The Wounded Heart

DISCLAIMER: Still talking about my childhood feelings and such. May bother you, and some of the language is (somewhat) graphic. Also, this will be the last time I mention the 'Wounded Heart' book, for the sanity of my readers.

I've been thinking about the nature of abuse lately, even more so than normal. I guess it's understandable, it's a subject that cuts close to home for me. I'm taking steps right now to try to patch up what happened to me, so maybe I can get a sense of closure. It's becoming painful, and I'm thinking about those people a lot. I'm thinking of home a lot, and if you can believe it, I'm getting homesick.

I tried calling someone I used to live with last night (from St George, my hometown), and I tried a few different times. She never answered the phone. Why am I doing this? It feels so compulsive. I put those people- or at least I thought I did- behind me for many reasons.

So anyway, I told Joseph my feelings of loneliness and isolation. How it makes me feel that I cannot share my childhood memories with people because I'm afraid of upsetting or offending them. There is nobody I can completely share myself with, and I imagine many other survivors must feel the same way.

My last post, I mentioned a book called 'The Wounded Heart' by Dr Allender. I've read through it more than once, even though it's distasteful. (Another compulsion, perhaps?)

In some ways, this book has made me feel grateful. Some of the people he's worked with are complete nutjobs- people who can't get aroused unless they're pretending they're getting raped or something. People who felt their bodies respond to the abuse (because that's how God made our bodies, remember) but I had sent up a prayer right then- thank you God, that I only experienced terrible pain and fear.

I never thought I'd be thankful for that one.

This Dr Allender thinks he's entitled, because he believes he's been abused. Forced masturbation at a camp (how on earth..?) a 'homosexual invitation' he turned down in Boy Scouts ( I hardly think an invitation to anything can qualify as abuse, especially when he's turned it down) and a sexual assault at a football camp. Okay, the football camp thing might be valid. Hard to tell, with what this guy considers abuse.

What is abuse? According to Dr Allender, sexual abuse is 'any contact or interaction (visual, verbal, or psychological) between a child/ adolescent and an adult when the child/ adolescent is being used for the sexual stimulation of the perpetrator or any other person'.

I can't seem to bring myself to believe that. My father would often leer at me, make comments about my body, ask if my boobs felt a certain way, and so on. I could agree that would be verbal/ emotional abuse. Sexual? Not so sure. The doctor says that 'sexually abusive words produce the same damage as sexually abusive contact'. Strange. I'm pretty sure I've never stayed up crying over the things my father said to me, even though they were inappropriate.

Dr Allender calls for strange things in the name of 'healing'. He says to trust people (in a chapter beforehand, he says that many victims trust too much, which gets them abused again) and to love unconditionally. To love every person unconditionally. I think this is asking too much of any person- whether or not they've been through something like this.

He says to love your abuser. I've come a long way in my journey of healing. It may not seem that way to people close to me, because I still feel the need to talk about it. (I suspect it's something to do with the fact I can't talk to anyone about this) I've confronted with my main abuser, which is what this book recommends. I can understand that it could give the survivor a sense of closure. My abuser pretended like he didn't even know what I was talking about, which is pretty painful. (Oh, sorry, I guess I imagined it. Give me a break)

This Dr Allender though, believes you need to not only approach the abuser, but to love him (or her). He says that you should seek a relationship with the person! You know, because the law doesn't already favour the abuser, and because the family doesn't already prefer the abusers side of the story. Talk about a kick in the teeth.

I have managed to put a lot of stuff behind me. I forgave my abusers long ago, but the fact that this guy is requesting this of people is asking too much, I think. I forgave the man who hated and beat me, and sent that other man up to hurt me- doesn't mean I want or need him to be a daily part of my life. How is any person supposed to grow beyond this kind of betrayal if the person who did it is sitting at your dinner table?

How could you ever put it behind you?

I wouldn't recommend this book to anyone, least of all a person with a traumatic past. The bad completely outweighs the good, especially with Dr Allender's holier- than- thou approach. I'd like to see him invite his football camp people to HIS supper table, just to see if he can practice what he preaches.

Different Tangent

DISCLAIMER: If the subject of abuse bothers you, then you either have to suck it up, or just don't bother reading this particular post. It happens, get used to it. In all likely hood, it never happened to you, so grow up. Now, on with the show.

My fiancée bought me this book a while ago, 'The Wounded Heart' by Dr. Allender. I had mentioned something about my feelings of isolation. I'm the only person I know in my life situation right now. It's like being the only person in a crowd with an obvious limp or something.

Dr Allender is a Christian psychologist, and that was the other reason Joseph bought me the book- see, we'd be on like, on the same wavelength. The book was insulting, and definitely written in a holier- than- thou tone. One of the reasons it was insulting?

Ignoring the fact that it was telling me that I should actively pursue a relationship with my abusers (which I've actually tried before. I was more insulted on the behalf of other people reading the book), I was insulted at the insinuations that Satan was at fault for what these people are doing.

I was abused by many people, for many years, in a number of ways. When a person says that 'Satan' caused these men/ women/ monsters to do these things, it feels to me like you're saying that they shouldn't be held responsible for their actions.

It's also like saying that the abuse was the fault of the victim. Why is it that our society heaps all this blame on the victims?

I have been held accountable for my abuse- as if it was my fault and I had orchestrated it to happen somehow. (Oh yes, I was so very conniving when I was three.)

I don't understand why I feel so much guilt and shame for what happened.

I don't understand my overwhelming sense of isolation. I'm glad that most people I know haven't been harmed in this way. Yet... yet I crave to be around people like me. Alcoholics get a group. Gay people get parades and a flag and villages, and maybe even special rights. Religious people have churches, mosques, and synagogues. Everyone has a community they go to and they feel accepted.

Christians (I am one, as well) don't tend to like people like me. A lot of them just see me as something that was sullied, and therefore not marriage material. I understand, to a degree, emotional baggage notwithstanding.

But I never asked for it to happen. I was told by an Anglican priest once that my abuser was attracted to the demons I was carrying. When he did what he did, he also transferred more demons into/ onto me. She also assumed he was gay. (Because a gay man abusing a girl makes oh so much sense)

Why do I have these feelings when my abusers do not? Why am I the one who has to feel this?

Why, after all these years, do I sometimes feel like the wounds are still fresh? Why do I feel like I'm the only one? (Especially when I know I definitely am not?)

I desire to meet other people like me, who have this 'dark mark' on their soul. To admit this makes me feel... ashamed. I feel like a freak.

I feel like there's something wrong with me- I should be happy that I'm surrounded by normal, decently- adjusted people.

But all I feel is alone.