“I’d have saved years if someone had asked”: Mental health services must ask about abuse

an article by Andrea Woodside published in the New Statesman

Some 38 per cent of women with a mental health problem have experienced domestic abuse.


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I have been accessing mental health services for pretty much my whole life. It wasn’t until two years ago, at 47 years old, that anyone asked me about my experiences of abuse. The question was life changing.

Before that, I had been living with a diagnosis of bipolar disorder for over 20 years. I’d been in and out of crisis care and made attempts on my own life. My whole adult life had been wrapped up in a tirade of poor mental health.

But in 2017, when a psychiatrist finally asked me about my experiences of abuse, everything suddenly become clear. It’s bizarre to think I had got to the age of 47 and no one had ever asked me about it before.

It was then that my diagnosis of bipolar disorder was changed: I was now told I was living with severe complex post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) as a result of the prolonged and traumatic sexual and emotional abuse I’d experienced. It all started to make sense.

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I really hope that you can access the whole article. I have a paid-for subscription to The Staggers but I seem to remember that you can access three articles each week (or something like that).

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No One Deserves to Be Abused

a post by Tina Blacksmith for the Tiny Buddha blog


“Out of suffering have emerged the strongest souls; the most massive characters are seared with scars.” ~Kahlil Gibran

You’re stupid. You’re a loser. You’re worthless. You will never amount to anything. You’re not worthy of love. These are things I’ve told myself throughout my life.

The experiences I had throughout my childhood led me to believe I was deeply unlovable. I thought that because I had been abused and ignored, there was something seriously wrong with me.

That’s what abuse and neglect does. It seeps inside you down to the deepest level. It changes you in every way.

You begin to feel as if you don’t matter. You blame yourself, thinking maybe you did something bad enough to deserve it.

You push people away. You build walls because it’s easier than letting people in and letting them get to know you.

You sabotage anything that could turn out to be good because you believe you don’t deserve to have good things.

You may look for any little thing in a relationship that would make you feel justified in running for the hills because when someone shows you love, it terrifies you.

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Hazel’s comment
Interesting that Tina talks about running for the hills (wanting to or actually doing it) to get away from love. I snatched at what I thought was love when I should have been running. Paid the price for getting it wrong.

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It's Not "Failing" to Leave a Toxic, Abusive Marriage

a post by Angela Savage for the Tiny Buddha blog


“Forgive yourself for not knowing better at the time. Forgive yourself for giving away your power. Forgive yourself for past behaviors. Forgive yourself for the survival patterns and traits you picked up while enduring trauma. Forgive yourself for being who you needed to be.” ~Audrey Kitching

I have always been an extremely glass-half-full kind of person. I always see the best in everyone, and not only the best, but also the unlimited beauty and potential. And my god, it is glorious!!

I met and fell in love with a charming man. I was on a trip to Alaska to visit a lifelong friend, and met Mr. Wonderful at a gathering. He was attentive, charismatic, and made me feel like a queen. I was hooked. We were married four months later, and five months after that I had my second daughter.

I didn’t see the red flags. Looking back, I ask myself how I could have been so naïve, so trusting, so blind. Slowly but surely, though, my world changed.

First, it was little things, like coming out to check on me at night when I was breast pumping milk, to see what “I was up to,” then there was the name calling and shaming if I wanted to dress up and go out with friends to a dinner. I wondered if other wives got called sluts too because they would wear a pretty shirt.

There came a day when it became difficult to see the beauty in myself, and in him. Everything changed that day. And it never was able to return back to how it was before. The person that had vowed to love me, to cherish me, to protect me, and be there for me, cut me to the core with words that will never be undone.

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Why Millions Of People Need To Say “No More” To Their Parents

a post by Jonice Webb for the Childhood Emotional Neglect blog [via World of Psychology]



Sister, brother, husband, wife, aunt, uncle, or friend. There are many different roles that important people may play in your life. But no role is anything remotely like your parents.

The people who brought you into this world are special, and they enjoy some very special privileges. Privileges you would probably never award to anyone else under any other circumstances.

Any mental health professional will tell you that it is extremely hard for even strong, capable adults to set limits with their parents and hold them accountable, no matter how much harm the parents may do in their children’s adult lives.

In many ways, holding our parents accountable is one of the most difficult for us human beings to do. Between our own biology and the messages we hear every day from the culture around us, it’s impossible to not receive the megaphoned party line: that our parents are to be loved, respected, and given authority over our lives, no matter what.

As a therapist, I have stood by helplessly and watched scores of wonderful people allow their parents to hurt them over and over emotionally — and sometimes even physically. I have watched many strong people put their parents’ needs and wishes ahead of their own, to their own great detriment.

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Why Adults Throw Toddler Temper Tantrums

a post by Christine Hammond for The Exhausted Woman blog [via World of Psychology]

“This is ridiculous,” James said after witnessing his soon-to-be ex-wife losing it because she didn’t get her way. She sounded like a 2-year-old who didn’t get a piece of candy with the same level of irrational reasoning. Her arms were flinging around, she threw a few small objects, her voice raised a couple of octaves, and she puffed out her chest as if she was ready to fight. All of this was over a location adjustment for exchanging their child.

This wasn’t the first time James watched this display. In fact, her erratic behavior greatly contributed to their pending divorce. Her fits of rage were unpredictable, volatile, forceful, absurd, and even threatening. He encouraged her to get help but she refused, insisting that if he just did what she asked then she would never get mad.

Desperate to keep the peace, James even tried giving into her demands. But it was not enough. The more he caved, the more she expected. He became a shell of himself and was embarrassed by his own tolerance for her behavior. Finally after she destroyed his new phone, he had enough of the abuse and decided to end the marriage.

Yet for his daughter’s sake, he wanted to understand why she continued to rage. So he sought out counseling and discovered several possibilities.

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Disability, Oppression and Violence: Towards a Sociological Explanation

an article by Andrea Hollomotz (University of Leeds, UK) published in Sociology Volume 47 Number 3 (June 2013)

Abstract

Disabled people are exposed to a higher incidence of violence compared to the population average. Consequently, they are often described as ‘vulnerable’.

This article argues that this concept focuses explanations for violence on the person at risk. It therefore redirects attention towards the social forces that make violence more likely to occur.

With reference to case studies, a micro-analysis outlines how subtle forms of oppression, including imbalanced personal relationships, social exclusion, restricted autonomy and a higher tolerance for maltreatment within segregated settings, affect the daily experiences of disabled people. This is followed by a macro-analysis, which exposes further structural inequalities and a societal ratification of hostility towards disabled people.

These processes are described as forming a continuum, which highlights that boundaries between mundane experiences and contact violence are at times blurred and shifting.

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