Sugaree, Lynn (and Other Readers)
Lynn-
You're right to feel angry about being treated for anxiety and depression when the reasons for your condition went unnoticed. It's just mind-boggingly insane when you stop to think how clueless society and health care practitioners were just a short time ago. Of course, you can't hold someone responsible for not knowing what wasn't known back then - but from our perspective today, it seems absolutely crazy to me especially when it comes to CHILDREN - that people never raised the WHY?????? question. That doesn't - or at lest it shouldn't happen nowadays, so thank god for the watchful eyes of a more enlightened nation. Doctors, psychologists, social workers, school nurses, teachers - everyone's on the lookout for "signs of abuse." We should be joyful for that. It's one of those advancements that can't be taken away.

I wanted to share this simple but poignant story from when I was a teenager; I knew this child, a baby really, with stunningly beautiful child-white hair and infinite blue eyes - I swear you could (at least I could) see clear straight to eternity in those eyes. This child's mother was clueless about a zillion things and I remember watching this child, wanting to tell his mother "Don't do this and don't do that and hold him this way, can't you see he's angry?" Not that I would have spoken, but oh how I wanted to! Some time around when this child was 10 months old, he started biting his mother - fairly violent biting. I had seen this happen, so I knew what the mom was talking about, but I also knew that the baby was ANGRY and to me, he was doing the only thing he could. (Again, you want to say hmmmm? now why would a 10 month old do this? what is this 10 month old trying to say? I remember hearing the mother talk about this to another women - I just wanted to steal the baby (good thing I didn't act on impulses then ). A short time later, I saw the mother and her son again. He was in her arms, and he looked different to me - some of that beautiful blue infinity seemed to have left his eyes forever. As I studied him that moment, the mother explained to a neighbor how she'd solved the biting problem...every time he bit her, she put Tobasco sauce on his tongue. She said this in a proud way, as if she'd invented a household shortcut or something. I remember feeling such sorrow when I heard this, for it seemed to me that I could literally see how the child had "gone away" (what PTSD and other trauma specialists refer to nowadays as "dissocation:). One day - there's a beautiful child with a soul that burns blue in his radiant eyes - then poof! a lot of stupidity and a little Tobasco sauce - and the child's soul turns in on itself, away from the world and from those who might hurt him.
It's so sad and so obvious when you think of the connection between what's done to a child and what a child does.
I wanted to tell this story because it is not about sexual abuse but the child's life took similar course to many abuse survivors. I still know "of him" today and he's way messed up as his "family" says. So here's an example of a life jettisoned off track at an early age from, oh, I'll just be kind and say "stupidity." Imagine, imagine, imagine what happens when the harm brought to a child is of physical or sexual abuse. Oh how sad that so many get broken so early. And how sad that just a short time ago, no one though to ask what might have broken these children!
But, but, but ... we do live in a time of great hope, not just for preventing child abuse, but for treating and healing - YES! HEALING! - survivors. One of the first steps is understanding the connection between what happened to you and what became of you because of what happened.
I applaud Lynn and Sugaree for sharing their stories. I know there are readers who must identify with them. Please, anyone, if there's something you want to talk about or something you want to see discussed, you can post a question or a "discussion request" - you don't have to say anything about yourself.
Until next time-
Julie