Sanctuary for the Abused
Tuesday, February 09, 2010
Projection
by Kathy Krajco
Projection is a new name for an old thing, scapegoating. In this section I just explain it in general terms, with examples. In the next section, we zero-in on how narcissists project and what is unique about the way they do it.
Projection. We find it everywhere. Which should be no surprise. It's actually the oldest trick in The Book. Really. The Serpent pulled it on Eve in the Book of Genesis when, in the very act of lying to Eve, he accused God of being the liar.
Here's how the story goes. The serpent had just suggested that Eve eat the Forbidden Fruit, and she replied that God told them not to because eating it would bring about their fall. The cunning serpent said, "God told you THAT?"
Slick, eh? In the very act of telling a whopper, the sneaky snake left-handedly called God a liar, through the power of suggestion. Thus the Prince of Lies pulled an identity-switch with God.
Moses ritualized a demonstration of projection in the Book of Leviticus as the prescribed rite for the annual Day of Atonement.
In this "atonement" ritual, all the people had to come forward, one by one, and make the scapegoat (a perfect yearling firstborn male to represent someone unblemished and with great potential) take their sins away from them and onto himself. How did they do this? By accusing him of their sins and laying the blame on his head. Then they had to purge themselves of him and make him atone for their sins. How did they do that? By chasing him away into the desert until he gave up trying to follow them back home, and then deserting him there. Which was the sentence worse than death = doom, because he would slowly die of thirst.
One hardly thinks they enjoyed doing this. Would you?
Wouldn't you instead get Moses' message? More powerful than a sermon, eh? Wouldn't you hang your head a little, thinking, "Jeez, are we that transparent?"
But never underestimate willful obtuseness' power to get things exactly backwards. Soon, people had done just that. Instead of being duly shamed by this ritual reenactment of how they "cleansed" and "saved" themselves (from justice) by scapegoating those who have the most to lose and are the least deserving, they decided that this ritual meant that this despicable behavior is the right thing to do! the way to cleanse yourself of sin!
How convenient.
They didn't get it later, either, when John the Baptist and Jesus of Nazareth came along and said: "Read our lips: To cleanse yourselves of your sins, don't punish an innocent scapegoat for them! Just R-E-F-O-R-M. Too complex?"
People still managed to just anti-get the message yet again, deciding that this meant they should graduate from animals and sacrifice these two men as the scapegoats to die for/of (in scripture you have this double entente, because the word used can mean either for or of) their sins.
So, then St. Paul gave it a shot. He really tried to make people see that they'd better quit acting stupid and projecting, instead of repenting, their sins. In his letter to the Romans, he basically put it in the plainest terms possible — those of a threat that asked, "Just whom do you think you're fooling?"
You — who steal — preach that other people should stop stealing. You — who commit adultery — preach that others should stop committing adultery. You — who commit sacrilege — preach that others should stop being idolaters. — Letter to the Romans, Chapter 2, verses 21-22How's that for letting the self-righteous know that you know all their finger pointing is just projection/scapegoating?
Ah, but obtuseness is invincible, and twisted thinking can make black white. So, again this simple message went in one ear and out the other. All three peoples of that Book (Jews, Christians, and Muslims) still got it exactly backwards. They all say that the blood of the innocent victim on them "cleanses" them of their sins.
Projection. We see it everywhere. It's a kind of baptism = a mud bath people give their betters, by rubbing themselves off on them. Here's how it works.
Got a guilty conscience? If so, you've certainly been tempted to say to yourself, "I'm not so bad." To prove that, you must look around for an example of someone who's worse. Then you can say to yourself, "Aha! I'm not as bad as So-and-So."
But guess what? You didn't pick a So-and-So who really has that fault and has it worse than you. You picked someone with very little mud on his name, someone who looks cleaner than you, if possible, someone who has the corresponding virtue instead of that fault.
We're all tempted to pull this stunt. Some of us do, and some of us don't.
For example: If you're stingy, look for someone with a reputation for generosity, because generosity in your neighbor puts your stinginess to shame by serving as a foil that (by contrast) makes your stinginess more noticeable. Then smear your vice off on him. Tell everybody that he's stingy. Make everything he does sound stingy.
Thus you kill two birds with one stone: you rid yourself of your stinginess and him of his generosity.
Not. But looks are everything, and Truth doesn't matter, and this fraud makes you look good by comparison with him. Ah, cheating is much easier than freeing yourself of sin the legitimate way, by repentance.
You can see why narcissists highly prize this device called "projection" and become expert in it.
Projection. We see it everywhere. For example, guess who's favorite portrayal of the President of the United States is as "a Hitler" or "even worse than Hitler?" You guessed it, the Germans. German Chancellor Gerhard Schroeder did it in campaign speeches to turn the tide and get elected. And guess whose favorite and constant characterization of Americans is as "arrogant?" You guessed it, the French. Projection.
Once you catch on to projection, you do recognize it in a vast amount of the badmouthing you hear.
Magicians call this trick "misdirection." With one hand magicians misdirect our attention so we don't see what they're doing with their other hand.
Finger-pointers do the same thing. They direct people's attention (critical attention, negative attention) away from themselves and what they're doing by accusing someone else of doing the same, or essentially the same, thing. Thus they make themselves seem like people who never would dream of doing such a thing themselves — while in the very act of doing it.
Pointing the finger at others is a red flag of malignant narcissism.
The worst examples of this that I personally know of happened in schools. In one case, a teacher (a malignant narcissist in a private school) took indecent liberties with, and sexually abused, pubescent boys he lured into his home while his wife was at work on the night shift. It was later discovered that many people knew that he invited boys to his home on Friday nights. But nobody had seen anything wrong with that. Over time, many school employees had caught him in his classroom alone with a boy — behind a closed, sometimes locked, door and in the back where neither could be seen from hall. Nobody had seen anything suspicious in that. Many people knew this teacher had an explosive temper that he often had to make excuses to a berated student for, but nobody had seen anything abnormal in that. In fact nobody saw anything inappropriate in the inappropriately patronizing and intimate relationship he had with his students. Even when it came between them and their parents.
And nobody thought anything of it when, every few years, he seized any opening in a conversation to pop off with "What? Are you the only one around here who doesn't know? He likes boys," referring to some unmarried teacher. One unmarried teacher after another.
Thus he play-acted the part of his anti-type, a man who was abhorred by homosexual child abuse = certainly NOT the type who might do such a thing himself. Though people saw plenty to view with suspicion in that unmarried teacher, nobody saw anything suspicious in the accuser failing to cite any evidence or report these allegations he was so sure of.
They didn't even see anything suspicious in the accuser glomping onto that unmarried teacher to become his best friend. Even when his doing this became a glaring pattern.
Indeed, every single unmarried teacher who came to that school got assassinated by this, his best friend. And nobody thought anything of it! Satan polished his halo by being a pillar of his parish, a lector and lay communion distributor. And he got away with this for over fifteen years.
A serial killer is less cruel. He doesn't betray a sacred trust by doing it to people who have every good reason to trust him. And even if he tortures them, he doesn't doom his victims to a life-sentence of torture in Hell.
Notice that the "innocent" people he fooled ain't innocent. They committed the Original Sin, believing an obvious lie just because it was juicy. Like Eve.Here's an example of the finger-pointer being guilty of the moral equivalent: Mr. Self-Righteous union-busts to keep the workers in his shoe factory so poor they go barefoot — and shows moral indignation in loudly condemning his neighbor for "muzzling an ox trampling the grain." He gets all fuzzy looking if you try to explain to him that he's doing the same thing, only worse. That's because he views rules, not as guidelines to be followed, but rather as red lines to catch other people with one toe over so he can condemn them. So he ignores the spirit of the law and obsesses over the letter of it.
To wit: It flew in the face of reason for her to think God might be lying. He was her creator. He provided everything for her and Adam. Which means that he had proved he wanted what was good them. He denied them but one thing, telling them that it was for their own good. So, what was she thinking? She had every good reason to believe that he was telling the truth.
Moreover, what credibility is there in a stranger who slithers up to you like a sidewinder? Why not doubt the serpent — someone she had no reason to trust?
Bottom Line: God has high credibility; serpent has about zero credibility. So, Eve wasn't honestly fooled: she just liked serpent's version of the world better, because it made her able to be as God. Adam's reason for swallowing the lie was even worse: he just did it to agree with Eve.
In other words, to please her he prostituted his mind to her. And thus political correctness was born.
Narcissists and political character assassins are dangerous precisely because people do this. If, say, you have known someone for 10 years, you know a lot about him. Doubtless, you have seen his honesty tested and seen that he proved to be an honest man. So, nobody should be able to slither up to you tomorrow and tell you he's dishonest. If you buy that, you are betraying that honest man. To believe that lie, you must annihilate history and 10 years of evidence to the contrary. You are not innocent.
Here's another example of projection that camouflages guilt for the moral equivalent. It also shows that even religious institutions are guilty of projection to polish their image.
The Catholic Church points the finger at mothers who have abortions, saying, "What kind of mother does that?" Okay, that position on the issue is reasonable, and it is the type of thing religion is expected to express its opinion on. But why does the Church harp on abortion when it has so little to say about countless other issues?
What issues? Well, for example, why don't we hear the Church crying out against Catholic dictators who mass-murder and torture their own people? You never hear a peep out of Rome about that. Why does the Church declare women who have abortions excommunicated but not these Catholic dictators? Why didn't it condemn the Irish Catholics in the IRA murdering Protestants? Why doesn't it cry out against the Catholic Mafia? Why doesn't it stop taking money from gangsters and burying them as Catholics in good standing? Why don't we hear the Church crying out against the scourge of child-beating and wife-beating, anti-Semitism and other bigotry, drugs, sweat shops, union-busting, exploiting undocumented migrant workers, and so forth? Why don't we hear it preaching against slander and character assassination? Why is it obsessed instead with just gays and women who have abortions?
The answer is obvious. The Church points the finger at others only for "sins" of which IT is guilty. This deflects attention for those sins off itself and onto others. Damage repair for the Church's image. Not to mention misdirection like that of the teacher in the example above.
The Church goes to great lengths to portray an image of itself as our "holy mother," virtually fusing its image with that of Jesus' mother. The harping on abortion is just part of that act. All this holy motherhood posturing tends to make us forget what Holy Mother Church has done to her own children.
Recall how truculently she has waded through her children by the tens of thousands throughout history. She aborted the lives of countless of her children — throughout the 900 years of the episcopal and monastic inquisitions and now by allowing predatory priests and other religious to sexually prey on countless more of her children. She has stonewalled justice, intimidated victims who seek it, and protected criminals — spiriting them off to Rome or to a distant school or parish for a fresh set of unsuspecting prey.
And to be fair, the Catholic Church certainly isn't the only religious institution guilty of using the pointed finger for misdirection to get our attention off its own sins and act like the opposite of what its conduct makes it. In fact, it does at least have something officially on record against many other evils: religious preachers of other denominations don't even seem to know that the other great evils exist.
Paul was in line with the ancient Hebrew scriptures. Scripture has a name for the spirit in which people point the finger at someone crying, "Look what they're doing! It's evil!" The name of that spirit is satan, which means the "finger-pointer," the "name-slayer" (slanderer, character assassin), the "prosecutor/persecutor," or the "accuser." In some places (e.g., the Book of Job) they also call this spirit "the policer of the world."
So, projection is everywhere.
The worst thing about it is that mud sticks best to a clean spot.
I'm sure that people who do this think they're clever, but it's childsplay. Send a muddy child into an unsupervised schoolyard and wait to see what happens. He will rub himself off on every cleaner, smaller child he can find, until they are all crying and he looks good by comparison.
Looks good by comparison. Those are the all-important words. The hypocrite makes himself look good by comparison with others. He does that the easy way — by smearing himself off on others to make them look bad. This is the root of envy. Which is NOT a rare motive for what people say about others. It's an all-too-common motive.
SOURCE
CLICK FOR A SUPPORT BOARD FOR VICTIMS OF NARCISSISTS
Labels: blame shifting, hypocrite, lying, narcissist, pathological, projection, scapegoating, smear campaign, sociopath
Monday, February 08, 2010
Migraines Could be Caused by Abuse
Researchers from the American Headache Society's Women's Issues Section Research Consortium found that incidence of childhood maltreatment, especially emotional abuse and neglect, are prevalent in migraine patients.
The study also found that migraine patients reporting childhood emotional or physical abuse and/or neglect had a significantly higher number of comorbid pain conditions compared with those without a history of maltreatment.
Both population- and clinic-based studies have demonstrated an association between childhood maltreatment and an increased risk of migraine chronification years later.
A total of 1348 patients diagnosed with migraine completed the surveys. Researchers found migraine sufferers who reported childhood emotional abuse or physical neglect had a significantly higher incidence of comorbid pain conditions compared with those without a history of maltreatment.
In the study population, 61% had at least 1 comorbid pain condition and 58% reported experiencing childhood trauma either by abuse or neglect. The number of different maltreatment types suffered in childhood correlated with the number of comorbid pain in adulthood.
SOURCE
Labels: abuse, anxiety, emotional abuse, maltreatment, migraine headaches, pain, ptsd
Sunday, February 07, 2010
The Super Bowl & Domestic Violece
Jeanette Norman - BellaOnline's Domestic Violence Editor
Are there more reports of domestic violence during Super Bowl season? Do men really get that angry and violent during a sporting event that would cause them to cause harm to their wife/girlfriends and their children?
Some people say this is a myth, some people will tell you it is the truth. If you check out the Urban Legends section of Snopes.com, the author of an article about this claims that there are more reports of domestic violence on Super Bowl Sunday is false. According to the article, Ken Ringle, a reporter for the Washington Post contacted a professor who participated in a study based on the claims of the increase in domestic violence. The professor informed Ringle that the report published based on the study was entirely true.
It is believed that this myth was perpetuated when in 1993 a women’s group asked the NFL to run a public service announcement about domestic violence aimed towards men. So many people must have assumed that domestic violence was a problem particularly during this sporting event because of the unusual nature of this type of commercial during a sporting event.
Many resources that I read while researching for this article state that there has never been a solid study to confirm this statement. With privacy issues for women and children that are in or have been in shelters, it would be a hard study to conduct. However, there have also been numerous newspaper articles, interviews, and other published materials supporting the statement of domestic violence rises during super bowl season. The social workers I personally speak to on a regular basis have said that this statement seems to be true. There is tension still lingering from the holiday season on top of the excitement of “the big game.”
The reports and journalist who decided to prove this claim wrong were mostly males, which may have played a role in some people changing their minds that there is no connection. Rush Limbaugh also had to put his two cents in by saying on his then TV show that the ad during the 1993 Super Bowl was “just a bunch of feminist bilge". He also continued to say the man dressed in a suit in the ad could not be a real abuser: "Like people who beat their wives wear ties.” Needless to say, his comments rubbed me the wrong way when I read them and further confirmed why I do not like that man.
ORIGINAL ARTICLE HERE
Labels: claims, domestic violence, false, men, superbowl, women
Saturday, February 06, 2010
Coping With Triggers
If Something is Scary or Upsetting: Coping With Triggers
A “trigger” is something which reminds you of something painful, frightening, dangerous or upsetting. A trigger can also be something which causes you to react or behave in a certain way—like seeing someone else using a drug and then having a more intense craving to use too, or like encountering something which ‘sets you off’—meaning something that makes you feel explosive, panicky, or like you might want to hurt yourself or someone else.
Figuring out how to take care of and protect yourself when you get triggered is a really powerful thing to do for yourself. And you deserve to feel better!
Here are some things which may be helpful to do when you get triggered. If one of these suggestions doesn’t work for you, or makes things worse—it’s okay not to use it! The most important thing is figuring out what helps you.
Separate from the trigger if you need to: If it’s possible, it may be a good idea to move away from the situation, person, or thing which is triggering you, and then figure out what happened or ask yourself “how am I feeling now?” If the trigger is something which is a present danger or threat to you, it’s very important to focus on getting safe. If the trigger is upsetting because it reminds you of something, it may still be a good idea to take a break from it.
Get grounded in the moment: When something is triggering, often it may be because it brings us back to old feelings of danger, pain or fear. If you’re not in a safe environment when you get triggered, it may help to focus on that first—telling yourself, “Okay, I’m getting triggered because I’m not safe here, so my first step is to get to a safer place if I can, and I’m also going to pay a lot of attention to how I’m feeling as soon as I can.” If you are in a safer environment, it can help to remind myself where and when and who you are—knowing what place you’re at, what day or year it is, and some things about yourself, like “I have been sober for 90 days”, or “I am 23 years old and I have my own life”, or “I have become a very strong, good person”. Reminding yourself that you are not in an old situation may help you gain comfort and strength from who and where you are now.
Remember to breathe: Taking a few slow deep breaths from your stomach can help your body know it’s okay to calm down or feel safer. Often when we’re panicked we take shallow breaths in our chest, rather than breathing from our stomach or our diaphragm. Focusing on breathing more deeply may give you a lot of relief.
Focus on things which help you feel safer or calmer: Figuring out what soothes or reassures you may be new to you, or you may already know things which help. Carrying a familiar object or touchstone with you may be helpful. Thinking about a place or person or activity which makes you feel better and safer may also help. Telling yourself kind or soothing things like “I’m safe now”, or “I don’t deserve to be hurt”, or “I don’t have to respond to that person”, or “I have choices” may also be helpful. Some people will do things like hugging your own shoulders or resting your head on your hands for awhile, something which helps you feel, physically, that you’re taking care of yourself.
Give yourself permission to be upset: Although it may be very helpful to focus on calming down, it’s also important not to beat yourself up for getting triggered. Sometimes when we’ve dealt with a lot of violence we get used to feeling like we should be strong all the time to deal with it, or we learn to feel ashamed because we’re in pain or sick or scared—like we should be handling things better, or that we should recover very quickly and not have problems anymore. It can be good to remember that as a survivor, you’ve had to deal with way too much violence and danger—and that it makes a lot of sense that you’ve been affected by that. Even if the trigger seems like it shouldn’t be such a big deal, you can remind yourself that the trauma and pain and violence you’ve had to deal with are a very big deal, and that to have survived at all—you’ve had to be very strong already.
Ask for help: Sometimes there won’t be safe or helpful people around, or it will feel too hard to reach out, but at other times it may be very helpful to tell someone—“Something made me feel frightened” or “Something made me feel pissed off” or “Something is really making me want to use right now”, and to let that person know how they can be helpful to you. It can be really important to tell them if you know what will or what won’t help you—like saying, “I just want you to listen”, or “I don’t want to talk but I need someone to sit with me for awhile”, or “Can you help me get to a quieter place”, or “I need to be really angry right now, I don’t want to calm down yet”. When you’re triggered, it can be really upsetting if you’re asking for help and someone isn’t responding the way you need—so talking about what will or won’t work can be very important! If there isn’t a friend, loved one, or counselor you can reach out to, remember that you can also call crisis lines or emergency resources if you need to talk someone soon.
How is your body?: Sometimes we can be more emotional or upset because our body is having a rough time—if you haven’t eaten anything healthy, or you need some sleep, or you’re in pain, you may be able to feel a lot better emotionally by paying attention to those needs. When you’re already upset, it’s usually a good idea to stay away from sugar or caffeine or anything that’s going to make your body more agitated or hyper.
Think about your options: One of the tough things about getting triggered is that it often may provoke or push us to want to act out in a particular way because it’s familiar, like using when you feel pain, or lashing out when you feel scared. Sometimes we can forget that we have choices and it can seem like we either have to suppress our feelings, or do whatever we’re used to. Reminding yourself that there are lots of ways to express what you feel may help a lot. Some options might include talking, writing, art, exercise, rest, taking a bath, reading, seeing a movie, or playing with pets or friends. It can help to keep reassuring yourself that you have choices—“I am upset, and I don’t have to use”, “I am angry, and I don’t have to get into it with that person”, “I am scared, and I can do things to protect myself”, “I feel bad, and I can do things to feel better instead of hurting myself”.
Make a self-care plan: Once you’ve gotten some kind of grip on what you’re feeling or what happened, figuring out what you can do to help yourself in the next minutes, the next hour, the next day, the next week can all be important steps. You may want to write down your ideas, or discuss it with a friend or counselor. If you get triggered again, or if you know something may be hard to deal with, it may help you feel stronger to know that you’ve really thought through what to do if things get hard, and you aren’t totally unprepared or powerless.
Drink water: Panic, rage, fear and other painful emotions cause our bodies to release certain kinds of hormones and substances to deal with crisis or emergency. Drinking plenty of water will help your body clean itself out and move through the painful feelings.
Keep paying attention to yourself: Even after you feel calmer or better or less triggered, it can be very important to check in with yourself every now and then, to acknowledge that you had a rough time and need a little extra care and support. Sometimes doing this will let you know if you still need to look for more help or support, or do some things for yourself to recover more.
Labels: abuse, coping, counseling, depression, panic, ptsd, triggers, victims
Friday, February 05, 2010
PTSD
POST-TRAUMATIC STRESS DISORDER
What Is It?
Post Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD) is classified as a type of anxiety disorder, but is actually much more than that. It is a debilitating disorder that often develops after highly traumatizing events, such as natural disasters, personal assaults and combat. In fact, PTSD was first called "shell shock" or "battle fatigue" because it was noticed primarily in combat veterans. Over the years, however, professionals have recognized that PTSD often develops in people who experience a wide variety of traumatizing events. These include car and plane wrecks, earthquakes and floods, rape and other assaults, abuse or being held captive. The person experiencing PTSD may have felt personally threatened or may have felt that the life of someone close to him or her was threatened. It even occurs among professionals such as paramedics and firefighters who respond to plane crashes and natural disasters.
Typically, people experiencing PTSD report persistent and frightening memories of the event and feel emotionally numb and unresponsive. There is a mixture of anxiety related symptoms as well as depression and emotional numbing. Intrusive thoughts and memories of the event are hallmarks of this disorder. This combination of reactions is the key to PTSD.
The traumatic event is relived again and again. Nightmares are common. In some cases, the person suffering from PTSD will feel like he or she is reliving the event. This can include such extremes as illusions, hallucinations and dissociative flashbacks. One Vietnam veteran came to the emergency room of the base hospital, wearing jungle combat fatigues and carrying a rifle. He believed he was in Vietnam and that the year was 1968. In reality, it was Las Vegas in 1985. (No one was hurt in that incident and the veteran was sent for treatment of PTSD.) When the sufferer is exposed to things that remind them of the trauma, there is much distress and this may trigger the "flashback." The sound of helicopters often triggers reactions in Vietnam veterans.
The emotional numbing includes efforts to avoid thoughts, feelings and conversations related to the event. "I just don't want to think about it," is a common reaction and often extends to the avoidance of activities, places and people that might remind the sufferer of the trauma. This avoidance of the trauma may include actual "forgetting" of important aspects of the trauma. People with PTSD find it difficult to enjoy the things they used to find pleasurable. They feel detached from others ("No one can understand"). They find it difficult to experience positive feelings and often believe that their futures are limited.
The anxiety reactions include difficulty falling or staying asleep, irritability and outbursts of anger, difficulty concentrating, startle responses and being constantly on the look out for threats. Some people, including professionals, may interpret these behaviors as "paranoid," when in fact, they are symptoms of PTSD.
Who Experiences PTSD?
PTSD can strike anyone. Children also experience PTSD.3 People who experience PTSD do not have a history of emotional problems, nor are they from particularly "dysfunctional" families. It can happen to anyone, including professionals. The key is the experience of a traumatizing event, not some "predisposing" factor in the person. On the other hand, different people have differing abilities to cope with catastrophic events. Some people exposed to traumatic events do not develop PTSD.
PTSD typically develops shortly after the traumatizing event usually within three months, but it may be delayed for months or years. When it is delayed, there is often a triggering event that recalls the threat from long ago.
According to the National Institute of Mental Health approximately 3.6 percent of U.S. adults between the ages of 18 and 54 (5.2 million people) have PTSD during the course of a given year. About 30 percent of the men and women who have spent time in war zones experience PTSD. It is estimated that one million veterans of the Vietnam War developed PTSD. PTSD has also been detected among veterans of the Persian Gulf War, with some estimates running as high as 8 percent. 4
What is the Course of the Illness?
PTSD can become chronic, lasting for years or even decades. Sometimes it lasts a lifetime. In patients with chronic PTSD, there is often a waxing and waning of symptoms over the course of time. Even in cases where the PTSD seems to be resolved and no longer a problem, certain behaviors and reactions can persist. For example, a woman who was awoken with an intruder in her home in the middle of the night, even after nearly 20 years, can no longer sleep in a totally darkened room. This difficulty rarely causes problems in her daily life and is something she now accepts.
Other forms of mental illness often go along with PTSD. Substance abuse is common. It is possible that the substance abuse develops in an attempt to "self-medicate" for the distressing symptoms of PTSD. Major depression and various other anxiety disorders are often seen. The overlapping diagnostic criteria of the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual 4th edition (DSM-IV)1 may contribute to the multiple diagnoses of sufferers of PTSD.2 Misdiagnosis is also possible if the traumatized person fails to reveal the history of the traumatizing event.
Treatment
The most successful interventions have been Cognitive/Behavioral therapy (CBT) and medications. "Exposure" through detailed recall of the traumatizing event and cognitive restructuring have been particularly helpful. This may be highly distressing to the patient, but in the long run, it is quite helpful in helping to diffuse the trauma of the event.
Various medications are often prescribed. Sertraline (Zoloft) is a selective serotonin reuptake inhibitor (SSRI) that has been approved by the FDA as an indicated treatment for PTSD.2 Psychiatrists often also prescribe a variety of tranquilizers as well as (in some cases) antipsychotic medications. The effectiveness of these medications is less clear.
Another form of treatment that has had some success is Eye Movement Desensitization and Reprocessing (EMDR), but it is not clear if this treatment is as effective as CBT.
Group therapy is probably the best approach for mild to moderate PTSD. This has been shown in studies of combat veterans as well as survivors of natural disasters. In these settings, the sufferers can share their memories and difficulties with others who have gone through the same thing. This helps break down the isolation experienced by many people with PTSD.
References:
1. Diagnostic and Statistical Manual-IV, American Psychiatric Association, 1994.
2. National Center for PTSD..
3.National Institute of Mental Health, PTSD Info.
4. National Institute of Mental Health: Facts about PTSD.
Cathy A. Chance, Ph.D.
Labels: abuse, emotional, manipulation, memories, psychological, ptsd, trauma, verbal abuse
Thursday, February 04, 2010
Mental Illness and Irrationality
Excerpted from I'm Sorry: Repairing a Hurtful RelationshipBy Jay Krunszyinsky
Did you know that one out of every three people suffers from a mental illness? Do you struggle with panic attacks, social fears, emptiness, paranoid thoughts, or extreme highs and lows? As a child, did you grow up with anxiety, attention problems, depression, social interaction problems, developmental problems, extreme energy, or involuntary vocal or motor tics? Did you find yourself pushing others away when you really wanted them to get close to you? The important factor to remember is that many of these disorders cause the person to think irrationally and to hurt others in his relationships. Many times, people with psychiatric and developmental problems do not intend to hurt, nor do they recognize the hurt they cause.
You may be wondering what types of irrational thoughts can prevent a person suffering a mental or developmental disorder from gaining insight into the hurt that he may cause another per-son. Major depression is a very prevalent psychiatric illness in society and will serve as a good example. Do you know what thoughts, feelings, and actions are associated with this disorder? The Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders,Fourth Edition (DSM-IV) is the manual used to classify mental and developmental disorders. The DSM-IV categorizes the thoughts of a depressed person as irrational.
A depressed person thinks that there is no way to solve his problems or to change his life circumstances. This is why a depressed person may have recurrent thoughts of death and suicide. His thoughts produce feelings of sadness, emptiness, fearfulness, worthlessness, and guilt. Some of the behaviors associated with depression include insomnia, diminished interest or pleasure in almost all activities, significant weight loss, and loss of energy each day. A person who possesses these thoughts, feelings, and behaviors will hurt other people in his relationships, though many times he will not recognize that he is doing so. This person will not communicate his problem with another person in a rational manner, nor will he look for ways to resolve his conflicts. This causes the other people in his relationships to also feel overwhelmed, helpless, and frustrated.
Many of the other psychiatric and developmental problems outlined in the DSM-IV involve irrational thoughts. People with schizophrenia experience delusions, or false beliefs. These beliefs, which are the results of their auditory and visual hallucinations, can range from paranoid thoughts that people are attempting to harm them to beliefs that they have special powers and abilities not based in reality.
Some adults and children with hyperactivity or mania think that their activities should provide constant stimulation and pleasure. They place their priorities on people, places, and events that are stimulating to them, which causes them to become disorganized and lose focus. People with various addictions obsessively think about their addicting activity. Many people with personality disorders do not think that others value or love them. They spend much of their time finding ways to make their irrational thoughts become self-fulfilling prophecies. Through their irrational belief that they are not valued or loved, they treat others poorly and set expectations that cannot be met for the other people in their relationships.
The antisocial person believes that he should be able to satisfy his needs and wants regardless of the social norms and laws of society.
SOURCE
Labels: anxiety, depression, irrational, mentally ill, personality disorder, schizophrenia, sociopathy
Wednesday, February 03, 2010
Internet Addiction & Internet Sex
A summary of this article was published in "The Source", July, 2001
Over 130,000,000 Americans are on-line. About 46,000 more people are getting on-line each day. Americans are going on-line looking for information, entertainment and relationships. Use of the Internet (also called the Net) has grown faster than any technology in history including the telephone, television, computers, video games and CD players. The Net provides everyday users with primarily the Web, e-mail, instant messaging, live chat and the ability to purchase goods and services on-line.
"You’ve Got Mail…" I Don’t Care.
"Do you want to know more?" Nope!
"Do you want to see a picture of a naked man?" Of course not!!
"Do you want to see a picture of young boy having sex with an older woman?" Not on your life!!!
"Would you like to talk to a beautiful lonely woman on-line and see what she looks like?" Never!!!!
"Have you have had sex with someone that you have not had sex with in person?" How is that possible?
People are naturally skeptical when they hear someone say there are problems when using the Internet. Here are several important research facts.
Women are now on-line more than men.
50% of the people on-line lie about their age, weight, job, marital status and gender.
20% of the people going on-line will experience clear negative impacts to their life.
Use of the Internet is a contributing factor in nearly 50% of all family, relationship and family problems.
11% of the people going on-line are becoming compulsive or addicted.
How could anything that feels so safe and innocent looking be unhealthy for so many people? Feeling good and not realizing the problem is precisely the problem. People can go anywhere, see almost anything, find out virtually anything, do anything and be anybody they want. They act out in ways that are exciting and they can do without leaving their chair or being with a real person. Accountability, supervision and social consequences are missing in a virtual society.
Problems
The potential problems for new Internet use are significant and may be growing. Nearly 20% of the people going on-line will encounter one or more of the following problems.
Personal neglect
Compulsive checking and "clicking"
Isolation and avoidance from people
Lost productivity
Depression
Marital problems
Sexual addiction
Gambling away savings.
Internet abuse in the workplace
Academic failure.
Are You Compulsive or Addicted To The Net?
Using the Net is not a problem for Internet users who are on-line less than two hours a week. Heavy users are at risk when they are plugged more than 18 hours a week. There is no official diagnosis for an addiction to the Internet. The proposed disorder is called Internet Addiction Disorder (IAD). There is rather exact criteria proposed but it essentially easy to spot a problem. A compulsive and potentially addicted user is on-line more than 10 hours a day in non-work related activity. Answering the question "Am I addicted?" is based on four questions.
Do you feel better when you are on-line, chatting, or exploring the Net?
Are you or have you been spending more and more time on-line?
Are you on-line when you should being doing something else?
Have you tried to cut back and don’t?
You probably have a compulsion if you feel a strong need to get on-line when you should be doing other things in your life. For instance, "Are you forgetting to eat?" Or, "Are you getting up at 3 a.m. in the morning to go to the bathroom and checking your e-mail before you go back to bed?" Checking e-mail at night when no one else is up and for no reason is a compulsion. You may even have early signs of addiction if you feel a need to be on the Internet more and more and feel worse when you stop.
Cyber Society
People go on-line and they are making friends. For many people the Internet is like a private night club or the place where you can find the friends you’ve always wanted. You don’t have to go out and find real people and have an honest relationship. You can stay in your own chair and explore endless activities. You can walk away and come right back. There is always something happening. People will even miss you and ask you to come back. If you embarrass yourself, or people get mad, then you can just change your name, age and marital status and just start over.
It doesn’t take much in the way of bravery to go into the Net. Once you’re in, a user can go anywhere and see almost anything without social consequences or anyone knowing. As result, the Internet is a fostering uninhibited social and sexual behavior. There are clear impacts on relationships when people become uninhibited, dishonest or secretive in life or on the Net. There is much less honesty, integrity and accountability on the Net than there is at work, in school or in a neighborhood.
The Internet is now a contributing factor to nearly one half of all marital or family problems. In some cases, relationships are breaking down when a men or woman develops a relationship in cyber society. High levels of Internet use can produce social isolation, loss of real intimacy and depression.
Men, women and families are going into counseling for relationship problems that are partly or entirely caused compulsive internet use or virtual addictions. Women are filling for divorce claiming that their husbands are having sex on-line or looking at "pornography" for hours every day. Kids stay up all night. Parents stop relating and spend less time raising their children.
The Internet is not only cutting into social and family time but it is also cutting into work. For some employees the Internet is just part of the job. But up to 70% of employees who have high speed Internet access at work can spend up 1 hour a day involved in non-work related activities. At least 6% of people at work use the Internet more than 6 hours per week for non-work related activities.
Cyber Brain Washing
Knowing what can happen to you, your friends or even your children won’t necessarily help. Heavy users will tell you that the Net will change you. If you spend enough time on-line, the rest of the world starts to look unreal or strange. You may not even notice the change. There is no sure way to know if you will get hooked or how long it can take. Here’s how it happens.
Prolonged chats on-line and mouse clicking on the Internet will produce what psychologist call a dissociative state. Net users separate from reality and enter cyber reality. Anyone with children has seen how children can watch television for countless hours. Children and even adults watching television long enough will enter a "hypnotic trance." They "meld" into the television and disconnect from reality. Limited use is a form or healthy recreation or escape. Prolonged and repeated use can create problems.
People can disappear into a good book or a movie, but there is always an end to a book or a movie. The Internet is especially addictive because the Net is endless, interactive, social and exploding with never ending images and information. The Net offers exciting relationships 24 hours a day all over the world. Before the Internet children and couples stopped working and talking with their friends after dark. Spending the evening together reading, playing games and watching television together was the norm. But not anymore.
How do people get caught up in the Net?
For one thing, human beings are curious. We like to see more and do more. Many of us like to travel. When we can’t travel, we like to read books and go to movies. We like to feel competent and in control. Human beings like to feel better and they don’t like to feel bad. We like to do things that feel good and avoid things that feel worse. We especially like doing pleasurable things more and more. Being on the Internet is not necessarily about having a good time. Being on-line might make you feel better but it might just change how you feel. It can be an escape from reality that isn’t necessarily better for you. For some people, a painful or disgusting fantasy is preferable to a less painful or disgusting reality.
Have you ever noticed that some people watch television even when there is nothing good to watch. And instead of turning the TV off, they resort to channel switching. The act of switching channels repeatedly is an annoying process that makes the rest of us want to leave the room or take the remote control away from somebody. The Net is a lot like television only the Net is timeless, interactive, challenging and endless.
Psychologists explain the seduction and addictive nature of the Net primarily in terms of a behavior modification process called a variable reinforcement schedule. That means you don’t know how much of a reward you will get and when for your behavior. A variable reinforcement schedule is the most addictive reward system. Slot machines are designed and operate in the same principle.
When you keep playing a slot machine, the odds are that you will eventually loose everything. But the human brain loves the possibilities and excitement of "winning" in the moment and it ignores the long term consequences. The occasional win doesn’t make up for the overall loss. People play anyway because the occasional win is highly rewarding for those who play long enough. Some people can walk away and stay away. Other can’t walk away or they always come back.
The Internet is also more addictive than a slot machine – especially once they begin to master the technology. Playing on the Net can give you self-confidence. A slot machine doesn’t. The most common rewards from a slot machine are those curious noises, spinning pictures and flashing lights. Once in a while a person wins some money.
Would you believe it, a cable modem is more addictive than a slower dial-up modem. Most people had no patience for the Internet when they had a dial up modem. The rewards were slow and boring. That changed when high speed modems allowed for rapid "clicking" and responses. People with high speed modems are now disappearing into a world where they wait anxiously for the result of the next click. The surprise, shock value and speed in which a person gets these "hits" of information and imagery are the key to creating a compulsion and addiction. Time begins to have no meaning when your next "hit" is just a "click" away. There is no time to think about something else you could or should be doing - unless you are waiting. People don’t think of what else they should be doing and they increasingly find there is always time for one more click and one more chat.
More than a slot machine, everything on the Internet is an adventure with social opportunities. It can be mildly or tremendously exhilarating. People feel rewarded when they finally figure it out why their software or a web site is not working. Every improvement in your skills including upgrades in software and your access to new and exciting links can produces a mind altering change in your brain chemistry. The most powerful change is called a dopamine rush. Dopamine is a chemical in the brain that controls brain function including decision making, impulsiveness, and it is released when you experience certain stimulation. It can improve your mood, confidence and produce a feeling of pleasure.
Cyber Sex
Men dominated the Net until just recently. Women are on-line more than men now. Men seek out pornography more than women. Women a seeking out relationships. But men and women are using the Internet equally for "cybering" (cyber sex). Cyber sex is defined as the consensual sexual discussion on-line for the purpose of achieving arousal or an orgasm.
People involved in cyber sex universally minimize the importance and impact of their behavior. They say "It’s was just on-line" or "It’s not real sex." Patients are telling counselors and therapists that having cyber sex with an adult is not an affair (assuming it really was an adult and not a teenage boy). Marriage and family counselors are no longer asking, "Did you had an affair?" Or, "Did you have sex with someone?" We are now asking "Have you have had sex with someone that you have not had sex with in person?" The bad news is that some teenagers are becoming sexual addicts by the age of 16. The good news is that they are not necessarily having intercourse yet.
What’s changes people most is their access to sexual content. People would never have access to such a wide range of sexually explicit material without the Internet. They can get it quickly and easily. It’s really easy for children to explore the Net for hours at a time without being caught. The problem is that people become "cross involved" with other content when they are exploring less intense material. There are web sites that are gateways to other more explicit and shocking content. Before long people can end up involved in sexual content that is way beyond their original interest and desire. It eventually becomes sick.
Many people go on-line to find information. But unfortunately the most perverse human and even human-animal sexual interactions are available on-line. The biggest "rushes" for the severe addicts come from violent sexual cruelties that are available on-line. People tell themselves that can just click and look for a second, but they don’t realize that the trauma and stimulating effects are addictive. The most addictive content is the most shocking that changes your mood quickly. A quick look at graphic violence is a "rush" even if you find it offensive. Normal people can become addicted to disgusting content not because they approve but because it changes and excites their mood. People become excited and disgusted at the same time.
As people become more comfortable, they begin to disappear and literally live on-line. Some will eventually move from back from the Internet to the real world. Eventually some will start seeking out people for real sex instead of cyber sex. A "danger downloader" is someone who views content that eventually creates a compulsion to explore potentially dangerous behavior in real life. "Danger downloaders" actually go out to fulfill their sexual fantasies with people who have cyber names like "Slave Master".
Internet Propaganda
People argue that the Internet saves time, but most people are merely spending more time learning how to save less and less time. The end result is that home users are loosing track of time and spending countless hours mastering and playing around with a technology that accomplishes nothing and generate no income. They end up getting behind on work, chores, child care and spending time with real people.
Internet technology does not add to the quality of life for most people. It provides a sense of mastery especially because the technology is unreliable and it requires people to master a changing technology. It is interesting challenge and often rewarding.
Did you know that more and more web sites are structured to get you there, keep you there, expose you to advertising and get you to spend money? All kinds of trickery and technology are being used to manipulate people. For instance, WhiteHouse.Com is a pornography site. The real White House web site is at WhiteHouse.Gov. And if you mistype the address of a web site for an airline or famous person you could end up in a web site for sadomasochistic bondage. Even worse, you might find that you are trapped and can’t get out. Backloading is a technique where you can’t get out of pornography web sites once you get in. You eventually realize that you have to shut down your computer, but not until colorful, sexual and even traumatic images are burned into your brain.
The Real World Vs Cyber World
Would you let your child go anywhere and spend time with anyone they wanted?
Do you want your child working on homework, playing music or shooting baskets with potential friends?
Do you want your child spending 2 to 4 hours a day on the Internet playing games, looking at pictures, talking with strange people in chat rooms or visiting a "private bedroom" while they pretend to be an adult?
Would you let your husband go over to the house of a woman you don’t know and spend hours talking about love, sex, his dreams, his frustration and the difficulty raising your children while he lies about his marital status?
Do you want to meet people on-line when you know that most of that relationship is based on a lie?
Do you want to work at building a real friendship that could last a lifetime?
Would you let your child go to the library if a pornography shop was in the back and no adults were watching? Or worse yet, would you let your child go into a pornography shop where adults were watching?
Psychologists agree than most things in life that have value require effort to accomplish. The Internet is a tool, but not a life. The Internet is a technological challenge, but it is not a real life challenge. It provides users with a sense of mastery in a machine world but not society, work, school or a relationship. The Internet allows for uninhibited social and sexual interactions. The Internet creates a feeling of adventure. It is stimulating and it can easily become shocking. If you need to be certain, go to www.Google.Com and run a search using sexual words. Then be prepared to be shocked at what you, your family and friends can easily find without charge and without verification of age.
There is no doubt that the Internet is becoming a substitute for an active life. The Internet is socially safe. But does it really help with shyness? You can go anywhere and be anyone you want on the Internet. Overweight people don’t need to become physically active and eat properly, they can pretend they are young, beautiful and buff, and no one will challenge their fantasy. Shy teenager girls and boys can have sex on line without fear of rejection. You can look at anything and talk to anyone you want without your parents, friends or spouse finding out. There is virtually no accountability when you are on-line.
The research on children is becoming very interesting. It turns out that teenagers are in greater risk that adults. Shy boys and girls in large school are especially vulnerable to having problems. Small schools have a lower incidence of teenage Internet addiction. Shy kids in large schools are withdrawing into their rooms. Some are becoming withdrawn, disturbed, and impatient. A few are becoming a violence risk. It should be no surprise that some teenagers prefer the cyber world and become infuriated and lonely in the real world.
Those with ADHD are especially vulnerable. The Internet appears to have calming effect and is the perfect escape from distractibility. Instant messaging presents the greatest risk for ADHD teenagers. It is not only becomes compulsive but it puts teens in virtual proximity to adults pretending to be kids.
Internet use began to cut down on family TV time. But now people are one the Internet while they are watching TV. Chat, E-mail and Instant Messaging have become major forms of entertainment for an older children and teens.
Prevention
The Internet has been designed to be visible and accessible. At present, there is no way to effectively prevent access to inappropriate content nor is there a reliable way to restrict activity. What methods exist can be circumvented by clever children and adults. Fortunately there are a number of ways to control Internet use.
Businesses have developed the technology to monitor employee Internet use in the work place. Employees are less likely to abuse this resource if they know it is being monitored. Human accountability and social consequences are a major deterrent.
Another way to create accountability is to place a computer in a public place. Visibility creates social pressure and consequences for actions. People are less likely to view socially objectionable material in public. Signs of compulsive behavior will become apparent to friends, peers or family members when Internet use is public.
While business has adopted technology to monitor employee use, families do not yet have ready access to such software. There is software to load onto your computer and to your Internet services provider that can monitor and let parents and adults know how their computer is being used.
Psychological and even physical safety are real concerns since children are connecting to all the information on the planet. Very few parents would not let their child go anywhere anytime and speak to anyone. Likewise, parents should not allow their child to go on-line unless they know where they are going and who they will be with. Leaving a child alone in their room with access to the world is a risky decision.
You can’t allow yourself to become Internet ignorant if you care about your relationships or family. You need to know what your employees at work and family members are doing. What adults do in their free time is their business. What you employees and children do is another matter. Children under the age of 16 are not ready to drive a car and they are not capable of resisting or understanding the dangers of being on the Internet. Monitoring and supervision is essential.
Finally, prevention is more likely to be assured if you maintain balance in your life. People go on-line looking for something missing in their life or they become involved in content and relationships on-line that begin to interfere with important routines, responsibilities and relationships. Making a conscious effort and commitment to a balanced life is crucial.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Dr. Conner is a clinical, medical and family psychologist who completed a research and training fellowship in graduate medical education and health education. He provides training, evaluation and intervention services for adults, families and youth. He is Board Certified in Traumatic Stress, Emergency Crisis Intervention, Emergency School Response and Sports Psychology. This article is also available at www.CrisisCounseling.Com. Dr. Conner’s practice is located in Bend Oregon and he can be reached at 541 388-5660 or Conner@CrisisCounseling.Com or www.Education-Options.Com
Labels: abuse, addiction, coercion, cybersex, infidelity, internet addiction, lies, manipulation
Tuesday, February 02, 2010
Overcoming Triangulation in Love Relationships
Reginald B. Humphreys, Ph.D. , Kathleen P. Eagan, M.S.
from the book: Detoxifying Love Relationships: Solutions for Couples
Although the term triangulation may at first seem to be highly complex, it has a simple meaning. Triangulation refers to the tendency of certain individuals to become involved in love triangles. The person struggling with triangulation goes through a repetitive cycle of love relationships, in which two or more men are simultaneously involved with the same woman, or in which one man is simultaneously involved with two or more women.
The problem of triangulation in love relationships remains one of the most serious issues confronting modern society. Infidelity in love relationships, often caused by triangulation, destroys the marriages and lives of many individuals, couples, and families each year.
Theological and religious sources would maintain that the answer to this problem is already at hand, and that a strict observation of principles of loyalty and fidelity can eliminate the phenomena and effects of triangulation. However, much of today’s society is beyond the reach of religion, and so society’s growing epidemic of triangulation and infidelity is likely to continue to rage out of control unless solutions are found which transcend the limits of individual religions. Also, clinical experience reveals that even enthusiastic participants in religious activities are often crippled with the same triangulation tendencies of the non-religious.
Overcoming triangulation does require that the individual be grounded in some system of morality or other. However, the main issues in triangulation are inadequately understood by most, and therefore these crucial issues are not usually addressed in any adequate fashion. The two most important issues which should be addressed in order to fully understand and correct triangulation, are:
(1) the tendency of the individual to unconsciously reconstruct and reenact unhealthy love triangles which were present in the individual’s early childhood experiences with parents, and;Only the well-analyzed person is usually aware of these two critical aspects of triangulation. On initial introduction of these ideas to patients in psychotherapy, it is common for both these notions to be rejected immediately as incorrect or inapplicable. However, the therapist will have to return to these ideas time after time, until the patient finally accepts and works on these two issues as the issues which are in control of the triangulation problem.
(2) repetitive attempts by the individual to symbolically "correct", "resolve", or "master" these historical issues and their ill effects, within current-day love triangles.
Many persons caught up in lifestyles riddled with triangulation claim that they would like to overcome this problem. However, the true motivation for this kind of self-correction rests entirely on the individual’s ability to deal with the two core issues. The more the person expresses opposition or indifference to these key insights, the worse that person’s prognosis for improvement becomes.
The person may protest that no love triangles or infidelity were present in the parents’ marriage. And while this may be factually true, this is where the person must learn to broaden their understanding of the nature of love triangles. The patient must eventually learn that he or she was the third party in the triangle, and that as a child, the individual became trapped in an envelope of triangulation dynamics which has left a life-long and deeply life-altering residual.
Patients often react with great intensity to the first discussion of these issues. The topic becomes controversial, and the patient may express disgust over the idea that it is possible that the child and parents are engaged in love-triangle dynamics. This disgust represent the deep unacceptability to the person of childhood triangulation feelings, and explains why the individual has felt forced to repress and hide these issues throughout life, although symbolically reenacting these in each new attempt at a love relationship.
As therapeutic work progresses, the individual may be even more resistant to the idea that within the early-childhood love triangle involving parents, that one of the parents may be loved obsessively, jealously, and possessively, while other parents may be loathed and hated with intensity that may reach homicidal proportions.
Rather than being in a context where the patient could have loved both parents in an appropriate way, the child is prematurely caught up in adult heterosexual dynamics, in which defenses of splitting may play a primary role. One parent is idealized as perfect, and becomes the repository for the child’s fantasies of perfection and omnipotence, while the other parent becomes the repository of everything that is hated, rejected, and scorned.
Being unable to accomplish the normal developmental task of establishing an integrated perception of parents which includes a realistic sense of both desirable and undesirable parental qualities, the patient also loses the ability to have an integrated perception of self. "Splitting of the self" occurs, and this non-integration of self-identity continues throughout the patient’s life unless this split is corrected in treatment.
Without such correction, the individual is condemned to compulsively repeat and reenact the unhealthy triangulation dynamics in the family of origin. These sexually-toned dynamics, impossible for the child to integrate, are re-enacted with each new person and relationship in life.
It is not difficult to understand why exposing the child to adult triangulation dynamics would have a life-long destructive impact. The child has literally had their childhood stripped away or stolen by the parents’ illness. The traumatic loss of childhood usually has lasting or permanent effects. The premature forcing of the child to cope with disturbing adult dynamics floods the child with unmanageable feelings and reactions, which leave an indelible effect. The child now is eroticized by the triangulation situation or thoughts of triangulation. Over time, only the triangular situation can "turn the person on". Without the psychological presence of a third party, feelings of love and eroticism are unattainable. Eventually, the only way to achieve a feeling of love and excitement requires that there be one person who is idealized, and another who can be rejected and symbolically "murdered" by rejection or elimination.
In the childhood situation either parent may be idealized, regardless of the sex of the child. Similarly, either parent may be hated with unconscious homicidal intensity.
Although few adults remember childhood erotic or retaliatory feelings, a few do have memories. The majority who do not remember the oedipal period of development (which is normal) must do their therapeutic work by reconstruction of events rather than direct recall. Adults may also deny any idealizing of current partners or any destructive motivation towards other partners. These feelings are usually so deeply buried that much work may be required for the person to see that each time they enact a love triangle, they are symbolically winning the idealized parent, and murdering or eliminating the hated one.
Persons with triangulation pathology (oedipal pathology) cut a destructive swath through humanity, retaliating against and symbolically "murdering" one "love partner" after another.
Especially characteristic of the "murderer" in these instances is a cold-heartedness and lack of remorse or sense of responsibility for the "victim" in the triangle. The person, having invested through splitting defenses all their rage toward one parent, can easily enjoy the disposal of the hated parent by disposal of the parental stand-in in the contemporary love triangle. If asked to reverse their infidelity, they may feel an utter coldness and unwillingness to alter their life course. They "must" murder the parent surrogate in order to fully "get off". Empathy or concern for their victim is impossible, and highly irrelevant. To do "what is profitable for oneself" becomes the only remaining remnant of a moral standard. The parent-surrogate is dehumanized and negated, as the child feels is justly deserved by the parent (surrogate) for having put the child through a traumatic loss of their own childhood, and the resulting lifelong ill effects.
Persons with triangulation pathology are often incapable of normal feelings of empathy or responsibility toward their "victims". Therefore, these persons can be easily thought of as being psychopathic, due to their unwillingness to adopt a responsible correction to their acting out, even when confronted. During the symbolic act of murdering the hated parent, their lack of remorse is obvious.
Confronting these behaviors in psychotherapy, the therapist becomes the only possible mechanism for correcting the defects of conscience that can allow the person to harm others in a wanton and indifferent fashion. The technique required in the psychotherapy of such individuals is highly specific. Two case vignettes are provided.
Patient N:
Patient N presented with a history of serial love relationships of varying degrees of duration. These were characterized by a rapid development of physical intimacy, immediate spending of all leisure time with the partner, a fusional quality of interaction, and then abrupt ending provoked by minor causes.
During the unfolding of one of these liaisons, therapist asked patient whether he had any perception regarding the eventual outcome of the current relationship. Patient revealed that he knew that he would eventually terminate the liaison. Over time, it was revealed that patient always had a perception that the relationship would end, but desired to experience whatever could be experienced as long as things could work out.
On questioning as to whether the respective feminine partners had a similar lack of concern over the future, i.e. an equivalent degree of comfort with a "no-strings, no-future" kind of expectation, the patient revealed that the current love object was not comfortable with this at all, and regularly requested a change in the status of the relationship to one with a serious future.
With analysis of new relationships and retrospective review of former ones, it became clear that Patient N was a "heartbreaker" in that each person he romanced experienced the termination of the relationship by him as traumatic and damaging. Patient N had left a string of depressed, brokenhearted women as victims of his psychopathic disregard of their lives and feelings.
Was N psychopathic, or merely neurotic? The answer to this crucial diagnostic question is often revealed by the patient’s response to the therapist’s verbal interventions.
Over time, the therapist asked N to recognize and acknowledge his destructive romantic patterns, and to come to terms with what it would mean about his character if he were to be willing to continue to inflict psychic pain and damage upon each new lover.
Although N may have always had a subliminal awareness of the implications of his relationship conduct, once it had been named and discussed in psychotherapy, the entire context could begin to shift. With his pattern now "on the table", patient could be asked to reverse his pattern and to adopt responsible conduct during new liaisons. N failed to do this, while acknowledging "I know that I should".
Triangulated patients can be expected to reject the therapist’s encouragement for them to give up exploitive relationships. These individuals are at the very brink of their developmental deficit, and need help to "bridge the gap" up to the next level of maturational sophistication.. At this juncture, the interventions of the therapist are critical. If the patient’s conscience development is ever to be solidified, there is no alternative except to succeed with the patient at this point. The therapist can no longer be a passive witness to the spectacle of abuse, but must now begin to operate according to the maxim that if the therapist cannot be part of the solution, they have become a part of the problem.
During the unfolding of one of N’s liaisons, at a highly opportune moment, the therapist asked N if he was planning on continuing with the relationship pattern as usual, and if so, inquired whether N would mind terminating therapy first, so that therapist could be saved from again witnessing the savage destruction of an innocent human being. Along with this, therapist acknowledged the fact that since N had continued his harmful conduct without interruption, that the therapy should now be considered to be failing anyway, further strengthening the appropriateness of terminating therapy at the current juncture.
Patient N’s subsequent choice to alter his relationship conduct was motivated by his desire to retain the therapeutic relationship, and to regain acceptance by the therapist. This factor works exactly in psychotherapy as it works in raising children. Children develop a conscience in order to retain parental acceptance, and if parents are flawed or passive in their teaching of conscience, or have deficient conscience themselves, then significant deficiencies in the child’s conscience development usually occur. To reverse the ill effects of this deficient parenting, the therapist assumes a parenting role in requiring the patient to either progress morally or exit treatment.
Beginning with Freud’s earliest observations regarding childhood oedipal issues, successful resolution of oedipal issues has been regarded as the fundamental cornerstone of conscience development. Without renunciation of the forbidden oedipal love object (parent), conscience formation is incomplete, and moral deficiency is inevitable and pervasive.
To correct the deficient adult conscience, the adult patient is always asked to renounce the inappropriate love object. If they choose to do so, even if with complaints, then they may be assumed to have occupied the neurotic spectrum of psychopathology. The more the patient resists the renunciation of the inappropriate love-object, the more the diagnosis should be psychopathic personality.
To expand on this important idea, it should be recognized that the neurotic triangulator can be persuaded to renounce inappropriate conduct, and feel remorse when the usually-repressed implications of their conduct are illuminated. No similar remorse or motivation for self-correction can be evoked in the psychopathic triangulator, who remains apathetic about the injury done to others, and never renounces the illicit love-object.
It is always tragic if the patient refuses to renounce the illicit partner in the current triangulation. Before the therapist brings this issue to the forefront, there always remains the possibility that the individual might choose a moral alternative. However, once the patient identifies with the psychopathic choice, then their personality becomes crystallized in alignment with a psychopathic orientation. At this point, the prognosis for the future begins to approach zero. However, occasionally the patient may leave therapy and return months or years later, as the "lessons" from the work on triangulation become gradually integrated. The patient returns to now deal in earnest with the issues previously analyzed.
Persons suffering from borderline personality disorder (BPD) also exhibit triangulation in their close relationships. These individuals are easily differentiated from oedipal neurotics by the pervasive presence of many other regressed symptoms, including profound depression, rage, poor impulse control, among others. In contrast, the neurotic is characterized by the central role which oedipal concerns take in the individual’s daily existence, along with a relative absence of other major symptoms.
Triangulated relationships and dynamics are sometimes suggestive of schizophrenia. A tipoff to the presence of an underlying schizophrenic process may be found in the degree of chaoticism of the triangulation patterns. For example, if a situation is already complicated by the presence of several love triangles, the most chaotic thing that could happen might be for the schizophrenic individual to add yet another triangulation to the situation by recruiting a new liaison. The more unpredictable, bizarre, or unfathomable a triangulation acting-out behavior seems, the more a schizophrenic process might be indicated. A diagnostic hypothesis of schizophrenia would of course require corroboration on other traditional diagnostic grounds.
In summary, triangulation phenomena are seen in small amounts in most relationships. Seriously harmful triangulation phenomena may occur in neurotic individuals, in psychopathic and borderline personalities, and in schizophrenia. Individuals at the treatable end of the spectrum, the neurotic end, are distinguished by the individual’s willingness to recognize and reverse the triangular acting-out, through renunciation of the illicit love-object (the triangulated relationship partner). The psychopathic patient refuses to revise their conduct, and becomes solidified in a non-empathic stance of willful abuse to the "victim" in the love triangle. The intractable patient refuses to stop reenacting the symbolic pattern of possession of the idealized parent, and "murder" or elimination of the opposing parent.
Patient Y:
Patient Y was a woman involved in a relationship which was fairly long-term, but unsatisfying. Patient Y had recently met another man who was desired, and the possibility of a liaison seemed of interest to both. Patient Y discussed her plans to see the new interest socially, citing her enhanced interest and feeling as compared to her current relationship.
Therapist advised the patient that since her feelings of new interest occurred before she had announced or decided upon leaving her current involvement, that her feelings of attraction could not be trusted as valid. Any feelings for a new person would tend to be idealizing as compared with her feelings for the individual in the more lasting relationship, which would tend to be more reality-based and less contaminated with idealizing fantasy. Only new, shallow relationships allow for deep idealization fantasies, and often promote splitting of toxic projections into the partner who has greater longevity of relationship with the individual.
Patient Y asked if the new love interest might not "work out" in spite of its inappropriate beginnings. The patient was advised that personal relationships which are built on the abuse and misfortune of others cannot later result in a valid relationship. The moral stain attached to the relationship from its inception is permanent, providing a built-in nullification of the validity of the relationship in all futures to come.
Patient was further advised that if the therapist were to witness the patient abusing her relationship partner in this fashion, that the therapist would be obliged to resign as therapist, as the commission of such actions by the patient would have profound implications that would tend to disqualify her as a valid candidate for future success in psychotherapeutic activities with that therapist.
Striking about the case of Y is that as soon as the barrier of resistance to renouncing the illicit love-object had been transcended, the patient was flooded with many critical perceptions of the new love interest, including an acute perception of severe flaws in the new person which had been obscured or repressed under the influence of intense idealization and idealizing defenses.
Patient Y’s gratitude to the therapist for "rescuing" her from the use of idealizing defenses with men she barely knew was profound. Her subsequent ability to succeed in her already-existing love relationship was attributed by her to her acquired ability to ignore and contain triangulation impulses, rather than being tempted to act on them.
In the cases of both patients N and Y, appreciation was eventually shown to the therapist for insisting that each patient achieve moral advancement when the patient was otherwise uninclined to advance. Each patient showed moral advance in other areas as well, as the generalized benefits of conquering triangulation dynamics began to accrue. Both preferred their developmental advances over their former acting out, and both went on to achieve fidelity and success in their respective love relationships.
In couples where neither party is in psychotherapy, the process is similar. The triangulating partner is usually confronted with their disloyalty by the other partner, and asked to renounce the illicit (triangulated) third party. However, the spouse, lover, or suitor of an individual rarely has the leverage and influence which are available to the therapist, and therefore rarely get a positive response to their request. Without the needed influence from a psychotherapist, the neurotic’s underlying potential to mature and transcend triangulation may never be fully realized.
Rationale for Interventions:
What is the nature of therapeutic change in these clinical examples? Why are these specific interventions indicated, and how may their effects be understood?
The original reason the individual acquired developmental arrest within the oedipal phase is that the child’s parents did not shield or protect the child from exposure to adult triangulation dynamics. Instead of being allowed to devote their inherent maturational capacities to the task of resolving their personal oedipal issues, the child’s life sphere is contaminated or saturated with the unfinished oedipal issues of each parent. The child automatically takes on the unfinished oedipal issues of each parent, as well as a new contamination that has to do with the way the particular childhood experiences originally unfolded. For example, if a child was used by one parent as a shield and buffer against the other parent, then the child’s oedipal disturbance will reflect this problem as well as each of the parent’s unresolved oedipal issues.
The adult with triangulation pathology cannot seem to take a stand based on conscience, fairness, and morality. The reason is clear: the child’s parents were unable to take a protective, empathic stance toward the child, by protecting the child from adult triangulation dynamics. The child therefore cannot take a protective stance toward anyone else whom they may harm within a love triangle. Empathy for the "victim" is impossible, as modeling of moral conduct by parents was inadequate.
Before the individual can take a empathic, moral stance which may be personally costly, this behavior must be modeled within the therapeutic relationship. The therapist must take a moral stand risking great cost (loss of the patient’s therapy) for the sake of the patient’s evolution. Also, the therapist must model a distaste and unwillingness to be a silent participant or accomplice in the degradation, harm, and destruction of any human being. In this special clinical circumstance, the therapist must momentarily shift into modeling empathy for the victim (of the love triangle) instead of empathy for the patient. In so doing, the therapist is not truly losing empathy with the patient, but has refocused the empathic connection on attempting to resonate with the patient’s latent capacity to function empathically and with conscience. Not until the patient is convinced regarding the necessity of maintaining empathy for all individuals at all times can the solidification of the individual’s conscience development be regarded as complete.
Parents use this same approach when they have empathy for a pet which a child has carelessly harmed, or for any sibling or other child whom their child may have hurt. Parents, like therapists treating adults with triangulation pathology, must ally themselves with the individual’s latent potential to function empathically if they hope to promote evolution of the empathic capacity of the individual. Without continuous functioning of the empathic faculty, conscience development remains arrested at the oedipal level.
Labels: abusive, brainwashing, control mind control, jealousy, love, manipulation, repetition compulsion, triangulation, unhealthy
Monday, February 01, 2010
Unresolved Trauma
REASONS FOR AND SYMPTOMS OF
The following are symptoms that may result from a more commonplace, unresolved trauma, especially if there were earlier, overwhelming life experiences:Physical
• Eating disturbances (more or less than usual)
• Sleep disturbances (more or less than usual)
• Sexual dysfunction (unable or unwilling to engage in sexual relations)
• Low energy
• Chronic, unexplained pain
Emotional
• Depression, spontaneous crying, despair and hopelessness
• Anxiety
• Panic attacks
• Fearfulness
• Compulsive and obsessive behaviors
• Feeling out of control
• Irritability, angry and resentment
• Emotional numbness
• Withdrawal from normal routine and relationships
Cognitive
• Memory lapses, especially about the trauma
• Difficulty making decisions
• Decreased ability to concentrate
• Feeling distracted
• ADHD-like symptoms (compulsiveness, needing to talk about it over and over, lack of attention span, rushing around, etc)
The following additional symptoms of emotional trauma are commonly associated with a severe precipitating event, such as a natural disaster, exposure to war, rape, assault, violent crime, major car or airplane crashes, or child abuse. Extreme symptoms can also occur as a delayed reaction to the traumatic event.
Re-experiencing the Trauma
• intrusive thoughts
• flashbacks or nightmares
• sudden floods of emotions or images related to the traumatic event
Emotional Numbing and Avoidance
• amnesia
• avoidance of situations that resemble the initial event
• detachment
• depression
• guilt feelings
• grief reactions
• an altered sense of time Increased Arousal
• hyper-vigilance, jumpiness, an extreme sense of being "on guard"
• overreactions, including sudden unprovoked anger
• underreactions, "deer in headlights" reaction to being yelled at or invalidated
• general anxiety
• insomnia
• obsessions with death
What are the possible effects of emotional trauma?
Even when unrecognized, emotional trauma can create lasting difficulties in an individual's life. One way to determine whether an emotional or psychological trauma has occurred, perhaps even early in life before language or conscious awareness were in place, is to look at the kinds of recurring problems one might be experiencing. These can serve as clues to an earlier situation that caused a dysregulation in the structure or function of the brain.
Common personal and behavioral effects of emotional trauma:
• substance abuse
• compulsive behavior patterns
• self-destructive and impulsive behavior
• uncontrollable reactive thoughts
• inability to make healthy professional or lifestyle choices
• dissociative symptoms ("splitting off" parts of the self)
• feelings of ineffectiveness, shame, despair, hopelessness
• feeling permanently damaged
• a loss of previously sustained beliefs
Common effects of emotional trauma on interpersonal relationships:
• inability to maintain close relationships or choose appropriate friends and mates
• sexual problems
• hostility
• arguments with family members, employers or co-workers
• social withdrawal
• feeling constantly threatened
What if symptoms don't go away, or appear at a later time?
Over time, even without professional treatment, symptoms of an emotional trauma generally subside, and normal daily functioning gradually returns. However, even after time has passed, sometimes the symptoms don't go away. Or they may appear to be gone, but surface again in another stressful situation. When a person's daily life functioning or life choices continue to be affected, a post-traumatic stress disorder may be the problem, requiring professional assistance.
~~~~~~~~~~~
Online Resources for Emotional or Psychological Trauma
www.sidran.org
This noncommercial site offers a thorough description of the causes and symptoms of trauma.
www.trauma-pages.com/pg2.htm
This popular non-commercial site by David Baldwin does a thorough job of defining and describing PTSD.
www.tlcinstitute.org/trauma.html
Is an educational institution that focuses on violent traumatic events and fears in children's lives. Especially helpful is the distinction made between trauma and grief.
www.traumainstitute.org/trauma.php
is a noncommercial site that focuses on the societal as well as personal impact of trauma
www.saferelationshipsmagazine.com
Sandra L. Brown, MA's informative and supportive website
Labels: abuse, distrubances, invalidated, ptsd, trauma, unresolved
Sunday, January 31, 2010
Abuser Red Flags/ Victim Red Flags
We believe that we have identified some of the "early warning" signs that we missed in ourselves and our abusers. Note that the abuser can be male or female; the victim can also be either male or female. Not every behavior listed below will be exhibited by a single individual. However, you may want to question your relationship if you find that a large number of these behaviors appear in yourself or your partner.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Abuser's Behavior
Watch out for these behaviors in your partner. Members of my support group believe that these are warning signs that this person may be an abuser. Note that the abuser can be male or female.
- Jealous of time or resources you give others.
- Gets angry if you spend "too much time" with friends, family, or children.
- Insists that it is "a bad time" to talk to family on the phone.
- Feels that resources are "wasted" if given to children.
- Gets angry if you do favors for other people or give them things.
- Would rather throw something away than give it to someone else.
- Is disinterested in or feels threatened by your personal desires or goals.
- Finds your hobbies boring, pointless, unproductive, or a waste of time.
- Is uncooperative about attending parties or events that interest you.
- Picks a fight or creates a crisis just before an event that is important to you.
- States or implies that your interests should not interfere with spending time with them.
- Is rude or inconsiderate of others in a self-centered way.
- Insists on discussing something with you while you are trying to read or watch television.
- Expects you to be the one who answers the door or telephone.
- Expects you to drop what you are doing when summoned.
- Interrupts others while talking on a consistent basis.
- Will not act to accommodate others' convenience or comfort.
- Won't go outside to smoke
- Will not turn down TV or radio while others are talking.
- Is unconcerned and unapologetic if rude behavior is pointed out.
- Does not respect your right to make your own decisions.
- Insists that your decision "affects them" and therefore should be a "joint" decision.
- Gets angry or hurt if you don't take their advice.
- Criticizes or questions the wisdom of decisions that you make without their input.
- Considers their own logic or intellect to be superior to all others.
- Insists that their way is the "right way".
- Claims that their arguments are based on logic or sound evidence and that yours are not.
- Places no value on decisions made based on feelings or intuition.
- Believes that any opinion you have is invalid, illogical, hysterical, or selfish.
- Is completely intolerant of any criticism of their own behavior.
- Is confident that their employer and/or employees are all defective somehow.
- Considers your friends to be idiots.
- Extremely opinionated and critical of others
- Racist or sexist.
- Dogmatic about behavior in others.
- Unwilling to tolerate opinions that differ from their own.
- Has double standards for behavior.
- Is rude to your family.
- Dislikes your family.
- Has "trouble" at work.
- Is chronically unemployed or changes jobs frequently.
- Explains employment set-backs as some sort of victimization.
- Believes that their boss treats them poorly.
- Believes that their co-workers are working against them.
- Disregards laws or social customs that interfere with their own goals or pleasure.
- Sees no point in observing holidays or giving gifts.
- Is disinterested in following family or religious customs.
- Believes that people who work hard for a living are "suckers".
- Is scornful of the government or the "system".
- Uses illegal drugs.
- Is very concerned about their public image.
- Treats you better in public than in private.
- Gets angry at you if they believe that you have somehow made them look bad to others.
- Brags about you or your accomplishments to others, but never compliments you in private.
- Attempts to make you jealous or insecure
- Threatens to leave you.
- Hints or states that they have other lovers waiting on the side.
- Compares you to previous lovers.
- Admires strangers and compares you to them.
- Tells you that no one will ever care about you the way they do.
- Is jealous and suspicious.
- Accuses you of infidelity.
- Insists that friends of the opposite sex are trying to seduce you.
- States or implies that you got a job offer or interview because of your appearance.
- Doesn't want you to take part in an activity or outing because you might meet someone else there.
- Rushes the relationship
- Pressures you to move in together.
- Pressures you to have sex before you are ready.
- Proposes marriage early in the relationship.
- Does not respect your privacy
- Reads your diary or journal.
- Opens your mail.
- Goes through your drawers and desk.
- Manipulates others to achieve their goals
- Uses guilt trips.
- Does things that are dishonest or illegal.
- Attempts to coerce you into doing things that make you uncomfortable.
- Threatens suicide or homicide if you don't cooperate with them.
- Lectures you endlessly until you agree.
- Is easily angered at others who interfere with their activities.
- Engages in "Road Rage".
- Reactions are out of proportion to level of inconvenience.
- Impatient
- Is intolerant of children or animals.
- Will not get up to feed or change the baby.
- Is unwilling to have pets or children because of the mess or inconvenience.
- Shows preferential treatment between children (especially "natural" vs. "step" children).
- Believes that children don't deserve the level of treatment or support as adults.
- Insists that THEY are the victim in the relationship.
- Accuses you of being selfish, rude, self-centered, uncooperative, etc.
- Claims that you are the one undermining the relationship.
- Accuses you of not loving them or not caring about them.
- Threatens suicide or homicide if you leave them.
- Lack of empathy
- Inability to put themselves in another's shoes.
- Unwilling to provide comfort to others unless "blame" clearly lies elsewhere.
- Makes minimal effort to care for others when sick or injured while complaining about the inconvenience.
- Cruel to animals.
- Considers donations to charity a waste.
- Unable to acknowledge or respond to pain in others/ or you that is not clearly visible.
- Turns up TV when you have a headache
- Insists on spicy food when you have an upset stomach
- Expects you to help with chores when you are feeling sick.
- Tears down your self esteem and erodes your confidence.
- Tone of voice unreasonably deriding or scornful for the situation.
- Questions your ability to do simple things.
- Asks you to make a decision and then rejects your decision. Often asking you to decide over again.
- Accuses you of being overly sensitive to criticism.
- Calls you names.
- Criticizes you openly.
- Interferes with or attempts to control your career.
- Pressures you to quit or change your job.
- Thinks that your employer interferes with your marriage.
- Thinks that your co-workers/employer/employees are defective somehow.
- Attempts to resolve conflicts you have at work for you.
- Seeks to "help you" with your career, and is upset if you don't cooperate.
- Attempts to choose your job or work projects for you.
- Punishes you or threatens to punish you for "misbehaving
- Strands you somewhere.
- Gives you the "silent treatment".
- Yells at you.
- Lectures you.
- Believes that a "discussion" about your relationship is more important that any other obligation or activity.
- Makes you late to work or social activities because they want to discuss something.
- Picks a fight with you at bedtime and then won't let you go to sleep for hours.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Victim's Behavior
Watch out for these behaviors in yourself. Members of my support group believe that these are warning signs of low self esteem and behaviors that set you up to be abused.
- Fear of failure, and extreme insecurity about your own competance
- Try hard to conceal or downplay any mistakes you make.
- Are afraid to be seen as stupid, lazy, or weak.
- Feel that you are "supposed" to be able to handle a situation or task.
- Fear that others will think less or you if you quit.
- Believe that no excuse is good enough for a mistake you have made.
- Willing to overlook other people's flaws or mistakes.
- Believe everyone else but you is perfect and has a good reason for making a mistake.
- Believe that you can help others "live up to their potential".
- Not trusting your own judgment.
- Feel as though your opinion is not as "worthy" as someone else's.
- Find a "logical" argument to disregard your "inner voice" or gut feeling.
- Assume that criticism you receive from others is valid.
- Need another person's input before you can make a decision.
- Not feeling that you deserve to be treated well.
- Are willing to go to great inconvenience and trouble to avoid causing someone else inconvenience.
- Don't want to appear "demanding" or to be considered a "trouble maker"
- Assume that if someone treats you poorly then you must have done something wrong.
- Expect and accept criticism when you have completed a task.
- Are unwilling to be disruptive to the relationship.
- Avoid discussing issues that you fear will upset your partner.
- Are unwilling to break off a bad relationship because you don't want to hurt your partner.
- Secretly wish that your partner would die, move away, find someone else, or offer to leave the relationship.
- Allow others to make most decisions.
- Let someone else make all the decisions with no input or discussion from you.
- Allow others to talk you into a decision you don't like.
- Make a decision to please others rather than yourself.
- Choose a course of action because you don't want to hurt a particular person's feelings.
- Find it easier to "go along" with others decision rather than stand your ground.
- Hide behind "womanly tasks" like cooking, etc. - rather than dealing with reality.
- Behave as though you agree with others, even when you don't.
- "Parrot" someone else's opinions or behaviors.
- Keep quiet when you disagree with something
- - Allowing someone to think by your silence that you agree with them even if you don't.
- - Thinking that the subject is not worth an argument.
- Act to "protect" others at your own expense.
- Won't break up with a significant other strictly to avoid hurting their feelings.
- Avoid saying what you want or need to say because you don't want to hurt someone.
- Accept blame that is not yours to protect someone else.
- Giving up things that are important to you to please others.
- Give up hobbies or activities that aren't shared or approved of.
- Give away or sell precious momentos because they "clutter up the place".
- Keep photos or momentos in storage rather than display them because your abuser doesn't like them.
- Isolate yourself from all people other than your abuser.
- Allow friendships with people your abuser dislikes to wither away.
- Visit or call family less and less because your abuser dislikes them.
- Spend less time with friends, family, or co-workers because it "takes too much time".
- Never go anywhere without your abuser.
- Conceal your abusers behavior from others.
- Believe that others "wouldn't understand" why a situation or behavior is "justified".
- Are embarrassed that you allow yourself to be treated this way.
- Have been asked or coerced by your abuser to not tell.
- Are afraid of being accused of "making them look bad".
- Take responsibility for things that are not your responsibility.
- "Help" resolve other people's conflicts by acting as mediator
- Apologize for things that OTHER people did.
- "Cover" for people who are not handling their own responsibilities.
- Accept more than your fair share of blame in a conflict.
- Apologize just so that the fight will end, not because you think you did something wrong.
- Fix, clean up, or conceal something done by someone else to avoid being accused of having done it.
- Attraction to authority figures.
- Attracted to the smart, self-confident, powerful people.
- Attempt to prove your worth to them.
- Are thrilled if they "bother" to notice you.
- Assume that their advice is sound.
Labels: abuse, abuser, blame, jealousy, lying, manipulation, projection, red flags, responsibility, victims
