Lived Experience Forum

[Razzle]

Hi @eth   I’m dragging my feet today, feeling totally exhausted.   Started to have a panic attack in the shower this morning, I managed to ground myself after a few minutes, cried for a bit and got through it.  Feel pretty shit house now, still very jittery - I hate this

feeling.  

My husband has a 1 on 1 with our councillor this morning (he started seeing us together for marriage councilling, now sees us individually between couple sessions).  At

least todays appointment is closer to home, about 100kms, so won’t be an all day event.  

We have to see our Ag manager at the bank afterward, so Ive been dragged along today as well.  Currently sitting in the car feeling too crappy to move.

I know it’s not my fault, it was done TO me, but I still get hung up on the fact that I never spoke up, that in some demented way to protect myself I’m also protecting them.  Noone’s ever been held responsible and I’m still too scared to speak up.

Im glad to hear you also have a supportive psychologist that’s helping you.  I really struggled to reach out for support, still struggle to communicate a lot of what’s happening in my head to my husband, but it has been a lot easier since I started seeing the councillor on my own.

[eth]

I hear you @Razzle .  Deciding whether to speak out in a way that can lead to the person being held responsible is a huge decision.  With pros and cons.  For me to do that I think I'd need to be feeling really strong, and have solid support when doing it.  At this stage I am not there yet, not about events in my teens.  I tried to get Victims of Crime involved with some more recent events and found out they have a statute limiting how much time can pass after events before action is taken.  I think it varies in each state.   But it might be worth a call to them to find out where you stand on a day when you're feeling stronger.  If they take on your matter you can also get unlimited free counselling sessions if you were a child when the events happpened.  Even just making initial contact with them might be really empowering for you, it was for me.

Also I did a 'living beyond abuse' course with the local women's centre that really helped me a lot.  Maybe something like that might be happening where you are.  It was for dv and csa.

[Razzle]

@eth   I’m a long way off from speaking up, I dont think I’ll ever be strong enough.  My abuse started when I was 8.  I was sexually assaulted by a group, there were 5 teenagers, but only 4 assualted me.  1 of these boys is still a very good friend of my oldest brother.  If I said something now, I’m more worried about what my brother would do.  He has a very short fuse and I think he’d be the one to end up in jail, not my abusers.  A couple of weeks after that attack, 1 of the group got to me again and sexually assaulted me for a 2nd time.

When I was 10 I was sexually assaulted

by my mums best friends son.  And through age 11 and 12 I was repeatedly sexually abused and molested by an old man, a friend of the family - he has since died so nothing would be achieved by speaking up about him now anyway.  

Im from a small country town, there are not many services available to me here, which is why I have to travel so far just to see my councillor.  I haven’t even spoken to my GP, I know his staff and I also know how the local grapevine works and I don’t want my personnel stuff becoming the talk of the town.  It can be very isolating out here in the sticks.

My only options locally are police (and CASA in the closest larger town) but I don’t feel like I could do that.  All I can do for now is muddle my way through with my councillor.  I’ve kept a lid on all my abuse for 40years, it’s only

through marriage councilling that I’ve had to confront all this as it has had a huge impact on my marriage.  

One step at a time I guess, maybe I’ll feel different in the future 

[eth]

That's right @Razzle  one step at a time, and sometimes they're baby steps.  I think you've been really brave lately in disclosing part of your history to your husband and your counsellor.  You are stronger than you might feel just taking these steps.  Respect and support from me, not pressure to go faster or do more than you feel ok about.  Anything you tell your doctor is meant to be totally confidential but I understand how difficult that can be in a small town.  

Thankyou for sharing with me.  Even here it's hard to tell some things some times.  But I've found that it can help us prepare what we want to say in real life.  And reflect on who we can trust.  I think you are brave.  I'm sorry you've been through so much, especially in your childhood.  You are not alone.

[Razzle]

@eth I had another dream/flash back again last night.  It was like the last one, like looking at a bunch of photo’s of something that did happen, but the

photos are all out of order.  

It almost doesnt even make sense.  When this assault originally happened it was when I “stepped out” (or disassociated) for the very first time.  My brain took me somewhere else where I was safe, when I came back it was after the assault and I was outside walking home.

None of these photos showed anything that I don’t already remember, they are all just mixed up and confusing.  I didn’t wake up crying this time, but I thought my heart was going to explode and I felt sick to my stomach.  I feel like I’ve spent the rest of the day dragging myself through concrete.  

I can’t get these images out of my head, I keep trying to put them all in order, but there’s a big chunk missing which makes me concentrate even more on the image. 

I hate this, it’s like the more I try to forget the more it all comes back.  I don’t want to remember all this, I don’t want all this “stuff” to be front and centre in my head all the time.  

[eth]

It happens like that for me too sometimes @Razzle .  I feel for you and going through it at the moment.   When it happens to me I try to picture a bag of jigsaw pieces and add the new pieces to the bag.  Which I then put on an imaginary shelf or even in an imaginary locked shipping container.  And I only open it when I'm with my psychologist.  She helped me learn to do this.  Of course it doesn't always work, but more often as I get the habit of doing it.  Another visualization is the one of putting the image on a leaf and putting it in a river and watching it get carried away.  They might sound trite, but I found worth a try when nothing else I did was working. 

And of course distracting the mind with fiction books and movies helped keep it all at bay a lot of the time for years.  But I was also withdrawn from the world and isolated during those years.

Hope you have a therapist you trust that you can discuss this with.  

Thinking of you and sending warm wishes.

[Razzle]

@eth  I had a session with my councilor today and we talked about this dream and the 1st one.  

He seems to think that the dreams are coming to me like photographs as it actually removes me from the situation.  It’s like when you take a photo, you aren’t actually absorbed in everything that’s going on around you, you are only seeing what’s within the actual shot.  And the fact that I’m in the photos means that I’m not taking the actual photo.  To look back on the photo means you are looking back on a memory, that you’re not actually experiencing the event, it’s already happened, I’m just looking back at the memory after the event.

And it’s not the actual event that I’m afraid of, it’s the feelings associated with it.  These feelings have been blocked for so long, that now when I remember the event I’m not connecting the appropriate feelings, but I do in the dream and as I’m waking up.  I have to stop blocking these feelings, no matter how distressing they are.  It’s been a habit for so long that it’s now become my normal to retreat and feel nothing about everything, or feel the complete wrong emotion.  

It probably all sounds confusing, but it did seem to make a lot of sense when we talked about it.  I’m still afraid to remember what happened when I disassociated, but I have to remember it’s not the event I’m scared of, it’s how I feel (or felt)  now (and at the time) that I’m actually afraid of.

[eth]

It makes sense to me @Razzle .  I also have chunks of memory missing and random dreams that bring some of what happened back to me.  The EMDR I'm doing with the psychologist seems to be helping with that a bit, in that sometimes I'm able to remember an event without re-living it.  I'm also on a night med that blocks adrenalin receptors and is helping to reduce PTSD dreams and I'm not waking up in a panic nearly so often.

Hope today is a peaceful one for you.

[Razzle]

Thanks @eth .  I do feel a little calmer today.  I’ve been afraid of “reliving” these events for so long, but my emotions are so messed up and really need to be addressed.  I have been thinking about yesterday’s session a lot, and I do still fear any dream about the last lot of abuse that went for almost 2 years by the old man (friend of the family).  

Because I dissasiciated frequently with him, particularly after he became violent  my emotion connected to the assaults (after I became aware of myself again, usually on my walk home) was always a quick burst of fear mixed in with pain, nausea - just a really rotten feeling but then straight away turned to elation that I was out of there and I was happy beyond belief.  I know if I have a dream about him and what happened, I’m not going to wake up feeling elated, it will literally be my worst nightmare.  

Even now, if things go wrong and I remove myself from the situation my first emotion is elation that I’m no longer in the situation, when it should have been empathy or sadness for whoever was hurting at the time.  

My emotions are really skewed, and I wasn’t even aware of that until just recently.  There’s still a lot of work to be done here, and at least I’m now aware of it.

Your treatments sound interesting, I haven’t tried anything like that.  I really hope they are working well for you.

Thankyou for your support @eth 

[eth]

You're welcome @Razzle  Sorry I've been busy the last few days.  Hope you're still feeling calmer.