A Child Abuse Survivors Group Community Group
We survived child abuse, but the pain still remains and so do the other effects which can last a lifetime. We are often unable to find adequate help, and we are seeking answers that can help us understand what happened so that we can go on to lead normal lives. (Please note that this is a group for child abuse survivors only. If you are a professional in the mental health...
It can be lonely when you're shy. I spent my school years cowering in fear of the other kids because I was smaller and weaker than them due to severe malnutrition. There wasn't any food at home most of the time except what my mother bought for herself, which we children weren't allowed to go near. She lived on a diet of Pepsi-cola and chocolate candy bars. I was bullied in school, and went around speaking to no one, hoping the other students wouldn't notice me because I didn't want to get beaten up or harassed. I was a pathetic mess, wearing the same clothes to school day after day, unbathed and probably smelling very offensive as a result. I was prone to passing out often in school, but nobody asked me why. At school lunch time, I would give my food to the big kids to avoid being 'punished' by them. We were extremely poor and we moved a lot because of my mother's schizophrenia mixed with narcissism. We moved from ghetto neighborhoods to city hotels that were filled with welfare recipients and prostitutes and drug users, to finally a tiny trailer in the middle of the desert near Pueblo, Colorado, where my mother could have absolute control over us, to beat us, starve us, and psychologically abuse us to her heart's content. We had no neighbors close to us, so she could do as she pleased. She enjoyed hurting people in ways too sick for me to go into detail about here. My mother died in January of this year, and I'm still not sure how I should feel about her.
I think that shyness and loneliness are closely associated. I think a person's upbringing can be at the root of the two. I also think that it is possible for people to overcome their pasts and create a better life for themselves. I would like to encourage all of you to keep reading posts and doing your own posts in this group until you find something that will help you on a path to a brighter tomorrow.
Regardless of your past, be good to yourself today. Do more of what makes you happy. Try not to worry over the small bothers in life as much as you can. Focus on the sunshine and joyful activity in the world. Take small steps towards participating in the goings on in your community when you can. If you are lucky enough to have a friend, be sure that you are a good friend to that person in return, because real friends are hard to find (take this to heart, it's from someone who has never had a real friend in the physical world). Celebrate being alive.
I think that shyness and loneliness are closely associated. I think a person's upbringing can be at the root of the two. I also think that it is possible for people to overcome their pasts and create a better life for themselves. I would like to encourage all of you to keep reading posts and doing your own posts in this group until you find something that will help you on a path to a brighter tomorrow.
Regardless of your past, be good to yourself today. Do more of what makes you happy. Try not to worry over the small bothers in life as much as you can. Focus on the sunshine and joyful activity in the world. Take small steps towards participating in the goings on in your community when you can. If you are lucky enough to have a friend, be sure that you are a good friend to that person in return, because real friends are hard to find (take this to heart, it's from someone who has never had a real friend in the physical world). Celebrate being alive.
When I was released from the mental hospital, I was sent to a facility for juvenile offenders, no matter that I had no criminal record and that I was a shy, compliant youngster who had never gotten into trouble with anyone. I should have been sent to a foster home where I would have at least been treated like a human being. Within the first week at the facility for juvenile offenders, I was again stripped naked, this time by juvenile criminals, and never got my clothes back. They traded my clothes back and forth with each other for marijuana and cigarettes. I was given some unclaimed clothes from the laundry room, but had no socks or underwear. I was beaten up several times and had male staff members approach me for homosexual sex, to which I said no. They had read my records from the mental hospital and assumed I must be what they had written down, a homosexual. Again, I never was and never will be, a homosexual.
When I reached 19, I was discharged from the juvenile offenders center. I lived homeless on the streets for a while, then enlisted in the U.S. Army for a few years, then returned to being homeless. For a while I worked as a day laborer, doing work such as moving furniture and assembly-line work for a day or two a week while living homeless on the streets or in low-rent hotels. Much of my life has been spent in hiding from people because I have an extreme fear of people in general. It's very lonely, and I wish I could trust people enough to have friends, but I can't seem to overcome my fear of people, and when you're desperately poor and kind of weird looking (maybe ugly is a better term), the choices you have in way of friends is among drug addicts, alcholics, severely mentally ill people, and other people who really aren't suitable for real friendships, at least, not for me, because I have nothing in common with such people and I don't like the abuse they do to people like me.
So here I am at age 47, without any thing tangible to show for those 47 years. I am ashamed of myself for allowing people to abuse me, even though I know it was beyond my control. I am ashamed of myself for being afraid of people, even though I have real reasons to fear people, given my past. If my brother and sister hadn't figured out that I was planning to run away from home, perhaps none of this would have ever happened to me.
My advice to every person who reads this is simply don't be like me. Make friends, hold a job, stay in one place long enough to build a life, and take care of yourself and others. Life has been a weird journey for me, and I wouldn't wish it on anyone else.
I recall trading things with my classmates at lunch so I could eat a decent meal. I wonder how my teachers didn't notice and intervene? My mother ate whatever she fancied never giving a thought to packing me a proper lunch for school. She was disorganized in the morning so we kids got up ourselves and got ready for school always in a chaotic hurry. Some days she'd manage to bring me a cup of milk as I was running out the door late. I would barely have enough time to drink two sips which angered her and led to her screaming and blaming which sometimes escalated to her throwing objects at me like shoes as I was running out. I have a lot of resentment towards her for being such an incompetent mother and blaming us for it.
I see now that everybody has some issue to deal with in life. Some issues are more difficult than others. Some people are more resilient than others. Having the childhood I had made me a good mother to my kids. Having lack of emotional nurture made me an introverted person but that in turn helped me develop deeper thinking skills. Having very little money to exist on for most of my earlier life made me become a financially responsible person. These are all examples of survival which is a feat in and of itself. It's even more amazing if you can turn it into a beneficial life skill.
I wanted to share a link to Pete Walker's page where he has some really good articles on complex ptsd. I've started to read some of them and can say he has some very good insight into this condition.
www.pete-walker.com
And in my young adult life I was labeled as homosexual, even though I'm not. There is just no way to prove that you're not, so eventually you stop arguing about it and just let people think whatever they want...at least that's what I did. So I wound up being very isolated...rejected by heterosexuals for being gay, but not part of the gay community because I was not one of them. Intolerance is despicable.
I suppose in the end it's the isolation and loneliness that hurts the most. Everybody wants to belong somewhere.
I'm so sorry you had to endure all that you did, no child should have to go through all that. If a society can't treat its children properly, it's not worth anything in my opinion.
My mother never wanted/loved me and verbally and mentally abused me. She literally destroyed my self-esteem.
I was a shy, sensitive, introverted/withdrawn child in a family full of bullys and extroverts who bullied me unmercifully. Then I would leave home to go to school where my peers bullied me as well. I remember often times, on my way home from school, I would sit/hide under an old weeping willow tree in order to be alone, safe from all the abuse.
I'm 59 and I'm still working on getting "me" right. I see a therapist who is helping me to learn new ways of thinking, it's a slow process but well worth the effort. I'm believing in me more and more.
In order to feel safe from rejection, I isolate and I agree with Richie, the loneliness hurts the most.
Beaumont, you are articulate and a very good writer! Have you ever thought of writing and publishing your life story? This would be something you could do in your own privacy while earning an income at the same time. If you published your story, I would definately buy the book!
Please take care and know that you are a valuable and worthwhile human being!
Sherry