Being forced to adjust...

from Poland trip one week ago.

Some reflections yesterday (when I was about to walk down the stairs at home with a lot of things for a visit to work and for going north after I quited work I fell and hit my forehead and the blood gushed, had to be sewed at the hospital):

After 31 years in this work with the conditions we have had all these years I am a bit tired! We have to compete with other people about the rooms out on the schools. And we have between 50- 67 students on a full time employment; on top we carry the material with us (heavy note books in my case, instruments and recorders for other colleagues)…

My strained patience? Even more stretched!!?? And I am taught not being a nuisance to the parents, a lesson too well learned? Creating troubles with later: either understanding too much or too little?? How many aren’t taught from very early in life (both being encouraged and having role-models resonating like this):

“Oh, it doesn’t matter!”

Maybe having a mom resonating in this way:

“It doesn’t matter; one can…!”

It feels this is on the same theme as I started reflecting upon during our trip to Poland; about adjusting to all and everyone, and what it can lead to. Either that you later on adjust too much, and give up yourself, make yourself invisible, or that you can’t compromise at all?? If the small child hadn't been forced learning those lessons I think it would have been capable handling these things much better later in life. I think Bosch is right about being forced to share early in life, i.e. not being selfish. This is what makes you selfish, and not unselfish. OR too unselfish, unselfish in a way that can harm you sooner or less. Many tend to think that they are glad they learned not being selfish, thinking of others. Is that the phenomenon that it was done "for my own good"?

If you have adjusted too much, and/or said: It doesn’t matter. Then you maybe get an explosion in the end??

We have spoken almost all my work-life about the problems with our rooms out on the schools, but our bosses have all minimized and belittled the problem… So this probably also triggers my relation to my parents (bosses) and tendencies to belittle and minimize things in my life from very early!!??

It didn't happen very often...

picture taken from here.

Wondering loudly: The old woman on a mother pulling her and her siblings hairs and giving slight blows in the face:

“It didn’t happen very often!”

Amazed: was it so harmless really? Didn’t it lead to anything? Were there no consequences?

After how many blows is the limit passed to when it becomes harmful?

What about questioning oneself? Ones fear for making things wrong? Wondering why about things? Ones bad self esteem and confidence? Not attributing (tillskriva) everything ones character (i.e. blaming oneself)? And doesn’t this denial have consequences – which, not only for the person who experienced this abuse first, but later for that person’s children? This is guaranteed not passed further in any manner?

The reaction:

“It didn’t happen very often”

came so quickly, as a reflex almost, and with a very sure voice.

This old woman now suffers from a lot of diseases, for instance muscle rheumatism. What is this rheumatism about? If you have gone a whole life with keeping things suppressed, in check and control, don’t you see effects sooner or later? A pressure and tension on the body day after day, year after year. Her two youngest siblings suffered and suffers from shaky hands, you can (could) see it when they wrote. And this old woman also has a scoliosis, but a milder form? Has had ache in her back, and had it when the kids were small (psycho-somatic?). She also ate very little, thinking of her kids, the totally sacrificing mother... I wonder if she suffer from a mild form of anorexia too, always saying: "I am not hungry!", with an excusing smile however. But as child this is not fun hearing. Of many different reasons probably.

I know of a man (an acquaintance of mine) who got rheumatoid arthritis when he was round 75 years. I think he too got beaten as a child, by his mom…

Both the woman and the man above know about these things, but they don’t rebel or question it really or at all, but belittle and minimize it. To the factual memories no real feelings are connected? Are these feelings so extremely painful and so extremely scary still, so bringing them up is too much, they have to keep them down and sacrifice their well-being and their true, real seeing and perceiving of the world?

So how little harmful are such things? Even though they “didn’t happen very often”? Because already the first blow was so painful and thus damaging because already the feelings from that first blow had to become suppressed? And that fact is the sign of HOW damaging it is, even this first little blow?

This is what for instance Jenson calls denial. As minimizing (bagatellisera eller förminska): you know what happened but you see it as having less of an impact than it did. You can say things like

"Other people had it much worse than I did."

"I know he (or she or they)...but it only happened sometimes (see above)."

And this sort of denial can be added with Resisting (göra motstånd): you know what happened but you believe it is irrelevant to your adult life. You can say things like:

"It was a long time ago."

"That was then, this is now."

"That's just how it was (back then)."

Balancing (uppväga/balansera): you know what happened but you think that the "good" balanced it out. One can say things like

"We got everything we needed."

"But they were good people."

Excusing/justifying (rättfärdiga, rättfärdiggöra, försvara): you admit to the past but find rationales for what hapened. You might say:

"I (or we) deserved it."

"Everyone did it in those days."

"It was all he (or she or they) knew."

"We knew they loved us, they just couldn't show it."

"They did the nest they could."

And your denial has no other consequences than for yourself? Especially if you have children and even grandchildren??? Wouldn't this person be even more eager and interested in breaking the chain, breaking the vicious circle?? Why shall a person with no own children do this work? I wonder quite ironically.

Denial and the possible, horrible effects of it...

a nuclear family (happy?).

A third posting on the American neurologist Jonathan H. Pincus’ findings. He writes at page 214-215 in “Appendix: Tools of Diagnosis, History, Physical Examination and the Role of Tests” that:

”Conventional wisdom among prosecutors and society at large holds that the fabrication of stories of abuse occurs often. But in twenty-five years of seeing the most violent people in America, I have only once encountered an inmate whose claim of abuse was reliably refuted by other family members. In my experience, falsification has weighed heavily in the other direction. I have seen many murderers whose claim not to have been abused was contradicted by independent evidence.

Many condemned prisoners would literally go to their deaths rather than consciously and publicly describe their abuse by their parents [abuse with really dire consequences]. Many families of the condemned would much rather see their relative executed than reveal the story of abuse that implicates them as either perpetrator or fellow victim.”

One denies and hides what has happened. And that’s why the abuse is passed further. This proves what for instance Miller has said. Things we see every day in society but in other forms and not as obvious? For instance in political decisions.

“Konventionell visdom bland kärande (åklagare?) och samhället i stort menar att påhitt om övergrepp ofta förekommer. Men under de tjugofem år som jag sett de mest våldsamma människorna i Amerika så har jag bara mött en intern vars anspråk på övergrepp var pålitligt vederlagda (motsagda) av andra familjemedlemmar. Enligt min erfarenhet så har förfalskning vägt tungt i den andra riktningen. Jag har sett många mördare vars anspråk på att inte ha blivit misshandlade har blivit motsagda av oberoende bevis.

Många dömda fångar skulle bokstavligen hellre gå i döden än att medvetet och offentligt beskriva misshandeln av sina föräldrar [man skyddar dem alltså snarare än berättar hur det verkligen var, med de ödesdigra konsekvenser det får. Och det är antagligen oerhört många i samhället oerhört tacksamma för att slippa höra!! Med de konsekvenser DET kan få! Hellre stoppar vi alla våra huvuden i sanden!?]. Många familjer till dömda skulle mycket hellre se sin släkting avrättad än att avslöja övergreppshistorien, vilken [samtidigt] skulle låta förstå att de antingen är förövare eller medoffer [också].”

I am for instance thinking of what we see in politics too. What sort of politicians and politics we (seem to) have today. Ideas opportune today. What society approves of today and what this can lead to?

Yes, the psycho-historian Bob Scharf is right when he writes in the essay “Leaders” for instance that:

“…the more defended psychoclasses tend to lead.”

I am not sure I agree with ALL he writes in his particular essay though… (psycho-historians seem to be influenced by psychoanalysis still? So brainwashed by it, not capable of shaking its influences off really? I don't believe in and don't like that language really, it's manipulative I think and more covering than relieving and liberating. But I wonder if thinking like this isn't like "swearing in the church"?) Rather see what Ingeborg writes about False power - anger defence and what Miller writes on anger, the justified anger, and scapegoats (anger directed at other targets than the factual perpetrators), I believe more in their ideas. And what these serial killers show is the extremes of this anger, their need for power and control??

I will write another posting later today I think about WHAT sorts of abuse Pincus actually has found and how the victims minimize and belittle the abuse. Probably the more the more horrible it is/was.

Yes, all these things: denial, belittling, minimizing can get dire consequences, because if you deny what you were exposed to you are a great risk of abusing other people as soon as you get that opportunity. From own children to committing murders etc.

The horrible thing is that the more serious the abuse the more difficult it is to admit that it was done… We should speak about these things much more? Even the abuse we (maybe) less harmed was exposed to. Making us more or less blind and more or less insensitive. And pone to voting for quite authoritarian and not so sound politicians and leaders for instance.

See the lasts postings on Pincus and this theme here and here.

Addition at 13:25: and now also here.

Child advocate Andrew Vachss…

[Updated May 18 and 24]. See earlier postings on Andrew Vachss here.

And read the article “You Carry the Cure in Your Heart” by Andrew Vachss.

This article mentions a form of abuse we probably belittle and minimize namely emotional abuse:

“I'm a lawyer with an unusual specialty. My clients are all children—damaged, hurting children who have been sexually assaulted, physically abused, starved, ignored, abandoned and every other lousy thing one human can do to another. People who know what I do always ask: "What is the worst case you ever handled?" When you're in a business where a baby who dies early may be the luckiest child in the family, there's no easy answer. But I have thought about it—I think about it every day. My answer is that, of all the many forms of child abuse, emotional abuse may be the cruelest and longest-lasting of all.

Emotional abuse is the systematic diminishment of another. It may be intentional or subconscious (or both), but it is always a course of conduct, not a single event. It is designed to reduce a child's self-concept to the point where the victim considers himself unworthy—unworthy of respect, unworthy of friendship, unworthy of the natural birthright of all children: love and protection.

Emotional abuse can be as deliberate as a gunshot: ‘You're fat. You're stupid. You're ugly.’/../

Emotional abuse can be active. Vicious belittling: ‘You'll never be the success your brother was.’ Deliberate humiliation: ‘You're so stupid. I'm ashamed you're my son.’

It also can be passive, the emotional equivalent of child neglect—a sin of omission, true, but one no less destructive.

And it may be a combination of the two, which increases the negative effects geometrically.

Emotional abuse can be verbal or behavioral, active or passive, frequent or occasional. Regardless, it is often as painful as physical assault. And, with rare exceptions, the pain lasts much longer. A parent's love is so important to a child that withholding it can cause a ‘failure to thrive’ condition similar to that of children who have been denied adequate nutrition.

Even the natural solace of siblings is denied to those victims of emotional abuse who have been designated as the family's 'target child.' The other children are quick to imitate their parents. Instead of learning the qualities every child will need as an adult—empathy, nurturing and protectiveness—they learn the viciousness of a pecking order. And so the cycle continues.

But whether as a deliberate target or an innocent bystander, the emotionally abused child inevitably struggles to ‘explain’ the conduct of his abusers—and ends up struggling for survival in a quicksand of self-blame.

Emotional abuse is both the most pervasive and the least understood form of child maltreatment. Its victims are often dismissed simply because their wounds are not visible. In an era in which fresh disclosures of unspeakable child abuse are everyday fare, the pain and torment of those who experience ‘only’ emotional abuse is often trivialized. We understand and accept that victims of physical or sexual abuse need both time and specialized treatment to heal. But when it comes to emotional abuse, we are more likely to believe the victims will ‘just get over it’ when they become adults.”

When I listened to these two I came to think: Can one forgive a person who doesn’t ask for forgiveness? And that’s what Miller has written.

Lip-service is läpparnas bekännelse?

Emotional needs are essential for survival.

Additional thoughts May 18, loudly thinking: I came to think that Miller writes about the child being humiliated, by for instance being accused for this and that and said to be this and that outspoken or not in often very cruel manners (maybe subtle though, or at least subtle to many of us who have become "unsensitized" to these things?), and see Jenson and Bosch on neglect… And Bosch writes about the phenomenon marasmus/inexplicable infant mortality. Also see Miller on the Wall of Silence and this sort of punishment for things the child isn’t enlightened about (the power the parent has not to explain why he/she punishes the child).

Vachss writes about what children learn in these families about the value of other human beings and of oneself. I think of what sort of role-models the parents actually are there. And what they maybe teach but don’t live after (lip-service?); all human beings equal worth and equal rights. How confusing and contradicting this must be. In some cases so confusing so the child gets mad?

See also what Bosch writes about self blame, i.e. what she calls the Primary Defence. Judith Lewis Herman writes about bystanders... See earlier posting "The problem without a name…"

And here the translation to Swedish:

Den här artikeln av Andrew Vachss nämner en form av övergrepp som vi förmodligen förminskar och bagatelliserar, nämligen emotionella eller känslomässiga övergrepp. Vachss skriver (i min kanske något fria amatöröversättning):

”Jag är advokat med en ovanlig specialitet. Mina klienter är alla barn – skadade, sårade barn som har blivit utsatta för sexuellt övervåld, fysiska övergrepp, svält, ignorerande, övergivande [kanske både fysiskt och känslomässigt, se Jenson och Bosch] och alla andra usla saker som mänskliga varelser kan göra mot varandra. Människor som vet vad jag gör frågar alltid: ’Vad är det värsta fall du någonsin har haft hand om?’ När du har ett fall där en baby som dör tidigt kan vara det barn i familjen som har mest tur finns det inga enkla svar. Men jag har tänkt på det – jag tänker på det varje dag. Mitt svar är att, känslomässig misshandel är kanske den grymmaste och längst verkande av alla formen av barnmisshandel.

Känslomässig misshandel är det systematiska förminskandet av en annan. Den kan vara avsiktlig eller undermedveten (eller båda), men den är alltid en fråga om [generellt] handhavande, inte en enstaka händelse. Den är utformad för att reducera barnets självbild till den punkt där offret anser sig ovärdig – ovärdig respekt, ovärdig vänskap/vänner, ovärdig den naturliga födslorätten som alla barn har av kärlek och skydd.

Känslomässig misshandel kan vara lika avsiktlig som ett gevärsskott: ’Du är fet. Du är dum. Du är ful.’/…/

Känslomässig misshandel kan vara aktiv. Elakt förminskande: ’Du kommer aldrig att lyckas så som din bror gjorde.’ Avsiktlig förödmjukelse: ’Du är så dum. Jag skäms over min son.’ [Jo, Miller skriver om förödmjukelse, liksom både Jenson och Bosch].

Den kan också vara passiv, den känslomässiga motsvarigheten till försummelse av barn – en underlåtenhetssynd, sant, men inte mindre destruktiv [dvs. att bara strunta i barnet, där en form kan vara att medvetet omge barnet med en mur av tystnad?].

Och den kan vara en kombination av de två [eller flera former av misshandel], vilket ökar dess negativa effekter geometriskt.

Känslomässig misshandel kan vara verbal eller beteendemässig, aktiv eller passiv, ofta förekommande eller tillfällig. Oavsett vilken, så är den ofta lika smärtsam som att bli fysiskt anfallen. Och, med sällsynta undantag, varar smärtan längre. En förälders kärlek är så viktig för ett barn så att undanhålla denna kan orsaka ’problem med att frodas och växa bra’ tillstånd liknande dem som barn får när de nekats adekvat föda [mat. Ja, Bosch skriver om fenomenet marasmus och om behov känslomässig näring - och behov av trygghet och tillit, respekt och aktning för ens person, tankar, behov, reaktioner, känslor].

Även det naturliga tröstande från syskon förnekas de offer som blivit utsedda som familjens måltavla för känslomässig misshandel. De andra barnen imiterar snabbt sina föräldrar. Istället för att lära sig de kvaliteter som barnen kommer att behöva som vuxna – empati, närande och skyddande – så lär de sig ondskans hackordning/rangordning [alla är inte lika mycket värda, trots att man försäkrar motsatsen om alla människors lika värde]. Och så fortsätter denna cykel [ja, vad slags förebilder? Och tala om motstridande budskap och förvirring?].

Men oavsett om man är den avsiktliga måltavlan eller ett oskyldigt vittne, så kämpar det känslomässigt misshandlade barnet oundvikligen med att ’förklara’ beteendet hos den misshandlande – och slutar med att kämpa för sin överlevnad i självklandrets kvicksand [trampar och trampar för att hålla nästippen ovanför vattenytan. Och att vara vittne till våld och övergrepp, vare sig fysiska, sexuella eller känslomässiga är också en kränkning påpekar Pia Mellody. Se också Bosch om the Primary defence eller det ursprungliga/första försvaret].

Känslomässiga övergrepp är både den mest genomträngande och minst förstådda formen av barnmisshandel. Dess offer blir ofta bortslagna ur tankarna helt enkelt för att deras sår inte är synliga. I en tid där färska avslöjanden av onämnbar barnmisshandel är vardagsmat, trivialiseras ofta smärtan och plågan hos dem som ’bara’ upplevt känslomässig misshandel. Vi förstår och accepterar att offer för fysiska och sexuella övergrepp behöver både tid och specialbehandling för att hela. Men när det kommer till känslomässig misshandel är det mer troligt att vi tror att offren ska ’komma över det’ är de blir vuxna [förminskande och bagatelliserande].”

Addition May 24: See the readers’ letter ”Interview with child advocate Adrew Vachss” at Miller’s web, and Miller’s view on it. The reader writes:

“In this talk, Andrew Vachss confronts Oprah with her belief that anger resulting from an abusive childhood is a bad thing that one needs to overcome, and that the way to "healing" is through forgiveness. And he thoroughly questions it.
What do you think?”

Miller answers:

“I saw the interview. These are some of my thoughts about it: We will never be able to stop child abuse as long as we say: ‘I put the past behind me, I don't feel anger, have forgiven and forgotten and get on with my life.’ This advice, given very often, never actually helps. Why? Because the endured abuse, if it is not worked out, drives the former victims to do the same with their children as long as they deny the pain and the anger, which the abuse left in their bodies. Our feelings may stay for a long time repressed, unconscious, but they wake up when we become parents. Advice like the one given by Oprah wants to help people who suffer by saying: ‘Enjoy your life, you should no longer suffer because of things that happened so long ago’. We must know that this advice works at the expense of the next generation, supporting our blindness. Feeling and understanding the causes of our old pain does not mean that the pain and the anger will stay with us forever. Quite the opposite is true. The felt anger and pain disappear with time and enable us to love our children. It is the UNFELT, avoided and denied pain, stored up in our bodies, that drive us to repeat what have been done to us and to say: ‘Spanking didn't harm me, it was good for me and will thus also not harm my children.’ People who talk like this go on writing books on how we should spank babies early enough so that they learn to behave and NEVER EVER realize what had been done to them so early in their lives."

Psychosocial stressors in children…

from the Swedish child-film Dunderklumpen (1974, English site here and Swedish here), I have played the first tune with a couple of pupils.

Peter Währborg (see former posting "Empathy and Stress...") also writes about children and psychosocial stressors at page 79-81 in his book (mentioned in the former posting).

He writes that in the main the same things which are stressing children are stressing adults.

The most important stressors are emotionally significant separations, for instance parents divorce, but also getting new teachers and classmates. When children loose a part of the body because of illness or accident they react with a powerful stress reaction, as when a person whom is important dies or moves. Children lives in a world which is a little bigger than adults understand Wärhborg writes.

Discomfort (vantrisel) being in a school and a class which only causes social and psychic suffering is of course not fun and causes (sometimes severe) stress in children. If you experience (thinks) you don’t manage especially well in school each failure gives new proofs on your insufficiency or inadequacy. The self esteem is jeopardized, and the inability to live up to the demands parents, teachers or others put turns into chronic stress.

Difficult relations are another source of stress in children. It looks as children in this case reacts more equal to grown up women, i.e., they react more pronounced on difficult relations than men do.

Children have many different sorts of relations which can play a significant or important role for the risk developing stress (my addition: and for minimizing the bad effects?).

Especially powerful are the stress reactions in children exposed to insulting “specific treatment” (särbehandling) or victimization (?) such as mobbing. (See this pdf-file on "Victimization at Work" from the Swedish National Board of Occupational Safety and Health).

Währborg thinks that children’s sensitivity means that the best would be if the classes were small and stable.

Encroachments (abuse), accidents, maltreatment or other severe traumas also causes stress. Sometimes this stress state is of a more serious nature, so called Post Traumatic Stress Syndrome. Not least children who have immigrated can carry things with them that they haven’t got any opportunity to process.

Währborg also mentions time and decision conflicts as a source for stress reactions in children something we also see in adults. When children feel powerlessness or that they don’t have control over their situation they react with stress.

Children suffer more seriously because of lack of security and social stability. The family-situation plays an important role in this (in moderating, and in moderating both this and that?). Here it isn’t only a question of interaction-patterns in the family but also about events happening to the family.

My brief reflections: We have tended to minimize and belittle things children experience, and to sweep it under the rug? And it was even more so earlier? If you didn’t talk about bigger and smaller events or traumas they didn’t harm one thought. And the child and whole events became surrounded by silence.

See about the ACE-study here and here.

Seeing things as wrong...

Some thoughts I have had or gotten recently… About therapy. About being allowed to question and see as wrong.

On a walk (or a couple of walks) I came to think: If the therapist listens to his/her client smiling when the client narrates what she/he has experienced… (what message does this therapist forward? That he/she doesn't believe what the clients says, doesn't see it as serious, minimizing and belittling the experience? And maybe that's also whathe/she ruly feels: what is this to make fuss about!!) What effect does that have on the client? Does that allow the client to realize/recognize what he/she was exposed to??

And how is this client then supposed to react towards others, for instance those under him/her in power (own and others children for instance)?? What sort of understanding does this client get? Of what is actually damaging and harmful – and painful??

Miller writes about successful group-therapy with fathers accused for incest. How these (some, not all) realized what they had done (the life-long harm to the ones they had sexually abused) when they were allowed to question and see as wrong what they had been exposed to themselves. And also to a certain degree emotionally caught this!

But there are other forms of abuse too: subtler, as emotional abuse... Which is even more belittled and minimized, but damaging too (maybe more damaging than we believe)! And making us more or less insensitive to others and ourselves!?

But he therapist mentioned above really minimized this form of abuse?? What was that? Nothing to him?? And what about possible other forms of abuse under the emotional (disrespect)?? As sexual abuse (even if it was "only" about improper touching??). Or not even about spanking the child?? He diminished all these things? Didn't he? The grown up child's fantasies etc.??

A client maybe struggling to see and wanting to avoid hurting or damaging others…I get so upset thinking about this.

How is this client supposed to be sensitive to others, to others suffering etc.? Especially young people, still powerless and helpless and dependent to different degrees…

I also came to think about ability and willingness to develop as human being, to learn… Becoming a little more mature by the years…

Are some forced to become? Others less forced?

How many are actually prepared to change and to “learn” or develop?? Or maybe even wanting to change? Maybe it’s more the latter? Wanting to, even if the success is small, of different reasons? What can one see between ones fingers with? And what less maybe?

Now I am thinking more generally, but also more specifically, about a former boss, who has gone from job to job, all highly qualified… That about realizing ones limits… Some are told they ought to realize their limits, and not take a lot of work on them for instance… Who are told the former and who are told the latter? Some just have to, but others don’t have to??

“No wonder you get angry!!”

a female physician and gestalt-therapist said…

“What? Am I allowed to get angry??? To react??”

Yes, it so it is or can be:

"What? Am I allowed to get angry? Are there reasons to get angry? To question and see as wrong?? Is there nothing wrong in me because I am reacting?"

And it should be like this in therapy, when a client talks about his/her early experiences, even more concerning them, than in actual events?? Not that actual events should become diminished or belittled (oh, my fantastic English).

I know of a woman telling her therapist (a male therapist) how her parents behaved, how it was earliest in life; with a dad coming home pouring out his frustration and anger at the family, being irritated, with no patience and a very short fuse (stubin)… The therapist just smiled, showed no indignation… This was nothing to talk about?? No damage done? This didn’t hurt or damage the child?? Or was this client fantasizing? Making a hen of a feather or?? Was/is it:

“But you know, he had it tough at work!! You know he had his things (it wasn't so fun when he grew up) in his backpack!!”

No, the child didn’t understand this!!!?? Observe the irony, because I think that’s exactly what a child can “understand”, and put her/his own back…

Despite this father acted his things out, he didn’t get healed!!?? By symbolically reacting his out, at children and wife (human beings who had nothing to do with his early history) it didn’t make him less angry…

Symbolically reacting things out doesn’t heal. Yes, I think Miller is right there. How does one do then?

Can this anger (or the milder expression inform of irritation) be a way of avoiding the pain and thus the truth?? Giving the one pouring out his/her anger a sense of strength and powerfulness?? Giving her/him power? Does he/she need this power and strength in this circumstance (yes, maybe)? Does he/she need to exercise and demonstrate this power? Does he demonstrate his/her power against the ones he/she ought to demonstrate it against and protect her/him against??

Yes, I think Jenson is right: if you are (unconsciously) rewriting your history the failure is unavoidable.

How many misunderstandings and misinterpretations does this cause??

Blaming and accusing oneself is also a defense... Protecting oneself against an even greater pain? But it isn't just to start behaving differently (but you can't use this as an excuse either for not doing anything?). Maybe you succeed doing this though, changing your behavior I mean, but it doesn't automatically change your feelings, reactions etc. If it feels as if nothing has changed actually despite all you know you should do - and not do, despite how enlightened you even are, how strong your will even is, it's because no real integration has occurred?? Due to lack of proper help or because you were so harmed so this work is so difficult...

And no, you can't solve this with your intellect or with intelligence!? But understanding, cognitively knowing/understanding isn't bad, maybe an important first step? But yes, intellect and intelligence can block too?

And the client above: did this make her seeing things even better?? Did she really dare to see her therapist trough? Is a more harmed client more caught in such therapy? More unable to believe what she sees, hear, senses? The less harmed (and thus less needy!!!) can leave more easily? Dare to question such a therapist? And leave him.

Staying in such a therapy, what does this mean? Maybe for many years? Years have been spoiled and things have been sacrificed? The sacrifices have been added with more sacrifices?? Where she should have gotten (and expected) to get help...

And a therapist behaving like this, smiling (of what reason) is revictimizing his client??? He behaved disrespectfully?

I also saw these words now when I was searching about other things: integrity violations... Because that's what disrespect is about?

It is very painful thinking that despite all knowledge one has probably behaved disrespectfully without seeing or knowing it??

How was it Freyd wrote about removing blinders, becoming connected?

Thinking further in the shower: Treating your child disrespectfully is playing your in the hands of abusers later in life! And/or making them to abusers of different degrees??

And knowledge isn't enough. I came to think of the father reacting at how his father ones treated him (and his siblings), shouting to his/them i front of others, the humiliation this caused... But he exposed his own children for the same/similar things... So, no, knowledge isn't enough...

You have to process this in a certain way for not passing this further!? Being allowed to see it as wrong and question the whole behavior: had I as child given the parent (other grown up/person) reasons to treat me like this? If so: what reason? The punisher should be able to tell for what and why he/she punishes??? Shouldn't he/she? And it is a question of not belittling or minimizing what as (is) done?? But we have tendencies doing this: I deserved it! It doesn't matter? That was then! etc. Denying the truth!? We probably do in a lot of ways??? More than we are aware of!? With what follows... I probably do too... But as grown ups we can always communicate things?? Try the best we can to do that??

Do I have a flu in the body? Not breaking out? Think if one could go to bed and draw a blanket over oneself... Do nothing... Can a blind lead a blind? Am I very self-occupied? And that is absolutely forbidden??

Not only Staff...

photos on Tor Erling Staff.

[Updated January 14 and 17 in the end]. Making my first real post on this new blog.

I got a tip from a friend this morning about an article about sexual abuse of children and a Norwegian man exposed to sexual abuse as 12-year old boy, the now retired Norwegian lawyer Tor Erling Staff (about him at wikipedia, though only in Norwegian), belittling and minimizing the damage he was caused.

His recent client is a pedophile, the so called "lommemannen", which has been sexually abusing several hundred small boys in Norway the last three decades, that has been caught in Norway recently, which was a big news in Sweden too.

See earlier blogposts about defences, because what this man is doing is defending himself against the truth to what he has been exposed to. He admits to the abuse he has suffered, he remembers it, but the feelings that would be adequate aren't connected to this. These he has suppressed? Probably immediately? And one can wonder what he has been exposed to even earlier in his life.

And the bad thing is that he goes out in public with this denial, he doesn't keep it for himself...

I came to think that Miller has actually written about Wilhelm Reich somewhere (maybe I come back to this) and his minimizing of the sexual abuse he was exposed to by a maiden in the family as only 4-year old, which she thinks is a protection against the utter pain the true realization would be. I think she is right.

Earlier blogposts about minimizing and belittling, and about Tor Erling Staff (both in English and Swedish).

I googled on him and in one article he says that the respect for the child is ruining, destroying the society. In another he says he has had sex with everything that can crawl or walk either it has two legs or four... Grew up in the upper middle-class? And seems to have been a very controversial lawyer in Norway... No wonder...

A female incest-victim in Norway had this man as defender, see here and here. She reacts over Staff's belittling and minimizing these issues! This woman killed her father 2000 as 38 years and Staff was the only lawyer she knew of and asked him. Her father had been abusing her sexually from she was a child up in teenage...

The article (in Norwegian):

"Ikke bare Staff.

Det er ingen grunn til å tro at hadde Tor Erling Staff vært uskadeliggjort, ville alt vært greit. Bagatellisering av overgrep mot barn skjer daglig, på mange fronter.

Tor Erling Staffs uttalelser om seksuelle overgrep mot barn opprører oss. Staff sier ting som er virkelig avskyelige. Han er helt på jordet når han legger skylden på politiet om smågutter blir traumatisert av å bli utsatt for orale overgrep fra voksne menn [Staff blames the police that boys gets traumatized by oral sexual abuse by men!!! It's the police's fault; if they didn't make this an issue there wouldn't be any damage he means?].

Hjelpeapparatet

Men bagatellisering av overgrep mot barn skjer mange steder. Blant annet i barnepsykiatrien, som ikke registrerer overgrepene blant de fleste av sine overgrepsutsatte pasienter. Da en undersøkelse av norsk barne- og ungdomspsykiatri ble offentliggjort for to år siden, kom det ingen reaksjon fra verken helseministeren, andre politikere, eller fra psykiatrien [investigations have shown that the psychiatry doesn't make any records over abuse their patients have been exposed to and dared to talk about? When this investigation actually was made public in Norway no ministers in the government reacted - of course!?].

Selv har jeg hørt en psykolog omskrive overgrep mot barn til Ødipus-komplekset (innlegg i Tidsskrift for psykisk helsearbeid 4/2006). Og jeg har opplevd at det har blitt brukt samme type uprofesjonell begrunnelse som Staff bruker, for å bagatellisere - i dette tilfellet fysiske - overgrep mot barn, ved at psykologen hevdet at han selv ikke hadde blitt skadet av å ha blitt utsatt for vold som barn [The author of this debate-article writes in a magazine for work on psychological health that a psychologist ascribed abuse the Oedipus-complex!!! And that a psychologist meant that he himself hadn't been damaged by violence he was exposed to as a child!! Very unprofessional from both Staff and the psychologist! I come to think of what the Norwegian physician Anna-Luise Kirkengen writes in the foreword to her book 'How Abused Children Becomes Unhealthy Adults' something about that her book is directed to all dealing with victims of abuse of all kinds and in all different circumstances, including that of lawyers! *see the bottom of this blogpost what Kirkengen writes, at the asterisk].

En prest som har tatt doktorgrad på seksualforbrytere og jobber som terapeut, mener at barneporno muligens kan brukes til noe positivt: som hjelp i det terapeutiske arbeidet. Barneporno er filmede eller fotograferte reelle overgrep mot barn. Hvorfor skrek ikke halve nasjonen opp etter en slik uttalelse? Jeg ble så sjokkert da jeg leste det at jeg skrev til vedkommendes biskop. Men det kom intet svar fra biskopen [a Norwegian priest/minister working as therapist with children exposed to sexual abuse means child-porno maybe can be used as something positive. Horrible.].

Eller hva med barnevernet? I rapporten Barnevernet og incestsaker fra Redd Barna og Støttesenter mot incest - Oslo leser vi:

- Fagfolk er redde for å gå inn i slike saker! Slik var det for noen år siden. Slik er det i dag, sier en saksbehandler. Mange barnevernsansatte opplever at de er alene på arbeidsplassen om å tro at det har skjedd overgrep [People are very lonely believing they are the one and only exposed to abuse because the silence around these issues.].

En fostermor var sikker på at fosterdatteren var misbrukt, men ble ikke hørt av barnevernet, som truet: - Hvis dere ikke slutter å være så opphengt i overgrep, vil vi vurdere å overlate barnet til noen andre.

Barneoppdragerne

Sammenhengen mellom fysisk og seksuell vold er fortsatt i liten grad erkjent i samfunnet. Selv om det kom mange og kraftige reaksjoner i høst da Carl I. Hagen, Aslam Ahsan med flere gikk ut i media og bagatelliserte fysisk avstraffelse av barn, forble dette et ikke-tema.

En avstemning VG gjorde, viste at hele 46,5 prosent godtok rising av barn. Det er åpenbart ikke bare Staff som ikke skjønner hva traumer hos barn er.

Oslos ordfører Fabian Stang, som selv er advokat, engasjerer seg nå mot Staffs uttalelser. Han sier Staff kan ha brutt Straffelovens § 140, der det heter at den som offentlig oppfordrer eller tilskynder til iverksettelsen av en straffbar handling eller forherliger en sådan, kan straffes med bøter eller med fengsel i inntil åtte år, eventuelt 2/3 av den høyeste straff for det aktuelle lovbruddet.

Men hvorfor reagerte ikke Stang etter Aslam Ahsans forsvar for vold mot barn? Oslo kommune har vært med og finansiert et senter for barn som Ahsan leder. Mener kommunen at de som forherliger vold er egnet til å arbeide med barn?

Mørkemennene

Så har vi enkelte kristenfundamentalisters bagatellisering av seksuelle overgrep mot barn, ved å likestille homofili og liberal seksualmoral med pedofili.

Stortingsrepresentant André Oktay Dahl (H) har fortalt at han får uhyggelige brev på grunn av sitt arbeid for felles ekteskapslov, homoplan og bedre homo-rettigheter. På nettstedet Gaysir kan vi lese utdrag av et, som påstår at 'homofile er like farlige overgripere mot barn og unge som de pedofile'.

Denne brevskriveren er ikke den eneste som ikke viker tilbake for å sammenlikne homofili med seksuelle overgrep mot barn. Espen Ottosen, informasjonsleder i Norsk Luthersk Misjonssamband, skrev i en kronikk i Aftenposten: "På det seksuelle området har relativismen fått en enorm innflytelse. Et tankevekkende utslag av denne relativismen var reaksjonene som kom til uttrykk da Tor Erling Staff ... fortalte at han som 12-åring hadde gode seksuelle opplevelser sammen med andre menn', og at 'få våget å hevde at tilfeldig sex som involverer et barn alltid er galt'.

Den gode kristne mann gjorde seg skyldig i brudd på det åttende bud. For Staff møtte motbør. Jeg var selv en, av flere, som hadde innlegg mot Staff da han gikk ut med dette i 2005.

Å kalle en tolvåring mann, og dermed ansvarliggjøre barn for sexmisbruk, er grovt. Å knytte en seksualmoral som er mer liberal enn mørkemannens til det å ha sex med barn, framstiller de aller fleste av oss voksne, heterofile eller homofile, som seksualovergripere.

At de mest skadelige overgrepene ofte skjer i den tradisjonelle, heterofile familien, tok ikke Ottosen seg bryet med å nevne. Men da er det jo heller ikke lenger snakk om 'tilfeldig sex', men ofte langvarige og systematiske krenkelser fra de nærmeste.

Folkeopplyserne

Staff bør ikke gjøres til den ene syndebukken, for å avlaste fellesskapet. Mye mer kan gjøres på dette feltet. Her har særlig fagfolk - fortrinnsvis de med kompetanse på traumer hos barn - en viktig oppgave.

I dag er noen av dem på banen og snakker om 'Lommemannens' antatte psyke. Men selv om den noe omstridte diagnosen dissosiativ lidelse skulle referere til et faktisk psykisk fenomen, der vedkommendes egne traumer fra barndommen er fraspaltet bevisstheten, så vet enhver voksen tenkende person at overgrep mot barn er galt og straffbart.

Burde ikke psykologer og andre profesjonelle bli flinkere enn de er i dag til å opplyse allmennheten om de alvorlige konsekvensene for mange ofre for overgrep, slik at potensielle overgripere der ute kunne velge å søke hjelp framfor å ødelegge barns liv?

Og vi andre kunne se litt på våre holdninger."

* Yes, Kirkengen in fact writes:

"I address this book about how personal integrity violations lead to illness to my colleagues who practice, do research, teach and write within the field of general and specialized medicine. I also address researchers and clinicians within health-related professions, such as nurses, psychologists, physiotherapists, midwives, pediatric nurses, and consultants in ergonomics. Furthermore, I address all professionals working with children, such as teachers, child care consultants, speech therapists, social workers, and special education teachers. I wish, moreover, to reach those in the legal professions. This includes the police because lawyers, judges and police personnel come in contact with people, old and young, who are being hurt or have been hurt in the past by other people's lack of respect for their personal integrity.

I also address politicians and lawmakers since they are in a position to translate knowledge regarding boundary violation into viable initiatives and laws. The initiatives must have as their goal the prevention of humiliation, violation, injury or abuse, particularly of people who are young and dependent. They must also aim to insure that all people, regardless of where they are or where they go, can trust that they will be valued and treated with respect. Laws must have as their aim that all people, especially those who are small and dependent, who have already been humiliated, violated, injured or abused receive the help they need, and in abundance. They must also aim to insure that all people who have been treated with disrespect or contempt can regain their sense of self-worth and self-respect.

First and foremost, however, I address this work to students within medicine and other health professions. My declared aim here is to point out in what ways a dualistic view of the human being and his body is untenable, how it leads both to a dualistic health system, one somatic and the other psychiatric, and to a dualistic conceptual world, divided into one classification system for somatic illnesses and another for mental illnesses. Medicine and related fields of study rest on this divided and dividing knowledge and students are trained to think those terms. I beg students not to allow this way of thinking to wipe out what they know about themselves, and, consequently, about other people as well: that they are unique individuals with mindful bodies.

In the hope that this book may also reach people outside the medical professions, I have chosen to use everyday language. Issues of integrity and violation are, in fact, themes all people share. We are all vulnerable, not just a few of us. In addition to our being mortal, what human beings have in common is the fact that we can all be humiliated."

Addition January 14: Silent reflection during a walk in the morning: Does Staff want the whole society to join his personal denial? Soon turning 75 years, with more and more weakening defenses? Maybe he even wants to convince himself that he wanted it, that it was good for him, that all children want this? As Wilhelm Reich did if I remember what Miller wrote right? Awful and so sad...

In the afternoon: Staff has the power and the position... He can allow himself to go out and say such things. And he is allowed too, even if I know people have reacted... I couldn't help wonder:think if Staff had been a woman. Could a woman do such a thing?

Addition January 17: more articles/opinions about Staff and what he has put forward recently here, here and here. People questioning and defending. Even a man charged for sexual abuse (of children?) is critical, even furious. Saying that what Staff has said legitimizes abuse, and of course the abusers

"...loves when something says it is ok to paw children."

Miller has written about successful therapy with men in prison for incest... If these men (and women) get an opportunity to question and view what they have endured themselves as (small, maybe even very small) children, they can realize what they ave done...