I heard so many things against speaking about the past.  Questions which are actually statements and judgements more than they are actual questions such as “why do you want to talk about your problems in public” or “why do you want to air your dirty laundry in front of the whole world?” These judgements always concluded with some version of “you are only making yourself look like a fool.” Statements like that carried with them the all too familiar indication that the speakers (the judges) were concerned for ME; that they truly cared about what was “best for me”.

When I faced the cold hard truth, I began to comprehend the actuality reality; I realized that their concern was never for me. I didn’t need to make myself look like a fool, they did that for me all of my life. I think of the times they delighted in finding ways to embarrass me or humiliate me in front of others. In fact I think that some of their motives were based on discrediting me in case I ever revealed the truth.  They were not concerned about MY dirty laundry. They were only concerned about what I was exposing about THEM. They didn’t want me to expose THEIR dirty laundry.  And I think this would be a good time to add that if they didn’t KNOW what they were doing was wrong, if they didn’t “know any better” then WHY did they know that they needed to keep me quiet about it?

The biggest reason that people persuaded me not to talk about child abuse and dysfunctional family stuff was either because THEY didn’t want to be exposed or because they knew that if they sided with me or even if they validated me, then they would have to face their own dysfunctional family stuff. They were not trying to help me live a better life in freedom and wholeness with their “just let it go” directives. They were concerned with covering their own butts and staying in denial by not facing the truth and so they could keep getting away with all the stuff that everyone knows deep down is wrong.

The legal definitions of child abuse and neglect were a huge eye opener for me. But an even bigger eye opener was when I realized the lengths that so many people went to, to make sure I kept quiet.  Like I said, if they did not know their behaviour was wrong, they would not have spent so much energy making sure it didn’t come out in the open. 

I wish I had found a website or like this when I was searching for answers all those years. Nobody was talking about holding family accountable for abuse or about exposing abusers… everyone seemed to be talking about forgiveness or letting go of the past. “Live for today” and “acceptance is the answer” but nobody wanted to talk about WHAT we were supposed to accept! Were they really telling me to accept that people messed with my head, discounted and devalued me, took advantage of me, taught me that something was “wrong with me”, abused, mistreated and objectified me, and telling me that I should just “get over it”? In that dysfunctional recovery system, everyone endorsed “keeping the silence” and no one wanted to talk about spending some time actually validating the dysfunction first. I was never able to put the past behind me until I actually validated the damage that was done. There are even therapists out there that will refuse to work with you if you want to talk about the past!

I spent over 25 years of my adult life trying to let go and let God and get over it, accept it, forgive and feel sorry for the sick people in my past and I ended up having increasingly difficult chronic depressions.  I spent only 2 years facing and validate it and all the results that I ever could have hoped for were achieved. So what is so wrong with my way? At least I am living proof that it worked!

I speak and I write EFB because it is my story and MINE to tell. I celebrate the permission I give myself to tell my story after years of being silenced.  It is validating for me and for others to hear the benefits of living in truth. Finding, facing and embracing the truth is what set me free from oppression, depression and the low self esteem that hindered me all of my life before I faced the lies so I could embrace this truth.

I will speak my truth. I will tell my story. Look at my life today! I am free. I am living a full and happy life bursting with wholeness and freedom in the sunlight of the truth and no longer in the shadow of the lie.  The fact that they are not happy for me is actually more proof of the dysfunctional system they live in. Like crabs in a bucket, clambering over each other to get out but only pulling each other back down because really, no one wants another little crab to escape into freedom if the darkness of the bucket is the fate of the rest. Well too bad for them. I finally stood up to them and stood up for me. I finally chose ME over them. I escaped. I don’t live in that darkness anymore and it feels GREAT to have the sun on my face!

Note: speaking up for myself and drawing boundaries does not always mean that I have to confront controlling and manipulative people; in many cases they walked away from the relationship as soon as they sensed that I had caught on to the disrespect and devaluing treatment. They skulked away like guilty dogs, which tells a tale now doesn’t it?  

Please share your thoughts about being told to leave the past in the past.

Another snapshot of truth;

Darlene Ouimet

Legal definitions of Child Neglect and Child Abuse and also see US department of Health

Related Posts: Standing up to Damaging Advice and Unhelpful Trauma Directives

Forgive the Abusers ~ A bit of a Rant

Manipulative and Controlling People and some abuse tactics

freedom ~ my grown son T.

I was not always who I am today. I was not strong. I was not independent. I was not an individual. I was not often happy. I was not a voice in the darkness and although I always had a desire to advocate for others, I was not effective.

I had to become effective in my own life before I was effective in the lives of others.

I was a victim. Some would rather I say that I was a survivor but in truth when I started this process I was still a victim. I was still a victim because I was still oppressed. I was still under the law of other people. I was still compliant and obedient. I was still defined by those other people and my true identity was suppressed.

I was lost, withdrawn and depressed. I was owned by many and disrespected by most.  I had three kids and when my oldest, who was 12 at the time started to treat me like I was ‘crazy’ and started using my depression as proof that I was crazy ~  just like his father (my husband) did, I knew that I had reached the end of what I could cope with. I was giving up on the fight for my life. The only decision that I had to make was how I was going to end it. I had to decide if I was going to escape, or if I was going to fight to find the solution one last time.

At first I had decided to leave my family. I thought that my husband and my three kids would be better off without me because I believed that I was the problem. I believed it deep down in my heart and soul because that was the message that I had always been given, all of my life and I never thought not to accept that message anymore.  The truth had been distorted for me since the beginning. I didn’t even question the truth as I knew it.  I believed the problem was “me” and I really believed that if I left my family, their lives would be so much easier; so much better.  I decided out of love for them that I should quietly go. But something nagged at me and today I know it was a glimmer of “the truth”.  It was NOT best for anyone if I were to just go.

I realized that for a very long time I learned to do what others wanted because I had been so totally convinced that what they wanted for me was ‘right’ because I had been so manipulated all my life. This was part of taking my life back from my oppressors. I started to look at what might be right for me. I started to think about what I might want and what was ‘best’ for me. I learned that most times “best” is best for everyone and not just best for me; it always comes down to the motive. What had happened to me most of my life was never best for me; it was just what someone else selfishly wanted.

As I started to look at HOW I had come to believe that the problem was me, I began to realize that I had been controlled and manipulated all my life by people who asked me to “try harder”. Trying harder was a default mode for me. As long as I believed I was the one that had to “try harder” I accepted that success in relationship and whether or not I was loved was all up to me.   

I write about “Emerging from Broken” from real experience. I lived functioning at a fraction of the level that I function at today. I survived living under the oppression and suppression of others. I survived by believing that if I did what “they” want and if I am who “they” want me to be, I would be loved. I was so brainwashed in victim mentality (that if I did what they wanted they would love me) that I could not see a solution other than leaving the world that I lived in.

I found a way to leave the world that I lived in by facing the damage that had been caused to me. I didn’t have to “go” anywhere. I literally stepped out of it by seeing how dysfunctional and harmful that it had been and still was.  I learned to validate my pain and declare that I had a right to my feelings, I had a right to my voice, I had been wronged and it WAS NOT my fault.   I finally owned my truth and discarded the lies that I had been encouraged to believe my entire life by realizing exactly what those lies were and how those lies were all designed by others who wanted to keep and maintain control over me. I learned to take care of myself emotionally.  I learned to love myself. And through all of this, I found myself. I found the original me and I embraced myself. I welcomed myself into a whole new world and a whole new existence.

I stayed with my husband and my children and we rebuilt our lives. I took the lead even though it was a fight for the first two years. No one in our home wanted anything to change but I wanted healing and I was willing to risk everything in order to obtain it. In my victim mentality I had actually taught my husband and kids to disregard my needs and even my opinions by disregarding them myself. They didn’t trust that I could model “emotional health”.

My husband had to do his own healing work and he did; I finally embraced the truth that it takes two to have a relationship and I was finally able to communicate that to him. I was no longer willing to carry the burden of relationship all by myself. We repaired the damage that had been done to us all of our lives and that we had in turn passed on by accepting and living in those false definitions of love. When our individual healing work was underway, we worked really hard to repair the damage and dysfunction in our marriage relationship and then in the relationships that we had with our three children.

Years have passed since I made the decision to face the pain and take my life back from the people who stole it from me. I live, really live each day now. Our three children have flourished living in the truth and without the oppression of the lies that we all used to live buried under.

Welcome to Emerging from Broken; the greatest and most rewarding adventure of my life. I look forward to meeting you on the journey from surviving to thriving.  

This article has been an emotional one for me to write. Tears sprang to my eyes several times; my determination to face the pain, acknowledge the damage, heal and take my life back surprised even me. I did not know that I had this amount of strength and persistence when I started this journey but today that is how I know that you can do it too.

As always, please share your thoughts.

There is freedom on the other side of broken,

Darlene Ouimet

When I grew up however, nothing changed.  I had been taught compliance and subservience and I didn’t step out of that role just because I became an adult.

I wasn’t heard so I stopped expecting to be heard. I was not “allowed” the impact that I saw other people had. I had to listen to what everyone else wanted, but I was not given that same consideration. My opinions rarely had any impact. I sought out friends who were similar to me in their own victim mentality and found fellowship with them but I continued to have bosses, parents, boyfriends who communicated that they were more important than I was.  Once again with those types of people in my life, I stopped trying to be heard. I accepted that I was not going to be heard and that my voice didn’t really matter. Not having a voice and not being heard had become “normal” to me.

That was the beginning of my depressions; that kind of “acceptance” was really like a kind of “giving up”.  It was a giving up on me.

My childhood relationships taught me not to expect much from relationships in adulthood.  No expectations equaled less disappointment.

Keep in mind the false definition of relationship that I had learned; I still thought that if I did what the other person wanted, then I would be loved so I kept trying harder to achieve love by “compliance to others wishes” And other people lived by this false truth too, enforcing my belief that I could “prove love” by compliance to their wishes however it was never enough.

Accepting that I wasn’t heard was a big problem when it came to my personal journey. Not being heard and accepting this “lesser value” had a major effect on the way I viewed myself and on the health of my self esteem. 

Not being heard and not being allowed to have an “impact” on the people that I believed were important in my life, is a common part of growing up with emotional neglect and psychological abuse. (And a part of every other kind of abuse.)

It is a very big part of the grooming process to be taught that (my) opinions, feelings etc. are not valuable. It got me “out of their way”. It got me to the compliance and obedience stages that they wanted me to be at. It got me “respecting” and sometimes even “worshiping” the very people who were causing me the most harm.  I didn’t question or oppose anyone as long as I accepted that my voice didn’t matter.

In the emotional healing process, I realized that in not being heard, I had also become the invisible child. Accepting that “I didn’t matter” defined me as unimportant. Not important enough to be heard made me feel invisible. Does a person who doesn’t matter, really exist?

Being the invisible child had its good points when I looked back through the grid of “survivor mode”. Being invisible seemed to be the right choice if I was going to stay safe. I realized that being invisible had served a purpose for a long time in my life, and when I began emotionally  healing, being visible was frightening.

I had to look at this conflict within myself.

Once I started to heal, being invisible and not being heard became a fear trigger that I didn’t always recognize or understand.  Being invisible was invalidating but being visible didn’t feel safe. I found my voice and was finally using it but I was not used to being so visible. It didn’t feel “comfortable”; being heard and being heard (visible) was really unfamiliar. 

Once I began to heal and validate my right to be respected, loved and my right to have equal value I found that I reacted to people who ignored me as though I was insignificant. I wanted to fight against being regarded as insignificant. But at the same time, being invisible was the only way that I had felt safe in the past so it was somewhat of a “default mode”. I had always lived by the thought that “if ‘they’ don’t notice me, ‘they’ won’t hurt me”.  When I took my life back, I wanted to be seen and heard. I had something to say and I had a right to say it. I wanted to have some impact on others but at the same time I was afraid of the rejection that was forthcoming whenever I had tried to have a voice before! It was complicated to realize both these thoughts/beliefs were operating simultaneously. 

I would say that learning to listen to myself and giving up on being heard by the people who silenced me in the first place was foundational in my healing. Finding my voice did not mean that I had to be heard by those that refused to hear me.

It was through looking at the history in my life that I was able to see all the aspects of these fears and overcome them. There was a reason that I was so shut down.  I was groomed overtime to “accept” that I didn’t matter; my voice was not important and my needs/wants were invalid.  Overcoming that false belief was only the first step on the road to emotional healing. I went on to realize that “invisible” had become something I hid in. Invisibility felt safer than visibility. Invisible no longer served me because I no longer needed to live in “survivor mode”.

Embracing equality and owning that equal value was for me too, was part of how I finally found, validated and reclaimed my voice.

Please share your thoughts through the comment form about losing or finding your voice or whatever stage of that process that resonates with you. Remember that you may use any name you wish if your privacy is a concern. Only the name you use will be public on this site. The optional URL spot is for if you want to share your blog or website.

There is freedom on the other side of broken,

Darlene Ouimet 

Peace through Truth by Theodora MacLeod

I am an advocate for truth. I am an advocate for the truth that leads to freedom, wholeness and healing. I am an advocate for the truth that leads to healthy self esteem, the true definition of love and equal value for adults and children, bosses and employees, teachers and students because in the eyes of the truth, we are ALL people with equal value. Although we may have more authority in some situations, we do not suddenly reach a certain age or status which gives us more value than someone else has.

I will no longer do what “they” have decided is best for me to do or what “they” think I should do. I will do what I believe is right and best for me. When others tell me what to do or what I am doing wrong according to them, my ability to make decisions for myself is insulted and that kind of put down is devaluing.

I am not going to be who others say I am or who others want me to be. I am who I really am. No one else can define me. When I am defined by others I feel judged and unappreciated and it stifles my ability to be who I AM.  

Taking my life back means that I am in charge of it now. I am the captain of my own ship. My happiness does not depend on someone else’s happiness anymore.  In learning what was best for me and living in that definition, I empower all those around me to live their best life as well. I am no longer that puppet allowing everyone to pull my strings and I don’t wish to pull anyone else’s strings.

I was always in a situation where people communicated that it was BEST for ME when I did what they wanted. That communicates the message that I have no gift or purpose outside of serving them and it discounts my life and my purpose. Everyone has a gift to offer. Everyone has equal value in this world. By communicating to me that I didn’t know what was best for me but that they knew better, my individuality was stifled and my self esteem was thwarted.  

 I do not live by the false definition of love; the false definition of love exists to serve the unhealthy (and unloving) motives of others. When I was taught that love was compliance and obedience I thought my best contribution to others was my compliance and obedience and that I was to serve them no matter what motive they had.  I don’t agree with that definition of love anymore. It is dysfunctional and it is wrong. That is not love and I don’t live within that box anymore.

I do not give up my life anymore. I was lost because abuse defined me. By the actions of others I was told that I was not worth protecting. I was taught that I was not as valuable. I was taught that “the real me” was not good enough and that I had to try harder. I had to find “ME” and I had to validate and empower myself.

I am not silent and will not silence my own voice anymore. I found my voice and I broke the silence. I don’t respect the reasons for keeping the silence anymore. The reasons for keeping the silence are wrong. They are damaging to me. They are rooted in defending abuse.  

Healthy relationship is mutual; Mutual respect and equal value for all people in the relationship.

Respect means treating me as an individual with my own thoughts and my own opinions and I will follow that same definition of respect. The truth is that we are ALL individuals. If we don’t agree on something, that does not mean I don’t love or respect.  I had to look at where my fears in relationship came from in order to understand the way other people reacted to me.  I had been taught that compliance was respect. Obedience was love. If I didn’t like what an adult (or even someone else) was doing, too bad.  I believed that I was “loved and accepted” when I agreed. SO, when someone didn’t agree with me, I thought the relationship was in danger. My definition of relationship was all wrong.  And because of my nature, I was the one who back downed in compliance and obedience first because I thought it proved my love.  BUT that is not what love is. I had to get this straight before I could move forward with the life of freedom and wholeness that I had begun to believe was possible. I realized that other people were reacting out of their own false belief systems. They had their own false definitions of love and respect.   

I had to stop trying to figure out how to make everyone else happy and concentrate on the truth about why I was so unhappy.  I had to find my own value and define myself through the grid of truth before I could stop jumping through the hoops of controlling and manipulative people.

Freedom and wholeness cost me a big price and disregarding the things that were so hard to learn for the sake of keeping a dysfunctional relationship would be like throwing away all my hard work. Working on a relationship with someone who disagrees with my value, is counterproductive.  Working on functioning within dysfunctional parameters is the exact relationship system I worked so hard to escape.

Please share your thoughts and examples of dysfunctional relationship through either the false definition of love or the new grid of looking at the truth.

There is freedom on the other side of broken;      

Darlene Ouimet

See the freedom and wholeness category for related posts

Trust

I found it easier to understand the concept of Trust, by looking at what I had been taught about trust. It was the experiences that I’d had to do with the word and definition of trust that were at the root of my understanding of the concept and meaning of the word trust.

I remember being scared half out of my wits while being yelled at “TRUST ME, I know what YOU need”. (which translated to me that I “needed” the spanking, the strap, the punishment)

I was told to trust teachers and leaders who were bullies and predators simply because they were “my elders”. Being taught to blindly trust only taught me that I was not worth much. Being “told” to trust people who were not trustworthy left me very confused about what trust really was.

I had a boyfriend who accused me of not trusting him when he was driving drunk. I felt shame and guilt even though drunk driving is illegal, I had been “groomed” to believe that questioning someone meant that I didn’t love him or her.   He went to jail for impaired driving.  

I didn’t make the connection that trust has nothing to do with love. 

I had another boyfriend who accused me of not trusting him when I found a girls phone number on his dresser. Once again I felt guilt and shame because as I already mentioned, I had been taught that if I didn’t trust, I didn’t love.  It turned out that he was cheating on me, just as I suspected. I didn’t find out for a long time because I was too busy trying to prove that I “trusted” and “loved him.”  I had several boyfriends who accused me of not trusting them. I don’t know why it never occurred to me to admit even to myself that I didn’t trust them.  There were reasons that I asked the questions I asked; questions such as “where were you all night?” “why did a woman phone for you?” Why didn’t you phone me to say you were going out with the boys?”  

By getting angry and accusing me of accusing HIM of something and trying to “control him” he got me off the actual subject and put me on the defense where in the end I was assuring him that it wasn’t that I didn’t trust him, it was that I just wanted to know where he was but that question never got a real answer. He deflected it by accusing me of not trusting him! And I spent all my time and energy making it up to HIM that I had made him feel like I didn’t trust him!  

This “rabbit trail” that we went down was about how it was MY fault we had problems because **I** didn’t trust. And I was told that if I didn’t trust him then I mustn’t love him. If I didn’t love him then he would leave me to find someone who WOULD love him. And love meant trust so back to square one; I trusted him, he cheated and did what he wanted and I stayed in the fog of dysfunctional relationship feeling guilty for not trusting him and making him feel unloved.   

 I was accused of not trusting and totally guilt tripped and reprimanded by those people only to find out that they were actually NOT trustworthy, just as I suspected.

I was told to trust abusive manipulative people while they were hurting me, all the while “soothing me” in quiet “loving” hushed tones with “trust me, I won’t hurt you”.  “Trust me” I am doing this because “I love you”.  My definitions and understanding of the words “trust” and “love” grew from these false statements from others. Seeing where they were rooted and the lies that grounded them was huge for me. I was told by other adults that I was wrong to be afraid of these “trustworthy” people who were hurting me. When stuff like this happens, it is no wonder why our definitions and understanding of words like trust get confused.

Having the false definition of the word trust in my belief system made it easy for manipulative people to get away with many things without question.  I was caught in the spin of feeling guilty for NOT trusting them without a “real reason”.  The spotlight was always turned back on me and I found myself drilling myself with accusations like “what is wrong with you Darlene, why can’t you trust him or her?” I had learned and in fact been taught to ignore my intuition until it was way too late.

The spin around this whole false belief system was huge!

In that false normal system, trust meant that I had to let someone hurt me and pretended it didn’t hurt me. Trust meant that I didn’t tell on the person hurting me because if I told I would damage the trust and especially the chance of “love” in our relationship. Physical, emotional, spiritual or sexual hurt, it didn’t matter. Trust meant that they were right and I had no rights.

Should trust, must trust… WHY? What does that MEAN? When there is a history of damage around the word trust, that damage has to be faced and the “action” of trust needs to be examined for what it really is.  By understanding how my belief system falsely formed about the word trust I was able to heal from the damage caused by living under the control of that false definition.

Trust is earned over time by each person and in each individual relationship. Trust takes time to grow and being uncertain about to trust or not to trust is not an indication of suspicion or accusation.

 And the action of trust needs to be examined for what it really IS NOT.

Trust is not a right. Trust is not love. Trust is not letting someone devalue you to prove love or loyalty. Trust does not hurt. Trust is not mandatory!

In the dysfunctional system that I grew up in, trust meant that I didn’t count. Trust meant that I protected the very person who was mistreating me. Trusting him meant that I “loved him” or so I misunderstood because that was what I had been taught and how I had been groomed. 

I was taught that I had no right NOT to trust. That version of trust was another false teaching that I had been taught that in the end meant that I was not worthy. I was always wrong. I was always the problem and I was responsible for the success and or failure of ALL relationships. 

See how mixed up “trust” was in my belief system? Can you see why I had to come to understand how I had been taught the wrong definition of trust?

In my case, having so many mixed up and false understandings of so many words and concepts I had no choice but to disconnect and dissociate more and more. I withdrew into the “fog” and dissociated from life in order to cope, in order to survive and in order to carry the burden of all these dysfunctional and often toxic relationships.

What are the trust messages that you have received?

Please feel free to share your thoughts. Please remember that you are welcome to use any name that you wish when you comment. Your identity is safe here; only the name you use will be seen by the public.

Facing the truth on the road to freedom;

Darlene Ouimet

see links in colour and bold print for related posts  Emotional Healing and Busting through Brainwashing

More Related Posts ~  

I wrote this in September of 2007.

Darlene ~ 2005

“Gardening isn’t just about planting and harvesting.  It is about peace, serenity and reality.  I can truly be in a deep state of relaxation and feel at one with myself and my surroundings when I am on my knees in the garden with my hands plunged deeply into the soft earth. 

Gardening is like life.  I had to get the soil all ready to plant tiny seeds of freedom and wholeness.  It is a lot of work to make ready fertile ground.  I can’t just throw the seeds in any old way on any old type of soil and expect to yield a bountiful result. 

I like to plant in nice neat rows, however they don’t always come up in nice straight paths but rather crooked lines sometimes there are even empty spaces as though there were a missed connection.  Should I fix it, or should I leave some blanks?

And there are weeds.  Oh man, don’t we hate the weeds? We certainly don’t plant them, so where do they come from? How do their seeds get in there?  Year after year the same weeds too.  Most of the work in my garden is really about tending to the weeds, picking them out so that all the nutrition in the soil and from the rain can be used for the healthy life sustaining food sources I am growing.

Growing and building, that is what this process is all about.

Weeding out the lies that are rooted so deeply that they sprout up all the time. I have to stay on top of them ~ I have to keep weeding and tending my garden.

If I let my garden get out of hand, then the weeds very quickly shoot up and choke out the good plants causing me to lose the balance I have worked so hard to achieve.  It can take mere weeks to find myself overwhelmed by the battle with weeds.

The weeds represent the false belief system that my life had been ruled by. I had to get those (weeds) lies out. Some of them were stubborn, like thistles with deep roots that we all connected to each other… all throughout the garden.

A little weeding each day is necessary in order to maintain the beauty and tranquility that I feel when I am in my garden.  This is after all “My Life”. 

I didn’t always realize how valuable my own life is. I especially didn’t realize how valuable I am.  I didn’t know how to weed my garden or how to nurture or maintain growth. I had never been taught. I didn’t have a teacher.  The harvest had not been very pretty. Not much nutrition or nurturing in my garden in the past. 

So I had to start over.  I had to take in the big machines, the real farm equipment and turn that soil upside down, tilling and churning over and over, working out the roots of the weeds (which were like lies) until I had beautiful dark soft earth, almost the way it was in the beginning before anything grew there.  Then I planted truth, and when those old lies pop up, I gently and tenderly separate them from the tiny new plants of truth, I pluck them out and throw them away. A little bit each day. A little bit of tending, maintaining and watering goes a long way towards a beautiful life.

There is freedom and wholeness in truth. And when the truth is tended and nurtured, the truth grows stronger and bigger eventually taking over the space that was previously occupied by the lies.  The truth will eventually grow strong enough that the lies will not come back to rob my life of the serenity, freedom and wholeness that I have cultivated and grown.

Freedom grows here.”                                                                            

Darlene Ouimet Sept.2007

Please share your thoughts.  I look forward to hearing from you.

Related Posts ~ Who am I ? Will I like me?  See also words in bold throuhout this post.

Mutual Trust

I didn’t have to learn how to trust in order to heal.  In fact if trust had been the criteria or even part of the requirement for healing, I may not have ever achieved emotional healing.  I had to take a few chances, I had to reveal a few secrets and take the chance that doing that might have negative results, but honestly, looking back over it, I didn’t actually have to trust.

I didn’t trust anyone when I began this journey. I had learned that trust was a dangerous thing to do. I got by alright without trust.

There are different ways to look at this I suppose. Two of my children were born via cesarean section.  I suppose that it could be assumed that I had to trust that the surgeon would do the job right, but the truth is that I had no choice. It was either let him do the surgery, or die. That was not the same as putting my trust in him. In this same way as a child I had no choice but to “trust” that the adults in my life were doing the best that they could too. Rebelling against them surely meant death.  I accepted their wishes and for the most part complied with what they wished from me. But that is not exactly trust in the way that we think of it as adults. Through my childhood and the way that I was so ill regarded, I learned a false definition of trust.

You don’t have to trust me. I believe that I am trust worthy, but how would you know that for yourself? I have had a few angry people on this website, so you may be able to find people that would suggest that you should NOT trust me.  It doesn’t really matter though because trusting me is not the key. I have very intentionally written the articles in this website to inspire HOPE for healing without trying to convince anyone that they have to “trust me” in order to achieve emotional healing. I write the way that I speak trying to communicate that this process is what worked for me. The things I write about are the processes and insights that have worked for me in my emotional growth and healing processes and that is all I can convey to the reader.  I let my work speak for itself, but you have a choice about how you feel or react towards what I present here.

I had to think about what “trust” meant to me. Trusting meant that I believed this “new person” would not invalidate me like I had been invalidated for most of my life. The problem was; how could I do that when invalidation was so much of what I had been raised on? I was used to it. It was familiar and comfortable.  How was I to believe that the next person (who had an answer for me) was going to be any different in the way they regarded me?

For me, having to “trust” someone else in the healing process produced further anxiety and fear. So I thought about “why do I have to trust??” The truth is that I don’t have to trust.

All that I needed in the beginning was the hope that I could recover and heal from the past. I had a glimmer of hope that I could overcome depressions and dissociative issues.  I had an inkling that I might find healing if I faced the reasons why I had so many trust issues. As always, it was at the roots of the damage where I found the keys to freedom.  

I gave myself permission NOT to trust until I had good reason to trust. I trusted people a little bit at a time when they continued to prove themselves trustworthy. People earned my trust when they treated me with respect and equal value. When people invalidated me or treated me as though I were beneath them, that was when I knew NOT to trust them. Those people are no longer worthy of my trust.  

I learned to trust myself way before I learned to trust anyone else. I learned to trust myself by realizing all the lies that I had come to believe about myself and setting the truth straight. I was convinced by the actions and inactions of others that I was invalid and unworthy of love and that was what I knew as truth. Invalidation was all I knew. Empowerment and validation of my human worth had not been taught to me. I trusted that I could face the truth about how that happened and I faced it one step at a time. Through that process, I began to trust that I could learn to love myself and I trusted that I could learn to take care of my own needs. 

I began to trust myself when I started to change the way that I regarded me. I no longer regard myself the way “they” taught me to regard myself.

It was when I achieved some progress in self love and self trust that I was finally able to trust a few other people in my life because once I trusted myself, it wasn’t such a big risk to trust others. As I grew stronger, I knew that I could protect myself if someone violated my trust. I knew that I could stand up to that kind of invalidation. I knew that I could be there for me. I was no longer a victim of the world and its people.

Today I know that “trust” was not a key in the healing process.  I didn’t trust most of the people who helped me. I gave myself permission NOT to trust which gave me the freedom to move forward without the usual fears I had when I was with other people.  I had to go through the process of trial and error. I had to take those little steps forward, testing the foundation, testing the waters, checking my feelings and asking myself if I was safe and if I didn’t feel safe was that a real feeling or a belief system leftover feeling? 

This has been a big part of the process of “Emerging from Broken”.

Please feel welcome to share your thoughts in the comments here. Please remember that the name you use in the comment form will be the name the other readers will see therefore you are welcome to use any name you wish here. (first name only, or even a fake name) Your email address (which is only asked for to validate that you are a real person) will remain private.

There is freedom on the other side of broken,

Darlene Ouimet

Please visit “Emerging from Broken” on Facebook ~ although EFB has an active facebook page, your comments here will not be published there.

run

Official Notice to the oppressors, abusers and perpetrators of emotional and psychological abuse;   ~ you were wrong about me. You ARE wrong about me.  I don’t need YOU to make me better. I am better than you know. I am stronger than you ever dreamed. I don’t need you to make me anything.  I am better without you. Watch me fly and wave good bye to you from my position of freedom high above the clouds.

“Sometimes our teachers teach us more than they themselves have learned” Darlene Ouimet

You smiled at me, nodding and tilting your head as though you really understood what I was telling you. You made it easy for me to talk about my pain.  I felt heard. I felt like finally someone understood.  No one had ever really understood me. Certainly no one had ever validated my pain. And since validation was what I needed, it was so easy for you to use that knowledge against me. You validated me yes, but in the end it was only so that you could get what YOU wanted. You were a predator but I was so starved for acknowledgement that I didn’t recognize you as one.

All the while you smiled and listened attentively you were thinking about how you could capture me for your own and take me for your own possession. But I didn’t see it.

I kept telling myself that you would never take advantage of me. I must be misunderstanding the tiny red flags coming up for me; I always misunderstood… all my life I had been told that I misunderstood. I thought that I must be misunderstanding again.

And we talked about my “trust issues”.

I was high with the new feelings of being heard, being validated and being seen. I did not consider that I was being groomed again. Everyone in my past had wanted something from me. Everyone took advantage of me. With men it was often something to do with sex or sexuality.  And this time the warning signs about sex were not present, so I missed the other signs. No one ever wanted me for my brain. No one saw my potential before, in fact, I was used to being treated like I was stupid and incapable. I was so excited to be valued for my brain that I didn’t realize that your motive was just different than what I was used to. Your motive was just as selfish however.   

You wanted me for what I could do for you. 

You threw me crumbs off your table as though I was lucky to have them.  I begged for those crumbs and I believed that I was SO LUCKY to have them until I realized that I am capable of providing the entire meal and that I don’t need you or your pathetic crumbs.

I am not interested in the kind of “love” you have in mind. I know this feeling that I have been tricked this way before. The tactics are familiar, only the details and outcomes have changed.   

I thought you were different. I thought you SHOULD have been different. You were a respected “professional”. You were a “Christian.” You were all the things that I thought meant ‘safe’.

You thought I was ‘nothing’ and you regarded me as such. You thought that I was insignificant compared to you. Well look at me now.

You tried to steal my gifts by telling me that I didn’t have them. You tried to convince me that without you I would not survive. How was I to know that you were manipulating me? How would I have known that you were thinking about what I could do for you, while I thought you were thinking about me; planning how you could take my gifts and make them yours while you took the credit and left me in the darkness.

You are like all the others. Just like all the others. 

You regarded me as though I was stupid; as though I would never catch on. Just like all the others. You are just as pathetic as you taught me THEY were. You are a pathetic blur along with all of the other abusers and oppressors in my past now.  

I thought I needed you but I was wrong.

You can’t have my mind. You can’t have my body. You can’t have me. Don’t touch me again with your poison. The truth has destroyed my respect for you. The truth has set me free.

All my life when men were convincing me that they were trying to “love me”, and make me feel good, they were really only trying to suit themselves. They were preparing the ground for their own pleasure and their own harvest. It was never about me or my feelings. It was all a grooming process. Even in some of the work projects that I did, this exact same grooming process took place. I was less than a prostitute since I never got paid. My contribution was dismissed as unimportant and as though I would never expect to be given any credit in the first place. Without acknowledgement, I now realize that your gratitude was glaringly insincere.  

 I thought it was love, to serve in this way. I thought you were love. And in truth, you were the same as every other predator. Misusing your power to empower yourself; using me to glorify you.  Never seeing ME as an individual with as much value as you saw in yourself.

And you believed all along that I wanted to serve you; you believed that I wanted to be your puppet. You acted like you were doing ME a favor because you regard yourself so highly and me so lowly. I am sure you thought ~ who wouldn’t want to have the privilege of sitting at your feet? And I believed it. I thought I was so lucky that you picked me.  You picked me. I was actually grateful.

As though the fact that you picked me defined me as “worthy”.  I have made that same mistake many times and with many other people in the past, but I see the truth more clearly now.

You are not more important than me. You are just like all the rest. I reeled with the shock of that truth.  You are just like the ones that you warned me about. 

You didn’t see ME, you only saw what I could do for you.

You did not value ME but only valued what I could do for you.

You are no different than any other predator.

But you were wrong about me. You ARE wrong about me.  I don’t need YOU to make me better. I am better than you know. I am stronger than you ever dreamed. I don’t need you to make me anything.  I am better without you. Watch me fly and wave good bye from my position of freedom high above the clouds.

Please share your thoughts. Think carefully about the people who fit this post in your own life. Originally this was a letter to one specific person, but as I wrote it, I realized it was to a former pastor, and to a priest, a few therapists, a few “friends” and a doctor that I had once. When I was editing it I realized that it applied to a much greater list of people in my past then I had first intended.

Exposing Truth;

Darlene Ouimet

Related Posts ~ Taught to think or taught Not to think

Psychological Abuse ~ if you don’t like it Leave

Psychological Abuse and Dysfunctional Parenting

the road can be beautiful

I am important. And so are you.

I have just as much importance as any other human being on this planet and that includes the presidents, movie stars, doctors, lawyers, teachers, my parents, grandparents, geniuses, famous inventers, authors royalty and  all others. And so do you.

A job, a profession, or a gift or title does not make some people more valuable than other people.  

People are People.

I am special. I am the same amount of special as any other human being.  And so are you.

I am valuable. I am just as valuable as any other person on this earth. And so are you.

I have a choice. I had to learn this truth before I tried it out, but today I know that I have a choice about the way that I am treated. I have choices about where I go and who I hang out with. I am not obligated to love. I am not owned by anyone. I can choose to say yes, or to say no. And so can you.

I can think for myself. And so can you.  I had to learn this truth, and I had to learn HOW to do this because it was never encouraged in the past, but I did it. And so can you.

People are people

I am just as smart as anyone else. And so are you. People have different gifts, but that is not a measure of intelligence. “Smart” comes in all kinds of packages and has many different colours. I didn’t know this before; I had to learn this truth, but I did learn it and I embrace it today and so can you.

I don’t have to believe the lies that I was raised with about ME any more.  Through this process of recovery, I found the original me; I found my gifts, my purpose and my individuality and I took all of it back. I took my life back and I live my life now, in wholeness and fullness. And so can you.

People cannot determine my value. That is not up to them. They can kick me down and call me stupid; they can sneer down their noses at me and turn their backs and call me a liar; it does not mean that they are right. They can reject me for my decisions to stand up for myself, but they can’t decide who I am.

These past few years I have LOVED celebrating the New Year. Since I have taken my life back, I love to reflect on the year coming to a close. 2011 has been fantastic. I accomplished many of the things that I set out to accomplish both personally and professionally.  My family continues to recover from living in an abusive system.  We grow closer with each passing month. My children are growing up beautifully and my marriage continues to flourish. I have so much to be grateful for and I am grateful every day. 

This whole recovery thing began when I first had the thought that I could recover. My new life began with a tiny seed of hope. At first I only believed that I could feel better enough to want to get out of bed in the morning and finish raising my kids who were then ages 7, 11 and 13. With the first discovery of the first false belief system I had, I believed that I could recover from the constant depressions and dissociative identity disorder that plagued my life.  Then I realized the roots of those debilitating issues in my life and little by little I had the courage to face those roots. Each new discovery helped me to move forward to the next discovery. Each thing I faced led me to a new truth hidden in the lies of my life.  Each forward movement led me to greater and greater freedom and wholeness and it all started with that little flame of hope and belief that it could be done and that I could do it.

My entire family has benefited from this process. My kids know that overcoming depression and dysfunction IS possible. They’ve lived through it. They know that relationship is two sided and that they have a choice. They know the true definition of love.

To all those who are still struggling to overcome; to all those who are still trying to come out of the fog and to take your own life and power back;

YOU CAN DO THIS TOO.

All things were possible when I believed that they were.  The truth, as painful as it was, set me free.

Happy New Year; I am grateful for each of you; I appreciate all that you contribute and share with me here and wish each of you a wonderful, healing 2012.

Bright blessings, hugs and squishes;

Darlene Ouimet

More Related Posts ~ See words in bold print and highlighted

My relationship with me ~ Emotional Healing

Darlene and Jim

My parents split up and eventually divorced when I was just turning 13 years old. After my mother went through her suicidal phase she started dating. She had not been separated from my father for very long when she started dating. Men and dating became her priority.

Through her behaviour she communicated to me that attracting men was the way to cope with low self esteem and pain. Looking back on what she taught me and how she impacted my belief system, she herself believed that men and having a man in her life was what she needed more than anything else.  She believed that she needed a man in order to survive. She needed a man in order for her to feel complete or even good about herself. Men defined her as worthy and good enough.  Her self esteem came from them. Their attraction to her identified her. Having a man meant that my mom was okay.

I had learned from my mother’s actions, words and teachings that men were the most important connection or relationship a woman can have. Because belief systems grow from layers of information, add to that teaching what I learned from the media (movies and books)  and from observing dysfunctional relationships in the la la land stages of love and there you have how I came to believed that the right man was the answer for me too. I thought that having a man (boyfriend) would mean that I was okay too.

When my parents split up, I was at the stage in life where I was noticing boys.  I wanted one for myself.  I wanted to be validated and cherished and good enough.  If men could sooth my mother’s hurts, then they must be able to sooth mine too. If men were the answer to all life’s problems for my mother, then they must be my answer too!

And at the age of 13 who knows anything about what “right one” would look like other than from the relationships that have already been modeled for us?

I believed that men were the answer, NOT because I saw the belief work, but because my mother believed it so deeply she communicated it to me in 100 ways; when she was in the beginning stages of a new romance she was so happy.  She would sing and play records. She did her hair and dressed a little more special.  She seemed to have higher self esteem. She seemed to like life more. I wanted her to be happy and not be in so much pain and it seemed that men were the answer to overcoming that pain and sadness, and like I said, if it worked for her, there was every reason to believe that it would work for me too.  I really wanted to be okay and I thought I would be is only someone said that I was!

I learned this false belief; that other people could define me as worthy. In fact I learned and believed that the ONLY way that I could be defined as worthy was through other people. Because of the example my mother set for me however, I thought that being defined as worthy by men however, was the “ultimate form of worthy”.  

I learned from all the people in my life that other people could validate me or invalidate me. This had been what had happened to me since I was born. I was rewarded (validated) when I did what was expected of me and I was punished (invalidated) when I disappointed.  Behaviour modification techniques can be a dangerous practice that results in teaching a child a false understanding of their own self worth and identity.

The foundation had been laid for me to for me to conclude that men were the answer to my low self esteem when I watched the positive effect that a man could have on my mothers demeanour. 

My mother rarely got hurt by a man so that was not my fear. My fear was not being loved. By the age of 13, I thought men were my last chance at ever being loved.

In that sick dysfunctional relationship system, the men that I was attracting were also looking for someone to define THEM as worthy too.  The false definition of love took over; I tried to prove that my man was lovable by my devotion and compliance to him. I tried to make HIM feel like HE was OKAY. That was what I had been taught love was. Ultimately in the false definition of love in these dysfunctional relationships, the more I sacrificed myself, the more I thought that I “proved” my love. Those men constantly asked for more devotion and compliance and I believed (as I had in my dysfunctional relationship with my mother) that if I found the right KEY to show him how wonderful and lovable HE was (especially at my own expense and by putting myself and my needs aside) then HE would no longer believe that there was anything missing in him and when he knew that, I was sure he would love me in return.

In the false definition of love, I had my ideas about what “proved love” and it was always about sacrifice because that’s what I was taught about love. I will give up my personal style of dress because he wants me to dress differently and that will prove how much I love him. I will give up my favourite TV show because he doesn’t like it and that will prove how important that HE is to me.  I won’t have certain friends because he says that they make me act differently when I am around them and if I walk away from them and choose him that will prove that I love him.  I will stop talking on the phone when he is home and I will watch sports with him or let him do things to me in the bedroom that made me feel sick and that will prove that I love him. In that false definition of love and in those dysfunctional relationships, I believed that if I could be who he wants me to be then he will love me. And when I am finally loved, I will be okay.

The truth is that when I finally loved me, I was okay. When I found me and embraced me, I was okay. When I realized that putting myself last is the same as agreeing that I am not worthy, and that I am not as “important” as they are, and when I stopped doing that; I was okay. When I found out that putting my needs last was not ‘selfless” and in fact it communicated that even I knew that my needs were actually less than anyone else’s and when I stopped doing that and I embraced the truth that my needs are just as important as everyone else’s, I was okay. When I said no to proving I was worthy of love, I was okay. I don’t have to prove it. It is already true. I was born worthy. When I realized that other people don’t define me as worthy, good enough, valuable or lovable and that I don’t need others to validate that in me, THEN I was okay.

(But first, I had to learn a whole new definition of love.)

Please share your thoughts.

Another snap shot on the journey to wholenes;

Darlene Ouimet

Related Posts ~ (The words in the post in coloured bold print are also related posts)

 My parents did the best they could according to who? 

~You Reap what you sow ~ what about child abuse

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