Two women...

from a walk February 4, 2007.

Struck me when I had gone to bed yesterday, had to turn the light on again and write:

Even grown ups can need support and encouragement (together with compassion and empathy. The least they need is being met with contempt or of being scorned!!?? Outspoken or not??) to leave an abusive relation, to speak up, to articulate what they have been exposed to, for being able to protect themselves properly, constructively and adequately, and maybe for protecting other weaker (if they have children).

How many don't protect the abuser/perpetrator (of shame that they "allowed" the bad treatment, that they made such a mistake, took so wrong, accusing themselves for what they are and have been exposed to, that they were such fools, admitting to how wrong they took and maybe being blamed and even laughed at "We told you!!" as so many times earlier maybe, and maybe also believing they deserved it. And the sad thing is that they are probably feeling more shame the worse they are or have been treated)??

The abused has to be explicitly asked (especially if she/he has problems of leaving), by a person that makes her/him feel confident enough?? Kirkengen also writes...

And how many doesn't have to be asked about their thoughts, you have to draw them out of them (why is this)? And then, when they later start to express them, how can they then be met? (“damn if you don’t, and damn if you do”, which is a master suppression technique). Quite ironically.

But a person's inability of leaving doesn’t excuse the abuse with that the abuser wasn't hindered from committing it (whether he/she is abusing verbally, emotionally, physically or sexually)!!!! But how often isn't this done? (as was written about in Swedish in this posting and in English in this posting about "Evilness and responsibility..."). The abuser is still responsible for his/her abuse. And also responsible whatever his/her history is or how conscious or little conscious this history is???

The Norwegian physician Anna Luise Kirkengen writes about this. As General Practitioner she met two women who got breast-cancer. When Kirkengen at last got their confidence they told her about abuse by their husbands. Both these women died in their cancer, but Kirkengen thought that if she had been aware of such connections, and seen and understood the signs those women showed, they would still have been alive.

People are often very loyal and don’t want to reveal things… And shame holds them from it too (see Jenson on shame). And from the child's point of view; the abusing parent isn't granted discharge because the other parent (non protecting) was incapable of protecting it!!? The abusing parent is still responsible for his/her abuse and deeds!

And that people have read Alice Miller doesn't have to mean a thing!!

Kirkengen writes in her book “How Abused Children Becomes Unhealthy Adults”;

"I have been a General Practitioner in western Oslo for 30 years. Most of my patients have been women, of all ages and stages of life. I remember well my shame when I realized how little I actually knew about my patients' lives. I had been examining and trying to treat two of my female patients for extensive loss of function for quite some time, though without success. I then discovered, and at about the same time, that they were both being beaten regularly by their husbands. Both men customarily ‘legitimatized’ their violent acts. One blamed his drunkenness, the responsibility for which he assigned to my patient as she had provoked him by nagging, and for that provocation she would have to accept her punishment. The other man cited the Bible giving him the right to chastise a sinful and disobedient wife, which he claimed she was. For him, it was always useful to drink a little hard liquor before the punishment began, but that too was her fault: he, a believing Pentecostal Christian and a highly regarded leader of the congregation, had to drink from time to time because she was promiscuous and ‘cozied up’ to other men at the Church meetings. Both women later developed breast cancer, and both told me after their operations that their men had stopped beating them. One of them experienced severe complications during follow-up treatment. The other struggled with unyielding pain in the area where she had been operated on. Both died of their cancers within two years of their operations. Both left behind teenage children.

It is possible that these women might still have been alive had I understood sooner just what of a strain they were under. However indirectly, their bodies had in fact sent me signals of their powerlessness. Both had an abundance of those symptoms which medicine tends to define as ‘diffuse and indeterminate.’ [and these women were so forbidden to speak up, and took this pattern with them in their marriages?] What appeared that way medically would have been quite palpable socially. But they each had a public standing to uphold and a family’s reputation to protect. They were ashamed of being married to such men and tried as hard as they could to act as if all were well – even as their ebbing energies betrayed them. This took the form of an illness with no medical findings, and pain without organic malfunction. They were constantly on the alert to prevent an outburst and, failing that, to keep the children from noticing and the neighbors from hearing. Still, they knew well that the neighbors knew. But ‘everyone’ entered into a tacit social agreement to maintain silence about the paternal violence going on behind closed doors within the protected zone called private life. I contend that this protection cost these women their lives.

I had to admit that I had been a blind and deaf physician to these two women. During the same period, I gradually understood that even nonviolent violation can kill, albeit indirectly. One of my young, healthy and happily pregnant, well-educated and self-aware patients was expecting a second child with her equally well-educated and healthy husband of her dreams. From the 24^th week on, she became increasingly ill and the outpatient maternity clinic and I were at our wits’ end. The baby needed to be rescued in the 32^nd week by means of Caesarean section. Once the woman came out of the anesthesia, she fell into a deep depression and the staff at the women’s clinic mobilized all their resources. An experienced family therapist was called in to meet with the couple and, it emerged slowly that the woman’s husband had had sexual relations with six different partners during her pregnancy. She had known nothing of this but had felt a deep sense of anxiety that she could not attach to anything concrete. His escapades, which he covered up with politeness and seemingly generous care, had nearly cost their child his life.

In the meantime, several others of my female patients, whose extensive medical problems necessitated their going on disability, revealed to me another destructive font of suffering – sexual abuse during childhood [but that they were abused in childhood doesn't excuse abuse later in grown up life!!]. This led me to conduct a half-year pilot study in my practice in which I followed-up gynecological examinations with a questionnaire about sexual violation experiences. Eighty-five of the 115 women who met the study’s criteria allowed me to interview them. Twenty-four of these had been sexually violated at least once in their lives. I had known all of these women prior to this study, most of them for years, yet I knew about the violation experience of only one of them. My further research into how childhood sexual violation can lead to adult health problems sprang from there.

I have spoken with many adults who lived out their childhood in what I would call ‘unboundaried’ families. By that I mean families in which the adults did not respect closed doors, personal letters, diaries or closed drawers, in which the children’s body parts were not off-limits to other people’s hands, in which all confidences were made public, homes where children were shamed and ridiculed in front of others, where corporal punishment was meted out, arbitrarily [godtyckligt], and where the adults lied and refused to take responsibility. In short, these were homes in which the child was not shown respect, and where the child’s personal integrity was scorned. [Does this excuse later abuse? Or contempt for weakness? Because these later adults are incapable of properly protecting themselves in abusive relations/marriages? Kirkengen writes that the environment didn’t help those women either, to (constructively) deal with what they experienced or to leave. A help they obviously would have needed? Because they were so harmed earlier, probably in many ways? Emotionally, physically and probably much more often than we believe sexually. But of course from the children’s point of view this is no excuse; that a parent isn't/wasn’t capable of protecting better or maybe at all etc. But because they weren’t able of protecting themselves and maybe on top very insecure, this gives noone the right to abuse them more and further – or to scorn them for their lack of security or inabilities. The one doing this isn’t much better than the husbands above!!?? Excusing their abuse with that it was the women’s (own) fault that they were abused, both physically and emotionally - and maybe also sexually. And they have no responsibility for that their children had to witness things either? Or for their abuse of their children because their mothers were incapable of protecting them from abusing their children??].”

And Kirkengen also writes about so called “helpers” abusing once again (in the name of help and for the other person’s best). I think of the father publicly offending? His public "constructive criticism"?? Because "they needed it, it was for their own best," and he was in his rights?? And the abuse goes on and on??

But from the child's point of view: how many children haven't had to understand their mothers' helplessness?? But both parents in such a family are responsible, but in different manners. For abuse, abandonment etc. Freyd has written about these things... In her book "Betrayal Trauma...", about betrayal of trust??

I reacted so strongly on a brother expressing his contempt for his sisters, incapable of leaving abusive relationships... And not only that?? But a general contempt for weakness (including for the weak sex and insecurity etc.), despite supposedly being enlightened? And didn't he show a general disrespect for human beings? And their struggles? Despite a so called enlightenment!?

Wasn't I clear enough? Am I too well-mannered to speak out more clearly? (yes, of course it is my fault?? For not being clear enough? Not expressing myself more clearly?? It has nothing with the other part to do? Not understanding, sensing, hearing?).

And I have wondered and thought earlier about a wall of words too... And that is of course also forbidden?? (but how harmful for others??)

Earlier postings with the label shame. Jenson on shame (in Swedish).

My fantastic English... Excuse for it, and excuse again...

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Jean Jenson skriver om skam sidan 150-151 i sin bok ”Att återerövra sitt liv”:

”… är skam en känsla som orsakas av att vi behandlas som om vi är dåliga, elaka eller onda när vi är barn. Jag tror att skambegreppet är en följd av att föräldrar fått lära sig att tro att människor har en medfödd tendens att vara onda (vilket inte innebär att det inte finns onda vuxna). Om förmågan att känna en normal känsla av att man begått något fel eller gjort något ont har blivit skadad kommer det destruktiva beteendet att hålla i sig. Det är vanligt att barn som har blivit svårt kränkta eller överdrivet bortskämda växer upp till vuxna med skadad förmåga att känna empati eller ha medlidande med någon annan än sig själva. Eftersom dessa människor inte kan känna skuld har de inget som driver dem att bättra sig, och de kommer troligen att fortsätta begå onda handlingar. Människor är dock inte onda av naturen.

När föräldrar reagerar på sina barns mänskliga tillkortakommanden som om de inte bara är uttryck för misstag eller ofullkomlighet utan handlingar som beror på deras inneboende ’ondska’ (en föreställning som får stöd av den religion som de flesta i vårt samhälle bekänner sig till), behandlar de sina barn på sätt som ger upphov till en känsla av ’skam’ (ondska). På grund av att dessa övertygelser är så allmänt spridda och att våra egna föräldrars reaktioner på oss som barn grundade sig på samma övertygelser, accepterar vi med barnslig tillit utan vidare att vi har en ondskefull natur som måste kontrolleras och att vi, när vi inte lyckas göra det, borde ’skämmas’. Min egen upplevelse av denna känsla var att jag var helt igenom ond, bortom all möjlighet till försoning – att jag var någon som ingen kunde älska. Det är min övertygelse att känslan av skam skapas av att man blir illa behandlad under barndomen, medan skuld är en normal känsla som kan upplevas under alla faser av livet.”

Bosch skriver också om skam under konceptet ursprungligt försvar sidorna 66-67 i sin bok (min översättning och se detta blogginlägg):

”…babyer och unga/små barn är hjälplösa och beroende av andra (vårdnadsgivaren) för att fylla alla sina behov (mat, tak över huvudet, kärlek, vårdande, trygghet osv.). När dessa behov inte blir fyllda utifrån av andra, skyddar barnet sig mot den livshotande sanningen genom att tänka att hon borde ha kunnat möta dessa behov inifrån sig själv. Men naturligtvis är barnet fortfarande för litet för att kunna göra detta. Resultatet blir negativa tankar om oss själva. ’

Det är något fel med mig, därför att jag inte kan ta hand om mina egna behov’.

Det ursprungliga försvaret kan bestå av tankar sådana som

’Jag kommer aldrig att klara detta’, ’Jag är dålig’, ’Jag är inget bra’, ’Jag är skyldig’, ’Jag är alltid den som krånglar till saker’, ’Ingen bryr sig om mig’, ’Jag är värdelös’, ’Jag kommer alltid att vara ensam’, ’Jag är en skam’ osv.

Det ursprungliga försvaret karaktäriseras av uppfattningar, tankar och idéer som närmar sig en allvarligt negativ självutvärdering/självvärdering. För vissa av oss fokuserar dessa uppfattningar mer på idén om att vara skyldig och inte god nog, slutligen ledande till förkastande (vanligtvis falskthopporienterade människor). För andra ligger betoningen på att man är en inneboende dålig människa, vilken förr eller senare kommer att bli avslöjad av andra och då bli förkastad (vanligtvis falskmaktorienterade människor). För vissa ligger det ursprungliga försvaret mer på ytan (falskmaktidentifierade), för andra är det skjutet mycket långt bort ifrån personen (falskmaktidentifierad) /../

Det ursprungliga försvaret är ett effektivt försvar därför att när någon tänker att något är fel med oss, så behöver vi inte känna skräcken och smärtan över den gamla livshotande verkligheten [att mamma och pappa faktiskt inte visste vad vi behövde och det de visade faktiskt inte var särskilt kärleksfullt, hur mycket de än påstod det och själva var övertygade om att de älskade sina barn]: att våra överlevnadsbehov inte blev mötta. Att känna att någonting är fel med oss, skyddar oss från att inse att det absolut inte fanns någonting fel med det barn som vi var. Men att det däremot var något fel med den omgivning som vi befann oss i: omgivningen (vanligtvis våra föräldrar) var inte förmögen att förse barnet med vad det behövde.

Medan vi får ett effektivt sätt att undvika att klart se människorna omkring oss för vad de verkligen är, så ger det ursprungliga försvaret också barnet en känsla av kontroll. Om barnet tror att hennes behov inte fylls, därför att något är inneboende fel med henne, så betyder det att hon skulle kunna ändra det predikament hon är i. Hon förtjänar det predikament hon befinner sig i, så därför kan det kanske finnas någonting som hon kan göra för att ändra denna. Här blir kopplingen mellan ursprungligt försvar och falskt hopp väldigt tunn: det ursprungliga försvaret kan lätt röra sig över till falskt hopp. Naturligtvis kommer detta att fallera, men barnet vi var kunde i alla fall leva med denna livräddande illusion. Detta blev möjliggjort genom det ursprungliga försvaret.”

Barnet klandrade sig självt för att det blev dåligt behandlat, kränkt osv. Och detta beteende tar den vuxne med sig och reagerar med självklander och skam när han/hon blir dåligt behandlad som vuxen, blir vittne till kränkningar eller befinner sig i en kränkande miljö. Alternativt förnekar att hon/han blir det eller bevittnar kränkning eller befinner sig i en kränkande miljö. Och att vi känner skam även som vuxna tror Jenson har med tidiga upplevelser att göra, som vi inte fått möjlighet att bearbeta tillräckligt och kanske också är helt omedvetna om.

Tillägg efter cykeltur: barnet och den senare vuxne tror inte hon/han förtjänar bättre och tiger av skam... Blir skamsnare ju sämre hon blir behandlad? Och skamsnare över kränkningar och övergrepp ju sämre hon/han blev behandlad tidigt? Alternativt har ingen kontakt alls med skam eller skuld? Men agerar ut den på andra, företrädesvis på dem som står under honom/henne i något avseende? Intar själv kränkarrollen? Och låter andra känna hur förödmjukad han/hon en gång kände sig om han/hon får chansen (känslor som troligen är bortträngda och förnekade dock?).