Giving
Pain a Voice |
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By
Mary Shannon, MSW
Flashback:
"A recurring, intensely vivid mental image of a past traumatic
experience."
"Six
months after I gave birth to my son I started having flashbacks,"
Kate told me in our first psychotherapy session. Her physician had referred
her to me, suspecting that her multiple physical problems had psychosocial
components.
"I
didn't tell anyone about them, not even my husband," she continued.
"I was afraid if I told anyone they'd think I was crazy, or at
the very least on my way to going crazy, so I kept them a secret. At
first they happened infrequently, which made them easier to ignore.
But as time went on, they nudged their way into my life like unwelcome
visitors that refused to leave, poking and prodding and picking away
at me until one day I realized ignoring them was no longer an option."
"The
most painful flashback was the one that recurred most often," she
recalled. "I saw myself as a little girl again, helpless, standing
like a trapped animal at the foot of mom's bed. She was laying on her
back, telling me to come closer to her--first in the kind of voice people
use when they want you to do something, then in a harsh, frustrated
voice when I still didn't move. I shook my head 'no,' praying she'd
change her mind and leave me alone, but I could tell from the look on
her face I'd better do as she said. I slowly made my way around the
bed to stand beside her, making sure to stand just far enough away so
she couldn't grab me unless she sat up. She reached out for me, telling
me again to come closer, but I didn't budge. Mom didn't say anything--she
didn't have to. Her eyes narrowed to a steady glare and said it all.
The little girl took a slow, small step toward the bed. I could feel
the queasiness in the pit of her stomach, the tickling sensation of
tears running down her face as they ran down mine."
After
each flashback, Kate convinced herself that the past was better left
in the past, shrugging off those images like you shrug off a chill that
comes out of nowhere, determined to move on with her life. "I was
married to a respected physician, had a beautiful new baby to care for,
and had just received my Masters degree in Social Work. I didn't have
time to deal with memories I'd worked so hard to forget!" she cried.
But memories are strange things, especially painful memories. Sometimes
they come at you all at once, like blinding strikes of lightening replaying
scenes from the past like two-second horror shows in your head. Other
times they trickle into your life like a slow poison, eating away at
you until the line between the past and the present is so blurred you
can't tell the difference between the two anymore. The hardest part
is not knowing which ones are waiting in your psyche to revisit you,
since they choose you--you don't choose them. Each flashback handed
Kate a different memory, and each memory triggered another. "It
was like going home again a little bit at a time," she told me,
"only I never knew when I was going, or what I was going to find
when I got there."
I encouraged
Kate to write about her past, and the following narrative excerpts have
been reprinted with her permission.
"It
started when I was young, about four or five years old from what I can
remember. That's when the other things started too--the self-hatred,
the shame, the self-mutilation. I remember trying to pretend I was like
all the other kids, but even then I knew I'd always be an outsider--different
from the rest. Other kids didn't have secrets like I did. They seemed
safe and sure about everything, while I jumped at my own shadow. My
secret consumed me, isolated me, tormented me. There was no one to tell.
It was the late 1950s, then the 1960s--no one imagined such things,
much less talked about them. Besides, I was too ashamed to admit my
mother made me touch her. Too afraid I'd be labeled a freak. Who was
I that my own mother would do such horrible things to me? What was wrong
with me?"
"As
I got older, I began to have multiple physical problems, from severe
headaches to gastrointestinal problems that finally resulted in exploratory
surgery when I was a teenager. Of course nothing was discovered. No
one ever asked the question, 'How are things at home?' They just did
another test, scheduled another surgery. No one realized, not even me,
that my body was trying to give my pain a voice, because I couldn't."
"Even as an adult, there was still no one to tell. My husband only
knew bits and pieces because he didn't want to hear any more than that,
and whenever I tried to deepen a friendship by sharing a little of my
past, the friendship quickly ended. There were no support groups for
a woman like me either, so I kept it buried, pretended I was like everyone
else. Lied, in order to be accepted. But I still wasn't accepted. My
world was so different from everyone else's that there was no connection,
no common ground. I couldn't laugh as others laughed."
"It
wasn't until years later that I began working with a therapist who encouraged
me to write about my past, which proved to be a significant breakthrough
for me. I'd already discovered the benefits of art therapy, having done
it both personally, as well as professionally with cancer patients.
But I was at a point where I needed more than the abstract use of color
and form. I needed to put words to the events and feelings that had
been haunting me. I needed to give my pain a concrete voice."
"On
a cold January morning I sat down at my computer and started writing.
I wrote until I couldn't stand to put down another word, then I took
a break, took a deep breath and wrote some more. Whenever the feelings
were too overwhelming I'd take another break. I wrote in fits and starts,
wrote in my journal, on the computer, in my mind. Sometimes I wrote
for hours on end. It was as if the words had finally found a way out
and didn't want to stop. The more I wrote, the more I was able to understand.
The more I wrote, the more I was able to let compassion take seed. The
more I wrote, the more I was able to construct a whole self, instead
of denying and burying half my life. The more I wrote, the more I was
able to give that little girl a voice--and when that happened, I started
to laugh as others laugh."
Writing
allowed Kate to take the horror within and make it manageable. "I
become a witness to my own experience, integrating it into my life instead
of suppressing it," she stated. Louise DeSalvo says, "Through
writing, we change our relationship to trauma, for we gain confidence
in ourselves and in our ability to handle life's difficulties."1
At the end of our last session, Kate left me a thank you card. In it,
she remarked on the healing benefits of writing: "As I watch my
words, phrases and paragraphs come together on the page, I can sometimes
feel the weight of silence begin to lift, the burden of isolation start
to disintegrate. And all the while, deep in the shadows, the little
girl is smiling."
"Statistically,
one in three women have been molested as children."2
In a 1997 groundbreaking report of daughters sexually abused by mothers,
it's stated that "sexual abuse by females and mothers is occurring
daily but remains very hidden." Bobbie Rosencrans, MSW, goes on
to say "... very little permission in this society is given for
women to be so far outside the stereotypes and social rules for women,
especially mothers."3 At one time this same social rule
applied to fathers, but now we have accepted the fact that father-daughter
incest is a sadly prevalent occurrence, and because we can finally speak
this truth, there is help for both. But until mother-daughter sexual
abuse is "out of the closet," the cycle of shame and isolation
will continue to dominate the lives of countless mothers and daughters.
Because
of a great deal of hard work, the cycle of abuse has stopped with Kate.
Her son is now a happy, healthy teenager who continues to amaze and
delight her, and her marriage of 22 years is stronger than ever. In
allowing me to share her own unspeakable truth here, our hope is to
increase awareness of this hidden, yet prevalent form of abuse, and
consequently encourage the development of resources for those who have
carried this secret in their lives for too many years. As Kate said
during our last meeting, "Perhaps one day I'll even meet a woman
like me--a woman who finally has someplace to go, and someone to tell.
That will be the day when I won't have to be alone with my secret any
more, and neither will she."
Note:
Parts of this article have been excerpted from Ms Shannon's upcoming
book, "The Sunday Wishbone." No part of this article may be
reprinted or used in any way without written permission from the author.
References
- DeSalvo
L. Writing as a way of healing: how telling our stories transforms
our lives. New York:
Harper San Francisco; 1999.
- Borysenko
J. A woman's book of life. New York: Riverhead Books; 1996.
- Rosencrans
B. The last secret: daughters sexually abused by mothers. Brandon
(VT): Safer Society Press; 1997.
