Here is a great article explaining how our ancestor’s negative experiences affect their DNA expression, which can be inherited by future generations. For instance, if Grandma was raised in an abusive, alcoholic home or suffered some other trauma, some of that trauma and reactions to it can be passed onto future generations, predisposing them to becoming anxious or depressed.
Each of you has your child-self inside you, the memories and feelings of what it was like at each age of your life. These memories and feelings still affect you today and can sabotage your life. If you are wanting to do something new, to take a risk and explore a new aspect of life, these younger parts of you may try to stop you if they don’t feel safe, if they remember taking risks before led to lots of pain or change = loss, heart break. In this sense they are trying to protect you and keep you safe. If you want to go ahead with your risk taking you will need to talk to and work with your inner child to reassure them that you are aware of the risk and you are taking steps to ensure it doesn’t go badly.
You literally can talk to, cuddle and hold your inner child. Close your eyes and feel them inside you. They may be hiding from view at first, but as you talk to them and try to connect with them they will come out from the shadows to talk to you. Ideally you want to build a healthy, loving relationship with your inner child. Check in with them daily, even if it is only a few minutes. See how they are feeling and ask them what they need. If you have been working really hard they may want you to rest and have some fun. You can visualise going to the partk with them and playing on the play equipment or having a picnic by the sea. There is no limit to this inner contact and its possibilities. As the child learns to trust you it will relax and play more on its own, not needing to interrupt your plans with its fear, concerns or anger. Ignoring your inner child is a recipe for disaster. It will throw a tantrum and cause you to behave in less than ideal ways. Better to meet your inner child’s needs first so this doesn’t occur.
My child was very scared and grumpy at first, feeling alone, neglected and abandoned. She wanted icecream and attention. She wanted to be heard and listened to as she told me all of the things I had done that hurt her. She then wanted the chance to dot he same with my parents and others whose actions had affected her. This can all be done through guided visualisations.
Basically your inner child wants you to become the good, attentive, loving parent to it. They may feel you didn’t receive enough love and attention when little and they want to receive that from you. If you give it they become contented, happy, joyful, playful and help you go through life seeing the beauty and innocence all around us.
Many of us had to grow up too quick. Many kids learn very young to shut off their childlikeness and innocence to focus on the needs of others – to watch out for danger in an abusive home or unsafe environment. Many end up taking care of their parent who may have been depressed, suicidal, or otherwise unavailable. Many kids become much older than their physical age by taking on some role in the family, it may be caring for siblings if the parents don’t do it. For whatever reasons, many people do not experience the beauty and innocence of childhood where life is all about exploring, learning, playing and having fun. Those inner children who missed out on that, who grew up too quick, may still be trying to control what happens to you, continuing to play the role of watcher, protector, guardian. They may be scanning for danger constantly or fearful of what might occur. They need you to take over, to be the adult, and to allow them to finally be a child and do age appropriate things. Then they can relax and play. They can open their hearts back up and have fun. They can let go of their grudges and resentments. As they heal we obtain the freedom to be more adult-like, to operate from the present, as oposed to being affected by the past.
The role of the inner child is to show us what we still need to heal and to help us return to our state of innocence and peace. They remind us how to live life in the moment in awe of the natural world around us. They remind us how to play, have fun, love unconditionally and just BE. They have a very important role in helping us return to health and wholeness. Love them, take time to be with them and your life will blossom, as you do so internally. Our inner children are very important and deserve to be rescued from the pain they have been trapped in for decades. Set them free and you also free yourself. Blessed BE, Amen.
By Jodi-Anne (22 Sept 2015).
These are insightful videos by Gabor Mate who explains that emotional pain and trauma underlies addiction. He also explains how trauma/addictive tendencies get past on through the generations unintentionally when addiction affected parents are not able to be present and available to their kids.
I love this video by Johann Harri. In it he explains that the opposite of addiction isn’t sobriety, it is connection. We all need to feel connected to others, to belong, to be loved and accepted as we are. Without that we look for that connection in things or substances.
When a person has been deeply wounded, they will project that wound out onto others. They will see others as wounded and in need of fixing. When in truth it is themselves that need healing.
Because of the depths of the pain, a person will see wounds everywhere, they will feel the pain of others – it is like they can see it, feel it, smell it. They don’t want to be in it all the time, so they try to fix people or run away, so they don’t have to be surrounded by pain. But you can’t run away from what is inside you. It always goes with you.
Some people are more sensitised to it than others. If you were raised in an abusive home, you learned to watch others closely, to see their dynamics and watch for danger. You could see their pain and see when it would burst out to attack others. You learned to do this to help yourself survive and not be in danger. You focused on the pain of others to protect yourself from their outbursts. In this sense it was a good skill that you developed. However, the habit of watching and feeling other people’s pain never got switched off. So now as an adult, you still see people’s pain and fear it will result in an emotional attack at some stage. So you stay on high alert inside and feel threatened by their pain. This is why you try to fix others, so you can relax and not have to be on guard all the time. That is your own issue. There is no danger. Other people, most people, are capable of managing their pain and not having it burst out and affect others.
It is only because of your past experience as a child in a volatile, abusive home, where your parents didn’t cope with their emotional pain, that you fear it all the time. Alcoholics in particular are known for lashing out with their pain. The drink inhibits their ability to manage the pain and their reactions to it.
Once drunk the pain and their sadness or anger about it comes spilling out and it may get projected onto all those around them. It can be overwhelming as the person has a massive release, a let go of their built up pain. However, because they don’t work through it, they don’t have any insights or forgiveness, it just happens again and again. The pain builds inside them until it topples over the edge and then cascades like a water fall from them to their surroundings.
People who don’t drink excessively, generally don’t react that same way. They can sense the emotions building up and do something constructive to release or manage them. most can heal themselves or at least not explode out affacting others.
The problem with children of alcoholics is they are used to seeing the pain of others as a danger sign, a warning to be careful and watch out. They don’t trust the other to handle it responsibly. Clearly the issue here is this high alertness and expectation of abuse – for that is what the urge to fix others really is. It is as if you have decided that you can’t relax or feel safe unless all the others are okay. Hence you see the problem as them and their behaviour, instead of recognising it as your own issue and wounding that needs resolving.
Once you have resolved your own pain and retrained yourself not to react in advance or expect the worst, then you can relax and be happy. The fixing that is needed is of yourself, not others.
Once you heal the pain in yourself you will not be so affected by others or care about their pain. You will happily live your life doing what you need to do and trust them to resolve their own issues without your help. They don’t need you to rescue them. You need to rescue yourself. The urge to fix others shows you are still drowning in pain from the past or outdated belief systems and defense mechanisms that are no longer needed. Thank them for keeping you safe in the past, and reassure your inner chld and those protective parts of you, that their efforts aren’t needed now. You are safe. You are an adult and you can walk away from anyone who did abuse you.
You are not a child trapped in an abusive, scary, volatile, unpredictable home any more. If you don’t do the work to heal yourself you react as if you are still living in that dangerous home, even though you left it many years, even decades before.
The feelings of pain and the need to protect yourself by watching others and attempting to manipulate situations so explosions don’t occur – is so strong that it will stay with you your whole life – unless you explain to the guard dog that the danger has past. You can take off the armour, put down the sword and relax. It is time to do it. Time to have fun and play.
Ultimately that is what we want – for you to play and have fun, and for you to have reprogrammed your subconscious beliefs so that you expect goodness, love and support from others. You feel peace and joy when others approach you, rather than angst and fear. It is your inner work you need to focus on, not what the other is doing. That is their business to resolve and action. Yours is yours. Focus where you can make the most change – in yourself. Do that work and be a positive role model for society – of healing, wholeness and love – that is what we need, more people who have done the inner work and can role model it for others.
Others will heal themselves, when the time is right. That is not up to you or set by your standards or expectations. Let people off the hook. Love them as they are. Support them to grow in their own way and time. Let go of control and choose peace, for it really does exist. It is just a choice you need to make. Blessed BE. Amen.
By Jodi-Anne (12 Sept 2015).
This is a great article posted on ‘Side Effects Public Media’ website explaining the impact of childhood trauma on a child’s developing brain.
This is a gigantic topic that can not be addressed in one blog. We will give some general guidance and cover other aspects in future blogs. Childhood sexual abuse is a heinous act that takes away a child’s sense of innocence and trust in the world. Whether the act was done in a violent or loving manner it rips apart a child’s identity. They are no longer a child living in a world of mystery, awe and learning. They no longer can lose themselves in the moment, they lose spontaneity and joy for life. In its place come watching, scanning for danger, for fear of it happening again. Confusion terrifies – is it good, bad, dirty, evil? Am I a bad person because of it? Why is it a secret? Why mustn’t others know? All of this takes a child out of a child’s mindset and experience of life. It robs them of their freedom to live life innocently and openly connecting with self, others, nature and life.
Each experience is different, based on the particular circumstances, but none of them are beneficial to the child. The child may feel some pleasure in the physical touch. They may feel love towards the perpetrator who is giving them special attention. They may become jealous of the other parent and sharing the perpetrator with them. This sets up an unhealthy competition between mother and daughter (if that is the scenario). Or mother may be depressed, father/stepfather unhappy and the child steps in to compensate, hoping father will stay, not leave.
There are many combinations and the above relates to incest by family members or friends of the family. These are the most common forms of incest. Strangers molesting children is much rarer. It is usually a person known to the child. Someone they trust and this also has a massive impact on their ability to trust others.
Whatever the situation, healing from childhood sexual abuse is a long and tedious process. All the various emotions have to be felt and released. The dysfunction of the family and the complicity of those involved has to be seen and acknowledged. Your parents / the adults should have been protecting you, but they didn’t. Shame, anger, rage, grief, loss, isolation, pain, all has to be worked through, before light can start to enter.
Because these events were so painful and confusing it is automatic to push the memories and feelings away when they surface, but suppressing them does not help. It just keeps them locked inside the body and the person numbed out from feeling fully. This means that they can not experience great joy or happiness either, as their feelings are numbed, on auto pilot, shut down to the bare minimum.
This all releases in time as the person learns to feel the emotions and release them. This can be done willingly or not. The body will trigger releases when it feels you are ready for them – be it flashbacks, memories surfacing, body aches / rashes, pain or emotional outbursts. It surfaces in many ways and it will impact your ability to function in your day to day life. Surrender to the process and allow the emotion to be felt and released. It will take time, a lot of time, but it will get easier as you learn how to deal with an emotional release and support yourself through the process.
Eat well, rest and get lots of sleep. Your body is undergoing massive shifts and changes. If the trauma or emotional pain was too intense it gets locked inside the body and it all has to come back out. It needs time for this to all occur. There are no miracle cures or quick answers. It has to occur bit by bit so you can cope and process the emotions that surface.
There is much healing to occur and it does take many years to fully resolve. That is the sad truth of it. It is a major impact on a person’s life and they have to deal with it the best they can. It does lead to lots of personal growth and insight, which is a good thing, but it is a hard way to get it. Especially when others around you may seem to be having a happy, easy life. So jealousy and feelings of ‘Why me?’, of victimhood, also have to be worked through.
It is a tumultuous ride and no wonder the body may struggle at times to cope with it all. Depression is common as people work through the issues. Do your best to support yourself with kindness, love and friendship. Be the loving parent to yourself that you wished your parents were. Be patient and kind to yourself, you are doing the best you can. Know it will shift in time and while frustrating, your feelings and experience is normal. It is part of the process. That is why we said it is a heinous act. It is one that destroys a person’s natural ability to live and enjoy their life. It dominates their reactions to life and the way they interact with others. All this damage, this processing and conditioning, has to be worked through and released.
Many people become over weight, even obese, as a result of childhood sexual abuse. They hide under the layers or weight, feeling more protected and safe. At some level they hope they are safer as they feel less attractive and hope no one will attack them again.
Some remain extremely thin, afraid to exist, and not accepting nourishment. They hope if they look weak, thin, like a child, people will take pity on them and hopefully look after them. The self loathing, shame and rejection of self can lead them to self harm, to punish themselves and therefore not nourish their bodies appropriately.
Some people armour up. They put layers of energetic and physical armouring on their body, which hardens them. It makes them rigid and cold and deflects off anyone or anything that approaches them. It acts as a defense, but keeps them isolated as no one can get close enough to give them love. Love would melt the armour and help the emotions to surface. But until a person is ready this feels threatening so they would push away anyone who comes close and tries to love them. They may judge those who come close as unacceptable, untrustworthy – finding some fault in them to justify their actions and rejection of them. This can be a very lonely and sad way to live.
Some channel their anger and rage into their work. They may fight for some cause, some charity, in an attempt to protect the vulnerable in society or the planet itself from abuse by man. This fight, this burning passion to save others or the Earth is due to their own buried pain and the need for themselves to be saved, rescued, loved and supported. It is a projection outwards of what they actually need. They need to allow themselves to be vulnerable, weak, and to be looked after by others. They have been trying to be strong for so long that eventually they will collapse and burnout. They will need to rest and face what is inside. They can’t go on fighting forever as they are depleting their energy reserves and no matter what they achieve in their work it will never feel like it is enough, because it isn’t what they really need. What they really need is to look inside themselves, feel the emotional pain and release it, so they can then enjoy their lives as much as possible.
Finding peace after childhood sexual abuse is possible. It is just a long journey. Call on the Angels and your Guides to help you. Find practitioners to support you – energetically with healing; your body physically with releasing; and nutritionally with vitamins. There are many different tools and techniques that can be used to support you through the process. Try different things and see what works for you. The key is to remember to be patient, loving and kind with yourself. You have suffered enough, so don’t burden yourself by feeling not good enough or getting mad at yourself.
Inside you is the scared, wounded, confused child who went through the experience. He/she needs your love and support. They need to be talked to, listened to and reassured. They need to be helped to feel safe again and to trust that you, the Adult you, will look after them. Then they can relax and play again, they can become a natural child again – free, spontaneous, in awe of life and full of joy at what they see. This then unlocks the door to your freedom to enjoy life more fully. So love yourself through it all. Talk to your inner child regularly. Tell him/her that you love them, you will protect them and you are sorry about what they went through. In time they will trust you more and open up. You can visualise with your eyes closed and imagine playing in the park with your inner child. You can eat ice-cream together and do all that you missed out on. You can have fun and form a strong connection and feeling of safety, of being loved, accepted and safe. That is important to do. It brings light into your life and the ability to have fun and play.
Life is meant to be enjoyed. Just this and other experiences get in the way. Do the work to free yourself from the past, so that you can enjoy the rest of your life and make the most of it. You can do it and it’s worth doing.
Don’t keep pushing the emotions away that prolongs the process.
You may draw pictures of how you feel releasing the energy onto paper. Whatever method works for you to get it out of your body.
Counselling can help if you find a therapist who is familiar with these issues and the complexities involved. It is not completely necessary, but for many people they have isolated themselves enough they have no one they trust or can talk to about what they are going through. If this is the case a counsellor can be that person and someone you experiment being vulnerable with, revealing your secrets and your fears, desires and truth.
Each person’s journey will be unique to them and it all takes time. Go easy with yourself. You don’t need to dig through your past trying to find clues about what did or didn’t happen. it will surface when it is meant to, when you are strong enough and ready to process it. So just enjoy your life as much as you can and know that you will remember or be triggered by others when the time is right for you to complete the next part of your healing journey.
Know that you do deserve peace, love and happiness, and you can get it. In time you will be free and you will be so grateful for that. You are brave souls on a massive journey. We cheer you on from the sidelines and we watch your progress. We hold your hands when you cry, and laugh along with you when you laugh. We are always here, supporting and encouraging you, whispering in your ear helping you to intuitively know what you need to do next. You are never alone. You are held in the arms of God and the angels. You are cherished and cared for by those of us assigned to you this lifetime. We see your beauty. We see your strength, your innocence and goodness. It is our job to help you to see them too. We love you. Blessed BE. Adieu.
By Jodi-Anne (09 Aug 2015).
Here are links to Part 2 and Part 3 of How to heal after childhood sexual abuse. Each post deals with a different aspect of how to heal.
There are higher rates of mental illness in society as people are living more disconnected lives. Parents are busy working and earning money for possessions, they do not have the depth or quality time required for deep bonding with a child. Without the bonding children do not develop a strong sense of being loved, lovable, acceptable or okay. They are left wondering whether they are lovable or not. This is the seed of mental illness – this questioning of self, this doubt as to one’s acceptability or not. It leads to self hatred / abuse and less ability to connect deeply with others for fear of rejection and loss.
People therefore isolate themselves and feel lonely, cold, separate and this too is emotionally painful. All of these sad, negative feeling emotions get bottled up and become the dominant, most common feelings in their life experience. Naturally this low vibration state results in depression and passivity. The person feels stuck, unable to pull themselves out of the situation.
Poor diet makes the situation worse and can result in sugar and hormone imbalances. Lack of exercise also results in imbalances that could be easily rectified. Serotonin and other brain chemicals can be balanced naturally – rest, spend time in nature, nurture and love yourself. This is hard to do when you feel you don’t deserve love or aren’t worthy of it. It feels like a waste of time to try and improve when it feels so bad and overwhelming.
Clearly it is at the mental level and emotional level that most work needs to be done to clear up negative thinking and expectations and open up to love. The emotions need to be felt and released so the person can balance back up to their natural state of peace and joy. It is possible. They just have to do the healing/transformational work.
False chemicals can help in the short term e.g. antidepressants or hormones/brain chemicals. But it is better if the body heals itself and starts producing the required chemical itself. This can and does happen. Exercise increases levels of serotonin and other endorphins, diet can also influence it, as of course can changes in thinking. The body can rebuild itself.
You live at paces that your body was not designed for. The frantic busyness of modern life leads to stress, fatigue and burn out. More and more people are affected and when they can’t cope internally with the pressure of their life it gets called mental illness. However, the solution in most cases is simple – simplify your lives; heal your emotional pain; learn to love and accept who you are; learn to be the the kind parent to yourself that you needed when little; learn to laugh and play and accept what comes; let go of trying to control life or impress others. Be yourself. That is enough. Life wants you to be your authentic self – live from your heart – follow / act on your passions, be of service to all in your own unique way.
By liberating yourself from the rat race, you show others it can be done and that they also could choose to do it – to choose freedom, simplicity, health, deeper connection with self, others and the Earth. This is healthy. This is how you are meant to live. It is all about love. If children are conceived in love, raised with love, learn how to love and respect themselves, others and the Earth there would be lower rates of mental illness.
Yes the pollution of food, air, water, soil does have some impact, but it is relatively minor compared to the internal pollution from negative, self loathing thoughts and painful emotions locked inside. These eat away at your spirit, your zest for life and leave you feeling flat, exhausted and low – a recipe for lethargy, depression and therefore mental illness.
Have a spring clean of your internal closet and let go of the darkness. Let the light, bright, colourful aspects of yourself come to the fore. You truly can enjoy life more fully. You just have to clean out the old and make room for the new to enter and anchor into your vibration. You can heal all pains with time, energy, love and awareness.
See the bigger picture and purpose of life, realise that ‘negative’ events in your life occurred to help you grow and evolve and are leading you onto something greater in yourself that could not have been achieved without that event.
Life is a mystery. Things happen. You can’t control it, but you can choose how you respond to it. You can choose to wallow in pain and regret and depression or choose to make the most of what you have and live life fully embracing all that comes your way – the choice is yours.
Mental illness or health is a choice in the sense that you can learn the skills to bring you back to balance, back to peace and joy.
Tension and Trauma Release Exercises (TRE) can help you to discharge the tension and stress in your body that has you on hyper alert. It can help your body and nervous system to calm down so that you can see more clearly rather than seeing through the lens of trauma and past experiences.
TRE can help set you free of the emotional pain and discharge it so that you can live in the now seeing life around you from a more open and positive perspective. While the pain and trauma is inside you it taints your view of the world and prevents you from relaxing, feeling safe and enjoying life more fully.
TRE can be done at home regularly to help you slowly, bit by bit to release the tension and flow more freely with life. If you have trouble moving through your emotions when they come up you may need to work with a TRE provider first for a little while so you can learn to self-regulate, but after that you can use it for free for the rest of your life as a tool to help you reduce stress, tension and trauma so you can live life more peacefully doing what you want in life.
You can’t control what happened in your past or what will occur in the future, but you can control how you respond to it and how you let it affect your life. Your reactions are your choice and you can change the way you react by altering your thoughts; altering your emotional balance inside; and by changing your expectations or core beliefs. There are many ways to do this. They are just skills to learn, that all of humanity would benefit from, so you could all live in peace and harmony.
By Jodi-Anne (31 July 2015).
Depression occurs when a person has not been able to express their emotions and has bottled them up inside. Their bodies are full of sadness, grief, anger and emotional pain – shame, guilt and more. Through life’s many challenges the person has faced the difficulty, but come out of it wounded, disappointed and dismayed – wondering if that is all there is to life.
In their dismay and disappointment they shut down from life and the possibility of joy, love and peace. They come to expect further hurt, loss and pain, so [they] hide away from life and interacting with others who they fear will judge and ridicule them for feeling the way they do.
What they don’t realise is that everyone goes through challenges, disappointments, and disturbances to life as they knew it. Things happen. People die, jobs end, heart attacks occur. These challenges come unexpectedly and can knock a person from peace and balance into a negative spin. Every one goes through it. There is no shame in struggling to cope with life’s pressures. You just need to learn how to process and release the emotions, the pent up energy and pain, so that you return to a state of balance and peace.
Mental work is required to adjust thinking patterns and come to allow hope, positive expectations of the future – to know ‘Good things can and will happen for me’; ‘I am a good person and I deserve good things’.
Often once a person feels blue they start to beat themselves up – to feel less than others, not okay, incompetent. This just worsens the situation as they then get stuck at home not wanting to go out and face the world. They don’t want to reach out for help or tell anyone as they are so embarrassed and ashamed, but really reaching out is what is needed.
Trying something new, making friends, having fun, speaking your truth, feeling your emotions and breathing through them, learning to witness them and not be overwhelmed by them – creating distance between them and you – the emotions and your true self – all help. They are just skills that need to be learned, as is being nice and supportive to yourself – eating well, exercising, moving through emotions with kindness to self, nurturing and nourishing self.
Many people when depressed feel like trash, worthless and that is how they treat themselves. They need to move from that to seeing themselves as someone who has temporarily lost focus and just needs love and support to get back on track.
They need to become the kind, loving parent to themselves – giving themselves permission to rest when needed and to play and enjoy life. It sounds easy to do, but it is very challenging as when you are depressed your energy is so dense, low in vibration, that it is hard to hear your intuition or higher self. It is hard to get guidance from within or from spirit. You don’t feel the spiritual support all around you as your vibration is such that their messages can’t get through.
The key is accessing and releasing the buried emotions as this is what keeps a person stuck in depression. They feel they can’t go on, they can’t face anything more as they feel they wouldn’t cope and it’s not worth the effort or risk to try. This type of thinking leads to fear and paralysis.
When your body is full of fear and you feel stuck, paralysed, unable to move forward, you are stuck in a freeze reaction. Your nervous system is overwhelmed and in a sense has shut down, it’s frozen and moved into collapse.
This is a normal process that occurs when a person has experienced or is in the process of experiencing trauma. You move through fight or flight into freeze and then into collapse.
In the frozen state, the body is still hoping the predator threatening you won’t see you and you’ll get to stay alive. You’re frozen, but still on hyperalert ready to flee if you get the chance. This is exhausting for the body as it uses up a lot of energy. It’s like you’ve got your foot on the brake and the gas pedal at the same time primed ready to act but staying still.
If escape seems impossible and death seems imminent you move into dissociation and collapse. Here your body is pumped full of natural endorphins, opioids, to numb you so you don’t feel the predator’s attack and what occurs to your body. This is why when you’re depressed you can feel detached, numb, not really present to what is occurring around you.
All of these bodily reactions are an innate mechanism that occurs at the subconscious level. You don’t choose to be numb and shutdown. Your body does it automatically to protect itself.
To come out of this state you need to calm your body so it feels safe again and can relax. One way to do that is by using Trauma and Tension Release Exercises (TRE). It is the body’s natural tremoring mechanism to release stress, tension and trauma. It can help calm your body down out of hyperarousal back through fight and flight, and down to calm relating, which is our natural baseline when we feel safe and supported.
Learning to witness your thoughts and watch them pass through your mind is another key. You don’t have to respond to the thoughts, be hooked by them, to go into the drama they try to create. Thank the thought and let it go.
Tell yourself positive messages –
All of these belief systems need to be programmed into the body and lots, lots more. Every negative self belief or belief about life can be changed. There are many ways to do this.
There are lots of ways to do it, but the key is to realise that it is these old, outdated negative thought patterns that keep a person feeling so flat and depressed. If their thoughts are really negative it is hard to motivate yourself into action. So it is here with the negative thoughts that change has to occur.
There are many tools you can use to help shift depression. It is just a matter of trying different things and finding what works best for you.
Know that simply staying stuck won’t work. You need to take action to change your situation. Depression is so common in today’s world that no one will laugh or ridicule you for it. There is lots of help out there.
If your emotional pain is so deep that you become suicidal then it can be useful to go on anti-depressants temporarily to give your body a chance to relax and restrengthen, before you delve into processing the emotions. You will still need to go through them and release them, but building your stamina first can help.
Anti-depressants are not a cure, just a temporary dulling of the intensity of the emotions, so you don’t feel them so much. They numb you slightly to the pain and this can be beneficial for a short while. It is not beneficial long time as it will not help you to find peace, joy or excitement in life. With your doctor’s help you can reduce the anti-depressant while you learn new skills to support yourself to function more effectively.
Depression results from emotional pain and disappointments in life, so people who suffer it need love, support and encouragement from those around them. Be kind to all people you interact with, as everyone is going through their own challenges and all need kindness and love to help them through.
Peace is found once the old thinking and negative emotions are released. These are replaced with joy, passion, fun and happiness. It is possible. It is your natural state of being, just life’s experiences took you away from it. We can all regain balance and peace if we do the work needed to shift that which no longer serves us and to fill the space with that which does. Blessed BE. Amen.
By Jodi-Anne (10 July 2015).
A child who was neglected, beaten, belittled or raped as a child will have grown with high levels of fear in their body. They will have learned to always be on guard, to watch out for danger, to not trust anyone and be alone. They have learned to focus on survival at the expense of joy, friendship and love. A child abused does not know how to relax and be peaceful. They don’t know how to receive or give love as that doesn’t feel safe. They have shut off from the softer sides of life and hardened themselves to cope with all the pain, grief, loss, anger, shame and rage. They are a powder-keg of emotions that are held together by strong armouring and defense mechanisms designed to protect them from experiencing further hurt.
To heal from child abuse all this damage needs to be undone so light can enter and soothe the dark spaces within, so love can enter and melt the sadness away, so peace can enter and joy can flood their cells returning them to their natural state of being.
Healing is a long process of becoming aware of the conditioning and patterning and allowing it to be dismantled. It takes courage to risk opening back up. It takes bravery to feel and release the buried emotions and it takes great commitment to continue unraveling layer upon layer of beliefs and armouring that have kept the person isolated and safe. It takes a lot of physical energy for the body to process these shifts as each layer drops away.
Children who have been abused often feel worthless, unloved, unwanted and not good enough. Healing involves changing these beliefs to realise the truth that you are loved, wanted, cared for and provided for. Life will bring experiences to help with these awakenings and help the individual to heal. Therapists and other practitioners can help speed the process up or help the person to understand what is occurring, so that they can go through it more easily rather than fighting / resisting the changes occurring.
It takes great strength to be willing to soften to feel your vulnerability. For that is what is needed so you can access the truth of your inner being and clear out all the blockages within.
All the trauma and painful experiences are stored within the body, locked into the muscles and cells. This is a protective mechanism so that the child can cope / stay on the planet. If the pain / trauma is too much to process when it is occurring it gets locked into the body, to wait until a time when the person is strong enough and ready to process it. So, unfortunately it is all stored inside waiting for the person to feel and release it. This is why abused children can feel so cold, like stone, rigid, because they are literally locked up inside with all these challenging memories and feelings. This will soften in time as they release all that has been trapped inside. But there is no magic bullet, no wiping it all away. It has to be felt and released, the energy processed, so your body can relax back into its natural state of peace and joy. You have to do the work to get back to this.
Tension and Trauma Release Exercises helps hugely with this release of blocked, trapped energy within the body. TRE is a process that activates the body’s natural mechanism for releasing stress, tension and trauma. The body will systematically shake out the contractions and release the stiffness enabling the body to come back to life more, to move through the emotional residue and open back up to love, laughter and play.
As the buried tension and emotions are released the body starts to feel safer, no longer under threat as the old trauma activations are completed. The past is known as the past. It no longer feels like it could happen again at any moment. The hyper-vigilant defensiveness softens and the person is able to be in the now more fully, not distracted by the past or worrying about the future.
The safer the body feels, the more space there is to focus on what you actually want to do and be in life, instead of automatically reacting to triggers from the buried trauma and pain.
It is worth the effort to heal the trauma so you gain that freedom to be you, to enjoy your life and have fun. TRE is a great tool to help with this. With consistent use of TRE your body will slowly unwind the tension and trauma patterns so you can move forward.
As unfair as it seems children who have been abused make massive leaps and bounds in their evolution as they heal and reach peace within. A lot is asked of them to heal and find inner peace, but the reward is mighty. Unlike those not affected, those who were abused have a burning desire to heal. The healing process can become the primary drive in their life as they want to escape the pain and find peace, joy, love. It is a force that cannot be stopped. Hence, they evolve quite quickly in that lifetime, as opposed to someone who has had an easy life and feels no need to focus on healing or personal growth. So, as painful as it is, on the larger scale of things it is a gift, an invitation to wholeness, to learn forgiveness, mastery of your thoughts and emotions and connection with your heart and God.
Do not lose hope. Yes, there is a lot of work to do to heal from child abuse, but there is also a lot of help out there. You just have to find what works for you. Most will need a therapist of some type as you have to learn to trust another, to feel your emotions and speak your truth. This cannot be done on your own. Books can only help so much. Support groups are very beneficial as long as their focus is on healing and growth – not just on sharing wounded stories, sympathizing with each other, but not progressing.
As anger and rage is worked through you will learn not to blame your parents or others. You will see they knew no better and often received the same treatment themselves. You will learn in time to forgive, not for the sake of the other person, but for your own sake. As if you hold onto resentment it is only your life that is affected with the bitterness and misery. You forgive to set yourself free, to no longer let the past affect you or that person control you.
As you process your emotions layer upon layer of issues related to various topics will arise. Forgiveness is not a once off act, but something you have to keep doing as you gain further insight into how much your life has been affected by the abuse. It takes a lot of strength to reach within and forgive the unforgivable.
Don’t waste energy trying to understand why something was done to you and perhaps not to your siblings. Do not go there! It was not about you. Abuse is about the perpetrator’s pain. They just take it out on you. It is their wounding that they are not coping with and it gets passed onto you to deal with. This happens generation after generation until one person says “Enough, this stops with me”. They commit to healing for their own sake and the sake of their current or future children. They break the link to abuse and heal the family dynamics so that future generations do not have to suffer from the unfinished business of their elder generations. Family karma is completed and the future generations freed from the tyranny. It is a brave soul that takes this healing journey on and there are many such brave souls on the planet now.
Know that you are supported to heal and grow. The right course, book, movie, song will occur to give you the necessary insight or tool to move forward. Time in nature can help soothe your soul and get in touch with what you are really feeling inside. There is a lot of support available today through websites, support groups, government funded programs, private practitioners and more.
You will be guided where you need to go. Trust. Seek help when you need it and go within to learn your truth, to see your freedom and opportunity for growth. Prayer and meditation help greatly, however, many people in the early stages find this hard as they feel foolish going within, speaking to a God who they feel has let them down, who should have protected them and kept them safe. For many there is a lot of rage and even hate for God. Others feel he/she does not exist. Each will work through this in time and come to realise that God is there, loving them, supporting them and smiling at their progress.
As souls we choose to incarnate and experience what we do, so we can grow and evolve. We choose the experiences and the other souls who would hurt us. We chose it to learn from and evolve through. God gives us free will to choose this, to go through these experiences. He/she will not interfere and stop it from happening for that would short circuit our evolution and growth. God sits waiting for us to call out for help and assistance, for us to invite him/her in. Then he/she can assist us, sending us to the right place or person for support, or helping us hear our inner guidance and what to do next.
While healing from child abuse is a long and painful process it is one that leads to liberation and freedom, massive amounts of personal growth and emotional intelligence. It is a path for higher guidance and quick evolution. It is a path only the brave walk and God is there waiting to hold our hand when we ask. Blessed BE. Amen.
By Jodi-Anne (24 June 2015).