June 5, 2024
If you read my Anger blog posted on June 3rd, you'd see that I am definitely one for minimizing. Now I pretty much minimize everything, my accomplishments, intelligence, looks, and so on, but I especially minimize my trauma, all the time. And since that was quite noticeable in my Anger blog, I felt I had best shed some light on this.
In therapy we discuss the way I minimize the abuse, the trauma, the pain from it, my feelings. I do this as it is a coping mechanism, a good one (to me anyway), that I started from very early childhood because it made it all that much easier to deal with the constant (horrific...stop downplaying it Connie) abuse. So, if it's not a big deal, then it won't hurt as bad. And if it's not a big deal it's easier to push aside, to ignore, to forget.
But I also minimize it because that is what the perpetrators did to me as well. They'd say I was lying, that it wasn't what I thought it was, that it wasn't a big deal, that it was my fault, that I asked for it, and so on. They would just always downplay the abuse, so I never saw it as much of anything. I thought it was normal behaviour, the crap they did to me, so I didn't know that I had to be upset about it. So now as an adult, in all fairness, for me anyway, because I went through so much crap, for so long, it made me hardened to it. So, I make light of situations, situations that probably most people would be completely ruined over. But to me, it's just another day. Another abuse. Another hit. Another rape. What's one more.
And then I say, 'I don't see it affecting me if it happens again', but I am told otherwise. Apparently, although I am used to this sort of abuse, this high excessive level of abuse, from some the most important people in my life, I may think that just some random crap won't hurt me, but on the contrary, it stirs up the old pain, no matter how minute I think the current situation is. No matter how much I downplay it, it'll still cause more pain because my brain/body is then dragged right back to the horrors of my past, the horrors of my childhood, and then I'm screwed. Even though, as a middle-aged woman, I see an event as nothing, as trivial, my injured Parts still suffer the consequences from that event as it brings them back to the original horrific events.
There is at least one strong Part of me that says, "Whatever, F off!!" to the trauma, to the abusers. She knows she is stronger than the abuse, that she's stronger than the abusers, and then she minimizes this crap so she can keep functioning. She also doesn't want to let the perpetrators win, they already got what they wanted, they don't deserve to still have a hold on her and take more from her. So, she makes light of it and pushes this crap deep down and just tries to forget about it because one, it's easier at that time, and two she knows she deserves better then to let them keep their hold on her.
But my body sees it differently, sadly, and causes a ton of uncontrollable pain. And the more I ignore the past trauma, the crap I've stuffed deep down inside, my body will never be able to, one, let the actual small crap that happens now just truly slide, and two, get rid of this uncontrollable pain that just seems to want to escalate even over the most trivial mundane crap. Sure, I may not see the trivial crap as anything, but my body does, and there's no telling her otherwise. She still sends out severe pain signals and then I get angry for that. Trivial bullshit triggers happen, this stirs up old long repressed trauma, which then causes severe excruciating pain, which in turn makes me so angry...hence the blog before. My anger is deep because of the pain I am in...the pain from the long-repressed trauma...and the trauma I feel I should be stronger than. It's a vicious cycle.
Out enjoying this beautiful farm on such a perfect day.
