*Trigger*
Moonface- I am here for you in every way I can be! I don't share exactly the same flashback. I did have a horrific flashback last week that involved my mother holding me down for my father. Previously I didn't know she was involved at all. I don't have the courage to share what happened yet. I also felt as if I needed to be hospitalized. Like my brain was on fire. I did see my T and let myself write it down for her. Just knowing I was believed was a relief. End Trigger

You are believed too. I know it seems fantastic and part of you doesn't want to accept it. But your body tells you the truth. We believe you. I believe you. And you will come out the other side of this too. Just like everything else you have overcome. You don't remember until you are ready. (Someone else told me that). And I believe it.

Delete your mother's email. Ignore any communication from her. It is poison for you right now.
I wish I had more helpful insights for you. But I would keep talking to any support you have and if you have the ability the call your T on the phone, now is the appropriate time. Take care.

first i'm sorry you are in such horrific pain and that your parents seem to suffer with mental illness and used you as a target for it. it is very difficult for anyone, and a child even more so, to live with others who have untreated mental illness.

fb's are by nature unreliable but that does not in any way lessen their pain or the reality of how they effect us when they happen. a very kind and supportive therapist once told me it doesn't matter at all if what i recall happened, it is happening to me now and i must honor my feelings and reactions to it. i was at the time making myself crazy, as you may be, trying to figure out if i was making it all up or if it was true - it was horrible either way and i was torturing myself. he pointed out very gently that the trauma i was experiencing from the fb's was enough, i didn't need to make it worse trying to determine if the content was historically accurate. he said that most memories had some truth and we would never know how much was valid, my father was long dead, so i should stop torturing myself.

i finally realized he was giving me wise advise and let it go and eventually they abated. i never told my mother, i don't know what her response would have been. denial i would guess.

being in a psychiatric hospital does not make one less of a person, it is a place of healing not of judgment. i work in such a place and it is not a prison where people are sent to repent. your mother is seriously delusional if that is what she thinks. patients often find safety in our rooms and compassion from our staff and other patients. not everyone is helped but while they are with us they are safe and even the most damaged know that. i am sad that your mother used it as a threat, i hope if you are unsafe that you will realize your mother was trying to harm not help you.

i hope the fb has faded and you are beginning to feel better. remember as real as it feels it is not happening now - if it begins again move, put your hands in something cold, water, ice. turn on music LOUD. do something that you could not have done at that time that will not harm you, something that will comfort and make you feel safe and grounded.

Moonface-you have helped me with your caring supportive comments more than you could ever know. You are a wonderful person. The flashback is exactly that-a flashback-when I am having them, the thing that helps me is if I can somehow remember that NOW I am safe-NOW everything is OK-I am an adult-no one can hurt me now-I can call the police-I can do so many things that I could not do back then. It doesn't take the pain away, but it does take some of the fear away and the out of control feeling too.

I did not go through what you went through, but I recently shared a horrible memory that I kept flashing back to. It was really upsetting me so much. I told my therapist and telling was so incredibly hard to do but now I do feel some relief and this is why..

She told me it was not my fault-and I am telling you the same thing.
She told me HE was totally at fault-not me-and I am telling you the same thing. She told me I was not bad-I am I want to say the same to you. Hearing her say those things to me-even after I shared this horrible stuff with her really helped.

So, if you can remember this:

It was not your fault.
You are not bad.
It was totally his fault.

try to say that to yourself over and over -that is what I do-and maybe it will sink in..(((hug)))

((((GIANT HUG))))
You did not have the choice.
And psych hospitals, if you need to go to one...well, my experience in one a long while ago was useful.
The staff bug you gently yet persistently, and eventually you get better out of annoyance and go home.

I also agree, if your mother sends you emails, block her and delete any that do get through unread.

I have had fb's these last couple of weeks. It wasnt about abortion, but it was very graphic and painful. I couldnt believe it at first! I really thought that I was going crazy. But I tried to focus on what I was remembering and how I was feeling -- I reminded myself like so many others have said and encouraged me on this forum thru posts. Remember its not happening at the moment its a memory. So with that in hand, I took in what was really hard for me to take in. I was on the floor utterly shaking, sick and I felt my mind was going to blow and my heart literly hurt!!! I felt like I was going to snap! I have been in a mental health facility before. I was going through a bout of depression and attempted suicide. I woke up in the hospital with my family at my side.
My stay there was the best treatment I've ever had, Because that was when I started thinking about 'what is the root of all my sadness?' Now I am here on this healing journey years later. I am just saying that Mental Health facilities are not a sign of weakness or being crazy. Its a place to find healing, restoration and help if needed!
I am so sorry you've had gone thru all that pain, at such a young age as well. I am here for you. One thing i've heard said here many times is 'we are not to blame' its not your fault. It was not a choice you made. Its not yours to carry! This is your parents doing,not you!
I had to put my foot down years ago about my Mom. She pinned so many things on me. It was always my fault, even the fact that I was born was my fault! Hmm
But I had to cut ties with her, I cut her out of my life and out of my daugthers life as well. She has passed now, but I didnt give her to much room after I found the strength to stand and courage to move away from her. I learnt to be my own Parent. and thru therapy I have nurtured my Inner Child.
Sending you lots of love, care and Strength! lots of safe hugs your way. I hope that I am/was able to encourage you.

Moonface, I am so sorry you are in such pain. I agree with the other commenters - delete all email from your mother. Please remember you get to honour yourself and that means you get to be safe and you get to be honest and to live according to your beliefs and values. You have rights and your mother would deny them because of her fear of being judged and being accountable. Hmm, she is no follower of Jesus.

flashbacks and reality - I just talked about this with my therapist today, what a coincidence. I was mad because I had looked up this information about so called experts who say that 'repressed memory' does not exist. I felt very angry at these so-called experts. what do they know.

I like what The People said about the reality of flashbacks. The reality is what you are feeling. We can't ever know for sure what happened back then, but we know how we feel. Remember you are safe now and you are not alone.

Please keep writing about this - and please consider stopping communication with your mother. She is afraid of what you will write or say and so she keeps trying to convince you that you are crazy or a bad child. If you give her the silent treatment, I bet her fear will increase, and from what I have read about you, your mom has earned feeling fear over her crimes.

Moonface, for what it is worth I do not believe you are crazy. I know you and I don't know each other, but your comments have always been so insightful and supportive and kind. You are a good person who suffered a horrible ordeal as a child for many years. From what I have read about your parents, I can believe that the flashback you had reflects real events. I also know very deeply because of all of your words you have written here that you are a person with a loving heart. Whatever happened, you had no choice. You were a child in a home of violence, you lived in fear, and you had no way of protecting any life begun in your womb as long as you were in that house with your parents.

Whatever happened then, and we don't have to prove it or discover the facts of history, like The People said, what we know now today is that you are a woman of deep compassion and you share your wisdom and your caring heart with the vulnerable and with those in need. You are not responsible for what your father did or for what he made you do. It was not your fault.

big hugs to you -

Let me put it this way...the "no repressed memories" statement...there's a crowd of psych researchers who loudly say that. There's also a crowd that says the opposite.

http://www.sidran.org/sub.cfm?contentID=104&sectionid=4 Has a lot of studies...this one convinced me though...I found the abstract here:

http://www.springerlink.com/content/h03180r4nm021mg1/

"One hundred twenty-nine women with documented histories of sexual victimization in childhood were interviewed and asked about abuse history. Seventeen years following the initial report of the abuse, 80 of the women recalled the victimization. One in 10 women (16% of those who recalled the abuse) reported that at some time in the past they had forgotten about the abuse. Those with a prior period of forgettingthe women with " recovered memories"were younger at the time of abuse and were less likely to have received support from their mothers than the women who reported that they had always remembered their victimization."

So 49 out of 129 still did not recall the assault which was reported and documented.
That study was what convinced me I'm not making this up.

thank you for that, hylie.

Dear One,

In silence, I stand with you as you move through the darkness of your healing.

namaste

Thank you everybody for your support and wonderful comments.I will be back soon.
You help me sooth with giant steps which would take me eons otherwise.These boards are amazing.Only love can heal us from sadism and torture.
I was not able to sleep last night,I think I am in hypervigilent mode.My temporal lobes are throbbing.It is all related to processing the memories.I know deep inside that what I"saw"and heard happened .
When I confronted my father 20 years ago, he thought I was referring to the abortions and had started talking about that ;At that time, i did not understand what he meant and could not handle it anyway.
A month ago,I met again my best friend from school I had not seen for 50 years.She sponteanously evoked my mother's checking on my periods every month.
It is only now I realise my parents were really mentally ill, sadist psychopaths who themselves had been subjected to extreme trauma by sadistic incestuous Nazi families.
Each following generation, a pattern of dysfunctionality carried itself on with the offenders, the deniers and the scapegoats.
The most painful was to get in touch with my mother's sadism and death wish towards me.She came to perceive me as the evil one in the family, and that madness spread to the whole family.
I can see that she did not want me to have a happy marriage and took revenge on what she perceived as betrayal by preventing me to have babies.
In fact,I got pregnant abroad, away from them;My mother later on insisted that she had brought my son up, which is not true.When we visited, she would treat me like a child and my son as hers.
I am now conducting my life as a police enquiry, recording every conversation, digging out from other people, in order to find the truth and dismantle the fabrication of a "normal family , as she loves to repeat.with a daughter who made her mother suffer so much."
Big hugs to all.

Dear Moonface,
We have not been able to be online due to an operation, but just got this message and are in tears. I'm so sorry for your pain, the sense of loss and confusion you feel. You are believed because this happened to you and it is your experience, no one can take that from you.

We have walked a mile in these shoes and lived through the same honey and it tore my heart apart much as it is yours right this moment when I remembered, only I was14. We're caught in the recesses of our mind between the reality of what "should be" and the WANT, DESIRE, and NEED to not have it true at all costs, for this is why we suppressed and repressed such a horrific ordeal all these years honey. ((((tears))) I'm so sad you went through this too, it is chocking me up and breaking my heart bringing up my own loss and remembrance as I hope to reach through your computer screen in comfort this moment.

Further may trigger@@@@@

Pieces of the past will come to us at an appointed time. It's so hard to accept and work with that timing but they do. Honey I believe you and I can tell you that they made us choose because they were cowards and wanted to put the blame, fear and shame inside of us and it worked for a time but you have risen out of it!

We are NOT to blame for our baby's death, even choosing their death in obedience to the cult instead of our own death, we were kids! We're Not meant to make those decisions let alone under such extreme torture or fear of our own death. WE ARE NOT TO BLAME! They can never take that from us.. at the core of who we are.. WE ARE NOT THEM!

I'm in such a season of really "FEELING" my shame, grief, and pain at the moment and we have not shared any of this, but my fathers, uncles or cousin's baby and the ritual abortion forced upon me at age 14 is one of the most shameful, painful, confusing, and torturous things I go through in my mind, so I applaud your courage to share that here. Be kind to yourself. Ask yourself would I have done this had I not been in the situation I was in? I have to ask these questions to bring myself back out of it. You were only 12 honey! You would have wanted to climb trees or anything else for that matter, not this! ! !

As for your mom.. the truth sets one free and so she is acting from fear and the religious principles placed upon you to keep you in check. My father uncle etc and the cult were Christians by day and satanists by night. We believe that when they twist religion into the cult as well, it is the ultimate shaming, because even the one who is "greater" finds you no less than. Sorry for going off on a tangent. People hide behind a cloak of religion to look good and not feel the pain and deal with it and she is doing this out of denial and fear.

You are precious! You are stronger than you realize and like a Phoenix bird we will rise from these ashes and flames truer to our hope and stronger than ever before. Keep on reminding yourself would you have done these things as a kid if it were not for the torture, the abuse? I have to daily or we would be dead from being made to kill and abuse others. Honoring does not mean allow poison into our lives like this.

***Hands you a cold compress for your head**

I hope this helps and you know we care.
~K and Destany's House