Topic : How Childhood Abuse Still Affects Me

This is my first time posting in this forum. I looked around a little to see if there were any others out there that shared my experience and didn't really see any. So if you are out there and can relate, I would appreciate hearing from you.

 

I was abused by my mother. Sexual and psychological abuse. I started remembering about 6 years ago. I have been diagnosed with DID and PPD (paranoid personality disorder) as well as depression. I think that right now I am doing and feeling better than I ever have despite the obstacles that try to trip me up daily. But I am really angry - about a lot of things. I just need to vent because few close to me really get it. I now have two daughters of my own and I am fighting each day to be the healthiest I can be and make sure that no one ever does to them what was done to me.

 

I am angry because I rarely hear about mothers who do this to their daughters and get caught and there is justice. I know that I am not the only one who had a mother like this. It seems like our culture is not ready to hear this, not ready to believe it. But i guess things are improving now that all of the female teachers abusing their students are getting caught.

 

I am angry that I have to live with illness that makes me vulnerable so much of the time. I have had family members use my illness as an excuse to justify their abusive behavior (ex: "you have depression and make mountains out of molehills"). I am angry that there is still so much denial.

 

But mostly I am angry because I am still so often afraid that she will come to kill me like she threatened so many times or that someone els will. My husband is gone on travel and I can still barely sleep afraid that someone will hurt me or my babies. In the daytime I worry about a lot of things, but I know we are safe. At night is a different story. That pisses me off so much because I just want some peace!

 

But i guess i just have to keep working on my healing. Let it be a process... I thank god for counseling, medication, and anyplace where I can just be myself without having to apologize or fear judgement.

thank you so much for being brave to write about waht happened to you. Your mothers behavior reminds me so much of mine. I hope to talk with you more. Hope you have peace and light.

I too was sexually abused by my mother, it is not heard of a

lot in the media or much naywhere else. I was told by a

counsleor to read "The Courage to Heal" by Laura Davis,

it does cover that and all other kinds. I like that book because

I don't have to read it from the front to back. I looke at what

mostly fits my situaion and read that info. Maybe you have

also read it?

 

I don't think anyone can really understand what it is like to

"live in our skin", if they have not experienced it, sad to say.

It makes me feel very isolated at times and so different. If I

go to group therapy, no one there has been molested by their

mother, so I feel very different.

 

I am doing better with it, I have a very good therapist right now

and that really helps, I have had many years of therapy and it has

helped me out tremendously. You have a lot of courage and

that is a good thing to have, I want you to know that you are not

alone, There are more of us out there, maybe there is still a lot

shame and many don't come out with it.

 

My mom also brought many guys home to watch them have sex

with me, so I was terribly abused by many different people, abused

in everyway you could imagine. Healing is the only way and it

sounds like you are doing a good job, keep it up!

 

  

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

I really appreciate you connecting. Yes, I think too that there is a lot of shame. I have experienced that myself. When it was happening, though at the time I was disasociating from it, I still walked around worrying that people were going to find out about me.

 

I too have done and am currently in therapy and it helps me the most. I tried to get by without meds for a time, but about a week after delivering my daughters I was in trouble and needed to get back on them. When they were six months old I checked into the hospital for a couple of days. Being a mom has forced me into another stage of dealing with my feelings about  my mother that has been really difficult.

 

Thank you for sharing your experience with me. I don't feel as isolated now. I have read courage to heal but it has been a while.  It sounds as though you too are healing and I am glad to hear that too. I need to be reminded that others like yourself can end the sickness and so can I. I want so much to be a happy, whole person and a great mom to my girls. I wish for peace and light for both of us.

I can relate with the meds and going off for a while.

I guess I have come to realize I may need them the

rest of my life. I have gone off for a while, when I had

my last child but the doctor had to put me back on a

low dose because of my depression getting too bad.

PTSD was really bad.

 

I still have problems "feeling", I have dissociated for

so long that it is hard to not fall into that habit over

and over again. I used ot post on this board and

the Childhood Sexual Abuse board, but it gets too

hard to function, so I only come here once in a while.

 

I am still dealing and coping, I think it will be a life process.

THat used ot really depress me thinking of it that way,

but it really is, most things have gotten so much better

for me, but I can only work on one area at a time.

 

    

 

 

 

I understand what you mean about it being a process. There is still a part of me that want's to believe that someday I will be completely healed and never again be triggered or be afraid or check out of reality. I want to be able to forgive and have peace in my life and not be so angry so much of the time.

 

I hope you are well. Thank you for sharing your experience.

Hi

I saw that a couple of other people here ahve mentioned being DID/MPD here and I just wanted to say that I have been diagnosed for 14 years and I still struggle everyday.

I just moved cities to get away from my abusers and my alters have been coming on me like a vengance.  One of them in particular Rebbecca a teenager is very mad at me becuase I left my father(my main abuser) and now she has noone to love her.

She gets sex and love confused and feels that if she cnat have sex with him anymore thath he isnt going to love her.

I fear him with my life and when I called home on the weekend to talk to my mom and he answered the phone he knew exactlly what to say to get rebbecca to come out. Not only was he sexually inappropriate with me on the phone but he threatened us and i dont appreciate that.

My mom walked in on the conversation and i assume she heard him on the phone but when he picked up she acted like nothing had happened.

HE has us programmed so well that all he has to do is say certain words and we switch.I am glad I moved away but ti is wearing me and my system out if their is anyone else with DID here who can realte or help please let me know

thanks

ladymozart

 

what made you overcome it all? please tell me as i feel lost in everyway possible right now. email me please, my email address is on my profile, thank you!

My abuse has been traced back to the time when I was in my mothers whoom.  Not a very pleasent place to start life and progress forward.  One mistake after another in my personal life with my professional life being quite sucessful.  Then I married my third husband and that did me in.  I have about 8 disorders from the ordeal and it is said it is surprizing I am still alive. 

 

What changed my life was a woman who told me when I stopped living in fear, I would take back my power and control.  This has been a journey; yet, I give noone power over myself any longer and finally have my life back.

 

I lived in hiding for 1 1/2 yrs in fear of my life and I just took baby steps in going out of the house one step at a time.  Just a moment ago, someone took the garbage out and the top of the dumpster slammed, I screamed.  Somethings will never change; yet, I tolerate no abuse today so I know it is progress not perfection.

 

I hope this is of some help to you dear.  Blessings to you and yours.

I have been struggling with depression for years. I was abused by a neighbor when I was seven. The police didn't believe me, and the psychologist that they sent me to told me to "not talk about it, and it would just go away". When I was thirteen the depression got worse, probably because I started having horrible nightmares. Over the past eight years they have become steadily worse. I tried to tell my mom (when I was thirteen and repeatedly through the years) that I needed counseling, but at the time we couldn't afford it, and she said that (because my only outward sign that I was still dealing with it was the nightmares) she thought she could handle it on her own. That really hurts because I was in ballet for ten years, and my sister took opera lessons. If we couldn't afford counseling, then why were they spending so much money on those lessons. The depression really worsened late last summer. It was so terrible that it felt as though someone was telling to just slam my car into the concrete barrier of the highway. I would never do that, but that fact that I felt that way for even a minute terrified me. I even posted a blog on myspace hoping that someone would read it and realize how bad the depression was. But my family got mad at me for airing "personal issues on the Internet". But I couldn't talk to them, they just get mad and start raising their voices and I can't deal with that. I know its not that they're mad at me, they're just mad at the situation. But I still can't talk to them. A friend helped me get into counseling in October, and it really helped. But I had to quit my job two months ago and had to stop going to see her because the insurance stopped. Now the depression is almost as bad as it was last summer, and I don't know what to do. I need help, but I don't know how to get it.