I would agree that I personally have figured things out....yes at this ripe age of 52 and it took a lot of abuse, a lot of failed relationships. I think my mind was pushed to the absolute limit before I finally realised last August what was happening to me. First the flashbacks- then my intellegence kicked in and I wanted to know why, where and when.Maybe it took the latest events in my own life to probe the *darkness* in me. I wanted to know why I was having these flashbacks.....I started to dig into my past... I am so committed and ready now to deal with my past and I fully intend to heal and live a happier life!!! Knowledge is very important in life and I have *confidence* that I am ready. Good point Beaumont :)

I am confident in my ability to figure things out, so when I come across something, anything really, that I don't know how to do but I need to know how to do or I want to know how to do, I figure it out or I ask if I know someone who does know how to do it. My confidence isn't so much in that I have figured everything out, because I know that I just don't know everything! So, my confidence is in my capacity to figure things out. It doesn't mean I'll end being great at it because I'm simply not perfect. But, I will at least have a basic understanding and that's good enough for me.

it takes a "village" to raise a child. i can't think of ONE person who didn't go through some kind of abuse, some worse than others....

there is a book called "the child within" which gets into a lot of that. also in psychology of adjustment, they use a book called "born to win" which gets into the same kind of thing, ego states and people who get stuck at an ego state because of bad upbringing.

there is an emotional iq test a person can take on line and it tells you emotionally where a person stopped, as for some reason many people simply stop growing emotionally at some age (generally from not going it on their own when they should). some people around age 7 start developing a life of their own, some are still dependent and blaming they are 37, if a person is isolated or oppressed by the people around them forging a life of their own may be difficult or even impossible except for with books and athletics. or church if the tyrant parent lets them attend church and the church is liberal and has a youth program....

i also think people need to join bullying support groups as most abusive/predatory people are bullies and bullies exist everywhere. joining the military also helps a person become 100 percent themselves and see all that they are, at least when given peronsal and exterior tools to work with.

i have figured out a lot, but i have also discovered over time that MANY that i thought were supportive and good, are actually guilty of all kinds of things themselves....reminds me of Joseph Conrad's the horror the horror. everytime i find another who is actually rotton i am always shocked! maybe pure good doesn't exist at all.

I think this is an excellent point. I had to figure out SO MUCH on my own. And, to top it off, whatever I did figure out when I was a child was mercilessly critiqued. So it has taken me over a year of therapy to even start to get past the feeling that I'm always doing everything the wrong way. This has been constituted much of my anxiety - I'm always afraid I'm just "wrong" and I can't help but do everything the "wrong" way. And I mean everything - speak, eat, cook, walk, everything. It's discouraging and difficult to get over.

Hi,

I think before I recognized the dysfunction, I thought I had things figured out. Man, I was seriously wrong there. There is a lot of value in being taught young things as a child that are healthy coping skills. In that sense, I am still learning and trying to work on the damage done. My mother is not a good role model at all when it comes to reading other people. Where other Cos (and me) are really sensitive to the environment, she seems oblivious. So, when I try to get a validation check from her, she is often wrong. She does not read people well at all, and I over-think external cues.

Shar

I have some confidence in some things I know, on others I do not. Most life skills I was left to figure out on my own, and usually at a very young age. I was 8 when I started doing the families laundry, I could clean since I was six (that I can remember, may have been earlier but I have almost no memories before then). At 14 I became a mom to my little sister, had to figure that out on my own. I moved out when I was 15, was all up to me to figure out then, my mother didnt speak to me again until I was 20.
I have not had a role model for relationships, so I'm muddling my way through that, my first two attempts were grand failures!
And I'm muddling my way through motherhood now, as I didn't have a good role model for that either. But I watch and learn from other moms!
I don't have confidence in my personal decisions, how I spend my money, how I dress, how I look. What I do with my spare time, ect. I just doubt it so much, thats the hardest thing for me right now.

This is a difficult one for me to answer. I did what my parents taught me but somehow it was never good enough or I never got it quite right. Never being good enough about something does not leave one with confidence. There are many things my parents taught me that I would say are acceptable lessons although I obessed about getting right that I continue today but still do not have confidence in. Then there are things they taught me that I do not do I believe simply for spite. I was supposed to learn to be somewhat independent yet everything they actually taught me made me dependent. I do not know how to relax and have fun because practically every minute of my day was devoted to some sort of chore, school, waiting on them. I am always indecisive for fear of making the wrong decision.

I have been able to change some of this over the past 15 years and I am gaining in confidence and learning to make decisions and stick to them no matter what the outcome. I also don't beat myself up as often or as much if the decision wasn't the right one to make. I'm slowly discovering that the world doesn't come crashing down around me if I get something wrong or I'm not perfect or even close.

I am still not confident in my ability to figure things out. My parents had no interactions with me other than when they were abusing me. For a very long time I thought that I must have done something wrong to deserve it. The only thing I did wrong was being there so that they could have someone to abuse. If I had somehow run away from home or found someone to talk to about what was going on, I might not have been around any longer for them to abuse. My fault was in not escaping.

I don't have a career or a job at this time because I still haven't figured out how to deal with abusive co-workers. I am thinking about going to college, which might allow me to find work in places where the dregs of society are less likely to be found.

I really need to make a lot of changes in my life.

I had to teach myself to do a lot of things. My mother was allways working and my father wasnt around. I taught myself how to ride a bike, how to fight and be a man, which Im still strugling with. I also taught myself how to balance my own check book. Anything that a father would help you do as a child, I did for myself. It scared the shit out me!
Since my mother was hardly around, when I wanted to dicapline myself I would hit myself, until I brused up. Then when I couldnt hit my legs anymore, I would push the bruses when I wanted to hurt myself.

I was left alone when I got to Arizona when I was a kid a lot. This would be illegal today if anyone knew about it. Im just glad I didnt burn the house down!

Then when my father started comming back into the picture, he taught me how to fish, that was it. Anything that I wanted to do, was either labled stupid, or not approved of.

Not having support as a child, messed me up pretty good as an adult. There are still many things I need to learn.

In my case that was part of the abuse. I was severely criticized or punished for not knowing what to do. I was raised in a cult that believes that they are not "part of the world" so when I walked away I had no life or social skills.

Beaumont, I definitely agree that proper parenting gives a child what is needed to survive as well as confidence to live in his own skin.

I also had a lot of mixed messages since my parents did things that were supposed to be nurturing. My father would take us on "picnics" bull in the van on our way there he'd be talking all the way to the place crap about how bad we are how we don't deserve what he's doing, and so on.

Then my mom was critical of anything she didn't understand or control (and she has a third grade education so there's a lot of what she doesn't know). So every time we talked about anything new she'd try to shut us down.