Yesterday, I got sick. Stinging sinus pain was my first clue. By midnight, I felt like a truck was parked on my chest. I'm always remembering my childhood, and this physical illness got me thinking of how my dad would alter his whole demeanor when I was sick, taking on the role of loving caregiver. He would set me up on the couch, get me a pillow, find out what I wanted to watch on TV, and then make me a nice meal. It felt so uncomfortable. Guilt washed over me in those times, like it had been unfair of me to ever despise his presence in my life. Then, my religious training kicked in, prompting me to thank God for my father, condemn myself for ever feeling anything but gratitude for him. Tears poured down my cheeks. Looking back now, the whole thing makes me sick the other way.
It's not like I've had the worst kind of suffering in life. I've taken hot showers. Most humans have never had the experience. I only have to go without a toilet when I choose to, for fun. That idea would be absurd to most of the world. I've never gone hungry for very long. The only times I've gone without food for a whole day were self-imposed for so-called spiritual purposes. My suffering doesn't stack up as extreme outside of the first world.
I suppose the worst part of my childhood was the mind fuck. Dad professed a love for me that was more dramatic than anything I've ever been offered. I grew up miserable but just knowing for sure that he was the one person I could always trust to be there for me. Sure, he would humiliate me in front of his friends, but, if someone tried to hurt me, I knew he would step in. I sucked in my fat lips and made up excuses for black eyes. Of course I wished he would stop hitting me, but, for the most part, I believed him when he explained how it was my fault. It was bad enough that my own foolish behavior was getting me beaten. The worst part was listening to how it hurt him. I was forcing him to whip and beat me by my constant betrayal of his deep love for me, a love that was almost dead because I bought the wrong thing at the store.
I don't want to say he wasn't being genuine, but he was totally fucked up. Getting free of the guilt of not behaving well enough to compensate for his issues has required separating myself from him in my own mind. I had to give up bowing to my father before I could stand up as my own man and take care of myself. Looking back, I see that playing along with him never quite worked out.
Does all of this sound a little like Christianity to you? It does to me. They say we have a Father who loves us but just can't stand the fact that we're not all about Him. So, He has to kill us. He doesn't want to though, so He made a way for us. All we have to do is admit that we have failed Him, admit that we deserve death and Hell, agree to worship Him forever, and try to live our lives exactly like He wants. If we do those things, then He will love us and make everything better someday, you know, after we die.
My dad ran this same game on me. There was always the promise of a happy life, the life I wanted, just around the corner. I'm working hard to let go. God and my dad are still sitting on my chest like a dump truck, but I'm wiggling more. Someday, I'll feel free, long before I die. Or maybe I've just been trained to create the promise of a happy life, just around the corner, for myself. Maybe the suffering I place upon myself is the worst. Black eyes and fat lips never last. Lies are forever.
Thursday, December 19, 2013
Tuesday, December 10, 2013
The 12 Steps of Christmas
Jesus, Dad, Santa, Self, Recovery
1. We admitted we were powerless over seasonal affect disorder - that our winter moods had become unmanageable.
2. Came to believe that believing in something unbelievable could restore our happiness.
3. Conscious of the lie, we turned our lives and finances over to Santa and Christmas Spirit
4. Used Santa mythology to give ourselves and each other covert attitude guilt trips...
5. There was no need to admit anything, because Santa watches us, even while we're sleeping.
OK, this is getting creepy.
After several years of toying with the idea of writing my life story, I have to admit that such introspection feels completely unmanageable to me. My memories have been untapped, running and ruining my life, shrouded in mental confusion, and hidden from view by my instinctive urges to find distracting relief from the distress of peering into their darkness. I've known I needed help, perhaps a framework or philosophy, something. I used to think that Jesus would keep me straight. In a way, he did, but facing the visions of my traumatic childhood has proven to be too much for me without a more tangible, effective helper.
Three months ago, I decided to try the 12 steps of recovery as a way of gaining that feeling of sanity, something I've never really had except in periods of complete denial. Jesus was good for that. I knew I needed something more. Will the steps work for me? I don't know. I don't really believe any power outside of myself is going to do this work on my behalf. So, in my step work, I'm mainly trying to rewrite the 12 steps in a way that makes some kind of sense to me. Here's what I've got so far:
Step #1 We admitted that our lives had become unmanageable
I had this one down already. Hiding in my closet as a toddler, listening to my dad beating my mom half to death in the next room, I was deeply aware that serenity was out of my hands. As an adult, trying to write this story, I recycle that same feeling of powerlessness. I'll write a nice blog entry, feel the burn, and then I'll pay for it in deep mental strife for days afterward. This is when I feel driven to salve my mind with romantic preoccupation and sex. Is it healthy? Am I an addict? I don't know, but I do wish my life was operating in a more manageable range. Fair enough Step #1, fair enough.
Step #2 We came to believe that a power greater than ourselves could restore us to sanity
Studying this one, I realize it's a well-worn step for me. As a child, I truly was and felt as though I was at the mercy of my mother and father. Looking to adults for salvation was reasonable and natural. "Mom, do you see me over here? Make him take the knife out of my mouth. Don't let him cook me in the oven. Please stand up with me so he stops knocking the wind out of me."
"Dad, now that you've killed my mom, please have mercy on me and stop threatening to kill me. Dad, please stop spending so many hours tearing me down verbally and physically. Dad, please stop fondling me and threatening to rape me again."
And later, "Hey pretty girl, please keep making me feel lovable. Hey pretty girl, please keep responding with love when I push you away. Hey, pretty girl, why won't you just be everything I think I need and make my life all better?"
"Hey God, how come you can't help either?" Why do I think I can't be sane without outside help? And, if I accept that, doesn't it mean that I've surrendered to the belief that I'll always be crazy? No thanks. I know I came to believe, over the course of my life, that feeling sane in my own head was outside of the grasp of my own self. I'm just not so convinced anymore that anything or anyone outside of my head has any clue how to fix me, much less the ability or willingness.
Step #3 Made a conscious decision to turn our lives and wills over to God as we understood God
Holy Fuck!!! What am I supposed to do with that? I will not turn my life and will over to someone else's ideas of the ideal for human life. Don't tell me, member of some popular religion, that turning my life and will over to the God of your understanding will help me in some way. That god hasn't healed me yet. The healing I've gotten has been the healing I pursued. It's been hard work. Honestly, if continuing with the 12 steps required standard acceptance of the Christian god, I would just hang it up right now.
So, if I won't turn my life and will over to Yahweh, how will I utilize Step #3?. If we can imagine the world of the mind as a huge thought-producing machine, my conscious awareness is a light shining on part of it. Sometimes I'm aware of the bigger picture, to varying degrees. Sometimes, the light of my consciousness is focused rather sharply on the needs or worries of the moment. Sometimes, I have little awareness outside of my anger at the driver who just cut me off. With that kind of transient awareness, it's easy, in the absence of a set structure like a god, to find myself drifting through a random sea of mental and emotional priorities in life. If I can have an idea in mind of another mind, a mind that does not shift from it's highest ideals, then that mind within my mind can be my guide into Step #4. Ok, I'll do it.
Step #4 Made a searching and fearless moral inventory of ourselves
I know I'm fighting the wording of the steps all along here, but this one presents some serious problems for me. The designers of the steps want me to look at myself, take inventory, inventory of my moral self. "Moral" implies judgment. Am I to look at myself from a place of judgment? "Fearless" is there because they knew that this step would take people like me into what is normally very frightening mental territory. No one has to be told to be fearless regarding any particular pending adventure unless fear is going to be a factor.
So, first I will acknowledge that, in looking within, fear is a factor for me. How can I fearlessly search through the feelings and coping mechanisms I carry from watching motionlessly while my dad murdered his girlfriend? How can discovering why I waited 23 years to come forward not lead me into places in my heart and soul which will be frightening? I've been feeling and facing those fears for many years now. The stories connected to them are extreme, but fear of looking within is the same for all of us.
Fear of shame keeps us from looking, keeps us making up stories about who we are, keeps us acting out coping behaviors, and keeps us from facing and accepting ourselves in a way that allows us to be transformed and truly happier. Here, a friend like Jesus can be helpful, especially if the Jesus we imagine loves and accepts us along the way. I don't like the 12-step language that makes this step into an inventory of "defects." It's important to identify shame that we have, but even more important to keep from feeling extra shame about having it. This is where a non-judgmental "higher power" to keep me company and help me remember the bigger picture can be very helpful.
I'm not going to share my 4th step work here. It's for me. For now, I just wanted to share my process in struggling with the steps themselves. This blog entry is feeling convoluted and complicated to me, but, then again, that complication accurately portrays my mental experience in regards to God and Step work. When I share my thoughts on God with people, I often illicit responses obviously designed to educate me about the nature of God which people think I have missed. The responses are canned. I've heard them before, many times over the years, repeated in sermons, songs, and shared first-hand from fellow churchgoers. Be sure of this, if you learned it in church, I've already learned it, taught it, rethought it, stopped repeating it, and, in some cases, thought out a better way to express the idea. In church, they often told me "don't put God in a box." Years of Bible reading while being beaten by an adamant believer in the angry, judgmental, murderous, insecure God in its pages will apparently cause a person to think outside of the box.
I don't believe in a god or gods actually existing as beings. I believe religious concepts are the concepts of human beings. Religions reflect us more than they reflect the mythological beings represented. Take the 12-steps for instance. They work if we work them. No matter what we think of God or his/her role in our recovery, nothing happens until we do it. Why do I bother with discussion of God when I don't even believe in one? I think the construct is useful. To understand my religious approach, consider adults who promote Santa Claus mythology even though they haven't really believed in Santa since they were kids. Christmas spirit is still considered worthwhile. That's how I am about God in my step work. I've got to keep my head when I plunge into the depths of horror in my mind. I've had to reject long-held ideas about God and myself in favor of keeping what works. That's been hard, but I believe it's what's meant by Jesus' parables about the judgment.
As far as corporate application of my personal theories of God:
People who think things will work out tend to be happier.
They also ignore that most of us are suffering.
Which is horribly invalidating to those of us who suffer.
So many things aren't working out for so many people,
and it's considered healthy for individuals to imagine
that things will work out for them even while they
participate in perpetuating the system that
produces the suffering? Is it ok that children starve as long
as you get to go to heaven when you die?
No, that's not the right
approach to happiness.
Collectively, things could work out for us. That's a better
approach. Think how much happiness is multiplied in the
face of selfless kindness. Even in our flawed social systems,
people rise to the challenges and manage to pay it forward.
I want to help move us all forward with my story. I'm just seeing
that our ideas about God, money, family, civic responsibility,
and personal happiness are all standing in the way of that movement.
So understanding God and the human condition is my chosen work.
Keep reading my blog to see if my system of thought works for me.
Take what works for you.
And, if I'm ever in a position to start the revolution, think about
following fearlessly. A worldwide, collectively approached searching
and fearless moral inventory of humanity as it is could be the thing
that saves kids like me from being tragically abused in the first place.
May it be so.
© Ernest Samuel Christie III 2013
1. We admitted we were powerless over seasonal affect disorder - that our winter moods had become unmanageable.
2. Came to believe that believing in something unbelievable could restore our happiness.
3. Conscious of the lie, we turned our lives and finances over to Santa and Christmas Spirit
4. Used Santa mythology to give ourselves and each other covert attitude guilt trips...
5. There was no need to admit anything, because Santa watches us, even while we're sleeping.
OK, this is getting creepy.
After several years of toying with the idea of writing my life story, I have to admit that such introspection feels completely unmanageable to me. My memories have been untapped, running and ruining my life, shrouded in mental confusion, and hidden from view by my instinctive urges to find distracting relief from the distress of peering into their darkness. I've known I needed help, perhaps a framework or philosophy, something. I used to think that Jesus would keep me straight. In a way, he did, but facing the visions of my traumatic childhood has proven to be too much for me without a more tangible, effective helper.
Three months ago, I decided to try the 12 steps of recovery as a way of gaining that feeling of sanity, something I've never really had except in periods of complete denial. Jesus was good for that. I knew I needed something more. Will the steps work for me? I don't know. I don't really believe any power outside of myself is going to do this work on my behalf. So, in my step work, I'm mainly trying to rewrite the 12 steps in a way that makes some kind of sense to me. Here's what I've got so far:
Step #1 We admitted that our lives had become unmanageable
I had this one down already. Hiding in my closet as a toddler, listening to my dad beating my mom half to death in the next room, I was deeply aware that serenity was out of my hands. As an adult, trying to write this story, I recycle that same feeling of powerlessness. I'll write a nice blog entry, feel the burn, and then I'll pay for it in deep mental strife for days afterward. This is when I feel driven to salve my mind with romantic preoccupation and sex. Is it healthy? Am I an addict? I don't know, but I do wish my life was operating in a more manageable range. Fair enough Step #1, fair enough.
Step #2 We came to believe that a power greater than ourselves could restore us to sanity
Studying this one, I realize it's a well-worn step for me. As a child, I truly was and felt as though I was at the mercy of my mother and father. Looking to adults for salvation was reasonable and natural. "Mom, do you see me over here? Make him take the knife out of my mouth. Don't let him cook me in the oven. Please stand up with me so he stops knocking the wind out of me."
"Dad, now that you've killed my mom, please have mercy on me and stop threatening to kill me. Dad, please stop spending so many hours tearing me down verbally and physically. Dad, please stop fondling me and threatening to rape me again."
And later, "Hey pretty girl, please keep making me feel lovable. Hey pretty girl, please keep responding with love when I push you away. Hey, pretty girl, why won't you just be everything I think I need and make my life all better?"
"Hey God, how come you can't help either?" Why do I think I can't be sane without outside help? And, if I accept that, doesn't it mean that I've surrendered to the belief that I'll always be crazy? No thanks. I know I came to believe, over the course of my life, that feeling sane in my own head was outside of the grasp of my own self. I'm just not so convinced anymore that anything or anyone outside of my head has any clue how to fix me, much less the ability or willingness.
Step #3 Made a conscious decision to turn our lives and wills over to God as we understood God
Holy Fuck!!! What am I supposed to do with that? I will not turn my life and will over to someone else's ideas of the ideal for human life. Don't tell me, member of some popular religion, that turning my life and will over to the God of your understanding will help me in some way. That god hasn't healed me yet. The healing I've gotten has been the healing I pursued. It's been hard work. Honestly, if continuing with the 12 steps required standard acceptance of the Christian god, I would just hang it up right now.
So, if I won't turn my life and will over to Yahweh, how will I utilize Step #3?. If we can imagine the world of the mind as a huge thought-producing machine, my conscious awareness is a light shining on part of it. Sometimes I'm aware of the bigger picture, to varying degrees. Sometimes, the light of my consciousness is focused rather sharply on the needs or worries of the moment. Sometimes, I have little awareness outside of my anger at the driver who just cut me off. With that kind of transient awareness, it's easy, in the absence of a set structure like a god, to find myself drifting through a random sea of mental and emotional priorities in life. If I can have an idea in mind of another mind, a mind that does not shift from it's highest ideals, then that mind within my mind can be my guide into Step #4. Ok, I'll do it.
Step #4 Made a searching and fearless moral inventory of ourselves
I know I'm fighting the wording of the steps all along here, but this one presents some serious problems for me. The designers of the steps want me to look at myself, take inventory, inventory of my moral self. "Moral" implies judgment. Am I to look at myself from a place of judgment? "Fearless" is there because they knew that this step would take people like me into what is normally very frightening mental territory. No one has to be told to be fearless regarding any particular pending adventure unless fear is going to be a factor.
So, first I will acknowledge that, in looking within, fear is a factor for me. How can I fearlessly search through the feelings and coping mechanisms I carry from watching motionlessly while my dad murdered his girlfriend? How can discovering why I waited 23 years to come forward not lead me into places in my heart and soul which will be frightening? I've been feeling and facing those fears for many years now. The stories connected to them are extreme, but fear of looking within is the same for all of us.
Fear of shame keeps us from looking, keeps us making up stories about who we are, keeps us acting out coping behaviors, and keeps us from facing and accepting ourselves in a way that allows us to be transformed and truly happier. Here, a friend like Jesus can be helpful, especially if the Jesus we imagine loves and accepts us along the way. I don't like the 12-step language that makes this step into an inventory of "defects." It's important to identify shame that we have, but even more important to keep from feeling extra shame about having it. This is where a non-judgmental "higher power" to keep me company and help me remember the bigger picture can be very helpful.
I'm not going to share my 4th step work here. It's for me. For now, I just wanted to share my process in struggling with the steps themselves. This blog entry is feeling convoluted and complicated to me, but, then again, that complication accurately portrays my mental experience in regards to God and Step work. When I share my thoughts on God with people, I often illicit responses obviously designed to educate me about the nature of God which people think I have missed. The responses are canned. I've heard them before, many times over the years, repeated in sermons, songs, and shared first-hand from fellow churchgoers. Be sure of this, if you learned it in church, I've already learned it, taught it, rethought it, stopped repeating it, and, in some cases, thought out a better way to express the idea. In church, they often told me "don't put God in a box." Years of Bible reading while being beaten by an adamant believer in the angry, judgmental, murderous, insecure God in its pages will apparently cause a person to think outside of the box.
I don't believe in a god or gods actually existing as beings. I believe religious concepts are the concepts of human beings. Religions reflect us more than they reflect the mythological beings represented. Take the 12-steps for instance. They work if we work them. No matter what we think of God or his/her role in our recovery, nothing happens until we do it. Why do I bother with discussion of God when I don't even believe in one? I think the construct is useful. To understand my religious approach, consider adults who promote Santa Claus mythology even though they haven't really believed in Santa since they were kids. Christmas spirit is still considered worthwhile. That's how I am about God in my step work. I've got to keep my head when I plunge into the depths of horror in my mind. I've had to reject long-held ideas about God and myself in favor of keeping what works. That's been hard, but I believe it's what's meant by Jesus' parables about the judgment.
As far as corporate application of my personal theories of God:
People who think things will work out tend to be happier.
They also ignore that most of us are suffering.
Which is horribly invalidating to those of us who suffer.
So many things aren't working out for so many people,
and it's considered healthy for individuals to imagine
that things will work out for them even while they
participate in perpetuating the system that
produces the suffering? Is it ok that children starve as long
as you get to go to heaven when you die?
No, that's not the right
approach to happiness.
Collectively, things could work out for us. That's a better
approach. Think how much happiness is multiplied in the
face of selfless kindness. Even in our flawed social systems,
people rise to the challenges and manage to pay it forward.
I want to help move us all forward with my story. I'm just seeing
that our ideas about God, money, family, civic responsibility,
and personal happiness are all standing in the way of that movement.
So understanding God and the human condition is my chosen work.
Keep reading my blog to see if my system of thought works for me.
Take what works for you.
And, if I'm ever in a position to start the revolution, think about
following fearlessly. A worldwide, collectively approached searching
and fearless moral inventory of humanity as it is could be the thing
that saves kids like me from being tragically abused in the first place.
May it be so.
© Ernest Samuel Christie III 2013
Friday, December 6, 2013
Shame-fueled Reinactment
A few years ago, my son was doing some introspection and came to me, worried about what kind of evil might be lurking within, afraid of who he might become. In an inspired parenting moment, without hesitation, I said, "Oh, Son, there's nothing inside of you that you need to fear." That declaration has come back to me over and over since then. I think my pre-emptive acceptance has been pivotal for his happiness and self-love. I know the concept has changed my whole life.
If what I was saying was true, if there really was nothing inside of me to fear, then I should be able to look within. My son had been facing shame and found courage in my words. I had uttered the words, and had to test it. If there was something too dark and shameful to be acceptable, then I needed to find out. By my own mouth, I had chosen a course, accept myself or give up on myself, once and for all.
Life is complicated as it is. My story is not easy to tell. At 16, I thought of little else besides survival. When my dad killed Sandy, I remember feeling like my life was over, like, even if I survived, I would never really be an acceptable member of the human race. How could anyone helplessly watch while a helpless woman is murdered? I heard the black and white thinking and harsh judgments of the people in this world. We humans are quick to judge and can quite easily dismiss others as evil. I assumed I would be dismissed or dispatched by the whole world if these secrets were ever exposed. Life went on. I "put it behind me." That toxic shame slowly faded into the background, or so I thought.
At 30, I moved across the country and began to have nightmares which forced me to think about Sandy for the first time in years. Maybe the distance away from my dad allowed me to start opening up to myself. Not surprisingly, this didn't happen with happy self-awareness and joyful discoveries of my survival strength. She would be sitting in the living room, staring at me, and then gone as soon as I took a second look. I would go to work and get on with my day like nothing had ever happened. Unable to consciously face these memories, I started acting out my feelings in self-destructive ways, picking up hookers and having emotional and sexual affairs with women I knew from church. If not for that whole mess, I might never have sought this kind of self-awareness. Because of my denial, the flashbacks were always a complete surprise. It's no wonder I can barely write about her today.
After Dad died in 2006, my world began to unravel. Suddenly, I was alone with my thoughts and feelings. The shame reared its ugly head. For a couple of years I went to therapy and wavered between trying to figure out how to interact with people (a seemingly brand new task) and hiding in my closet, plotting my own end. I cried, I shook, I sat with my anger, pain, and shame.
By 2009, I was well past that dark place and beginning to have hope for the future. I had spoken to several therapists and a couple of attorneys about Sandy's death and my long held secrecy. Everyone said to forget it and move on. My own war on shame finally drove me to go forward, despite any potential consequences. I'm thankful I was not tried as an accessory to murder, but I had no assurances going in. Ultimately, going forward did for me what I had expected. Breaking my silence allowed me to see myself as a member of the human race. The secret no longer held sway over my sense of self.
I'm still battling my own demons. The consensus among my mental health professionals seems to be that, given my history, I ought to be in a padded cell, wearing a strait jacket, heavily medicated, and that 24/7.
Eh, I guess there's something to that, but life is complicated. My life included some horrific stuff, but there was more to it than that. How did I survive? I just kept moving forward, day by day, yes, but how?
I'm glad I've come forward. I try to understand the questions I've received about my years of silence. At first, I was angry and defensive. Today, I can talk about any of it, I think. My childhood almost destroyed me, but, as an adult, facing myself in the mirror and doing the hard emotional work of healing have taught me that I'm stronger than I thought.
Today, I have come to accept myself more than ever before. From not being able to identify myself to seeing and feeling good about who I am, telling my story to the world has set me free. I may still be in what feels like mental prison, a haunted, surreal prison, but we the inmates of Sam's head have more light, better communication skills, and even a developing sense of purpose for a better life and world. Prisoners need hope. Shame keeps us stuck in hopelessness. If I could pass on one message in life, this would be it: There's nothing inside of us that we need to fear.
Opening up has been hard, really hard. If I could just take a few years of beatings instead, that would be easier, but the failure-tested confidence that I'm a perfectly good me has been worth the price. I've done more than find out if people would understand and accept me. I've discovered how much we're all alike, to a degree that I never imagined. I belong, here, with all of you. If everyone knew everything about you, what's happened, what you've done, and what's been done to you, wouldn't we all understand and view you with compassion and love? Of course, we can't easily understand everything, but I'll give you the benefit of the doubt. Please give it to me, and please give it to yourself. Thanks for keeping me writing.
If what I was saying was true, if there really was nothing inside of me to fear, then I should be able to look within. My son had been facing shame and found courage in my words. I had uttered the words, and had to test it. If there was something too dark and shameful to be acceptable, then I needed to find out. By my own mouth, I had chosen a course, accept myself or give up on myself, once and for all.
Life is complicated as it is. My story is not easy to tell. At 16, I thought of little else besides survival. When my dad killed Sandy, I remember feeling like my life was over, like, even if I survived, I would never really be an acceptable member of the human race. How could anyone helplessly watch while a helpless woman is murdered? I heard the black and white thinking and harsh judgments of the people in this world. We humans are quick to judge and can quite easily dismiss others as evil. I assumed I would be dismissed or dispatched by the whole world if these secrets were ever exposed. Life went on. I "put it behind me." That toxic shame slowly faded into the background, or so I thought.
At 30, I moved across the country and began to have nightmares which forced me to think about Sandy for the first time in years. Maybe the distance away from my dad allowed me to start opening up to myself. Not surprisingly, this didn't happen with happy self-awareness and joyful discoveries of my survival strength. She would be sitting in the living room, staring at me, and then gone as soon as I took a second look. I would go to work and get on with my day like nothing had ever happened. Unable to consciously face these memories, I started acting out my feelings in self-destructive ways, picking up hookers and having emotional and sexual affairs with women I knew from church. If not for that whole mess, I might never have sought this kind of self-awareness. Because of my denial, the flashbacks were always a complete surprise. It's no wonder I can barely write about her today.
After Dad died in 2006, my world began to unravel. Suddenly, I was alone with my thoughts and feelings. The shame reared its ugly head. For a couple of years I went to therapy and wavered between trying to figure out how to interact with people (a seemingly brand new task) and hiding in my closet, plotting my own end. I cried, I shook, I sat with my anger, pain, and shame.
By 2009, I was well past that dark place and beginning to have hope for the future. I had spoken to several therapists and a couple of attorneys about Sandy's death and my long held secrecy. Everyone said to forget it and move on. My own war on shame finally drove me to go forward, despite any potential consequences. I'm thankful I was not tried as an accessory to murder, but I had no assurances going in. Ultimately, going forward did for me what I had expected. Breaking my silence allowed me to see myself as a member of the human race. The secret no longer held sway over my sense of self.
I'm still battling my own demons. The consensus among my mental health professionals seems to be that, given my history, I ought to be in a padded cell, wearing a strait jacket, heavily medicated, and that 24/7.
Eh, I guess there's something to that, but life is complicated. My life included some horrific stuff, but there was more to it than that. How did I survive? I just kept moving forward, day by day, yes, but how?
I'm glad I've come forward. I try to understand the questions I've received about my years of silence. At first, I was angry and defensive. Today, I can talk about any of it, I think. My childhood almost destroyed me, but, as an adult, facing myself in the mirror and doing the hard emotional work of healing have taught me that I'm stronger than I thought.
Today, I have come to accept myself more than ever before. From not being able to identify myself to seeing and feeling good about who I am, telling my story to the world has set me free. I may still be in what feels like mental prison, a haunted, surreal prison, but we the inmates of Sam's head have more light, better communication skills, and even a developing sense of purpose for a better life and world. Prisoners need hope. Shame keeps us stuck in hopelessness. If I could pass on one message in life, this would be it: There's nothing inside of us that we need to fear.
Opening up has been hard, really hard. If I could just take a few years of beatings instead, that would be easier, but the failure-tested confidence that I'm a perfectly good me has been worth the price. I've done more than find out if people would understand and accept me. I've discovered how much we're all alike, to a degree that I never imagined. I belong, here, with all of you. If everyone knew everything about you, what's happened, what you've done, and what's been done to you, wouldn't we all understand and view you with compassion and love? Of course, we can't easily understand everything, but I'll give you the benefit of the doubt. Please give it to me, and please give it to yourself. Thanks for keeping me writing.
Tuesday, December 3, 2013
Breaking the Cycle?
My dad killed his girlfriend in front of me when I was 16. Nineteen years later, shortly after his death, it started dawning on me that he probably killed my mom too.
Boyfriends kill their girlfriends. Husbands kill their wives. It happens every day. I would insert some statistics in here, but I got stuck on this one:
I spanked my children when they were younger. I had broken the cycle of abuse with baseball bats, rope, hammers to the skull, and death threats. It's taken me years to learn what cycles I was riding, much less how to break them. Obviously, I wasn't going to kill anyone in front of them, but I was eight years into parenting before I decided it could be done without physical punishment, 15 years in before I started seriously letting go of the idea that I knew what was best for them. Parents have a hard time letting go in general. In previous generations, beating a child was the best way to keep them from foolishly straying from the Lord. Was it not that way in your family? Oh, ok, maybe it's just me.
I realized years ago, that my children will love me, no matter what. They will want my love. They want it so badly that they find ways to be loving to me, to make me feel special and seen. Now, it's widely accepted that children are out for themselves, but, even if they are loving toward me because of love they want returned I am free to love them in return. In this world, there are people who will love me. I don't have to chase them. I'm free to trust them and just focus on being loving. Don't praise me too quickly. This is just my mindset. It's an improvement. I still fail miserably as a dad.
The only reason I'm doing this, digging into the darkness of my past, is for love. Love is hard. To love at a distinguishable level requires giving more than we get. So, to love is to feel less loved in return. If you're in it for yourself, you can't love. I think we all want to be loved, and we know it when we feel it. We all know the desire to be loved, but we also all know what it feels like when someone is kind and loving toward us. To me, it feels suspect, but I'm trying to adjust.
If watching a child watching his father beat his mother is the strongest risk factor for transmitting violent behavior from one generation to the next, what is the strongest factor for transmitting love and kindness? Do we even know? Ironically, my intention with this blog post was to focus on love and a positive approach to life. It's hard for me to do that, especially in a blog devoted to the abuse I suffered as a child.
Oh, now I remember what prompted all this. People want me to tell my stories. I suppose I want to tell them too, but I don't want to simply dump my dirty laundry on the world for entertainment purposes. I want to pull some meaning out of my experience. I want to have something meaningful to offer. It's not enough for me that I don't beat my children and kill women. That I don't is certainly a breaking of the cycle, but it's not enough for me. Love that doesn't go beyond what's fair is not the kind of love I was raised to appreciate. Jesus preached love for enemies, a transformative love. My dad certainly pulled the moral landscape down a few notches with his behavior. I was there watching it, and I feel some obligation to make up for my inaction. I feel an obligation to advance love. I don't know exactly how to do it, but I'm here, trying to figure it out. Thanks for reading.
Boyfriends kill their girlfriends. Husbands kill their wives. It happens every day. I would insert some statistics in here, but I got stuck on this one:
A child's exposure to the father abusing the mother is the strongest risk factor for transmitting violent behavior from one generation to the next. -American Psychological Association, Report of the American Psychological Association Presidential Task Force on Violence and the Family, 1996
I realized years ago, that my children will love me, no matter what. They will want my love. They want it so badly that they find ways to be loving to me, to make me feel special and seen. Now, it's widely accepted that children are out for themselves, but, even if they are loving toward me because of love they want returned I am free to love them in return. In this world, there are people who will love me. I don't have to chase them. I'm free to trust them and just focus on being loving. Don't praise me too quickly. This is just my mindset. It's an improvement. I still fail miserably as a dad.
The only reason I'm doing this, digging into the darkness of my past, is for love. Love is hard. To love at a distinguishable level requires giving more than we get. So, to love is to feel less loved in return. If you're in it for yourself, you can't love. I think we all want to be loved, and we know it when we feel it. We all know the desire to be loved, but we also all know what it feels like when someone is kind and loving toward us. To me, it feels suspect, but I'm trying to adjust.
If watching a child watching his father beat his mother is the strongest risk factor for transmitting violent behavior from one generation to the next, what is the strongest factor for transmitting love and kindness? Do we even know? Ironically, my intention with this blog post was to focus on love and a positive approach to life. It's hard for me to do that, especially in a blog devoted to the abuse I suffered as a child.
Oh, now I remember what prompted all this. People want me to tell my stories. I suppose I want to tell them too, but I don't want to simply dump my dirty laundry on the world for entertainment purposes. I want to pull some meaning out of my experience. I want to have something meaningful to offer. It's not enough for me that I don't beat my children and kill women. That I don't is certainly a breaking of the cycle, but it's not enough for me. Love that doesn't go beyond what's fair is not the kind of love I was raised to appreciate. Jesus preached love for enemies, a transformative love. My dad certainly pulled the moral landscape down a few notches with his behavior. I was there watching it, and I feel some obligation to make up for my inaction. I feel an obligation to advance love. I don't know exactly how to do it, but I'm here, trying to figure it out. Thanks for reading.
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