Editor’s note: The following article was submitted by the Lovefraud reader who comments as “Pearl.”
By Pearl
Someone on this blog once mentioned a book by Alice Miller and Andrew Jenkins, and it caught my attention. So now I’m reading The Truth Will Set You Free—Overcoming Emotional Blindness and Finding Your True Adult Self.
Even though I’m only about halfway through the book, I wanted to share parts of it because it is so important to what a lot of us are working on—forgiving ourselves and trying to understand why this (fraud) happened to us. I know this won’t apply or appeal to everyone, but it might help some of you as it has me. Miller’s ideas help me understand why I was susceptible and forgive myself for my blindness—my inability to spot a “bad guy.”
Miller focuses on childhood—on how corporal punishment (spanking/whipping) and humiliation—cause a type of blindness in adulthood that can lead to being manipulated and UNABLE TO SEE THROUGH LIES. She emphasizes that the kind of parenting and education aimed at breaking a child’s will and making that child into an obedient subject by means of overt or covert coercion, manipulation and emotional blackmail leaves long-lasting imprints on the way we think and relate to one another as adults.
Here is the cycle as she sees it:
- Traditional methods of upbringing, which have included corporal punishment, lead a child to DENY suffering and humiliation. (Can anyone related to having a high pain threshold? Where did I get that bruise or cut—I don’t remember getting it? Ever feel humiliated at being spanked, paddled or whipped as a child? Ever experience a parent being insensitive to suffering?)
- This denial, although essential if the child is to SURVIVE, will later cause emotional blindness.
- Emotional blindness produces “barriers in the mind” erected to guard against dangers. This means that early denied traumas become encoded in the brain, and even though they no longer pose a threat, they continue to have a subtle, destructive impact. (The memory of how to respond to such crappy behavior from our parents and authority figures is still there.)
- Barriers in the mind keep us from learning new information, putting it to good use, and shedding old, outdated behaviors.
- Our bodies retain a complete memory of the humiliations we suffered, driving us to inflict unconsciously on the next generation what we endured in childhood, unless we become aware of the cause of our behavior, which is embedded in the history of our own childhoods.
As children, some of us learned to suppress and deny natural feelings. Some of us lived in a world where our feelings were ignored and denied.
All the beaten child remembers is FEAR and the face of the ANGRY parent, not why the beating was taking place. The child may even assume he had been naughty and deserved the punishment. Miller writes that in the absence of a witness who can empathize with us in childhood and genuinely listen to us, we have no other way of protecting ourselves from the pain but to close our minds to it.
In a bid to blot the fear and pain of our abused younger self, we erase what we know can help us, we can fall prey to the seductiveness of sects and cults, and FAIL TO SEE THROUGH ALL KINDS OF LIES.
Having this information helps me understand why I was “ripe for the picking.” It also goes a long way toward helping me forgive myself and move on in the healing process.
Justabouthealed,
Thank you, sweetheart. I wrote them with all of us in mind, ya know?
Not trying to force my will on you; only sharing my journey of healing, recovering, and restoration. The basic purpose of LF.
And I DO understand your current dilemma, your frustration and confusion with your husbands’ alcoholism.
I’ve had quite a few family members, lovers and friends in the past who seemed to suck the life-force out of me by continuing their self-destructive drugs and alcohol usage.
They placed upon my seemingly strong shoulders their burdens, their emotional and mental damage, always expecting me to clean up their messes and love, help them unconditionally.
Hell, I wasn’t exactly mentally and emotionally healthy myself, but compared to them….I was a rock.
I finally, resolutely decided to “divorce” each and every one of them from my life, over time of course when I was involved with them.
Best damn thing I could have done for myself.
They were incapable of understanding the definition of reciprocity and I was so very tired and beat up from their unreasonable crapola that I cut the umbilical cords and saved myself!
I can’t advise you on what you should do regarding your personal circumstances.
But I can assure you that me or one of the LF tribe members will be here to listen, to care, and to offer support.
Unconditionally, I might add.
Bless you, doll..
Stay strong and have faith!!
Dear Keeping Faith,
I live in Arkansas in the northwest/central part and tonight it will be 5 (that is FIVE) degrees and tomorrow top out at 25 or so, then Saturday up to 50 degrees wwith only 30 for a low. BRUTAL weather today.
Oh, I want to quote you a poem by Maya Angelou, one of my favorite poets.
You may write me down in history,
With your bitter, twisted lies,
You may tread me in the very dirt,
But still, like dust, I’ll rise.
(((hugs))))
Oxy,
We’re almost neighbors! I live in the nw corner of Ohio, & it was 2 today! Down to -7 tonight, I know I’m not leaving the warm house for fer nuthun.
Oxy and Sstiles: That’s nothing … come on up to New England!
“Oh, the weather outside is frightful, but by the fire, delightful … da, da, da, da, da, da, daaaaaaaaaaaaaa … let it snow, let it snow, let it snow”.
OK, so I have cabin fever.
Peace.
Saturday is supposed to be up to 50 for hi, and about freezing for lows. Tonight is the coldest night in 9 yrs (jan 1999/2000) was the last time (we were out of electric 2 weeks, with 2 inches of ice on everything) So I am very pleased that things are better here than that! You can keep new England and Montana, and N. and S. Dakota and all the other parts of the frozen north! This is far enough north for me! I will come visit you in the summer though when we have 90% humidity and 95+ degrees and buffalo gants eating your nose and eyes. LOL
I have a friend in upstate Maine that is a logger and logs out of the forest in the winter time with several pair of oxen. Talk about hard work and COLD!!! Nah, not for me! His GF does dog sleds….NOT for me!!! LOL
You guys keep warm, it was -30 up in MOntana today, far too cold for these old bones!
Thank you for the advice JaneSmith and OxDrover. It has helped me a lot. I can see that I can have those mantras AND give him one last chance, without swinging all the way back to blind, unconditional love. And reading your writing made me realize that it is probably my growth that let me finally question him and bust him, I didn’t accept the explanation he was giving me when I caught him after drinking, came home earlier than expected (His explanation was that it was non-alcoholic beer…I decided to check the garbage cans outside in the snow.) And it was my insistence for the last year plus that we be TOTALLY honest that made him finally decide to confess not just to this incident but to tell me of the last 38 years. So I’m beginning to feel less like I’m caving and more proud. I WILL hold to the line in the sand. I WILL not be blind. I WILL be ready to walk. It is high time I learned to love while at the SAME TIME knowing I can walk. And after all, death can take a love away too, and you need to know you will be okay.
I love you guys!
Good morning all, it’s something like 7 degrees here in upstate New York, and I’m sitting waiting for my first cup of hot decaf, my first handful of vitamins, and the turned-up heat to wake me up.
This has been a great thread. I keep checking in, between tasks in a midweek workload that’s been nonstop for days.
JAH, you can have those mantras and postpone a decision to do anything radical. Giving him one last chance isn’t the issue now. Taking care of yourself is.
One of the things that motivates alcoholics to get well is the knowledge that their lives are at risk — not necessarily their health, but the lifestyle they’ve been taking for granted. Like losing their marriage and home. You’re not doing him any favors by telling him you’re giving him another chance, or even thinking it.
If you can, sit tight and observe. Get in an “it depends” mindset. If he tells you he needs you, tell him what he needs it to get sober and get well. And you’ll make your own decisions based on what’s right for you.
I know this is hard, but it’s why tough love is called tough. It can be as hard on you as it is on them.
I’m in my own dramas right now. Two of the people closest to me have started drinking again. Another one who works for me went through a major act-out yesterday which boiled down to trying to convince me why he had too many personal problems to meet his commitments to me.
Sometimes the best thing you can do is breathe, back off and wait for everyone to get sane again, while you figure out the next best thing to do for yourself.
Kathleen Hawk: I hear you loud and clear about having to take a deep breath and step back …
I’ve always debated whether they get sane again! Addiction (of any kind) is the worst of the worst and you know of course, the addict focuses on all the ramifications their addiction brings into their lives … and no longer has to remember or at this point actually remember the original reason for them to start their drug of choice.
The drug of choice runs their lives. The addicted person is no longer in control.
Peace.
Yes and no. The addiction runs their lives. But there is a part of them that is aware of if.
In the case of the person who works for me, his “emotional problems” are related to the fact that he spends hours cruising the internet every morning, and plays World of Warcraft into the early morning hours every night. I used to point this out. But I’d run into a wall of denial and lies.
The problem with getting an addict to wake up is that you can’t wake up for them. You can create an environment in which they are more likely to wake up. And that’s the benefit of tough love, which is stopping enabling them. Even by sympathy, encouragement or “chances.”
WE are part of the resources they use to stay addicted. The only influence we have over the situation is to stop being part of the resources.
In the case of this person, after he raged at me for a while for “not listening to him” or “not caring about him,” and then cried for a while about how he wants to kill himself, I gave it a half hour and then told him that I’m sorry about his problems but I don’t have a solution for them. My problem is that I need him to be dependable.
He started to emote all over the place again, telling me I expected him to care about my problems. I just walked away.
These are his problems, his life choices, and he’s the one who’s going to have to figure out what he needs to do for himself. The more I interfere, the more reason I give him to make it about me, not him.
Addicts do regain control over their lives. But it happens when they have enough evidence that their solution of choice is causing them too many problems. Bottoming out.
The other things about addicts is that they tend to backslide before they get it right, if they ever do. And if we pin our happiness on their sobriety, we’re going to have a bumpy ride.
One of my alcoholic friends, during a period of sobriety, got honest with me about what really happened to money and gifts I’d given her that had all be “stolen” from her in a spate of muggings in the dangerous neighborhood she lived in. They weren’t stolen, they were turned into drugs.
“Addicts lie,” she said. It’s something that really struck me, because she had been so plausible at the time. I believed everything she told me.
It’s one of the reasons I’ve become so hard-nosed about the words and actions thing. Words are easy. Actions are what matters. I believe what they do, not what they say.
Dear Kathy,
Your words are wise and we all need to heed them. I think in a way all psychopaths and narcissists and others with personality disorders are ADDICTS, to adrenaline if nothing else. In a way, WE TOO are “addicts” to various things, that’s why even though it was causing us problems we kept on doing the same thing over and over.
After the first time in my life I got drunk, I had a doozie of a hang over, “prayed to the porcelain god” until I thought my guts would come out, and have been careful since then, to keep my drinking within check. I don’t drink often and when I do it is VERY moderate. I learned that I didn’t like the consequences of my drinking.
An old alky friend of my grandfather’s told him once, “It’s Saturday night and I’ve gotta go get drunk, AND I SURE DO DREAD IT.” (the guy was serious!)
My grandfather was a heavy drinker in his younger years, but one night in 1929 he came home drunk and my mother, who was less than a year old, was afraid of him. As drunk as he was he realized his drinking was scaring his children and he put the bottle down. He never had another drink as long as he lived. He saw the consequences of his behavior were bad, and he realized he didn’t want his children alienated.
His son, my Uncle Monster, though, knew the consequences of his behavior but continued to drink. Even losing essentially everything, he never quit.
Until THEY have TRUE insight into the fact that their addictions (to whatever it is) is ruining their lives, they will continue to “get fixes.” I think my “addiction” to being abused, to trying to placate the family demons by throwing them meat didn’t stop until I was having to cut portions of my own body off to “feed” them. I was so involved with the dysfunction I didn’t have time or insight into looking into MYSELF for the ANSWER to MY PROBLEMS and realize I couldn’t fix theirs, I could never placate them entirely.
I no longer have a desire to have a close relationship with people who have “problems” with lying, substance abuse, illegal or immoral behavior or abusive behavior, who are not willing to support themselves and be responsible for their own actions. Who are not dependable because of the drama in their lives and other relationships. I Don’t need the stress!!!!!
Since I am an “addict” of another sort (trying to fix people and playing the “triangle game”) I don’t need to be around these people any more than an alcoholic needs to get a job as a bar tender. LOL
My renter’s hired hand, a nice young man age 26 who also takes care of my livestock as part of his job, is getting divorced after four months marriage with a Borderline Personality disordered woman who swore to him “she would change her ways.” Apparently she has been sleeping with her previous boyfriend the entire time they dated and were married, gave custody of her kids up to her ex husband, or they were taken away, I’m not sure.
This young man is sweet as he can be but he is CLUELESS about what train just ran over him. As he describes her actions, I theraputicly listen and do a little pro bono counseling with him (which he is very receptive to BTW) as he is hurting but has NO IDEA what kind of a person he has been dealing with. She is doing all the CLASSIC things from threats to stalking him. Fortunately he is going NC with her and keeping his head on pretty straight. She’s back living with her “trashy” (probably psychopathic or borderline) X-BF and believe it or not, trying to get back with the husband! LOL
I’m not sure this young man has enough smarts or education to really “get it” about what she is, or what the relationship was, but I do have hope he will look for RED FLAGS in the future. All I can do is to put the knowledge out there for him to pick up what he wants to. He doesn’t have a computer so I can’t send him here to LF, but I have printed off a couple of articles for him to read.
Fortunately, he is a young man that “respects his elders” and so he does seem to listen to “Miss Oxy” and seems at least to be taking in the idea of what red flags to look for in a relationship. I’m just not sure he is mature enough yet to think with the BIG HEAD. LOL