The enormous importance of the parenting and care taking style and of not exposing children to stress...

A quick blogposting in the morning, spontaneously thinking loudly.

Read the article ”How Childhood Trauma Can Cause Adult Obesity”.

Reducing the stress, already for the not born baby and by treating it with the greatest respect during its whole childhood (and understanding its "inadequate" reactions), is of enormous importance, not only for the individual and her/his future life and life quality, but also for the society and the world.

With other words we have to treat the children with love, genuine love, and if we can't genuinely love we should be willing to explore why; if it has with us or in fact with the child to do. Maybe what the child is triggering in us.

But if you became stressed and didn't get what you needed early I think you can recover later, with a lot of work though, and recover if your painful experiences aren't/haven't been played down. And by that adults recognize what is actually painful, thus needed to be repressed and/or played down, experiences that are still remaining in the body with all what that means, for the individual and her/his environment wherever this person is in the society.

And this has nothing to do with forgiveness. Even if forgiveness probably can feel good for the moment, because what you are ding when you are forgiving is to deny (more or less) what was done and how painful and even harmful and not right it actually was (meeting evil with evil doesn't solve anything, not even when it comes to a parent meeting a small child's evilness with punishments).

See what Alice Miller has written about this with forgiveness, for instance in "Decepetion Kills Love."

Also see the preface to Alice Miller's book "From Rage to Courage."

And it's crucial how we meet children who have already become traumatized and who are stressed (maybe showing it in hyperactivity) later on. That we are willing to listen to them and not expose them for even more stress and pressure. I'm very critical to the current school politics and they who are responsible for it (and oher politics) in the Swedish government today. See David Korten being shocked that countries like Sweden are on their way of copying his home country USA when it comes to economic politics (causing increasing inequality with everything that follows in the footsteps of this).

And what is hyperactivity about? What is ADHD etc. actually?

The article points out that a child being exposed to another parenting style than her mother's (father's or parents') changes her/his future parenting style. So a child born to a neglectful parent who is raised by a caring caretaker becomes a caring caretaker for her/his children later.

The article also refers to research showing that early stress causes a lot of health troubles of different kinds. Troubles that could become avoided.

I think those (we) could be healed to different degrees if they (we) were allowed to admit to the things we have been exposed and were allowed to call early (and later) experiences in question.

Also read the blogposting (my translation of the heading of the posting from Norwegian to English, but the text in the posting is in English) "Adverse Childhood Experiences and Psychosis."

A different view on ADHD...

When I was writing about the school and health I came to think about hyperactive children. Some children react with hyperactivity (like ADHD) and others with being noisy and in some cases they even react with violence.

See the posting about the Swedish documentary "The Scapegoats" (with a letter to Alice Miller on this documentary) and also here about his documentary on how children behave in school due to being (in this case in first hand) spanked at home. About children directing things at other people than those who originally abuse them.

A quiet thought: and this easily triggers abusive counter reactions from responsible in school, making the bad even worse... So we dealing with kids ought to have a lot of self-knowledge! And being interested in developing it. Many of us ought to be interested in this, not only a few. But I as a single teacher maybe can't create miracles in the whole milieu? In the best cases for single students.

And there are probably also kids being silent and clever, hiding things (maybe even carrying heavy loads, of abuse, maybe subtle, on their shoulders, pretending to themselves everything is fine at home) managing to reach adulthood and enter into it quite successfully, but who later end in smaller or bigger crisis of different kinds, in important relations, with people close; people they live with or are having close relations with, or with troubles at work (as being too clever there as they have always been, maybe managing everything on their own, not asking for help, afraid of being a nuisance), landing in what we call the 40-year crisis. But what are those crisis about in the bottom?

On ADHD see this question on ADHD in a preschool kid about alternative treatments and the replies to it, especially the fourth reply which I thought was great!

Earlier postings on ADHD, see here. And about hyperactive children. There you can for instance read:

"Alice Miller writes about “hyperactive” children in her book ”The Body Never Lies – The Lingering Effects of Cruel Parenting”. She writes at pages 176-177:

“With support of the enlightened witness represented by such a therapist, a hyperactive child (or a child suffering from any other disorder) can be encouraged to feel its perturbation [förvirring eller oordning in Swedish], rather than acting it out, and to articulate its feelings to the parents, rather than fearing them and dissociating from them. In this way the parents can learn from the child that one can have feelings without heeding to fear disastrous consequences, that, on the contrary, something can develop from this which gives support and creates mutual trust.

I know of a mother who was actually able to escape from the destructive attachment to her parents thanks to her own child. After several years of therapy, she was still concerned to see the good sides of her parents even though she had been severely abused in her childhood. She suffered greatly from the hyperactive and aggressive outbursts of her little daughter, who had been under continual medical care since birth. The routine had been the same for years. She took her child to the doctor, gave her the medicine prescribed for her, went to see her therapist regularly, and went on seeking justifications for her own parents. At a conscious level, she never suffered because of her parent’s treatment of her, only because of her daughter.

One day, however, she finally flew into a rage in the company of a new therapist and was finally able to admit to the extreme anger at her parents that had been pent up inside her for thirty years. And then the miraculous thing happened (although it was anything but a miracle): in the space of a few days, her daughter played started to play normally, lost all her symptoms, asked questions, and was given straightforward answers. It was as if the mother had emerged from a dense fog and was seeing her daughter properly for the first time. A child who is not being used as the object of projections can play quietly without having to run around like a mad all the time. She no longer has the hopeless task of saving her mother, or at least of confronting her with the truth by means of her own ‘disorder’.

Early unmet needs…

Before I take a bike ride: trying to fill our early, unmet needs will always cause problems, bigger and smaller.

And this is true for therapists too! They should want to work on these things? They should have done during their training, and not only on an intellectual level. Should have got proper help doing this. So they don’t play these out unconsciously.

Miller writes about therapists who have come to terms with conscious manipulation, however (but how many don’t use conscious manipulation and are aware of it and admitting to it maybe only to themselves, yet reluctantly?). Yes, she is writing quite a lot about this (ucoscious manipulation) in the revised version of "The Drama..." or "Det självutplånande barnet..."

Who cause most harm? The ones entirely denying they are playing their early things out (or are denying there are any early things to be played out), or the ones yet reluctantly are admitting that they maybe are playing their unmet needs out, if not consciously so unconsciously? And would want to deal with this. Who hasn't got proper help though... But have to struggle on their own. And make mistakes during this journey, harming both others and themselves, more or less severely. Maybe not noticing it until afterwards?

I think I want to explore this once again, and even more.

I wonder if there are any Lilies of the Valley yet? It has been so many warm days, so maybe?

Addition: I need to remind myself, and I think these things can't become repeated too much. Miller writes that abused grown ups can use protection laws if they are abused, so long as they aren’t paralysed by suppressed pain and thus prevented from protecting themselves.

We are born with the right to be feeling and conscious human beings and to develop as such. To survive, but only at the prize of a complete consciousness, wasn’t the natural goal for our lives – it was a necessity, a consequence of our tragic destiny. To find our way out of this drama we need to be aware of this.

Therapists’ manipulations can only continue so long as the child’s fear is left inside the patient and prevents him/her from seeing his/her actual chances today.

You can’t fight the hatred with arguments, one has to realise their origins and use tools/instruments which make it possible to dissolve the hatred.

When one at last has felt/experienced the hatred and understood that it was justified, then it gets dissolved.

Jenson thinks that one of the serious consequences of the necessary and constant, perpetual suppression is the distortion of the conscious which is the result and which we are forced to. With other words, an innate human ability is damaged – namely to process experiences.

When we start to becoming aware of and realising how some traditional ways of handling children as a matter of fact is violating them, it’s important to start changing these behaviours, based on this insight – but first and foremost we need to become aware of what we ourselves experienced as abuse in our family of origin, to avoid passing this further (but it s no excuse for what we do or say, only an explanation). The more we process these things and liberate us from pain and losses; we automatically take care of and understand our kids.

The more we liberate us from the suppressions which are protecting us from the pain from our own childhoods, the easier it becomes for us avoiding behaving in ways that harm our children (and other people, especially those in our power) without knowing it.

Jenson writes at page 50 in her book the Swedish edition) that children who have grown up in a false hope can believe that it is justified that they are treated badly, that they deserve it because they aren’t good enough. These children, most often girls, will grow up to adults with a low self esteem who can’t pose boundaries or even realize that they are badly treated, but continue to struggle becoming “better.” Trials in changing through learning how to pose boundaries or through participating in self confidence training won’t lead to any noticeable results until one succeed to remove the original obstacle, impediment for what shouldn’t become conscious and felt during childhood, so one shouldn’t perceive or discover and experience the original pain.

Other children, usually boys, make themselves insensitive to all feelings on the whole so they believe they can’t get hurt by anything their parents do, by denying they have any needs or by believing they have a power they don't have (or don't need later as grown ups). They grow up to adults with emotionally weak reactions, who can’t be really near people whom are important for them Getting in contact with their “manliness” through playing drums (furiously) or even through allowing themselves roaring of anger and crying in despair can be a starting point – but if they aren’t confronted (in some way) with the original experiences which demanded that they became emotionally dead no real healing will take place.

Jenson also thinks that we can’t get to the root with problems through aiming at changing fruitless adult behaviours. She thinks that this root lies hidden or concealed under the unconscious impediment which stands between us and the consciousness about old experiences of violations and abuse from childhood.

Perfectionism…

Georgio Grossi.

[Updated during the day]. In the Swedish magazine ”MåBra” (”FeelWell” there was an article with the title ”The more roles you play – the higher the demands.”

There it stood that wanting to be clever isn’t wrong. But always being the cleverest can break the best.

Stop comparing yourself with others so you get spared from unnecessary demands! It stood in the article.

You shall be an engaged parent, creative colleague and lover, in good physical shape and with the makeup on the right place. We shall develop and become better, smarter and quicker on everything we do. Suddenly the whole existence has become a race and the cleverest wins! But the question is if the most clever is the most happy? Or if the cleverest is the most exhausted?

“If you try to fill all those roles you never get a relaxed moment”

the psychologist and stress researcher at the Karolinska Institute in Stockholm Giorgio Grossi says, working at a stress clinic sorting under the University?

With all the tasks we have taken on ourselves; as "women in the career," lover, friend etc. a carousel of demands follows of a sort we have never seen before.

At last we have to have everything in check, from fond wall papers and share market to the man’s erogenous zones it stood in the article.

“Wanting to be clever isn’t wrong, but it can become a problem when one feels forced to be perfect in all areas of life!”

Grossi says.

He means that we are competing in being clever of two reasons. One is the fear “being wrong” and getting critics for that. The other is the kick one gets of achieving!! It’s enough hearing

“Oh God, how have you succeeded with all this??”

for us to continue our chase of confirmation kicks. The praise is worth the stress, in short term.

But in long term the trap of high demands are a risk of stifling us because we never get the opportunity for relaxation - and recovery.

Fifty ears ago we had much less to compare ourselves with. You compared yourself with your neighbour. But today we compare ourselves with many more people. There is always anyone smarter, kinder, and faster. And on we chase to become better and we don’t stop until we get a mental break down.

What are we striving and chasing for?

To be good enough?

Getting love? For this you have to be perfect?? And nothing less? The most perfect of the perfect?

And we are told:

“But stop that!!”

Easy like that.

“It’s nothing wrong with being clever!”

And the next moment

“You don’t have to be so clever!!!”

How do we actually come to terms with these things? Many of these hard working women (and men) aren't "stupid" people (and what is "stupid" and "not stupid" The most intelligent can be the most stupid - emotionally? Entirely insensitive?)?? Just by telling us what to do and what to stop with? Quite ironically: I don’t think so! I think many of us should need to understand this on a deeper level, and get loved despite we are like this.

Not be rejected because we don’t have those things better in check – and are so weak??

But by whom are we rejected? Are they worth our time and energy - at all? Do they help us with their attitude? And what is THEIR attitude actually about? Is it actually about contempt for weakness, looking down on people struggling and striving enormously?

And one of Ås' Master Suppression techniques wasn’t it “Damned If You Do And Damned If You Don’t”, double bind or double punishment?

It stands about it that:

“It is strange that the double bind is such an effective master suppression technique. It is manifestly illogical and unjust! But centuries of making women and female culture invisible and ridiculing either or both, do make even the strictest logician go soft. Meantime, women exposed to this master suppression technique, become stressed out when they try without much success to avoid attracting criticism from either side.

The double bind is extremely unpleasant for the constant guilty conscience and feelings of inadequacy it often brings. To avoid such unpleasantness, a woman can abstain from getting politically involved or from having children. She can accept an inferior position at work, and she can try her utmost to adapt to and balance the conflicting demands made on her.

It is important to learn to recognize this fourth master-suppression technique. Women, like men, are needed everywhere: at work, in politics, and with their children. And women must have the right and opportunity to combine different types of involvement without physical and mental burnout.”

PS. And (young) men are adopting the bad female sides concerning occupation with the outer approach I can think (That one reacts at this does it have to mean one is moralising though? Are we allowed to react and wonder and question?).

Of some reason I googled on Britt Ekland and read she has problems with osteoporosis!! She has been overly careful with her weight?

More young women are not feeling well today. The pressure is bigger than ever? Earlier there were no burn-outs or psychological break downs (more hidden earlier?). Are young people weaker today? Spoiled because they have been too protected and not hardened enough. As a Swedish psychiatrist (!!!!) David Eberhard thinks. He wrote a book three years ago called "I trygghetnarkomanernas land" or "In the land of the safety addicted"!! He means that we in Sweden have exaggerated needs on safety, that we have been too protected by the state!!! See an upset blogposting about this here titled "The cynic psychiatry boss".

And yesterday a female colleague whispered quite angrily and ironically that they had said on a one-day course in friskvård (how to care about health) according to two other female colleagues attending this course that the ones lacking ability to say no are (more and more?) labeled with suffering from personality disorder (personlighetsstörning). How convenient!!! Is this an expression of power abuse. And are so called "experts" walking in the leading strings of the power more than ever again??

Are demands and permissions similar for all people on a work-place, in society? Or in the family? We had a studying day (a day where the teachers are educated or just talk a lot!!) yesterday at work, and when I sat there I started to wonder over these things. A bit startled, or how I shall express it.

I thought there for myself: think if one should measure the time men and women are talking and compare this with the subjective experience of how much they talk, what would this show?

You aren't allowed to be long-winded, neither in speech nor in written text!!

When and were and how are you allowed to speak up? And who are actually listened to?

What about giving voice?

Addition after a shower: It's the one suffering who is at fault?? Genes? And/or he/she shouldn't be so sensitive!! But in another occasion she/he can be accused for being totally insensitive!!! You shall be but not be!! In the latest news here today it stands about War veterans (from Afghanistan and Iraq) in US suffering from PTSD commit suicide to a high (an even higher) degree (than before)! Googled on this and found this in English.

But some people claim that soldiers from the WWI didn't suffer from PSTD! So there must be some weakness in soldiers later!!!! Or? How was it actually with the older soldiers? Is it Judith Lewis Herman who writes about this in her book "Trauma and Recovery?"

Communication...

picture taken from here.

Here some great things I found I would want to save, and keep here. The thread was about pressures people like Alice Miller (and all other struggling for these issues) have/had to resist on all sides, but it felt as this is applicable in other circumstances.

And see earlier postings on "giving and taking voice." And as van Dyke wrote:

"Use what talent you possess - the woods would be very silent if no birds sang except those that sang best"

(Henry van Dyke)

And I also found this in Quotations when I scrolled my blog to listen to a video:

"But with adult freedom and responsibility come the potential to break silence, to use voice and language to promote internal integration, deeper external connection, and a social transformation, Through communication – integration within ourselves and connection between individuals – we can become whole; embodied, aware, vital, powerful”

(Jennifer Freyd in the chapter “Removing Blinders, Becoming Connected” in her book “Betrayal Trauma…”)

John Stuart Mill writes in his essay on "The Subjugation of women" (1869) or “Underkuvandet av kvinnor” according to this site (also see his book "The Subjection of Women", are these two actually the same book, but with slightly different titles?):

“But was there ever any domination which did not appear natural to those who possessed it? ... the generality of the male sex cannot yet tolerate the idea of living with an equal... In the present day, power holds a smoother language, and whomsoever it oppresses, always pretends to do so for their own good...”

Translated it would be something like:

“Men fanns det någonsin någon tyranni som inte tycktes vara naturlig för den/dem som ägde (besatt) den?...

…allmängiltigheten hos det manliga könet kan dock inte tolerera idén att leva med en jämlik… Som det är idag så håller makten ett mildare språk, och vem den än förtrycker, låtsas han/hon alltid att han/hon gör det för deras eget bästa…”

From where do these needs come? Other quotations from Mill's book "The Subjection of women" see here.

The person writes that she (he) would like to see her (Alice Miller's) 'failures' given the same level of compassionate understanding that she asks for children. And she (he) does this so well; how to communicate, or how we could try to communicate… She puts things in words so well. I couldn’t find better words I think... It could have been written by me...

“Someone is always first to walk a new path; everyone who follows finds rough places left untrodden. What's more important is that she took the first steps - it is up to the rest of us to smooth the way and widen the path, without criticizing her for not finishing the whole job in one go [but we are allowed to question things, and shall question things too? But how do we do this? How can we do this to reach out with our message? And, of course, is it always possible to reach out with our messages?]."

“…we humans are just barely beginning to evolve beyond the raw violence of the jungle. We have a LONG way to go; let's not waste our energy attacking other wounded souls who, like us, are doing the best they can with damaged goods.

We're a bunch of wounded, limping, bleeding folks struggling along as best we can; let's help each other! [and not least to people trying to understand and working hard on trying to understand, who aren't mean and don't want to harm other people, and who aren't mean. And maybe also is dong this mostly on her own, in a sort of monologue. Of course she can be "misled" from time to time? Or? Even less if what she says or writes isn't really met]. To me, criticism has no place in this. And how else do we learn, you might ask? Well, there's a zen saying that goes ‘Do not teach unless asked’ (something like that). In other words, a person is not going to learn something until they're ready. So it's a waste of time to criticize.”

Yes, I think that is true, but we are allowed to question things…

”Instead, we're each responsible to try to get the healing we need, and as we heal, we become available as 'enlightened witnesses' for others who are still suffering. We are there, ready to offer a hand if and when a person asks for help.”

She (he) thinks that we use different ways in our processes of making sense of our own life experiences? We walk different paths, use different strategies, more or less? Can't we do this? Walking there in parallel? And can't this be to complement each other? Respecting each other in our struggles? So long as we don't hurt other people (or ourselves)? But this is probably not easy. Hmmm, this easily sounds so pretentious?

Continues here. Well worth reading!

From a quick walk from town...

photos taken with my mobile phone camera just before lunch during a 25 minutes quick walk from town (need to get my bike fixed, so I cycled to town and had to walk home).

[Updated April 16, see the end] A blogger writes that critical examination of science, research, scientific reports and material is the core in science and exactly what makes science more reliable, in long term, than only (pure) thinking (she had seen a TV-program on a case about research on ADHD - Christopher Gillberg in Gothenburg). Without possibilities to such examinations the science isn’t much better than whatever general thinking she writes.

She writes that when a researcher prevents the, for all science, basic controlling of a researcher’s work then he isn’t a serious researcher any longer.

She writes something about scientific-methodological grounds…

Yes, that about questioning… And things which cannot be examined or questioned - what's that about? Both here and there... Also see earlier posting on similar topics?

And one cannot just mechanistically change the state of affairs in ones life? Or one CAN, but isn't that exactly as one has behaved and done ones whole life, and what has this meant and led to?

Has energy been bound up (with all which follows from that)? I don't know...

Addition April 16: Read this blogposting on the blog Biology and Politics, which is more about the Academic world (this posting is though in Swedish)...