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<blockquote data-quote="recoveringenabler" data-source="post: 610947" data-attributes="member: 13542"><p>Greenrene, thank you, as Cedar has mentioned, I too am honored to be a part of your emergence, your healing. It takes courage to look at this stuff and unravel it so that we can indeed feel wholeness...........I applaud you for embarking on this journey! And, really, I'm also sorry you need to be on it as well..............in a perfect world, to have a loving, nurturing, healthy and balanced mother should be every child's birthright. But, here we are.............</p><p></p><p>Cedar, yes, absolutely a witness is crucial. I've read repeatedly that even children who've been terribly abused can heal if there is just ONE person who can really see and hear that child's pain. Sometimes it's a teacher, sometimes a therapist, sometimes a grandparent, someone who can show that child a heart which cares.</p><p></p><p>If abuse isn't healed, it continues down...........it took me awhile to see that my parents had their own history within their own families. Part of my own healing was to recognize that they were doing to us what was done to them................that took time. </p><p></p><p>I believe my own mother shut down completely because of her own pain and in seeing my own aliveness, the spark still present in me at 5 years old, because her spark was already gone, she set out to destroy mine. Something a friend of mine said many years ago makes sense in this particular context, "when you shine a big light, what other's see is their own darkness." Children are filled with light. And, there is the jealousy, the unconscious anger...............that instead of nurturing that light, an unhealed person wants it extinguished. That is played out on the world stage as well as in families.</p><p></p><p>Over many years of listening to many women with "mother wounds" I've come to believe this is more common then I would have imagined. Beyond my own hurts, my interpretation has been that the inability to be our true selves not only damages us, it can damage our children in profound ways.</p><p></p><p>I see both of my parents having had their lives limited in massive ways because of not only gender expectations of their age group, but by their particular upbringings based on their nationalities. All adding up to being completely arrested in their development. The results for us, their offspring, was devastating. We were silently blamed, I think unconsciously, out of their awareness, for all they could <strong>not </strong>become. </p><p></p><p>That came down both sides of my family of origin and for whatever reason, I had a powerful internal commitment to alter that history and end the cycle of abuse. </p><p></p><p>My Dad has passed away, but my mother is 88 and although in some ways she has moved away from her cruel self, for my own protection I've had to develop clear boundaries because my interpretation is that she does not know healthy ways of getting her needs met other then by manipulation and deception and that makes her dangerous. I love her but I am aware of her power to harm. And, truthfully, I have empathy for her too because she never healed or became whole or lived her real, authentic life. It's taken me a lot of therapy to be able to integrate all of that...............the integration of all of those feelings is what allowed me to feel whole.</p><p></p><p>It appears that my daughter has inherited the same cruelty and need to extinguish the 'light' of those in her vision............</p><p></p><p>The way I see it is in terms of power, my parents didn't have authentic selves, so all of their power was in having power over us, the children, those who were too vulnerable to fight back. Had my parents been allowed to develop into their real,authentic selves, perhaps they would have flowered in their own lives and been able to empower us to do the same. I don't know, these are all my theories based in my own healing and what I believe to be true now. I also think that because I could see my parents disappointments in life, my mission, early on, became to be able to live my own, real, whole, healed and true life. </p><p></p><p>I believe many people 'sleep' through life, whether because of too many hurts, or fear, or holding back for whatever reason, I did not want to be one of them because of how I grew up. Sometimes I think that was a gift, many times I thought it was a curse. Now I think it just is what it is and it all happened for a reason which continues to reveal itself to me.</p><p></p><p>Cedar, I understand your stories..........I've learned not to trust a scorpion........and my daughter recently has taught me that I can't set foot into the poisoned pond where the rest of my family resides. These are hard lessons. It's hard not to open the bottle of poison Cedar, there are still those hopeful children within us trying to gain our parents approval and love. Perhaps give the bottle to your husband and when the need arises to open it once again, he can remind you of its lethal quality. Recently my SO has taken on that role, so now I've learned to ask, "<em>do you see any holes in my thinking?</em>" The fog of childhood can be pretty thick and our ability to see in that fog is shaky, sometimes we need a guide. Or perhaps, our own clear light.</p><p></p><p>I'm still reconciling my role in between my mother and my daughter.............your poison pond story gives me a different way to look at it..........in emerging out of that pond, shaking off the last remnants of the poison, I am free to be me. Leaving my daughter behind, still in that pond, is taking some effort to learn to live with..........</p><p></p><p>I love that you had your mother in law there to guide you. She showed you how to love. My best friends mother was Italian also, she was the mother image I related to from the seventh grade on..........I saw the look of love in her eyes when my best friend walked in the room..........it was so powerful, she was who I tried to model myself after..............</p><p></p><p>Love is the key. But first, we have to love ourselves............that's been my life's journey............</p></blockquote><p></p>
[QUOTE="recoveringenabler, post: 610947, member: 13542"] Greenrene, thank you, as Cedar has mentioned, I too am honored to be a part of your emergence, your healing. It takes courage to look at this stuff and unravel it so that we can indeed feel wholeness...........I applaud you for embarking on this journey! And, really, I'm also sorry you need to be on it as well..............in a perfect world, to have a loving, nurturing, healthy and balanced mother should be every child's birthright. But, here we are............. Cedar, yes, absolutely a witness is crucial. I've read repeatedly that even children who've been terribly abused can heal if there is just ONE person who can really see and hear that child's pain. Sometimes it's a teacher, sometimes a therapist, sometimes a grandparent, someone who can show that child a heart which cares. If abuse isn't healed, it continues down...........it took me awhile to see that my parents had their own history within their own families. Part of my own healing was to recognize that they were doing to us what was done to them................that took time. I believe my own mother shut down completely because of her own pain and in seeing my own aliveness, the spark still present in me at 5 years old, because her spark was already gone, she set out to destroy mine. Something a friend of mine said many years ago makes sense in this particular context, "when you shine a big light, what other's see is their own darkness." Children are filled with light. And, there is the jealousy, the unconscious anger...............that instead of nurturing that light, an unhealed person wants it extinguished. That is played out on the world stage as well as in families. Over many years of listening to many women with "mother wounds" I've come to believe this is more common then I would have imagined. Beyond my own hurts, my interpretation has been that the inability to be our true selves not only damages us, it can damage our children in profound ways. I see both of my parents having had their lives limited in massive ways because of not only gender expectations of their age group, but by their particular upbringings based on their nationalities. All adding up to being completely arrested in their development. The results for us, their offspring, was devastating. We were silently blamed, I think unconsciously, out of their awareness, for all they could [B]not [/B]become. That came down both sides of my family of origin and for whatever reason, I had a powerful internal commitment to alter that history and end the cycle of abuse. My Dad has passed away, but my mother is 88 and although in some ways she has moved away from her cruel self, for my own protection I've had to develop clear boundaries because my interpretation is that she does not know healthy ways of getting her needs met other then by manipulation and deception and that makes her dangerous. I love her but I am aware of her power to harm. And, truthfully, I have empathy for her too because she never healed or became whole or lived her real, authentic life. It's taken me a lot of therapy to be able to integrate all of that...............the integration of all of those feelings is what allowed me to feel whole. It appears that my daughter has inherited the same cruelty and need to extinguish the 'light' of those in her vision............ The way I see it is in terms of power, my parents didn't have authentic selves, so all of their power was in having power over us, the children, those who were too vulnerable to fight back. Had my parents been allowed to develop into their real,authentic selves, perhaps they would have flowered in their own lives and been able to empower us to do the same. I don't know, these are all my theories based in my own healing and what I believe to be true now. I also think that because I could see my parents disappointments in life, my mission, early on, became to be able to live my own, real, whole, healed and true life. I believe many people 'sleep' through life, whether because of too many hurts, or fear, or holding back for whatever reason, I did not want to be one of them because of how I grew up. Sometimes I think that was a gift, many times I thought it was a curse. Now I think it just is what it is and it all happened for a reason which continues to reveal itself to me. Cedar, I understand your stories..........I've learned not to trust a scorpion........and my daughter recently has taught me that I can't set foot into the poisoned pond where the rest of my family resides. These are hard lessons. It's hard not to open the bottle of poison Cedar, there are still those hopeful children within us trying to gain our parents approval and love. Perhaps give the bottle to your husband and when the need arises to open it once again, he can remind you of its lethal quality. Recently my SO has taken on that role, so now I've learned to ask, "[I]do you see any holes in my thinking?[/I]" The fog of childhood can be pretty thick and our ability to see in that fog is shaky, sometimes we need a guide. Or perhaps, our own clear light. I'm still reconciling my role in between my mother and my daughter.............your poison pond story gives me a different way to look at it..........in emerging out of that pond, shaking off the last remnants of the poison, I am free to be me. Leaving my daughter behind, still in that pond, is taking some effort to learn to live with.......... I love that you had your mother in law there to guide you. She showed you how to love. My best friends mother was Italian also, she was the mother image I related to from the seventh grade on..........I saw the look of love in her eyes when my best friend walked in the room..........it was so powerful, she was who I tried to model myself after.............. Love is the key. But first, we have to love ourselves............that's been my life's journey............ [/QUOTE]
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