I was just sitting with my copy of Steven Farmer's "Adult Children of Abusive Parents" in hand, working on one of the exercises in there. Yup, I fit the title. My parents fit the title, too, big time. I have left a lot of it behind, but I don't know if you ever get to leave all of it behind. One thing I do know is that none of it gets left behind without a conscious effort and sometimes one hell of a lot of work. If you fit the title, there's a lot of literature out there for you, but this is really one of the good ones. It's not too expensive - under thirty bucks - and worth the investment.
I was on page 87, at one of the "Seeing, Not Just Looking" exercises in what Farmer calls "active looking". Especially if you were physically abused, you may have developed the coping strategy of dissociation, in order to help yourself survive. It served me well when I was little and having plastic hair-brushes and wooden rulers broken over me, but I don't want it anymore. I don't need it anymore, and I've worked for years now to be rid of it.
This technique is defined as "a psychological defense mechanism in which specific anxiety-provoking thoughts, emotions, or physical sensations are separated from the rest of the psyche" and it means that you can actually detach yourself from the part of you that is undergoing whatever sensation is currently threatening to overwhelm you. The only problem is that invariably you get to the point where this 'strategy' is always functioning, even though you may no longer need it. It begins to rob you of valuable parts of your life, parts that you should be experiencing without any filter to come between you and them in their fullest degree. The challenge becomes how to reconnect with your surroundings, how to actually experience them first-hand, instead of through photographs or other second-hand substitutes.
The exercise that I spent time on today is a good one, really a good one, and I came away from it feeling good about myself. I came away feeling positive, and glad to think that I have taken another step away from the destructive part of my past, and another step closer to the wonderful time that is the present.
I was on page 87, at one of the "Seeing, Not Just Looking" exercises in what Farmer calls "active looking". Especially if you were physically abused, you may have developed the coping strategy of dissociation, in order to help yourself survive. It served me well when I was little and having plastic hair-brushes and wooden rulers broken over me, but I don't want it anymore. I don't need it anymore, and I've worked for years now to be rid of it.
This technique is defined as "a psychological defense mechanism in which specific anxiety-provoking thoughts, emotions, or physical sensations are separated from the rest of the psyche" and it means that you can actually detach yourself from the part of you that is undergoing whatever sensation is currently threatening to overwhelm you. The only problem is that invariably you get to the point where this 'strategy' is always functioning, even though you may no longer need it. It begins to rob you of valuable parts of your life, parts that you should be experiencing without any filter to come between you and them in their fullest degree. The challenge becomes how to reconnect with your surroundings, how to actually experience them first-hand, instead of through photographs or other second-hand substitutes.
The exercise that I spent time on today is a good one, really a good one, and I came away from it feeling good about myself. I came away feeling positive, and glad to think that I have taken another step away from the destructive part of my past, and another step closer to the wonderful time that is the present.
1 Comments:
Good for you. The present ... the future ... here you come!
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