GRIEVING

[Caressa2]

"Sometimes I think I'm going to die from the sadness. Not that anyone ever died from crying for two hours, but it sure feels like it."

As a survivor of child (sexual) abuse you have a lot to grieve for. You will grieve for the way you were hurt. You will grieve for not being protected, for the things you missed out on as a child. You will grieve for the time and money it takes to heal, for the relationships and happiness you have lost.

If you covered up your pain by pretending you had a happy childhood, you will have to grieve for the ideal family you didn't really have. You'll have to give up the idea that the abuser had your best interests at heart.

You may have to grieve for the fact that you don't have suitable grandparents for your children, or a family you can depend on.

You must also grieve for the shattered image of a world that is fair and safe for children. You will grieve for your lost innocence and ability to trust.

[Caressa2]

As a survivor of child 'sexual' asbuse you have a lot to grieve for.

Buried grief

Buried grief poisons you. It limits your ability to feel joy or to be fully alive. An important part of healing is to express the grief you've carried inside.

When you were young, you had to hide your feelings. Now, to move on in your life, you need to go back and relive the experiences you had as a child. You have to feel the grief and anguish, but this time with the support of caring people. You might wonder how going back into the pain can help release you from it. But this is how healing from trauma works.

The way to move beyond grief is to experience your pain fully and honor your feelings. When you face your feelings, and they are met with caring and compasion, they change.

- A first book for Survivors of Child Sexual Abuse by Ellen Bass and Laura Davis

THOUGHT FOR TODAY:

A lot of my pain was done by a psychic healer and by using Dianetics written by L. Ron Hubbard.,which is a tool of The Church of Scientology. I don't believe in the church but I believe in the tool that is offered. It goes beyond Steps Ten, Eleven and Twelve and helps you to heal at a deeper level.

Some of the pain I revisited, but a lot of it was just a mass of pent up energy, that I needed to release and let go of in a healthy way. I didn't have to "live" in it, I could revisit but come back to the present and not stay there which is so important when healing this type of pain. That was then, this is now; but what happened back then, can affect me in today until I heal and let it go.

[Caressa2]

About Grief

You may feel foolish crying over events that happened so long ago. But grief stays stored up until you have a chance to express it.

The way to move beyond grief is to experience your pain fully and honor your feelings.

Grief has its own timing. You can't say, "This is it. I'm going to grieve now." You have to make room for grief as it arises. You need to give yourself the time and space to let go:

"I had been in therapy for several months and I began to feel safe. There were weeks when I entered the building, went up the stairs, and checked in, all with a smile on my face. Then I'd enter the office, and my therapist would close the door. Before she could even get to her chair, I'd be crying. Deep within me I help those feelings, waiting until I new there would be time and compassion."

However your grieve, allow yourself to release the feelings you've been holding inside. Grieving can be a grief relief.

THOUGHT FOR TODAY:

Many times over the years, especially the last five years of recovery; I have sat in meditation after asking for what I needed to heal, and the ability to let go of what I didn't need, want or desire. I have sat there with tears just streaming down my face. Most times, not knowing the source, but other times, as a result of something that had triggered me in today.

Tears are a great healer. They cleanse the soul.

[DJgrrl]

I'm an abuse survivor I needed to read this more than you know. It's helped me step further towards acceptance of my own grief. I'm having a hard time accepting that I have so much grief about the past. I have tried to end the grief by lumping them into larger piles <childhood><teens><family><twenties><dreams> and be done with it.
It hasn't worked.
I feel ashamed, guilty, and fearful that I am letting the grief consume me. I have cried for 3 years at almost every face to face ACOA meeting. It is like the therapist story. I've even had members comment to me on how much I cry which makes me feel very ashamed and guilty. In turn I try to hold my feelings in and not cry. I end up carrying it home with me where I cry alone in silence. I need to talk about this at my meetings
I'm trying to find some Al Anon literature for a meeting this week. I'm chairing and it's my choice of topic. I'd like to do it on GRIEF. I haven't been able to find anything like what Careesa has posted in the literature. Most of the grief is about death of a person. If anyone can help please post here.
*hugs* to Caressa for sharing !

DJgrrl

[lildee]

Dear DJgrrl,

I found these sites hope they help, seems to be a lot of info there.

msms.essortment.com/adultsurvivorc_rflk.htm

www.grief.net/index.html

God Bless
Arlene

[Lin]

I jsut read your post DJ. AlAnon meeting shares from books need to be from CAL books. (conference approved literature) There is an awesome book that is CAL called from Survival to recovery. It's an Alanon book for ACOA . On page 25 it talks about grief...the loss of our childhood. That might be a good place to start. I hope you can find a copy of the book.

LIN

[DJgrrl]

Lin,

I do have this book at home. My sponsor gave it to me from our library a while ago. I found it very painful to read. I can barely get past the first few section.
I went to the page you suggested and several pages after. I found so much of myself in those pages. I have to put it down cause it's overwhelming. Hopefully I can find the strength to share some of this when I chair.

DJgrrl

[adagio]

Can I ever relate to this topic! I was sexually abused as a child too, and the grief does seem to come out when it wants to, but subtley does help once it is brought out in the open.
I too miss having a normal childhood...sometimes it seems too much of a burden to bear. For me, writing a lot and talking to my sponsor help immensely. I won't ever be cured, of course, but there is hope that the past will not bother me as much the more I go to Al-Anon.
That book..."From Survival To Recovery" is the first book that I bought, and it is a good one.

[Caressa2]

Grieving is such a big part of recovery. I looked at a couple of topic discussion books I have and no reference was given.

Just walking into the doors of recovery brings about a loss. A loss of illusion, a loss of a way of life, the losing of walls and survival tools, which no longer serve us in today. Many were more blocks and hinderance, and as we make changes in our life, every changed thought and pattern, puts us through a grieving periods in our life.

I took over the parent role at 14, but I was being trained for the job at 10. I say 10, because that is when I was aware. I have no memory prior to five years old, and that memory came two years ago. The next memory is me with my mother at the age of six, and the next one was 8, and then they start coming in about ten.

I believe that my fibromyalgia is a result of stuffed emotions and pain that was never dealt with as I grew up. We are products of our environment I believe more so than heredity, but it could be in the genes as well as the jeans. I know the jeans seemed to do me more harm that the genes. I was brought up to be a lady, a good little Christian girl, and as a result I got a whole lot of mixed messages.

The first person to rape me was my first husband. I didn't know I had a right to say no! I didn't know I was suppose to enjoy sex, I thought I was just a recepticle for a man's use and my way of serving him! As I type that, I shudder and I can feel the anger. That marriage lasted three years and I have a beautiful son as a result of, I had a year relationship after that which I ran from, and it wasn't until after another four month relationship, that I met a man who became my friend and lover and showed me that God had intended me to enjoy life, sex and was deserving of love.

He wanted me to move to the city of TO and I wouldn't go there, and as a result I was to be sexually abused by a doctor and raped twice before I made the decision at 41 to give up men because they were my problem.

I had to grieve those lost years. When I came into recovery at 49 there were no men around to blame my problems on, other than the ones in the past, but they were long gone and I had to face me in today.

Many times I was the victim of other people's choices, and hurt because of choices I made which put me in a position to be hurt.

Thanks to recovery I have been able to let a lot of that pain go, but I didn't get sick overnight and it takes time. I am not who I was in active addiction. My disease took over, and I got left behind or I gave away myself looking for the love, affirmation, and the courage to live. I had to morn my loss of self, and make an amend to myself for abusing me.

I try not to keep anything a secret today, as I remember I deal with it. I can't afford to keep it there because it just festers and grows and shows itself in ways that are not condusive to serenity, peace and love.

What brought me here will take me back. If I don't break the cycle, it will keep repeating itself. Feeling the feelings, allows me to let go, it is part of the grief and even in today one of the hardest things for me to do is cry. It is only when I sit in meditation and ask for healing and spend time with God and ask for that healing that I have sat alone and in the dark and have had tears just roll down my cheeks. I haven't had a clue as to what the origin of them are, but it is just like a cleansing of my soul.

[adagio]

Big ditto here!!


The first person to rape me was my first husband. I didn't know I had a right to say no! I didn't know I was suppose to enjoy sex, I thought I was just a recepticle for a man's use and my way of serving him! As I type that, I shudder and I can feel the anger..

This was added on to the abuse that I had as a child, further convincing me that I was a nothing.

[Lin]

Thanks for sharing these thoughts Caressa and Adagio. I'm so sorry this happened to you both as children. Children should never have to endure such things.

Adagio...it's sad that these things convinced you that you were a "nothing". I hope today you ahve worked through these beliefs and put them i the past. They are so NOT TRUE. You are a warm, human being with feelings and intelligence. You deserve to be treated with dignity and respect.

God bless you as you travel on your recovery jouney!

LIN

[adagio]

Getting there, Lin.. ;D Thank goodness! I don't feel half as worthess as I used to.

[caressa]

Had a friend ask me about grieving this week. My friend is planning to move and I didn't realize how much grieving is attached to such a big change in your life. She is moving to a positive situation and yet to be able to accept and enjoy the new, you need to grieve the old.

This was posted to help another friend. I was never sexually abused until I was an adult.

Grief is anything that is a loss in your life. Every time I go through change in my routine, in my circumstances, in my day to day living, I need to go through the grieving process. Grief is not a straight forward process, you can jump from one feeling to another and back again and it takes time.

[caressa]

Realized that I have been going through a grieving process with regards to my son. It is so easy to see it in others but when you are in it, it isn't always easy to recognize. I think I have finally come to the acceptance part and there will be no more of the other up and down emotions.

Always thought grief had five stages, this site lists seven.

www.recover-from-grief.com/7-stages-of-grief.html

[majestyjo]

Always good to remember that grief isn't just about a loss of a friend and a death of a loved one. We have a lot to grieve in early recovery.

Be kind to yourself. Find things that soothe your soul.

[majestyjo]

Posted this on another site, not sure if it came from here originally or not. I have posted so much over the years, it is hard for me to remember.

We go through a grieving process daily. Even more so during the holiday season, especially if we are alone.

Those of us who suffer from chronic pain, no matter what the source of that pain, goes through the grieving of:

1) What was, prior to our disability which causes our pain

2) What it use to be like, if we are so fortunate not to have been born with our challenges.

3) What we use to be able to do and can no longer.

4) The loss of our routine, mobility, memory, jobs, relationships, friends, family, etc.

You can probably add to my list, and please do. This was made just to make you aware, and to start you thinking, so you recognize that often grief and the feelings of often trigger more pain.

When we don't deal with our grief issues and keep things inside, we add more pain.

My pain was the root of my addiction. I tried to cover up and not feel it instead of looking at what caused it and what could be changed within me because so often emotional pain makes itself known physically. That can be a two way street as well.

As my chiropractor said many times over the years, "A healthy mind makes for a healthy body. I have never met someone who is so in tune with herself and her body. I can trust you." Not words you expect to hear after many years of addiction.

Have been going through several grief issues, you can get caught up in things in the moment, and not able to recognize them for what they are.

www.webmd.com/balance/tc/grie...eving-symptoms