Stop Child Abuse Now - SCAN - 790 on Blog Talk Radio

Hi, everyone. In case you missed my guest speaker spot on Stop Child Abuse Now (SCAN) on Friday, March 14, I will give you the link at the bottom of this article. Bill Murray is a great host who makes his guests feel comfortable and loved. Usually there is a panel of three or four others who add to the conversation with questions and experiences of their own. This was my second appearance on Bill's radio program.

I briefly shared parts of my childhood story because in my first time on SCAN's program, I shared in more detail about the alcoholism, incest and domestic violence that I grew up with in my family of origin. I will also share the link to that radio program at the bottom of the page in case you want to listen to more details of my life as an incest survivor.

Friday night's program was more about the recovery part of my journey. My biggest resource for healing was the 12-Step programs of Adult Children of Alcoholics and Al-Anon. I didn't mention it on Friday night but I also attended a Coda meeting for a short time. Coda is Codependents Anonymous. Most of us who grow up in alcoholic home grow up to be alcoholics or co-dependents. Sometimes we do both. One of the things that I told Bill and his audience of listeners was that I even though I don't drink, I have about 8 out of 10 characteristics of an alcoholic. I have no doubt, if I drank, I would be a mean drunk like my dad and his dad both were. I choose to not drink and not put my family and friends though that.

Here are the links to my two visits to Stop Child Abuse Now - SCAN's program on Blog Talk Radio.

The first link is to the show that I was on for Friday, March 14, 2014:
http://www.blogtalkradio.com/bill-murray/2014/03/15/stop-child-abuse-now-scan--790

My very first time as a guest speaker for SCAN and Bill Murray and his panel was on November 20, 2013. Here is the link for it in case you missed it back in November.
http://www.blogtalkradio.com/bill-murray/2013/11/21/stop-child-abuse-now-scan--708

I also want to introduce you to several other websites that are good resources for incest and child abuse survivors.

The Lamplighter Movement @  http://www.theLamplighters.org/http://www.ASCAsupport.org

Adult Survivors of Child Abuse @  http://www.ASCAsupport.org/

Adult Survivors of Child Abuse Anonymous @  http://www.ASCA12step.org/

I hope you find the above links helpful in your journey to healing.
Patricia

Revisiting My Interview On LA Talk Live - Truth Be Told Hosted By Lucinda Bassett

If you haven't listened to my talk on LA Talk Live - Truth Be Told which was hosted by Lucinda Bassett on November 29, 2012, then you now have two links to choose from. The easiest link to go to would be the link on YouTube:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QXWwDIvw7IM

Or if you would like more information about Lucinda Bassett and her book Truth Be Told which is coming out in March 2013, you can go to her website at the following link:

http://latalklive.com/new/truth-be-told

Be sure to listen to my interview about being an adult child of an alcoholic and an incest survivor. As I said in at the beginning of the program, I wasn't sure which of the two topics that I was going to talk about. I talked about both being an adult child and about being an incest survivor. Both are parts of my childhood history that continue to affect me, even today as I heal.

For my interview done by Lucinda Bassett, click on the right hand side of the page on the interview labeled:

11/29/2012 - Truth Be Told hosted by Lucinda Bassett
Guest:Lauren Etheridge / Patricia Singleton

Next click on the big white arrow on the left with LA TALK LIVE! under it and enjoy the interview. Lauren Etheridge is on the first 30 minutes and shares what it is like to be a 25-year-old living with the effects and memories of being an adult child of an alcoholic.  I admire Lauren for being able to talk about growing up with an alcoholic and how it is affecting her today. I wasn't strong enough or brave enough to tell anyone about the incest or alcoholism at her age. At 25 years old, I was still in denial that any of my past was still affecting me. I thought that if I didn't talk about it or think about it that the pain would go away. At least, that is what I hoped at that place in my life.

Keep listening because I am on the second part of the program with Lucinda. I enjoyed being interviewed by Lucinda and think that I did a good job of answering her questions. I talk about incest toward the end of the program.

My healing from being an adult child of an alcoholic started in January 1989 when I read the book Adult Children of Alcoholics which was written by Janet G. Woititz. The book was on the New York Times Bestseller and is still available if you would like to read it. A week later I was reading the newspaper and saw an Adult Children of Alcoholics 12-Step meeting listed. I went to my first meeting a few days later. Almost all of the characteristics of an adult child fit me. One of the first things that I was given was called The Laundry List. That fit me too. I will list the link below to the post that I wrote about The Laundry List in case you are interested in knowing more about being an Adult Child.

One question that Lucinda asked me about on the program that I wanted to expand on has to do with her question if either of my children drink or are alcoholics. I told her that my daughter doesn't drink at all but that my son does. I need to say that, as of today, he is not an alcoholic. It is just my fear that he could become one if he continues to drink more as he ages. I am not around him when he drinks so I don't know how much he drinks or how often. It is none of my business. Because of the history of alcoholism in both sides of my family, I will always have the fear that, if either of my children or my siblings drink, they can become alcoholics. I am not saying that any of them are alcoholics.

Now, I hope that, if you haven't listened to the program, you will now and come back here with any comments that you have about the show. Thank you Lucinda Bassett for having me on as a guest speaker. I do hope that you will consider having me on again so that we can have a conversation about incest and how it affects the adult survivor.

Lauren Etheridge, I wish you the best in your life and hope that you have a support system to help you heal from being an adult child of an alcoholic. I know your pain because I grew up with alcoholism in my family too.

I have made a new friend on Twitter in the past few weeks. His name is David Pittman and he is the head of a non-profit organization called Together We Heal. Lucinda Bassett interviewed David on her radio program too. Here is the link for David's interview:

http://latalklive.com/new/truth-be-told

Click on the interview labelled as 12/6/2012 Truth Be Told - Guests: Dr. Arlene Drake / David Pittman

Click on the big white arrow to listen to the program.

David's interview covers the subject of Childhood Sexual Abuse. Dr. Arlene Drake is the expert that talks during the first part of the program. David is on during the last part of the program. I wish that David had been able to talk in more detail about the topic of Childhood Sexual Abuse. Anyone that reads my blog knows that I am passionate about protecting children from being sexually abused as I was by my dad when I was a child.

Like me, David Pittman has a blog at the following link:

http://togetherweheal.wordpress.com

David can tell you about his organization and what it does better than I can, so I am using his words here to tell you about Together We Heal.

"Together We Heal is for those who have suffered the trauma of childhood sexual abuse. It exists to give aid and counseling to those in need, educate any who seek information on how to best protect our children and to expose the predators and their methods. Together we can do all of these things and begin the process of healing. There is a real need to change statute of limitation laws on child molestation and sexual abuse. We are here to promote that change and provide a safe forum for victims of abuse to share, learn and heal. 'One person cannot change the world, but you can change the world of one person' - Help us do just that..... Please follow us on Twitter @Together_WeHeal"

Thank you David for coming into my life through Together We Heal on Twitter. Together we will reach more survivors and we will save more children from sexual abuse. I thank everyone who comes to my blog to read my posts and for those who take the time to leave comments. I love you all.

Tomorrow is my birthday. I will be 61 years old. For the first time ever, I have had eight different people wish me Happy Birthday early. My husband had to be join in when I told him about the other seven. My son and daughter-in-law are going out to dinner with my husband and I later tonight because they are both working tomorrow night. So I am even celebrating early. One of my best friends called me on Saturday and wished me Happy Birthday by singing the song Happy Birthday to me over the phone. She sang it to the tune of I Want to Wish You A Merry Christmas. Then we argued about her being early. She thought it was the 11th and I had to tell her that the 11th was on Tuesday. My mother-in-law called me today as well as a friend on Facebook wishing me happy birthday.

Tomorrow is a big day for my husband too. He is going to the printer to pick up his novel that he has worked the last 9 years writing. His book is called Standing On The Edge of Time. It is a novel about the Civil War and what Daniel thinks it might have been like for his great-grandfather to fight with the 4th Arkansas Infantry during the first two years of the war. What took so long for my husband to write was all of the research that he did on the 4th Arkansas Infantry and their part in the war. He has included many factual resources as well. He is excited so tomorrow we will be celebrating my birthday but also the birth of his baby - Standing On The Edge of Time. Have a glorious day everyone.
Patricia

Related Blog Articles:

The Laundry List of Adult Children Of Alcoholics @
http://patriciasingleton.blogspot.com/2010/10/laundry-list-of-adult-children-of.html

Al-Anon and Adult Children of Alcoholics Played Major Roles In My Recovery From Incest @
http://patriciasingleton.blogspot.com/2008/01/al-anon-and-adult-children-of.html

Growing Up With Alcoholism In The Family @
http://patriciasingleton.blogspot.com/2008/09/growing-up-with-alcoholism-in-family.html

Resources For An Incest Survivor And Adult Children Of Dysfunctional Families @
http://patriciasingleton.blogspot.com/2012/04/resources-for-incest-survivor-and-adult.html

My Story Of Incest Guest Post on Survivor Advocacy @
http://patriciasingleton.blogspot.com/2012/11/my-story-of-incest-guest-post-on.html

40 Years Married To The Same Man Is Commitment

My husband Daniel and I are celebrating our 40th Wedding Anniversary today. Forty years married to the same man is commitment, love, compromise, and honesty. Our marriage of that long has also been filled with anger, fear, struggles and sometimes denial of feelings.

Our marriage has seen good years and some bad years. The bad years were among the first 25 when I was either in denial or was angry and sometimes raging because of the lasting effects of incest upon me and my interactions with others.

The first ten years, I was trying to control everything because of my fear of being out of control or under someone else's control like my dad when the incest was happening. I didn't trust Daniel to be able to keep me safe. When I was 27, I hit bottom emotionally when I heard myself screaming at Daniel that I hated him and everything about my life. I heard myself screaming those hateful words and I knew they weren't true. The reality that I faced that day was that I hated myself - the abused and terrified little girl inside of me who thought if she could control everything and everyone then she would never be hurt again. I hated and blamed that little girl for the incest. I hated myself. Somewhere the wisdom came that said that Daniel had nothing to do with me being so unhappy, so angry and so bitter.

I knew that I had to change me if I had any chance of being happy. I still had no idea what healthy was. I knew that trying to change Daniel would not help the situation. In a marriage, or any kind of relationship, you cannot change the other person to make you happy. My happiness came from inside me, not from Daniel. Daniel could do nothing to make me happy.

I wish I could say that I woke up to everything that day but I didn't. I struggled with who I was and what was normal. I didn't know for many years to come that what was normal was rarely healthy. Instead I decided to work on myself which means that I read the three books on incest that the Tyler, Texas library had at the time. I also decided to not have any contact with my dad or his side of the family hoping that would bring me some peace. I was still in denial trying to be okay when I wasn't. Having no contact with my dad's family of origin lasted for ten years and stopped when I realized that they weren't my dad and they shouldn't be punished for what he did. I missed my aunts and uncles and grandmother being in my life.

As I searched for peace, I stuffed emotions until they would come spewing out with the force of a volcano in either tears late at night when no one but my husband could see or rage that hurt those closest to me, mostly Daniel. I couldn't control the feelings so the stuffing and exploding went on for years. Those were the bad years. I missed a lot because I was so focused on trying to not feel the pain of incest. Those years were filled with denial that the incest happened and was a part of my life even though I no longer lived at home with my dad. I didn't leave the incest behind just because my dad was out of my life. I couldn't wish it so no matter how much I tried. Denial just builds more hurt on top of the original.

Wow! I didn't know that I was going to tell you all of that. I don't want you to think that all of our 40 years were bad because they weren't. Daniel and I have had good years too. In the 1970's we moved from Shreveport, Louisiana to Asheville, North Carolina when our son was born and where we spent every Sunday driving through the Smokey and Blue Ridge Mountains and absorbing the beauty of God's creation. Daniel and I moved to Asheville when he got a job there in 1973. The three years that we spent in Asheville allowed us to learn to depend upon each other without any family members living nearby. We left Asheville to move back to Louisiana when I was pregnant with our daughter.

The three years we spent in North Carolina strengthened our friendship with each other. I don't believe we would have been married for 40 years if not for our friendship. Marriage, to me, is about liking as well as loving someone else. My husband taught me that someone could love me. Before I met Daniel I didn't think I would ever find someone to love or someone who would love me back. He taught me that I was lovable.

Believe me when I tell you that Daniel taught me all about love over the years. He stayed during the worst of times before and after I started healing from incest. With the healing came a time of great confusion where I had to find out who I was. I had to learn to love myself. In learning to love myself, I was able to give a much greater love to my husband and children. Since our 25th Anniversary, more love, laughter and joy has come into my life. Daniel is responsible for a lot of the changes that I have made. He didn't make the changes, I did, but he is part of the reason that I wanted to make the changes. I wanted the pain to stop but I also wanted to be a better wife and mother for Daniel and our children.

Happy 40th Anniversary my love of my life, Daniel.  You mean more to me that I can express. You are a big part of the reason that I am the person that I am today. I love you with all of my heart. You are my Sweetheart.  You taught me to laugh. You showed me that it is okay to cry. You helped me to build a safe place for me to live in our home and in my own body. Thank you.

I am surprised to see how long this post has become. I hope it makes some sense to you. Let me know what you think.
Patricia

After Effects Of Sexual Assault

One of several books that I am currently reading is called Rid of My Disgrace: Hope and Healing for Victims of Sexual Assault written by Justin S. Holcomb & Lindsey A. Holcomb, Crossway, Wheaton, Illinois, 2011, page 40.  I want to share a quote from this book with you.

"Because sexual assault is always traumatizing, victims are three times more likely than nonvictims to suffer from depression, six times more likely to suffer from post-traumatic stress disorder, thirteen times more likely to abuse alcohol, twenty-six times more likely to abuse drugs, and four times more likely to contemplate suicide."

The Holcombs got these figures from the following source:

National Center for Victims of Crime and Crime Victims Research and Treatment Center, Rape in America: A Report to the Nation (Arlington, VA: National Center for Victims of Crime, 1992).

I am glad that someone is finally doing studies and coming out with statistics on sexual assault.  Maybe someone will read these statistics and decide today that sexual assault, which includes rape and incest, has to stop.  More people need to take action to stop these statistics from being true. Start out by not blaming the rape victim for their own rapes.  Many children don't tell about their own sexual abuse situations because they are afraid for their safety and because they are afraid they won't be believed.  So many children who do tell are blamed for their own abuse.  Help me spread the awareness that sexual abuse has to stop.
Patricia

Blog Carnival Against Child Abuse: May Issue Is Posted

The May issue of Blog Carnival Against Child Abuse is out at Kate1975's Blog.  Here is the link:

http://kate1975.wordpress.com/2011/05/20/blog-carnival-against-child-abuse-may-2/

Go by and wish Kate a late birthday as this month is her birthday month.  The topic of this month's Blog Carnival Against Child Abuse is self-care.

So many people take it for granted that everyone is raised to take care of their personal needs.  That is true if they are raised in a healthy family.  For those  who are child abuse survivors, that usually isn't true.  The lies that children who are abused are taught tell them that they have no value to their parents or society.  Victims are taught that their needs are not important.  As adults, they continue to believe that their needs are not important.  They are taught to take care of others' needs and to ignore their own needs.  Many times they are taught to hate their bodies and to ignore even their health.  If they get sick as children, they are ignored or made to feel bad because of their illness.  Some are even punished for daring to get sick.

As survivors, many have to learn the basics of self-care.  Many have fears of doctors and dentists in particular.  As a child a doctor was someone who might ask questions, that might demand answers that the abusers didn't want known.  Dentists are often so frightening because of the survivors fight or flight response that is set off anytime that someone, like a dentist, is right there in their face.  Often because of these fears from childhood, the body is ignored when it first starts to hurt.  Many abuse survivors have a high tolerance for pain.  By the time that they give in to the pain and go to the doctor or the dentist what might have been a minor thing has become a major illness or a major problem with their teeth such as an absess or a rotted tooth.  Self-care isn't taught to child abuse victims.  Self-care is often learned from books or mentors when the victim starts their journey as a survivor.

I hope that you will join me in going to the link to Kate1975's Blog at the following link:

http://kate1975.wordpress.com/2011/05/20/blog-carnival-against-child-abuse-may-2/

This month you have your choice of 34 blog posts.  I hope that you will take the time to read all of them.  This month, 5 of the submissions are mine.  Please feel free to leave comments and let each blogger know what you think about their blog post.  If you have any blog posts of your own that you would like to submit to the Blog Carnival Against Child Abuse, the carnival is posted each month.  You can go to Blog Carnival and look for the deadline for posting for Carnival Against Child Abuse and submit your own posts for next month's carnival.
Patricia

Anger, Fear, Sadness And Hurt - How They Interact - Part 2

If you are visiting here for the first time you might want to go and read my previous post which is Part 1 of this series.  My article will take you to the blog  Emerging From Broken  post where I left my comments.  Without any more introduction, here is Comment #3 that I wrote in response to Darlene's post and other comments.   Any words in brackets [ ] are my thoughts that I have added as I wrote this post.  They were not in the original comment.

Comment #3
"Darlene, I got what you meant in the first comment rather than reading it as only being all in your mind.  Ever since I started this recovery journey, I have been aware of the battle with the part of me that resists change.  It doesn't matter that recovery brings about good change.  Change of any kind was always terrifying to me as a child and still can be as an adult if it is sudden.  [Change in my family of origin was often sudden and sometimes quite dramatic because my dad was very unstable usually with his drinking and/or rage so change became frightening to me as a child.  This is a thought pattern that I still struggle with today but to a lessening degree.]  My husband will gladly agree with me when I say that the child inside of me when she gets scared will still argue and get angry sometimes, not all the time, before the adult part of me steps in and thinks about the change and sees that it is reasonable and good to make the change.  Sometimes the battle between inner child and adult just goes on briefly inside my mind.  Sometimes she is quicker than the adult me and voices her fears as anger.  Then the adult me has to step in and discuss what was just said rationally, with my husband usually.  He is more adventurous and more spontaneous than I am so he is usually the one to stir up the fear and anger.

Anger is an emotion that I know well.  It was allowed in our house when I was a child, but the only one who was allowed to feel and voice his anger was my dad.  His anger came out as rage.  His rage always came out with a threat of violence, especially if he was drunk.

For may years, I could go from calm to anger to full blown rage in a matter of seconds.  [Just like I saw my dad do when I was a child.  I didn't realize for many years how I was copying him.  I would have hated it if I had.  I didn't want to be like my mom or my dad.  Neither was healthy but I didn't know any other way to be.  I saw my mom as weak and helpless so it was better to be like the parent who was strong and in control.]  It sounds strange even to me to say that anger was a safer emotion to me than fear was.  I think maybe, in my mind, that I felt I could control the anger better than I could control the fear.  Anger was also a powerful thing of strength.  Fear was not.  Fear showed weakness.  Anger showed control and strength.  I didn't want to be afraid and weak.  I wanted to be strong and powerful so that I could feel protected.  (This is a very big ah-ha moment for me in typing that - Something that I have never made the connection to before.  I will have to share my 2 [actually 3] comments in a blog post of my own.  This is really big for me.)

I have known for many years that my anger was almost always a cover-up for my fear but I never realized the powerful/safety - weak/not safe thing before.  I felt powerless and very frightened when my dad was doing the anger/rageful episodes in my childhood.  He was so controlling that as an adult, I always think of him as a dictator.  He was in total control of each of our family members.  I wasn't allowed to participate in sports or any after school clubs or activities.  Neither were my brother or sister because it would give us something that was out of his control.  Isolation was the only way that his control would work. . . . "

There was a little more to my comment but it doesn't really apply to my topic here so I didn't copy it.  Again you can go to Emerging From Broken to read the rest of my comment if you haven't already.



Something else that I realized while typing the above comment was how much all of this came from my desire to not be like my mother.  Safety was a really big part of this too.  If I was in control then I could pretend I wasn't afraid.  If I wasn't afraid, I could feel safe.  The bigger part though has to do with my mother and what she taught me.  I have always known that my mother was the one that my real issues would be with.  I have done very little work on my mother issues.  I always told myself that since my dad was the abuser that my major issues were with him.  That is and isn't true.  My dad was the violently abusive person.  Rape, even when it doesn't appear physically violent as in beating you up violent is still violent because of the physical pain that penetration causes and the emotional lines that it crosses when the person raping you is your parent or some other close relative or someone who has authority over you as a child.  Throw in boundary violations and you have another big area of emotional rape.  Signs of physical violence heal much quicker and easier than those of emotional rape caused by crossing of boundaries.  Okay, I just distracted myself from the mother issues again.  The above needed to be said and I may continue it at another time.  Back to my mother.

Anger/rage represents my dad and what he taught me about feelings and myself.  I saw him as the stronger, more in control of my two parents.  As a child, I had no control.  As an adult, I swore to myself that no one would ever have that kind of control over me again.  I became like him because I saw him as strong.  Strong meant powerful instead of powerless/helpless like my mom was. 

The fear came from my mom - fear of feeling, fear of really being alive, fear of dreaming about a better life, fear of being a powerful human being, fear of being a woman in all of her glory.  These are the things that I learned from my mother.  I learned how to be a woman and mother from watching my mother.  All of the things that she taught me, I didn't want to be.  I saw her as weak, as helpless, as controlled by others, as afraid of her own self.  Because in being a woman, I was like her, I hated myself.  I couldn't hate her.  I could hate my dad but I couldn't hate her.  She was weak and helpless.  I learned at an early age to protect her.  You can't hate someone that you have to protect, someone who is weaker than you.  Wow!!!  This is intense for me.  My solar plexus is full of churning emotions right now.  That is where I feel all of this.  It may be a different place for you. 

I have never equated my fear with my mom before.  I didn't realize that I didn't want to be afraid because I saw fear as weak and powerless.  I can even take it to the next level in that fear covers my hurt which I feel as heavy, heavy sadness.  I can barely remember a time when I didn't feel this great sadness.  The fear of feeling the hurt has to do with my very existence.  My fear of feeling the hurt was that if I let it all out and felt it that it would just be too much and I would cease to exist.  I would either kill myself, lay down and never get up again until I died (I did this in a past life which you can read about in the very first post that I wrote here back in June 2007.)  or I would go stark raving mad and just totally lose myself.  I was always afraid that if I felt the hurt that I would start screaming and never stop.  The silent screams would have a voice and become my reality.  How does a child feel that much pain and survive it without disconnecting in some way.  As bad as the physical pain was in the beginning, that isn't the pain that I am talking about.  I am talking about the emotional pain of being betrayed by your parents, your parents who are in charge of your very existence.  I was always afraid that if pushed too much my dad could cross the line and kill all of us.  I was always afraid that if I told my mom about the incest, she would get a gun and shoot my dad and go to jail which were have left me parentless.  I was always afraid that my mom would cross the line and go into limbo somewhere that I couldn't reach her even on a physical level.  If she was ever there for me emotionally, I don't remember it.  I know she was gone emotionally by the time that I was three years old.  There are more ways than just physically to commit suicide and I was afraid that she would fine a way.   You can shut down so much that only an empty shell is left behind.  I couldn't take the chance that my mom would do that.  She had to be there so that I could continue to lie to myself when I told myself that my mom loved me.  I couldn't let go of that or her for many years.

What frightens me the most is that I know that I have all of those things that my mom and dad taught me inside of me.  I fight so strongly against being like either one of them because I know that I could be just like them if I just gave in and gave up.  I refuse to give in to the helplessness or the hopelessness that my mother taught me.  I am stronger than that.  There is a balance - a middle ground which is healthy - which is somewhere in the middle of the extremes that I learned as a child.  Let me know what you think about my ramblings.
Patricia

Anger, Fear, Sadness And Hurt - How They Interact - Part 1

This post comes to you from my comments on Emerging From Broken's post "Coping Methods ~ Trying to Escape Myself" which you will find at the following link:  http://emergingfrombroken.com/coping-methods-trying-to-escape-myself/ .  My comments brought me a very big ah-ha moment that is still making more connections in my mind.  Those connections are what I want to share with you here.  I hope that it doesn't sound like a crazy person just rambling as you follow my thoughts here.  My words inside of brackets were not shared in the comment.  I have added them as I write this post.  This is Part 1.  Comment #3 deserves a post all its own which I will write and post in a few days.

Comment #1:
"I survived my childhood by shutting down my emotions like my mom taught me and by taking care of others.  [As an adult, my taking care of others became a way to control the people around me as my dad controlled me as a child.  It was years before I realized what I was doing and why.]  As an adult, I did the two extremes that my parents taught me with feelings.  My mom was always emotionally unavailable so I learned to not feel. [Stuffing down my feelings with food has become my method for not feeling as an adult.  This is one coping method that I still catch myself doing today.]  I stuffed the feelings deep inside of me hiding the hurt even from myself as long as I could.  When the pressure would become too intense then I would explode in rage like my dad taught me to do.  Neither extremes were the real me.  They were the coping mechanisms that my parents taught me.  I continued them into adulthood and added controlling as another coping skill.  In not wanting to be like my mother who portrayed helplessness very well, I became like my dad who was the dictator of our family.  He controlled all of us to the point that I wasn't allowed to have needs or an opinion different than his. [I also wasn't allowed to have wants or dreams of a future that he wasn't in control of.]  In order to not allow anyone to control me, as an adult, I became the controller.  If you came anywhere near me, I tried to fix you.  If I could fix your problems then I had some value as a person and I could feel good about myself.  You would like me if I could fix your problems.  I don't know if I ever knew the 'real' me until I, like Darlene, [the person who writes Emerging From Broken] learned to love and respect myself and learned that I had needs and worth.  I was always 'good enough' and so much more.  I just didn't know it until I started working on my incest issues and started loving me."


Comment #2
"Darlene, I too found that the control was just an illusion.  [Today I quickly recognize other controlling people when I meet them.  I see, in them, all of the things that I used to do to feel safe.  The more controlling a person is, the more afraid they are.]  The more that I was into controlling, the more out of control I really was.  I didn't try to fix you because you needed fixing.  I did it so that I wouldn't have to see my own issues that needed fixing.  If I could concentrate on you and your problems, I didn't have time to look at my own.  I didn't have to feel about my own issues if I was focused on your issues.  It was my method of escaping my own pain and anger.  It seemed to work for awhile (or at least that is what I told myself at the time).  The reality was that I was disconnecting from the terrible rage and under the rage all of the fear and hurt that I was carrying around inside of me.

When I got into 12-Step programs, I discovered that, for me, (I don't know if this is true for anybody else or not but it was true for me.) the emotion that I could see and feel was rage.  The rage meant that I was in control (like my dad when I was a child).  The rage covered over my fear which was this big, big monster.  The fear covered up the terrible sadness and hurt that was overwhelming if I allowed myself to feel it.  I felt like if I acknowledged the hurt that I would cease to exist as a person or I would lose my mind.  It just felt so big and endless [and uncontrollable if I felt it].  I didn't know that grieving would release all of that sadness.  The sadness was so much a part of me from a very early age.  [Even today, some of the sadness is still there.  It is such an old part of me that I am not sure who I would be without it. I only have one memory of me without the sadness.  I was younger than three years old.]

I once told a group that my fear would fill the entire space of the room that we were sitting in.  That fear was weighing down on my body all the time until I started chipping away at it a little at a time. . . ."

[There was a little more to this comment that doesn't pertain to my topic here so you can read it on Emerging From Broken.]


I will tell you that Darlene's blog Emerging From Broken has been bringing up feelings for me for awhile that the inner child in me doesn't want to look at so I haven't read all of her posts over the past few months.  I intend to start reading more of those posts that I missed in the coming month.  I thank Darlene for her blog.  It is helping me and so many others.  We have some pretty intense conversations in the comment section of many of her posts.  I am going to stop this post and make Comment #3 into it's own blog post sometime in the next few days.  I am still processing the information that is coming in for me.  It is okay if you have already read Comment #3 on Emerging From Broken.  I am going to be expanding on Comment #3 in my next post.  Feel free to leave a comment here and on Emerging From Broken. 

If you aren't a subsciber here or at Emerging From Broken, I invite you to do so.  As a subscriber, my posts will automatically come to either your email address or in the reader of your choice when they are posted.  You will find subscribe buttons on the right column of my blog page.  I know that I haven't been posting very often since I got sick with pneumonia in November.  I have needed the private time to recover from the illness and to process other things that have come up. 

Just as I was in the final stages of recovering from the pneumonia, an aunt died and a few days later it was Christmas with all of the family activities and traveling that Christmas brings with it.  Five weeks after my aunt died, her husband, who was one of my dad's younger brothers, followed his wife in death.  They were both good people.  They have hosted our Caldwell Family Reunions for many years.  Their daughter is a very strong, caring person who has been taking care of them for the past few years.  They were both diabetics and are a reminder for me to take better care of myself with my own blood sugar issues.  My cousin said, at my uncle's funeral last week, that she is going to continue the family reunions in honor of her dad who enjoyed them so much.  Funerals always bring up any unresolved grief issues that I may have so I have been feeling some of that sadness that I have carried for so many years.  Feeling the sadness is so different from all of the many years that I stuffed it instead.

One last topic before I close this post, have you ever seen weather like we have had this Winter?  We have our third snow of the Winter melting outside right now.  We have another chance of freezing rain and snow tomorrow and then again on Wednesday.  It is rare for Arkansas to get more than one snow over several years time.  We got three inches of snow yesterday and three and a fourth inches of the snow on January 9 which we kept on the ground until the following Saturday (1/15) before it all melted.  Our temperatures have been below normal too down in the teens and 20's for the lows at night over much of the past month.  We usually have a week of these cold temperatures in February.  I am glad that I don't live in Chicago or Boston or Maine.  They have gotten every snow storm that we have with a lot more snow and ice.  Ice is what can be so damaging here and Thank God we haven't gotten any this year.  I hope that all of you where ever you live are staying warm and dry.
Patricia

A Short Biography - Who Am I?

I am a woman who has struggled with knowing who I am and what I want out of Life.

I am a daughter who was neglected and sexually abused as a child and survived.

I am a sister who tried to be perfect and failed as protector of my younger siblings.

I am a wife who loves my kind and very patient husband as best I can with the intimacy scars that I still carry.

I am a mother who swore I would love and protect my own children from incest.

I am an incest survivor who shares my stories to offer hope, strength and healing to other survivors.

I am an incest survivor who refused to ever quit.

I am a wounded child who has learned to thrive as a loving, beautiful woman.

Because of the struggle with incest, I am strong and compassionate when I might not have been otherwise.

I am who I am because of the incest, not in spite of it.

Today I am a survivor and a thriver who loves my family, friends and my life. 

I still struggle some days, but there is also laughter and joy in my life.

I still hurt and get angry at times but have also forgiven my abusers and myself.

I call my blog Spiritual Journey Of A Lightworker because my life has been a spiritual journey back to God and his love. 

I call myself a Lightworker because we all, at our centers, are Light. 

I choose to shine my Light to help others heal from the pain of child abuse.

If I can heal, I know that you can heal too.

Will you join me in letting your Light shine and helping someone else to heal?

We all are so much more than our experiences can define us as.

Let your Light shine for the world to see that united we stand to stop child abuse.
Patricia

Guest Post On Emerging From Broken - Self-Worth Gives You Ability To Say No

Today you have to do a little traveling across the internet from the southern USA all the way to the southwestern part of Canada where Darlene Ouimet sits at her computer and puts out her blog Emerging From Broken.  The internet really has made the world smaller.  Without it, Darlene and I would never have met and established our friendship online over the past year.

Today rather than a post here for you to read, Darlene asked me to do a Guest Post for her at her blog Emerging From Broken.  The post is called "Self-Worth Gives You Ability To Say No by Patricia Singleton".  You will find the post at the following link:

http://emergingfrombroken.com/self-worth-gives-you-ability-to-say-no-by-patricia-singleton/

Please feel free to leave comments here afterwords and to also join the conversation at Emerging From Broken.  If you have never visited the blog Emerging From Broken, please take the time to do so and read some of Darlene's thought provoking articles.  You will be glad that you did.

Again, thank you Darlene for allowing me the honor to speak to your blog readers about part of my own journey through recovery from incest.  I appreciate you and the work that you do at Emerging From Broken.
Patricia

Dear Daddy - Facing My Incest Abuser

June 29, 1992

Dear Daddy,

You used me and sexually abused me when I was just a child.  You betrayed me when you were supposed to be taking care of me and helping me to grow up.  I loved you and you used that to hurt me.  What you did was wrong.  I was just a child.  I couldn't stop what you were doing.  You were the adult and responsible for your own actions.  Nothing you did was ever my fault.  You, as an adult, should have been in control of your actions.  Instead, you took advantage of a little child who did nothing to encourage your actions.  I never wanted you to be anything but my Daddy.

I never wanted to be your sexual partner.  I loved you, but I also hated you for what you were doing to me.  Did you know that I hated you?  Did you know that I was afraid of your temper?  Did you know that I don't sleep well at night because of you?

No longer can you be a part of my life.  Your influence is too painful and too destructive to those I love.  I will not let you hurt me or my family.

I give you back your shame and your anger.  I refuse to accept any part of it.  You are alone because you use and hurt people who try to love you.  I refuse to feel dirty or bad or guilty because of what you did.  I did nothing wrong.

I am putting my life together and becoming who I want to be and you have no place in my life any more.  Right now I don't feel any love for you, I only feel anger toward you.  I feel sad for the life that we could have had when I was a child and for the relationship we could have had as adults if you had just loved me instead.

Your kind of love is too sick and I won't have that in my life.  The price is too high.  I am learning to deal with my own pain and anger just as you will have to live with yours.  Please stay out of my life.  I don't need you.

I feel sad that my children do not have a grandfather that they can love and who can be there to watch them grow up to be adults.  I intend to tell them why you are not in their lives so that you can never abuse them.  I can protect them as I could not protect myself from you and your so-called love.
Patricia


I wrote this letter with the intent of reading it to my dad face-to-face but that didn't happen.  He suddenly disappeared when I started trying to track him down.  Then I decided to mail the letter to him but nobody had an address for him.  I held on to the letter.

Finally one evening months later, I got called to the phone by my husband.  My dad was on the line wanting me to do something for him.  I told him I was glad that he had called because I had something that I wanted to read to him.  I went and got the letter I had written.  When I started to read, he got angry and interrupted me.  I got angry and told him to just shut up and listen.  He said okay.  I was shaking so hard that it showed in my voice as I read the above letter to him.  When I finished, he said that if that was the way that I wanted it to be, then fine, that is how it would be.  We hung up.  I didn't talk to him again until he was in the hospital sometime in 1999.  His sister had called me and told me that Dad had been diagnosed with a terminal brain tumor.  Surgery was done but all of the tumor could not be removed.  He died early sometime on the morning of January 6, 2001.  He died as he lived - alone.
Patricia

Revisiting Dear Family Member Letter About Incest

I had lost my copy of the Dear Family Member letter that I sent to all of my aunts and uncles on my dad's side of the family.  My sister recently found her copy and gave it to me.  My last post is of that letter.  If you haven't read it, here is the link: 

http://patriciasingleton.blogspot.com/2010/10/dear-family-member-notification-about.html

I forgot much of what I had said in the letter.  In the letter, it says that I had been dealing with my incest issues for the past three years.  My recovery program started in January 1989 when I found a newspaper ad listing an Adult Children of Alcoholics meeting that week.  I went to the meeting and found a safe place to start talking about my incest issues.  My incest issues were a major part of growing up with an alcoholic.  At the time, I didn't see any differences between my incest issues and my issues with growing up with an alcoholic.  In my mind, they were so closely related that I couldn't separate them for many years.  When I went into that room, I didn't even know what my issues were.   For the first time ever, I found a place that I could talk about my incest issues.  I didn't stop talking for almost ten years.  The flood gates were wide open. I know that some people got tired of hearing me talk about incest.

After three years of getting in touch with who I was, three years of breaking the silence of incest in my 12-Step meetings, I was ready to break the silence with my own family.  That is where the Dear Family Member letter came from.  After ten years of having nothing to do with my dad's family, (Not because of anything that they had done, but because of my own fears and my denial that if I didn't see them or my dad, then I could live as if the incest never happened.) I had opened the door and started attending family reunions again.  Several people in my dad's family of origin had been slipping me hints that I should step in and help my dad get on Social Security and other things since I was his oldest daughter.  They felt that I should be helping him out - taking care of him. This letter was an attempt to tell them why I was not going to do anything that would bring my dad back into my life or the lives of my children.  As a mother, I could protect my children from my dad. 

In reading my Dear Family Member letter, I realized several things.  One was that even though I said that I didn't need any reaction back from my family members, I realized that I was disappointed that so few of them did let me know how they felt about the letters.  My dad had 10 brothers and sisters living at the time that I mailed out the letters.  My sister and I discussed the letter but my brother has never said anything about the letter to me.  I was so afraid of what my family's reactions were going to be.  I realize now that I was still so afraid that they would blame me for the abuse.  That is why I told them, "I don't need you to react at all."  I was afraid of their reactions.  Today I am not afraid.  I did need them to react.  I did need for them to tell me that I did nothing to deserve the abuse.  It was not my fault.  I was afraid of their anger and their condemnation.  I was afraid of their judgments - afraid they would match my own critical self-judgments.  At the time that I wrote this letter, I still had the inner critic in my head that kept repeating the judgments that I grew up with coming from my parents.  That inner critic said I was stupid; I was incapable of making decisions; I was somehow defective or I wouldn't have been abused; I was a bad child or my parents would have loved me.  I still heard all of those voices in my head and worse, I believed them.  Having a healthy self worth was still a few years away for me.

At the end of the letter, I sounded like I had it all together.  How little did I know that I was still years away from doing much more than just surviving.  Yes, things were better but they were still a long way from being healthy.  I was still living with so much rage that I hadn't learned how to control and let go of yet.  I was fooling myself when I said that I liked where I was and who I was.  I meant it at the time that I said it but I hadn't reconnected with my body or my feelings at the end of those three years.  I still carried around a lot of buried self-hatred.   I still had a long way to go.  Ignorance sometimes is bliss, as they say.  If I had known how bad it was going to get before it got better, I might not would have gone down that path.  I am glad that I didn't know.  Where I am today is such a better place than I was then.  Am I finished with healing?  No, I am not sure that healing will ever stop as I move forward in my life.  Tomorrow will be better than today.  Even today, I take some detours down roads that still require me to be open to new pain and new growth.  As new challenges come my way, I am stronger and more resilient than I was as a child and even as a young adult in denial.  Because I am willing to face what comes to the door of recovery next, I experience more peace and more joy in my life.  I hear laughter more and realize that it is coming from me.

Sending out this letter, writing it, opened many doors of healing for me.  This was a very big beginning for me to becoming more honest with myself.  The ten years of cutting myself off from my Caldwell side of the family is a great example of what denial can do to you, of how it can keep you locked up in the pain of abuse.  In denying its existence (the incest, not the family), I thought it would lose its ability to hurt me.  I thought if I refused to look at the incest and acknowledge that it happened, it would go away.  I thought the fear would go away.  I thought the rage and hurt that I carried inside would just magically disappear if I didn't give it the power of acknowledgment. It didn't go away.  It continued to hurt me and I transferred that hurt to my husband and children.  Loving them wasn't enough to guarantee that I wouldn't hurt them.  Until I learned to control my feelings and feel them rather than stuffing them, I didn't have the tools to heal myself and to let go of the rage in constructive ways.

Denial doesn't work.  It was another way to stuff feelings inside.  It was another way to become numb to what I was feeling.  I didn't use drugs.  I used food.  To a smaller degree, I still do this today with food when everything gets too intense.  Through denial, I almost developed stomach ulcers when I was in my 20's.  Migraines started in my 30's.  High blood pressure plagues me today in my 50's.  I am overweight as a way to physically protect myself from the possibility of sexual abuse.  Denial turned me into a volcano or pressure cooker that could explode at the smallest provocation.  When I wrote this letter, I still wasn't in touch with my feelings.  I didn't know how to control my rage when the volcano erupted.  I didn't know how to not let my angry words hurt my husband or my children when the hate and hurt came spewing out when they erupted because I couldn't hold it in any longer.  The pressure became too much and I exploded all over my family before I learned to use my anger constructively.  It took three to five years before I learned that my anger could be defused without hurting anyone, myself included.  My husband will agree with me that those years were pure Hell.  My regret is that out of my pain, I hurt my husband and children, before I learned that anger can be healthy and doesn't have to hurt anyone.  Anger can be expressed in healthy ways so that it doesn't become rage.  In my childhood, rage equalled violence or at least the threat of violence.  The threat of violence can be just as frightening as the actual violence itself.  That threat can keep you frozen in inaction and silence.  I lived with that threat daily and didn't even recognize it until I was nineteen.

Growing up all that I saw of anger was rage and it could be violent.  This month is Domestic Violence Awareness month.  I don't often think about myself growing up with domestic violence in my family, but it was there.  The threat of violence does damage too.  In my recent interview with Cyrus Webb, I told a story that I grew up hearing from my mom.  My dad only hit my mom once.  That was sometime in the year before I was born.  I don't know why he hit her, that was never part of my mom's story.  She said that he hit her and she went and got his rifle.  She aimed it and pulled the trigger.  She was so angry that she didn't take the time to load the gun.  If it had been loaded, my dad would have died.  She was a very good shot with a rifle.  He never hit her again.  This story was one of the reasons that I didn't tell my mom about the incest until many years later when I was adult. (Actually just before mailing my Dear Family Member letters, I told my mom about the incest.)

I was afraid that if I told my mother about the incest she would blame me and call me a liar or she would shot my dad.  If she shot my dad, he would be dead and she would be in jail and I would not have a parent.  Those were really big fears in my mind as a child. And it would have been my fault for telling about the incest. This is victim mode thinking.

I ended my letter by saying that I hoped I would still be welcomed to future family reunions.  As far as I could tell, the letter didn't make any difference in how I was treated.  I don't know if the letter made any difference to any of them but it did for me.  I hope that sharing my Dear Family Member letter will make a difference in your life if you are a survivor of abuse.  You are not alone.  You do not have to continue to carry the burden of abuse alone.
Patricia

Dear Family Member - Notification About Incest Happening In Family

April 24, 1992
Dear Family Member:

It is nice to feel that I have a family and roots again after so many years of feeling alone and empty.  For years, I cut myself off from any attachment to my "Caldwell" side of the family.  I now know that this was the only way I could deal with the pain of Dad's betrayal of me as a child.  To survive and try to lead a nearly normal adult life I had to disconnect from my painful past and any reminders of it.  My family was a very strong reminder of that past.

For over three years I have been dealing with that painful past---working through my anger and grief---and learning to let go of it.  For what I am about to tell you, I don't want your pity or your anger.  I don't need you to react at all.  I am doing this for me and for no one else.  I do hope that I can have your support in my working through this.

I know that some of you may be disbelieving and some of you may be angry that I am just now revealing this and you want to know why after all these years of being quiet that I am now stirring up all this trouble.  I am not doing this to cause trouble or to seek revenge.  I am doing this as a further step in my recovery.  I am refusing to keep silent and to carry the burden of this secret anymore.  It has become too heavy.  Too much of my life has been harmed by it.  I still have a lot of anger to deal with over this and to deal with it, the reasons have to brought out into the open.  I don't want another generation of children to suffer because of our silence and it will continue to happen unless we speak out and others have the awareness to deal with it.  Secrecy hurts too many people.

Most of you know that Daddy has a drinking problem.  For my own self, I choose to give it a name---alcoholism.  No one else has to agree with me.  I won't argue over this point.  It is strictly my opinion.  Everyone is entitled to their own opinion.

I thought about talking about this to some of you at the recent Family Reunion, but I decided to just enjoy the day instead.  I have worked hard this year and deserved to have that day to savor the pleasant memories and feelings of love that I felt from each of you.  This was an important day for me.

I don't make any apology to anyone for the feelings that you have as you read this.  This is a family secret that must be exposed for what it is---dangerous and deadly to our children and their self-esteem.

Some of you wonder why [my sister], [my brother] and I aren't close to the family anymore.  I can't speak for [my brother].  I don't know his reasons.  [My sister] is afraid of Daddy and refuses to be around him or to allow her children contact with him.  I don't want him in my life or in my children's lives.  I won't let him continue to abuse me.

I won't tell you [my brother's] or [my sister's] story.  I will only tell you mine.  I won't go into details here.  That would take to long.  I've already written more than I thought I would.

Starting at least by the age of eleven years old, I was sexually abused by Daddy.  I don't have memories of it starting earlier than that, but it may have.  Some of the work that I have done leads me to believe that I may have been as young as eight or nine years old.  You can't imagine the emotional pain I have gone through because of this.  Do you know what it is like to hate the parent that you also love and have to depend upon for your very survival?  When I was seventeen years old, I reached the point of having the courage to say no to Daddy.  If the abuse had continued, I would have lost my sanity.  I knew that.  I never again let Daddy abuse me.  I think he was afraid I would tell if he continued to push me.  He left me alone physically, but the emotional abuse continued until I left home at the age of nineteen.  I knew that was my one and only chance to get out from under his control. Living with Dad was like having a dictator tell you everything you could do or not do.  I never learned to make decisions or to think for myself until I was a Junior in college.  I know that God was with me and keeping me sane.  He gave me the courage to do what I had to do.  He allowed me to find the people that I needed to guide me in the right direction at each crucial point in my life.  I have a husband who loves me and has tried to be understanding of all that I have gone through.  That hasn't always been easy.  Dan has allowed me the space to find out who I am.  For me, the process has been both painful and joyful.

I like who I am today.  I am at a good place in my life.  I have told Mom about the abuse just this month.  She says she didn't know or she would have stopped it.  She was as much under Dad's control as I was.  I have made my peace with her.  I haven't confronted Dad yet, because when I try to contact him person to person he disappears.  I have written a letter to him giving him back responsibility for his actions.  This step will close a chapter in my life.  This is a positive step for me.  It has been a long journey to reach this healthy point in my life.

I hope that each of you can still welcome me to future Family Reunions with the same enthusiasm as you did this year.  Family means a lot to me.  I love everyone of you.  Please help me to bring awareness to our next generation of children so the hurt and the abuse can be stopped at least for this family.  I love you all.
Patricia Caldwell Singleton


I didn't use my brother or my sister's names here as I did in the original letters.  I have been searching for my copy of this letter for over a year and could not find it.  My sister a few weeks ago called me and asked me if I would like to have her copy of the letter.  She didn't know that I had been looking for my copy.  Thanks, Sis for giving me your copy.  She also gave me her copy of the copy letter written to her and my brother telling them that they were getting their copy of the "Dear Family Member" letter two weeks before I mailed them out to everyone else.  I wrote the above letter on April 24, 1992 but my sister's letter was written on June 10, 1992 so I apparently took a few months after writing the "Dear Family Member" letter before I mailed them out to my dad's brothers and sisters.  I chose not to send a copy to my grandmother because she was elderly and in poor health.  I didn't want to hurt her with the knowledge of her sons actions.  I told each of my aunts and uncles that it was their choice as to whether or not they shared the contents of my letter with their children, most of whom are my age and older.  I don't know if they did or not.  No one ever said anything to me about it.  One of my nephews recently told me he had read his dad's letter when he was a teenager.  My youngest niece recently read her mom's copy before my sister gave the letter to me. 

I look forward to hearing from you letting me know what you think about my letter.
Patricia

Just A Mom

I am starting this post out with an email that I received today.  I don't know the source of the written words called "JUST A MOM?"  If I did, I would include you as the author, but I don't know who you are.  Thank you for your words of humor and truth.

JUST A MOM?

A woman, renewing her driver's license at the County Clerk's Office, was asked by the woman recorder to state her occupation.
She hesitated, uncertain how to classify herself.
"What I mean is," explained the recorder,
"Do you have a job or are you just a ....?"
"Of course I have a job," snapped the woman.
"I'm a Mom."
"We don't list 'Mom' as an occupation, 'Housewife' covers it," said the recorder emphatically.

I forgot all about her story until one day I found myself in the same situation, this time at our own Town Hall.  The Clerk was obviously a career woman, poised, efficient, and possessed of a high sounding title like, "Official Interrogator" or "Town Registrar."
"What is your occupation?" she probed.
What made me say it?  I do not know?  The words simply popped out.
"I'm a Research Associate in the field of Child Development and Human Relations."
The clerk paused, ball-point frozen in midair and looked up as though she had not heard right.
I repeated the title slowly emphasizing the most significant words.  Then I stared with wonder as my pronouncement was written, in bold, black ink on the official questionnaire.
"Might I ask," said the clerk with new interest, "just what you do in your field?"
Coolly, without any trace of fluster in my voice, I heard myself reply, "I have a continuing program of research, (what mother doesn't) in the laboratory and in the field, (normally I would have said indoors and out).  I'm working for my Masters, (first the Lord and then the whole family) and already have four credits (all daughters).  Of course, the job is one of the most demanding in the humanities, (any mother care to disagree?) and I often work 14 hours a day, (24 is more like it).  But the job is more challenging than most run-of-the-mill careers and the rewards are more of a satisfaction rather than just money."
There was an increasing note of respect in the clerk's voice as she completed the form, stood up, and personally ushered me to the door.

As I drove into our driveway, buoyed up by my glamorous new career, I was greeted by my lab assistants - ages 13, 7, and 3.  Upstairs I could hear our new experimental model, (a 6 month old baby), in the child development program, testing out a new vocal pattern.  I felt I had scored a beat on bureaucracy!  And I had gone on the official records as someone more distinguished and indispensable to mankind than "just another Mom."

Motherhood!
What a glorious career!  Especially when there's a title on the door.
Does this make grandmothers "Senior Research Associates in the field of Child Development and Human Relations"
And great grandmothers "Executive Senior Research Associates?"  I think so.
I also think it makes Aunts "Associate Research Assistants."


I love the humor of the above words and titles.  Why does it take a title to give a mother the importance that she deserves.  Mothers play such an important role in the lives of their children and therefore the world.  I hope that I was this type of mother - one who researches and grows as her children grow.  In my own eyes, I often fell short as a mother.  Why?  I wasn't given the proper tools to be the kind of mother that I wanted to be to my children.  Who is?  Especially those of us who comes from homes with dysfunction and abuse.

I grew up wanting to be a better mother than my mother was to me.  Yes, my mother did the best that she could with the tools that she was given, and it wasn't good enough.  I did not want to repeat that pattern with my own children, especially the patterns of abuse and emotional abandonment.

I believe that mothers are the most important role model for their daughters because we are both women.  Mothers fill so many roles in the life of a child.  Mothers teach us about loving and caring for others.  They teach us kindness and how to nurture ourselves and others.  As little girls, mothers teach us how to be women just as daddies teach little boys how to be men.  So much of who I am comes from my mother.

To quote a comment that I left on my Facebook page today, "My mother/daughter relationship was confusing and difficult.  I always told myself that my mother loved me.  I now know that my mother couldn't love me because she didn't love herself.  She was so shut down emotionally.  The only emotion that got through from her to the world [and to me] was rage and she did that silently.  She didn't know what love was.  She wasn't taught to love.  Dysfunctional families cannot teach what they don't have - self love."

My inspiration for this post came from fellow blogger Darlene Ouimet.  On her blog Emerging From Broken, Darlene has been writing a series of articles about the relationship that she had with her mother.  The latest article is called "Mother Daughter Relationship Nightmares."  You will find this blog article are the following link:

http://emergingfrombroken.com/mother-daughter-relationship-nightmares/

I warn you that some of the comments for this article of Darlene's are brutally honest and may be tear triggering for some of you.  Everyone of the people - women and men - are being courageous in sharing their stories of pain and healing in their comments.  I thank you Darlene for being the one to bring this out into the open so that we can all break the silence of abuse and continue to heal.

Related posts:
Your Parents Did The Best They Could found at
http://patriciasingleton.blogspot.com/2010/09/your-parents-did-best-they-could.html
Patricia

Repeating The Effects Of Growing Up In A Dysfunctional Home

Becoming Your Own Parent, The Solution for Adult Children of Alcoholic and Other Dysfunctional Families , written by Dennis Wholey, Bantam Books, New York, New York, January 1990.
This book was first published by Doubleday in October 1988. 

This is one of the many books that I read back in the early 1990's that helped me to grow so much in my beginning years of recovery.  I gave my original copy of this book away years ago to someone else that I thought would find the information useful.  Sometime in the past year, I found my current copy in a used book store.  I haven't checked with Amazon to see if you can still get the book or if it is out of print.

You will find me quoting from this book for awhile longer yet as I continue to read through it.  Here is some more information that I found in the book that I thought you might find as valuable as I did back in the 1990's and still find very useful today.

page 182-183: 
"People coming out of a dysfunctional home always feel unlovable.  They feel they have been loved for the role they play, not for who they are.  You are only capable of re-creating with another human being the nature of the relationship you have with yourself.  If you punish yourself, you will punish your love partner.  If you hate yourself, you will end up hating your love partner.  If you are afraid of yourself, you will be afraid of your love partner.  A person is incapable of establishing a level of intimacy with another human being that is greater than the level of intimacy he or she has with himself or herself.  You can't go out and find intimacy.  What you can do is adopt a policy of attraction, and who you are limits who's going to be attracted to you.  A woman who needs to be victimized will attract a brutalizing man.  Healthy people attract healthy partners."

My very first date was when I was 19, two years after I had stood up to my dad and said no more sexual abuse is going to happen.  I was still living at home and going to a small junior college near by.  I had a crush on the guy for a year before he finally asked me out.  Even though I was no longer being sexually abused, I was still in victim mode.  I had three dates with this young man.  The first one was the only one that I asked permission from my parents.  The next one I went to spend the night at a girl friend's house and went on the second date from there.  Even though I was 19 and legally an adult, my dad was still telling me what I could do and what I couldn't.  I let him because I wasn't strong enough to do otherwise.  I was 19 but still very immature from never being given choices as a child.  I was also emotionally stuck at 11 years old or younger because of the incest.  I knew none of this when I was 19.

I thank God today that this young man did not ask me to marry him.  If he had, I would have said yes because I thought I loved him.  His version of love was the same as my dad's.  I was someone that he could control.  I would do whatever he said.  When we had sex, I let it happen rather than saying no.  To me, sex was love since that is what my dad had told me for all of my childhood years.  I believed him.  I thought if I said no that he wouldn't "love" me. 

Today I know that sex isn't love.  It can be a part of love but just the act is not love especially if it is abusive too.  Sex with this young man was abusive.  I didn't complain or say no because I didn't know how to be anything else but a victim at that time in my life.  On that first date, we went to his younger sister's where he borrowed some of her clothes for me to wear on our date.  According to him, I wasn't dressed good enough for our date.  I said nothing and went along with it even though my feelings were hurt.  I was proud of the pants suit that I had put together from the few clothes that I had.  Pants suits had become popular for girls to wear in the late 1960's.  This was his first controlling behavior toward me.

Why didn't I ask my parents before going out on the second date?  Because I knew instinctively that my dad hated this young man that had the courage to come and ask for that first date.  I didn't realize at the time that the two were probably jealous of each other.  Both sensed the predator in the other.  Both sensed the controller in each of other.  They were very much alike. They both wanted to control me, not love me.  I just didn't know it at the time.  If we had married, I would have gone from one dictator to another.  With this new dictator, there would have also been physical abuse, not just sexual abuse.  At one point during that first date, the young man made the statement that he really ought to just take me away from my dad.  He said it joyfully and spitefully.  I sensed that something was wrong but didn't know what.  Some part of me was afraid of this young man, but then again, that was familiar to me.  I was afraid of my dad.

The last date we had, I was away at college.  I was still 19 or maybe had just turned 20.  We went to a drive-in movie, my first since I was about 5 years old.  We spent most of the time wrestling in the front seat of his car because I said no to sex.  By then, I had grown a little and was no longer content to be abused or to call sex love any longer.  I had been away from home for a few months.  I had gone through a summer away from home and the influence of my parents.  I loved the freedom to explore what I wanted for myself.  I knew I didn't want to be abused any longer.  I was a long way from knowing who I was but I was able to set a few small boundaries for myself - not being abused or sexual with this person was one of those first boundaries.  He didn't ask me out for another date after that night.  Thank you God.

I would have followed a path similar to the path my sister chose if I had continued to date this young man and married him.  I would have been a battered woman because at that point in my life I didn't know that I deserved better.  Only through the Grace of God did I not go down that path in life.

I was a long way from leaving the victim role behind but still beginning to feel better about myself.  I was at the point where I thought if I wasn't living at home that I could ignore the incest and that meant I wasn't still being affected by it.  I could pretend that was true.  I wanted so badly to be happy and to be free from my past that I pretended that it just didn't happen. It seemed to work for awhile.  Reality is pretending never worked but I continued to lie to myself anyway.  Another familiar pattern, everyone else lied to me so why shouldn't I lie to myself.  I just wanted to be happy and to fit in.

The next date that I attracted into my life was an alcoholic like my dad.  We only dated a few times.  I didn't know at the time that he was an alcoholic.  He dated me for a short time after he and his high school sweetheart broke up.  They went back together sometime after our few dates and eventually married.  Today he is divorced.  Does he still drink?  I have no idea.  Again, I thank God that our paths divided and he went one way and I went another.  Why was I attracted to him?  Probably because he was an alcoholic and that was familiar to me.  It wasn't what I wanted in my life but it was familiar.  I didn't see the signs.  I didn't know about all of the drinking he was doing at the time.  We don't see what we don't want to see.  Because it is familiar, we are attracted to it.  That is why many Adult Children grow up to become alcoholics themselves or they marry them.

By the time that I met my husband, I knew that I didn't want to marry an alcoholic.  Instead I married another Adult Child of an Alcoholic.  Neither of us drinks.  I don't drink because I saw the consequences of living with my dad and my grandfather and their drinking when I was a child.  Drinking scares me.  The thought of losing control like my dad and grandfather did scares me.  My husband doesn't drink because he can't.  It puts him to sleep.  He must be one of those Adult Children that is allergic to alcohol.  For whatever reason, I am grateful.

Well, when I sat down to write this post, I thought I would just give you the quote and leave it at that.  I am glad that the thoughts started pouring into my mind.  I think that the words are much better when you can back them up with personal experiences.  It also helps me to make the connections for myself as I write to you.  I think we all learn much more from the experiences shared.  Hope you are all having a glorious weekend.
Patricia

Incest Recovery---Give Your Child Permission To Say No

Before I get into the topic of this article, I want to invite you to join me on BlogTalkRadio as I am interviewed by Cyrus Webb of Conversations Live at noon Central Standard Time on Thursday, April 29, 2010.  Cyrus has been doing interviews on BlogTalkRadio for seven years.  He is a great interviewer.  I thank you Cyrus for giving me this opportunity to share my message of recovery from incest with a larger audience.  I don't have any prepared list of questions from Cyrus so forgive me if I stumble out of nervousness.  I am excited to do this.  It is a totally new experience for me so there is some fear of saying the wrong thing, fear of not knowing what to say and fear of not doing it right.  The perfectionist in me tends to come out at times like this even though I have wrestled with not being a perfectionist for years.  I know myself well enough to know that I will be stressed out before the interview because that is when all of those old negative tapes will be running through my head.  I know they aren't true but that doesn't stop them from running.  I also know that as soon as Cyrus asks me the very first question, the stress will be gone and I will be comfortable with myself and my story.  I have shared small pieces of my story before and the calmness comes over me as soon as I start to speak.  I also always ask God to give me the right words to say.  If you can't listen to the interview at noon on April 29, Cyrus will have the recording up on his site afterwards.  Here is the link to Cyrus's website:
http://www.blogtalkradio.com/conversationslive/2010/04/29/cyrus-webb-presents-the-patricia-singleton-story-o
I will post a reminder in another few days.  I hope you will join us and give me feedback afterwards.

I will warn you that if you are an incest and/or abuse survivor, the rest of this article may be triggering for you.  Precede with caution.  I am sharing things that I have never shared with anyone before.

Since I posted my recent article, "A New Chapter In Incest Recovery @ http://patriciasingleton.blogspot.com/2010/04/new-chapter-in-incest-recovery.html , I have been waiting to see what feelings are going to come up for me.  I know that this new work will entail grieving again.  Usually the first emotion to come up, for me, is anger or fear.  There was fear and anger both in the dream that I that I had that started this new chapter of work.  A few nights ago, after thinking about it for awhile, I told my grieving class that the first emotion to come up is anger at my parents and at my uncle for not asking me if I wanted to go with him on the fishing trip and if I wanted to go home with him for the weekend.  I was not asked if I wanted to do either of these things.  I wasn't given a choice of going with this man.  I was told to go because it would be fun.  Being 11 years old and being raped by a man in his 50's was not fun.  It was torture.  And the day of the fishing trip wasn't enough for him.  I was taken home with him and the rape happened several more times over the weekend.  He lied to my parents about other people being at his house.  The two of us were the only ones there for the weekend.  What makes me mad, so far, is that I was not given a choice in the matter.  I was not asked what I wanted.  The fact that I wasn't asked means to those adults that I didn't matter.  I had no value.  I was an object to be used and discarded.  I did not trust adults not to hurt me after that weekend.  I remember that I was afraid of hurting my uncle's feelings if I said anything.  I did not scream out the hurt.  I did not cry through the pain, through the tearing of my immature, 11-year-old body.  I went inside my head and stayed there.  I went as deep inside as I could away from the pain and the fear.  I decided that something was badly wrong with me for me to deserve to be treated this way by the adults in my life.  I can tell you the year that this abuse happened---the year that I was 11 years old which was in 1962.  I can tell you it was the Summer of 1962 because I was wearing shorts and the first night that my uncle visited we sat in chairs in the front yard under the stars.  He was talking to my sister and me.  No other adults were around.  They must have been in the house.  It was unusual for an adult to sit and talk to me so I enjoyed the attention.  I was on one side of him and my sister was in a chair on the other side of him.

I knew something was wrong the second he put his hand down into my shorts and panties but I didn't understand what was wrong.  This was a year before the sex talk that my six grade health teacher had with all of the girls in the class.  I felt uncomfortable with what he was doing but didn't want to hurt his feelings by moving away.  What he was doing didn't hurt but it also wasn't pleasurable to me.  Some part of me knew what he was doing was wrong. 

My sister, sitting on his other side, asked what he was doing.  He put his other hand into her shorts and panties too.  I can't tell you how long this continued.  On some level I must have shut down or my mind went off into the night.  I don't remember.  I do remember being relieved when Mom called us into the house.

The next morning after my dad went to work, my uncle asked Mom if I could spend the day fishing with him.  Without asking me if I wanted to go, she said yes.  I think that I will leave this fishing trip for another article.  I am feeling overwhelmed with what I have written so far.  I am sorry to leave you hanging like this but I need to take care of me.
Patricia

A New Chapter In Incest Recovery

I have done no healing work on being molested by my uncle when I was 11 years old.  This happened a few short weeks before the incest was initiated by my dad.  I thought, I guess I hoped, that working on my issues with my dad and mom would take care of it since they seemed more important.

Maybe it is now time to look at my incest issues with my uncle since I had a dream about it in the early morning hours of Easter Sunday.  I didn't remember the dream when I first woke up that morning so some of the memory of the dream was lost.  I wrote the dream down later in the afternoon when I did remember having it.  Here is what I wrote down that afternoon:

I was in a house with my uncle and a woman, maybe my grandmother.  I am not clear about who the woman was.  I forgot parts of the dream in the waking time that I used to get ready to take my mother-in-law to church this morning.

In the dream, I had a conversation with my uncle, but I don't remember most of it.  I do remember there was a sexual element to the dream and I remember that I was angry.  I was an adult in the dream.  My uncle was making demands and I refused to give in to his demands.  I said some words to the effect that I would tell someone if he didn't leave me alone.  I know he then got angry.  I wasn't afraid of him like I was as a child.

Next he was gone from the dream.  There was a knock on the front door.  I opened the door into a hallway like I was in an apartment building instead of in a house.  A man with a gun in his hand was there to kill me because I was going to talk about the incest and my uncle.  I remember waking up when the man put the gun to my head.

I woke myself up from the dream frightened and confused.  After a short while I went back to sleep and had another dream that I don't remember at all.


I know that this dream came about because I have been reading Dan L. Hays' book Freedom's Just Another Word.  [ http://www.danlhays.com/freedom.html ]  [ http://patriciasingleton.blogspot.com/2010/04/freedoms-just-another-word-book-review.html ].  I also know the dream came about because obviously it is time for me to work on recovery from the incest experiences with my uncle.

One thing that I have learned from reading Dan's book is that we sometimes have to revisit different time periods and the different people who have affected our lives rather than just dumping all of the issues into one big pile. 

I have hesitated to post about my uncle because he still has sons and daughters living.  I won't use his name for that reason to protect the privacy of his children.  I don't know if he abused any of them or not.  I don't know how they feel about him either. 

He died back in the 1980's or 1990's.  I don't know the exact year so I am not in fear of him hiring someone to kill me like he did in my dream.  The killer represents that part of me that is still very afraid of talking about this topic and this man.  The threat of shooting me tells me how very deep this fear is.   As a child, I thought my uncle was capable of killing me or hiring someone to do it.  When he was raping me I didn't know whether he would kill me or not afterwards.  I was afraid of him for reasons that I won't share here. 

I don't know where this part of my journey is going to take me but I am willing to go along to the end.
Patricia

Inspiration, Denial And Incest

This post is the result of a comment that I received on my last post "What Childhood Incest Taught Me". You will find the words from the comment here in italics when I quote it.

Warning this comment and post may be triggering.

I came through here looking for something inspirational to read and this is what I've found. I am feeling overwhelmingly sad for whoever this is. That life is one noone would choose to bare or even wish on the worst of people.

For inspirational, you picked the wrong post. And for "whoever this is", that is me. These were the lessons that I learned. I know from other comments and friends that these were also lessons that they learned from their own childhoods of abuse.

For anyone who has read my blog for very long, you know that some of my blog posts are inspirational. Some of my blog posts are about the very real facts, feelings, memories and stages of living with and dealing with the effects of incest. There is nothing inspirational about those posts. Yes, I know that some of them are difficult to read. They are also difficult for me to write even though I am in a better place in my life today. Sometimes I still feel the pain, sadness, anger and hurt of that abuse. Those blog posts I write are for other abuse survivors to let them know what my own experiences have been and to let them know that they are not alone. I have been there. I know it for the hell that it can be, especially when you feel so alone and so sad that you wonder if life is even worth living. I have always managed to take the next step. Sometimes it is two steps forward and one step back. That is the road to recovery. There is nothing easy about it.


For your experiences, all of you, I am truly heartbroken.

Thank you for your compassion and empathy. They are appreciated.


But there is something you each must realize. You each have suffered, in your own time, some of you maybe once or twice, others for years. But those times are not here, those years are not these years.

Part of my comment reply to this comment fits here: My question to you is, "Have you experienced any major trauma or abuse in your life?" It doesn't sound like it. If you haven't, you have no idea what it is like or how difficult it is to get over it.


You have to realize that sometimes life hands us so much... and all the while the world is so cruel. We start to feel like that is all that is ever to be dealt us. But it just isn't. You must each move on. I know you may think that this is impossible. But I know that as you read this those encounters are distant, very real, experiences. Key word being distant.

You have probably never had flashbacks or nightmares or Post Traumatic Stress Disorder. Soldiers aren't the only ones who get PTSD. Survivors of child abuse and survivors of sexual abuse do too. When those symptoms happen, you are not in control of your feelings or actions. You can be thrown back into "those years". Nobody wants that to happen but it does, sometimes on a daily basis. It takes years of therapy to recover from these. "Key word being distant." There is nothing distant about those years when you are in the middle of a flashback or nightmare. You can tell me they aren't real but when you are in the middle of it, they are very real. Have you ever had a flashback? If not, you don't know what you are talking about.


You are each holding so closely to something that with every single thought of it your heart breaks inside. Why are you choosing to hold on?

Why would anyone choose to hold on to the kind of emotional pain that most people can't even imagine, if they had a choice? Just choosing to be happy sounds like a really good reality but it is very often the road to denial. I did that road for a lot of years. That road that says, "I don't feel anything about the incest. I don't hate my abusers. I don't hate myself. I don't feel anything so I can't be affected by the incest. It doesn't affect my life, my decisions, my children, me. Life is fine. Life is great." The road to denial is a road of lies. I was disconnected from my feelings, from myself. I did hate myself. I did hate my abusers. I was so full of rage, sadness and hurt that I couldn't feel anything else. If you deny any feelings, you deny them all. I had a volcano of fire inside of me that caused headaches, stomach aches and other physical symptoms that shows what I was holding in rather than dealing with. I was taught all of this denial as a child. The denial didn't stop until I got sick and realized that denial didn't work. That is the real world of an incest survivor.

Just letting go of all of the pain isn't really an option until you have worked through all of your issues. Then the letting go is possible. Is it an instant possibility, just in the case of a miracle. I do believe in miracles. I also know that denial is alive and well until I choose to let go of it and face the reality of incest.


You have to realize that you are something amazing on the inside. That the real true parts of us are ones that NO ONE can touch but you.

I can agree with the above statement. On the spiritual level, my Higher Self is untouchable by what happens to my body. The truth is that each of us is a Light to the world. Sometimes that Light does get hidden by the struggles of Life. This isn't something that a child who is being abused or an adult who is still suffering from the abuse is even aware of. On a spiritual level, I can even say that "Yes, I chose this lifetime to learn the lessons that incest teaches me. My parents chose to help teach me those lessons." It has taken me years to reach the level of acceptance that this requires. Most abuse survivors aren't there yet. Do I condemn them as stupid or not whole or anything else derogatory because they aren't at this level of understanding yet? No, not at all. There are still some days that I question the validity of those beliefs and they are my own. Do I expect everyone else to accept and live by those "spiritual" beliefs? Again, no, not at all. Is it ok if you disagree with me? Yes, absolutely. Do I want to hear how you disagree with me? Only if it is offered in a respectful manner.


What happened to you, happened to your body. And you each, understandably, allowed it to alter more than just your body. You let your spirits still feel the pain.

I don't know about you but, yes, I live in a physical world which affects my mental and emotional world. I believe that my spiritual world encompasses all of the others and uses those others to teach its lessons. I eventually see the blessings that come from going through the pain but not until I have worked through the pain.

Again you used the word "let" as if the victim of abuse knows that they have choices. Victims don't know that they have choices. Choices didn't exist for me for many, many years because I believed the lies of the abuser who told me he was in control and that I had to do what he told me to do. I had no choices until I got into a recovery program and learned what choices meant. That is when I learned that I was responsible for my own life and my own choices. That is a very big lesson for survivors. Not everyone learns that lesson.


Just imagine yourself as a light inside a dark cave. No matter how dark it is on the outside, no matter how it may storm, it doesn't change that there is light on the inside. You are safe because you are that light.

As an incest survivor, I didn't learn that the world was a safe place. Yes, I have always been aware of that inner Light. That inner Light is probably the only thing that kept me from splitting into different personalities as some childhood abuse survivors do. My Spirit has always been and will always be safe. My physical world has never felt safe.


You are you at the happiest moments in your life, not the you that always returns home to your pain.

You live in a world of duality---Light and Dark, Love and Fear, Good and Evil, Day and Night, Sad and Happy, Calm and Chaos. You can't have one without the other. Without Sad how would you know what Happy is? Without Evil how would you know what Good is? Without Fear how would you know what Safe is or Love is? Hate isn't the opposite of Love, Fear is. Lack of Love equals Fear. You can't know what the "happiest moments in your life" are unless you know what the worst moments of your life are.


Let it go now. Move on. Decide you have this one life, and no matter what the world will ever throw at you will never matter.

I have discovered that those people who tell me to "Let it go now. Move on." are usually one of two types. They either have never experienced what I have and therefore know nothing about the process that it takes to heal. Or, they have their own abuse issues that they want to stay in denial of. If you see me going through my issues and haven't dealt with your own, then my struggle threatens your denial. That is why you tell me to let it go and to move on so that you don't have to become aware of your own unresolved issues.

I feel sad for those who are still in denial of their own issues. I have little sympathy for those who don't know what they are talking about because they have never experienced what I have. If you haven't been there, you have no idea of what it takes to live my life and to struggle to get better. Don't tell me to get over it. If you have been where I am and were able to let go of your issues by healing them, then tell me how you did it. Share your experiences and what worked. Don't share your denial of your issues. I don't need that. I did that, on my own, years ago and I know that denial just helps you continue to live in the pain. Denial heals nothing. When you are in denial, you aren't happy. You aren't free. The only way to freedom is through the pain, not around it.


You are stronger now than anyone will ever know. You can take this world on and actually live free from your past.

Yes, I am stronger than even I knew that I would ever be. I am more courageous than I ever thought I could be. I am more compassionate that I ever thought possible. I am proud to be the woman that I am today. I am the best parent that I know how to be to my inner child.

I don't live completely free from my past. I don't believe that that is totally possible. I don't know that I would want it to be. My past has formed who I am today. Without that past I would not be stronger, more courageous, compassionate, proud of who I am today. Without my past, I would not be aware of the blessings of my life today. Yes, today, I can take on whatever the world throws at me. This is true because of my past.


Some of you maybe have already found a church. But some of you may feel like there are far too many questions. But all I can say is...you can walk make the decision to just say goodbye to all that stuff you can't bring back or change. And never have to think about it again. The person that hurt you had their free will, and they chose to storm boldly away from what was right, and you suffered. That makes it the fault of no one but them, not you and definitely not God. Choose to forget and start living your life in the light. Remember these bodies die, but we will never die. Where are you headed, and lets make it great! "Love your neighbor as yourself" said someone very special. It's great advice. Good Luck.

The comment about finding a church can be a future post all of its own. I "found a church", but many others, not just survivors, choose differently. I am happy with my church. That is my choice.

I don't blame God for what happened to me. I never have. I know that some survivors do. I did turn my back on God for a few years because I thought He did nothing to stop the abuse. A part of me always felt His presence in my life. That presence is what gave me the strength to survive when many others didn't.

I know that some don't believe in a God who could allow such abuses to happen to a child. Others look to God for grace and love. I believe in free will and that you are each responsible for your own actions. I know that some of the abused go on to abuse the next generation. Most of you don't. Many choose to stop the abuse rather than pass it on to future generations.

Some of you choose to share your own experiences, as I do, by blogging about them online. Others choose to write in private journals. Some of you still continue in the silence because you haven't found your voice yet. It is for other incest and childhood abuse survivors that I write of my experiences. Any time that someone survives abuse in any form and can write about that journey, that is inspirational. It isn't light, funny inspiration. It is sad, thoughtful, sometimes tearful. It is always heartfelt. Sometimes it comes from a deep well of hurt. It is always healing to be able to bring these thoughts and feelings to the surface and share them with others. It can be educational to share with others who have never experienced abuse in their own lives. Without awareness, you can stop nothing.

If you come here looking for happy and joyful and light, sometimes you will find it here. Other times you won't. I won't apologize for my words. This is my life. I share it to give strength and hope to other survivors. I also share it to spread awareness of the evil disease of abuse that lives in this world. I look forward to hearing what you think about this post and any other post that you want to comment on. I reserve the right to agree or disagree with your comments.
Patricia