Loving Voices

Long into my family estrangement, the negative comments from my past continued to visit on the present. Sometimes, they played like a repetitive loop. Other times, a certain event triggered the voices of anger, blame, and rejection. I could hear my mother’s voice in my head: You are bad. You are sick. You are crazy. You single handedly destroyed our family.

I could feel myself shrinking and feeling small.

It is easy to get stuck. Even though we no longer had a relationship, I continued to yearn for my mother’s love and approval. I wanted her to replace the ugly voices in my head with new loving voices. I wanted her to accept responsibility for what she had done.

It’s easy to become seduced by our longing to receive support from the one place that it isn’t available. I knew I had to take responsibility for my own healing and to find support where it was available.

Over a period of many years, I developed a loving community of encouragement. With the aid of loving people in my life, I worked on healing myself by replacing the old unhealthy internal messages, feelings and responses, with new healthy internal messages, feelings and responses.

Slowly over time, I began tipping the scale from the negative to the positive.

As survivors, we need help changing the majority voice we hear in our heads - from that of our abusers – to that of love, so that we can heal, mourn, and move on with our lives.

A Fresh Start with Sallie Felton - Update

Tomorrow, I will be a guest on A Fresh Start with Sallie Felton. 

Wish me luck!


Update:

My thanks to Sallie for an enjoyable interview. Anyone interested in listening to a recording of our live interview can do so from the archives of "A FRESH START" with SALLIE FELTON.

Forgiveness and Justice

A few months ago, I heard Marianne Williamson interview Immaculee Ilibagiza on XM radio. Immaculle Ilibagiza is the author of Left to Tell: Discovering God Amidst the Rwandan Holocaust. Ms. Ilibagiza gave a fascinating interview, humbly describing the details of her survival and provided a courageous model for overcoming injustice.

Her words, “To me, I think justice is part of forgiving” were very validating.

She noted that although she had forgiven the man who murdered her entire family, that didn’t mean that she thought he should be freed from jail. On the contrary, she thought that he should be held responsible for his actions and prevented from harming others.

In an excerpt from Heal and Forgive:

“Often I have witnessed humanities disbelief when a relative forgives a loved ones’ murder. “How can you forgive murder?” is our collective outcry.

I have come to understand that forgiveness is not necessarily predicated on the degree of the offence but rather on the justice we receive. In other words – did the murderer go to trial? Did the community acknowledge the offence?

I have found that in general – those who forgive crimes of violence – have seen some sort of justice. Not revenge. Simply justice.

For victims of childhood violence, receiving justice is often not the case. Rarely do child abusers see the inside of a courtroom and rarer still do they admit their offences.

How do we forgive something that in the eyes of our community did not happen?”

Another element that justice provides is a balance of power. Long into adulthood, I continued to stand before my mother still a damaged child. As long as I viewed her as more powerful than I was, how could I even consider forgiveness?

I longed for my mother to acknowledge my abuse, to apologize, and to change her abusive behavior. Isn’t that another way of asking her to relinquish her power?

Because my mother was unwilling to do these things, I found it necessary to empower myself, and safeguard my own well-being. This involved seeking justice in a community of support to help me protect myself, receive acknowledgment from other individuals, express my anger appropriately, mourn my losses and to heal. I needed to heal and balance the power before I could even consider forgiveness.

Motherloss

My motherlessness came as the result of years of abuse, betrayal, rejection, and finally a fourteen-year estrangement. During our time apart, I realized that whether I had a relationship with my mom or not – I was motherless - and I mourned the loss of the mother she could have been - but was not.

Our separation did protect me from further injury and was essential for healing from my abuse. Nonetheless, after I had largely healed from my mistreatment, the pain of estrangement remained.

Estrangement is an unnatural loss. Whereas death is “an act of God,” estrangement - or the need to estrange - feels like the ultimate rip-off. Oh how I wished my mother would acknowledge my abuse, apologize and become a loving mother.

With death, we have to accept the finality of our loss. With estrangement there is often hope of reconciliation. Hope that the mother-love we have always sought will finally come our way.

The estranged adult child doesn’t carry the loving essence of a mother, but instead carries painful memories of their mother and of rejection. When emotional hardships befall an estranged child, we often long for a mother’s love. We search to fill the void created in our hearts by the lifelong emotional absence of a mother.

Estrangement is like the amputation of an intricate part of ourselves. It’s a soul injury. We are alone in the world, floating like a leaf in the wind, homesick; yet, not able to find our home. My mother was the missing link in my life, disconnecting me from my family history and from the roots of my gender.

The most difficult aspect of motherlessness is the sense of aloneness. Sometimes, no matter how much emotional work I did, I still felt the “void” and I found it necessary to turn to my sense of spirituality. When I ached for “home,” I visualized Christ on the cross. In the human sense, Christ was completely alone. Yet, Christ was not alone. The Lord was with this beloved Child. For me, sometimes merely saying that God is with you doesn’t seem to be enough; however, visualizing Christ, suffering alone but not alone, gave me the strength to feel God’s presence meeting me right where I was.

“But now, this is what the Lord says –
he who created you, O Jacob,
he who formed you, O Israel:
Fear not, for I have redeemed you;
I have summoned you by name; you are mine.
When you pass through the waters,
I will be with you;
And when you pass through the rivers,
They will not sweep over you.
When you walk through the fire,
You will not be burned;
The flames will not set you ablaze.
For I am the Lord, your God,
The Holy One of Israel, your Savior.
Isaiah 43:1-3”

Sometimes, I imagined Christ’s unconditional love surrounding me like giant hands, tenderly holding me, loving me and keeping me safe.

God provided me with healing tears to wash away my heartache. The Lord sent me people who were willing to bear witness to my pain. God blessed me with daughters of my own so that I could experience a loving mother-daughter bond.

I thought about those in my life who did love me – my children, my friends, my partner, and I reminded myself of all for which I had to be grateful.

My father died when I was nine. I kept his picture next to my bed. Sometimes, before lying down at night, I looked into his eyes and remembered how much he loved me.

The pain of estrangement did lessen with time. As I peeled away each layer of pain, I experienced all the stages of grief until I finally reached a place of acceptance. In the end, the void made room for something more loving to grow in my life.

Betrayal and Trust

Trust is such a basic relationship necessity that if we can't trust a parent to love and protect us - whom can we trust? When we have been betrayed in our most basic human relationship - and that trust is never restored - how can we learn to trust ourselves to respond appropriately to betrayal?

I actually betrayed myself when I accepted betrayal as a part of my relationship with my mother.

I began safeguarding myself when I realized that I didn't have to accept betrayal - especially from my own mother.

I learned to trust myself in baby steps. I needed to feel the pain of my misplaced trust in order to protect myself and to seek out those whom I could trust. I learned that when I listen close enough, pain is a useful resource for protecting oneself.

The National Association to Protect Children

I belong to The National Association to Protect Children - a membership association dedicated to providing political strength and leadership to create tougher laws for the protection of abused children. As a member, I am comforted that I am doing something to support creating safer communities for our nation's kids.

From their Mission Statement:

“There’s an old saying in politics: “Children don’t vote.”

That old saying is supposed to explain why children do not inspire fear and respect among elected leaders. But the real reason children always lose out in the political arena is that adults don't fight for children the way they fight for themselves……

….Like the NRA or the AARP, we know that there is strength in numbers and power in being focused exclusively on a single issue.”

For any one who is interested in helping to create new ways to protect children, this is a very worthy organization.

Check out their recent victories on the right hand side of their "campaigns" page.

Risking Vulnerability

I feel vulnerable as a new blogger. I am struck by the number of survivors, who risk vulnerability in order to connect with people of like experiences – to share, to be heard – and to help fellow survivors.

It was only a few years ago when I discovered the world of online support. My first thought was, “Shoot. I wish we had the internet 20 years ago when I felt isolated and alone, as I went through the worst part of my recovery.

Finding other abuse survivors, support, and understanding in the real world, was a long, difficult task. Today, internet support groups (with varying degrees of privacy), and survivor blogs abound.

The internet can be a scary place – as well as a vehicle for valuable support. What the internet does offer – unlike ever before – is the ability to easily find and connect with people in similar situations. Yet, just as in the real world, we all need safe environments in which to share.

I think vulnerability in conjunction with clear, respectful boundaries - in any setting – is a risk that does have its rewards.