Parents Whose children have been sexually abused Community Group
This group is for parents whose children have been sexually abused. We welcome both Mothers and Fathers. Here, we can offer support to one another. We can vent, cry and lift each other up. No condemning or criticizing allowed. We are here for support. We LOVE (((HUGS))) !
****UPDATE****
Hi, Friends,
I am sorry to have to report some really weird news. My daughter reports that, in fact, her therapist NEVER gave her the tests I mentioned below.
Several weeks ago, this therapist had asked me if I would be willing to approve her running several mental health inventories. I asked about the costs -- oh, a few thousand dollars. I am paying for the therapy, so she needed my okay. I said, of those tests, which would be the most useful for guiding treatment from here on. Therapist said the best one would be the MMPI-2, and quoted the price. I okayed it, and that was the last I heard about it -- fine, just do it and send me the bill! Then, about two weeks ago my daughter said the therapist had given a her the diagnosis -- complex PTSD, but nothing else -- and that's what they were going to work on. I assumed this was the result of testing. The other day, my daughter said the therapist wanted to give her some tests. I said, "She didn't already do that?" My daughter was confused -- "you knew about the tests?" I said I had authorized them because they were expensive. My daughter said, "No, I haven't taken any tests at all! That was just her diagnosis based on our work together. Besides, she wants me to come in to her office for five hours this weekend to complete the MMPI-2, and I told her I'm not comfortable coming to her office during Covid." What nonsense! As it turns out, the MMPI-2 can be completed at home, for a cost of $25!! It does, however, cost $500 for the therapist to buy the entire administrative kit for the first time. But she was going to charge us for the entire thing!
Well, my daughter was back and forth with this therapist, reporting on her experience to a relative who is a clinical psychologist. That relative said this was quite irregular, and that my daughter had reported other irregularities about her practice that made us wonder about her motives. I'm not even sure she has experience with first responders, as I was led to believe.
This week, my daughter ended the therapeutic relationship, and that night -- at 2:35 AM -- the therapist texted me: "Pay my in full so I can close your account." What a wack job!
So, we continue our search for an ethical, effective PTSD therapist. SOOO disappointed. In any case, I still believe that "borderline" is mainly "just" complex PTSD, with an unhealthy side dish of reactive attachment disorder and any other mental illnesses that might have lain dormant if not for abuse. And I also believe it is the "easy" diagnosis for professionals who have yet to succeed at treating the PTSD aspects.
Anyhow....the following story contains an inaccuracy, and I wanted readers to be forewarned.
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I'm an old-timer here. I joined in 2013, I think (?), when my daughter disclosed to me as a young woman that she had been raped by an adult neighbor when she was 8 years old.
Over the years, before disclosure, I took my unhappy, anxious daughter to different therapists (some for years), and they diagnosed various conditions: depression, anxiety, and borderline personality disorder. Shortly before disclosure, I also learned that my daughter was addicted to painkillers (and, later, to heroin). Life was a dizzying nightmare for our family. Disclosure explained everything about why my daughter behaved as she did.
Now two years clean, my daughter is working with another therapist, one who specializes in treating first responders for PTSD. (AND one with the smarts to know that an active addict is unready for therapy, because the addiction does all the talking, and none of the healing.) She recently administered a full battery of psychological assessments none of my daughter's previous psychologists and therapists had. Her findings: my daughter has PTSD. JUST PTSD. Not "borderline," which for years I have been insisting is the diagnosis psychologists confer mostly upon girls and women because "PTSD is for soldiers, firefighters, police" -- mostly men who "earned" their emotional battle scars.
I believe that "borderline" is a "lady's diagnosis" that minimizes the utterly soul-negating aspects of sexual trauma. When people are sexually traumatized and untreated, their relationships with others change utterly as well. Add the expectation that girls and women be people pleasers, and you have traumatized, deeply insecure girls and women who are easily influenced to engage in sex with multiple partners because it's what the partners want. And/or to "try" different substances because it's "cool" and a way to be "popular."
Take away the sexual aspect, and anyone can see that all of these behaviors are trauma-based.
A lot of people have made a lot of money studying "borderline personality disorder," selling books about the subject, and treating this "disorder" with therapy that lasts for years, because -- supposedly -- "borderline" is a lifelong condition.
Please be wary if your child has been diagnosed with "borderline." Please get a second opinion from a caregiver who can recognize the TRAUMA in sexual trauma and work on that alone, without ascribing some sort of "personality" flaw to your child. My daughter has been seeing this PTSD specialist for three months now, and she is transformed! Everything has improved: her behavior, attitudes, manner of speech, ability to listen and to talk out any disagreements (which are now very few), and to plan and stick to her commitments. We finally have an adult daughter who can be in the moment with grace and gratitude. We are so proud of her!!
https://www.psychologytoday.com/us/blog/understanding-ptsd/202006/is-it-bpd-or-cptsd
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4165723/
...because what they classify as necessary components of BPD are ALSO present in men with PTSD:
"BPD is characterized by fears of abandonment, unstable sense of self, unstable relationships with others, and impulsive and self-harming behaviors. In contrast, in CPTSD as in PTSD, there was little endorsement of items related to instability in self-representation or relationships. Self-concept is likely to be consistently negative and relational difficulties concern mostly avoidance of relationships and sense of alienation."
And let's consider what PTSD looks like IN CHILDREN:
• clinginess/fear of being apart from trusted, non-offending adults (who among us hasn't experienced tearful neediness from our traumatized children?). -- I.e., "
fears of abandonment."
* unexplained personality changes -- from carefree to pensive -- sudden loss of interest in activities once enjoyed (playing with the neighbor children whose dad abused our child), sudden negative self-assessments (my daughter started saying she was "bad") -- I.e., "unstable sense of self."
• fear of men (or women, if abuser is female), anger at parents who don't know what's happening, fear of being examined by a doctor, rage or extreme anxiety when dealing with anyone who reminds a child of the abuser (our dream vacations to Europe created deep anxiety in our daughter -- it was hard to relax and have fun. After disclosure, it all made sense: it was the foreign accents -- her abuser is from Germany, with a strong accent, and he told her she was bad, that she was stupid, that he would kill us all if she told) -- i.e., "unstable relationships with others."
• Many here have shared that their children have behaved erratically, and have had episodes of cutting, promiscuity, substance abuse and other risk-taking, including attempted suicide. There's your "BPD" criterion of "impulsive and self-harming behaviors." Completely unknown to us, our daughter first began using alcohol to treat her anxiety within the year in which our neighbor began to rape her. She drank up any leftover wine at our parties, poured drinks from the liquor cabinets of her friends' parents. By high school she was drinking and smoking pot, and in college she was off to painkillers and heroin. Addiction is just one suicide attempt after another. It's the ultimate in self-harm, save for a completed suicide.
Both of our daughters have been diagnosed with a gambit of conditions. Here in Australia I think that females who present with constant self harm, suicide attempts, "challenging" authority, ie asserting themselves ate often diagnosed with bpd and too difficult to treat. I have downloaded quite a few articles comparing the similarities etc between these disorders.
We still bounce from one crisis to the next. Our youngest is not doing well. Since June she has had severe non epileptic seizures, been admitted to icu multiple times because of thesr, has seizures every time she goes to hospital, which is about every second day., and is now displaying traits of DID.
Will post some resources. I agree that the quote from that pastor is awesome.
Hugs
Ozmum
I sent you a link to the pastor's info, Naive.