inside of me and changed it from being destructive to being constructive.  We tapped on "The volcano inside of me is just energy."  "The energy of the volcano can be turned into a passion for life, for living."  When we finished, I didn't feel dark and heavy any more.  I feel joyful.  I told my counselor that I like the way that I feel after a session.  I left the session smiling and full of joy.

I don't know how much writing I will get done on my blog for the next three weeks.  My daughter, son-in-law and four grandchildren are right now driving through Kansas on their way here.  They left Idaho when my son-in-law got off work yesterday afternoon and drove all night.  They will be here in Hot Springs, Arkansas sometime early tomorrow morning (Sunday).  Our son-in-law is flying back home on Monday.  He couldn't get off for more than a few days.  Our daughter and grandchildren will be here visiting for three weeks.  My husband and I are excited to have them visiting.  We only get to see them usually once a year.  Usually we go out to Idaho.  This time they are visiting us so all of the family will get to see them.  Everyone is excited.
Patricia