YOU ARE NOT ALONE - A companion online community discussion board for The Mental Illness Happy Hour podcast with Paul Gilmartin

Hi friends.

Here are two bodily-autonomy traumas I just un-repressed:

Multiple times as a child I was violated by (1) unwanted tickling and (2) my (otherwise kind) uncle intentionally pinching my shoulder-nerve.

(I’ll post tomorrow on the spanking; I’m exhausted on a Friday night.)

How can anyone be so cruel?

Does anyone wonder why I have lifelong issues with intimacy?

Hello Oak,

yes, in the bad old days, bodily-autonomy in children was treated as a non-issue

adults would just unleash their cruelty upon children that depended on them

very cruel, of course this would be trauma-inducing and lead to trust issues

i am sorry you went through this, you deserved so much better

manuel_moe_g wrote: ↑March 19th, 2022, 11:07 am i am sorry you went through this, you deserved so much better

Thank you, Manuel Moe. Though it took me over a year (!) to reply, your comment gives me comfort.

Friends, see if I can thread this needle, with two (seemingly) contradictory thoughts at the same time:

1. I was physically abused, spanked specifically. My parents read an evangelical author’s book, in the 80s. Now, decades later, I am estranged from my family, and I am half the man I could have been had I not been abused.

2. True as #1 is, I face difficulties and have opportunities that are here in 2023. Said another way: I want a remote job and to date a specific person from my fitness class.

I neither want to ignore what happened to me nor wallow in it.

Said a third way: I know my past limits me. Yet I have to live here in the present. If I forgive (and my parents and the ghoul of an author would never admit they needed forgiving), I am letting them get away with abuse (which they are currently, anyway).

All this can be true, and I am no closer to the job or person.

If anyone has any advice, insight, or experience/strength/hope the by all means share what you have. Please.

If I forgive (and my parents and the ghoul of an author would never admit they needed forgiving), I am letting them get away with abuse (which they are currently, anyway).

Hello Oak,

A few things come to mind -

Is it possible to forgive someone if they're not seeking that forgiveness? We usually think of it in two parts - the transgressor asked for forgiveness, and it's then extended by the injured party. But if the transgressor isn't looking for it, what then?

"Forgiveness" in that case has to be a sort of letting go or coming to terms with the situation, I think.

(My own exposure to this would be letting go of the grudge I held toward the leader of the group I spent a few years in, so long ago. He certainly didn't think he was culpable in any way, and really - I could have walked at any time. It was just my depression and apparent lack of vision/ alternatives that kept me around longer than I really wanted).

Paul mentions forgiveness a lot, and how it needs to be "organic" and not forced.

A search of "forgiveness" on the boards brings up quite a few threads on the subject.

SD

Totally agree with SD. It is so freeing do be able to do.