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scw4survivors
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Posted: Tue Mar 11th, 2008 01:55 pm |
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New Amsterdam, a new television drama on Fox, showed its third episode last night. I had liked the first two very much.
Not so much the third.
I don’t know the writers and I don’t know the producers … what I do know is that the pseudo-science on the show last night was quite bogus.
The question of recovered memories was directly addressed in last night’s show, and the show strongly suggested that traumatic memories would be reinforced by the adrenaline surge brought on by the trauma … thus, “recovered memories” must be false.
I know that it is very possible to bury deep, deep hurts repeatedly inflicted until there is enough support … enough safety … enough strength … enough courage to survive them.
Jim Hopper provides an excellent overview of the real science of forgotten trauma. According to Hopper:
At least 10% of people sexually abused in childhood will have periods of complete amnesia for their abuse, followed by experiences of delayed recall.
Shame on you, Fox, for potentially harming those struggling to heal. I can speak only for myself … I don’t want “revenge” … I don’t want to hurt my family … In fact, I’d love for it not to be true … but, it is. And, those of us who have survived it don’t need you trying to knock us down again … we were knocked down plenty as children.
I know what I’m talking about. For years I buried the extremely painful memories of the truly heinous acts my grandfather perpetrated upon me. Unless you’ve been there, you can’t imagine how awful it is, and you can’t understand the logic of forgetting. You can read my story here for free. You can see that my sisters believe me … they say it clears so many things up. My parents believe me. My husband believes me. My grandfather is dead, so I guess I can never have the absolute verification that it would take to satisfy you, Fox … but I know that I am right and you are so very, very wrong.
Never, ever, has a therapist — or anyone else — suggested to me that I might have forgotten something. Never, ever, has a therapist — or anyone else — tried to coax a memory from me.
Shame on you, Fox!
I have a website for those seeking to heal from childhood sexual abuse. You can visit it here.
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Lorus
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Posted: Sun Mar 16th, 2008 06:04 pm |
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| I think society as a whole is not or has it ever been ready to face the horrors that some members have perpetrated. One of the biggest ugliest most horrific things is to take a child and use that child for sexual gratification. It shows a sick, twisted and sometimes deadly fault. Some people will never believe this is possible because they don't want to be associated with these perpetrators. But to all those who don't believe, you are associated with these perpetrators, they are as human as you and I. It's people who can't face these perpetrators who slow down or stop any solutions to our problems. People need to only take a serious look around and see what humans are doing to each other. Humans are not just at each others throats for land or assets. People, especially our young are killing for no reason, or do they have reasons? If the victims are constantly questioned and the perpetrators are thought of as innocent our news hours will be filled with more of the horror stories we have been hearing. It's time for society to wake up and take a look around.
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Breaking the shell
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Posted: Wed Mar 19th, 2008 11:51 am |
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I'd like to know what was in the show. Could you summarise it here?
I remember years ago the press had a field day on 'False memory syndrome'. This significantly added to my difficulties in accepting my memories as genuine when they started returning.
Thanks
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scw4survivors
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Posted: Wed Mar 19th, 2008 03:53 pm |
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Basically it included a story line about a therapist who had written a book about how memories work which supported the notion that we can't forget traumatic events.
I very much disagree with that premise, and so do many who have scientifically studied the ways memories work.
Sometimes we have to forget in order to survive.
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Lea
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Posted: Sun Mar 23rd, 2008 12:32 am |
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The thing that has mystified me for a while now, is why it is only recovered memories surrounding sexual abuse that are attacked. This is not the only scenario in which people lose memories of trauma. People go through the same type of memory loss - memory loss as a coping method, not related to brain injury - after surviving natural disastors and from being in wars. It happens, and it is documented in the pyschiatric world. But I don't see anyone raising a fuss about it in any other context than with sexual abuse.
Why isn't there page after page of internet sites crucifying former soldiers for "making up" their memory loss surrounding their war experiences?
Why aren't there fox TV shows telling us there is no way the survivors of Katrina could have blocked out their memories?
The obvious answer of course is that we all know wars and natural disasters happen. So even if someone blocks their memories - the rest of the world still knows it happened.
The not quite as obvious (at least to those who were never abused) answer is that it is always easier to blame the victim. It is always easier to pretend these things don't happen. Nobody wants to acknowledge how many abusers there are out there, or how systemic this problem is. It takes too much work. It's too uncomfortable.
Lea
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Breaking the shell
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Posted: Sun Mar 23rd, 2008 01:53 pm |
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Hi Lea,
Would you have any references to memory loss being documented as a coping method in non-sexual abuse cases? Although it makes perfect sense to me, having it recognised by the outside world would make me feel stronger.
I think the 'blame the victim' syndrome goes very deep.
You have those who want to believe that these things don't happen (like my friend who couldn't believe it was physically possible - well if an adult vagina can stretch to allow a baby through......) because it disturbs their world.
You have those who are guilty of something (not necessarily child abuse, it could be many things) and so live in fear of being accused and their accuser being believed. These people will look for any excuse to discredit any claim.
You have those who were abused themselves and have forgotten it and do not want to recall it. Someone else recalling their experience threatens them and their coping mechanism. I used to be one of these and I suspect it is a large group.
And you have those who don't want to believe that people can have a very nasty side to them that they are able to hide from all but their victims. To accept that that person is a child abuser means accepting that you can't judge character - so on the whole you don't unless you have no choice. My father was a fairly prominant member of local society and a magistrate. Just think how many people would have had to accept that they were wrong about him.
The other thing is that wars and natural disasters can be mentally confined to a particular place and/or time. They are affecting you and your community or they are not and if they are not then you can say 'I and my family and friends are safe'. This is not so with sexual abuse which has no confining boundaries.
All the more reason for us to speak out and make people aware that it goes on so they are prepared when it arrives on their doorstep.
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Lea
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Posted: Sun Mar 23rd, 2008 05:24 pm |
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"My father was a fairly prominant member of local society and a magistrate. Just think how many people would have had to accept that they were wrong about him."
You made alot of really good points about why people don't want to face this issue. And why people so vehemently deny it's possibility. What you said about your father, and about how people would have to change their ideas about him, that hits closest to home for me. I think I'm still struggling with that myself. I still don't have clear memories - just flashes and suspicions, not to mention an absolute terror of actually having to see or talk to my father. I've realized lately that to look at the full spectrum of my father, at least what I can see of him, the terrible things he did make sense in a strange way with the kind of person he was.
My father was a very charismatic man, he had an ease with people that seemed like magic to me. But the very thing that made him charming made him dangerous too. He was incredibly convincing, and he believed fully that the ideas in his head were RIGHT. Anybody that disagreed with him wasn't intelligent enough to understand his perspective. He made it feel good and right to do what he wanted (even if it went against your better judgement), if you didn't do what he wanted he took on the easygoing friend, the patient father, the wise sage to better convince you he was right. And if that didn't work, oh his disapointment in you was well crafted. Never over the top or blasting, but deep and from a point of wisdom - the cool experienced judge looking down on you as you make a fool of yourself. And if you can weather all this and still stand up to him then you disapear. In his eyes you vanish without a trace, and you will stay invisible until you come to your senses and grovel your apologies to him. I experienced all of this myself of course, but I watched him do these things to other people too. To greater and lesser degrees depending on the nature of what he wanted and who he wanted it from. But his tools were always the same, never overt.
I'm running off on a dangent here. I guess I was just musing on the idea that people think of perpetrators as 'other'. As having an obvious flaw or defect. As being easy to spot - the creepy guy hiding in the bushes, not a beloved pastor, or respected teacher, or any generally well estemed member of the community. But in my experience - that's usually who they are. It's precicely because they are charismatic that they can do these things and not be seen.
It's precicely because my dad was so good at manipulation, that he could do these things to me and that I forgot for 20 years. And now, though I don't remember exactly or can't believe it yet - I feel that coersion clearly.
The following excerpt is from the book "Trauma and Recovery" by Judith Herman M.D. This is an incredible book. I really can't say enough about it. This book has a focus on domestic abuse and sexual abuse. But that focus is through the lense of the complete history of our pyschiatric understanding of the impact of trauma. The roots of this study are found in the medical community's attempts over time to understand PTSD in combat veterens. Here goes:
"Little is known about the mind of the perpetrator. since he is contemptuous of those who seek to understand him, he does not volunteer to be studied. Since he does not perceive that anything is wrong with him, he does not seek help - unless he is in trouble with the law. His most consistant feature, in both the testimony of victims and the observations of psychologists, is his apparent normality. Ordinary concepts of psycholpathology fail to define or comprehen him. This idea is deeply disturbing to most people. How much mor comforting it would be if the perpetrator were easily recognizable, obviously deviant or disturbed. But he is not. The legal scholar Hannah Arendt created a scandal when she reported that Adolf Eichmann, a man who committed unfathomable crimes against humanity, had been certified by half a dozen psychiatrists as normal: "The trouble with Eichmann was precisely that so many were like him, and that the many were neither perverted nor sadistic, that they were, and still are, terribly and terrifyingly normal. From the viewpoint of our legal instituitions and of our moral standards of judgment, this normality was much more terrifying than all the atrocities put together.""
So, trying to reel myself in, the book is an excellent reference point for examples of memory loss not related to sexual abuse. Jim Hopper's website is another great source.
Terminology is everything when it comes to this. If you google "Recovered Memories" you will find websites based solely in the recovered memories of sexual abuse - some are helpful, many will try to convince you it is a hoax. If you google "Dissociative Amnesia" - which is the diagnostic name for it - you will pull up medical and psychiatric websites that explain what the disorder is. They talk about it in it's full context, which is by no means just about sexual abuse.
Sorry so long. Hope that helps.
lea
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Breaking the shell
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Posted: Sun Mar 23rd, 2008 06:06 pm |
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Thanks Lea. I had a look at Hopper's website and wow! what a lot of information there is there. I'll take a look at that book as well. By the way, your description of your father sounds very similar to the way mine behaved.
I haven't had any clear memories either (although the unclear memories are powerful enough) and I often have to go through the logic of 'Why would I make up something like this?' etc etc.
Your comments about the aparent normalcy of abuse perpetrators leads me to one of my bug bears.
A few years ago I read Lolita - people refer to it and the character the whole time so I wanted to see just what the book said. It is a while ago that I read it so excuse me if my memory is incorrect (I can't face reading it at the moment) but what I read was the story of a paedophile who, in order to get the young girl he wants, seduces, maries and kills her mother. He then becomes her legal guardian and procedes to travel the country with her forcing her to have sex with him. Realising that she is totally dependant on this monster she learns to get what she can in return for his brutalisation. In the end she escapes and I think the last chapter has him seing her again living a pretty unhappy, deprived life.
The story is written through the eyes of the paedophile, who does not see the harm he is doing. I think it does this very well - too well. The description 'Lolita' has entered the lexicon not as a word for a defenceless child forced to perform sex (but with the wherewithall to stand up to her abuser as well as she can), but as a pubescent girl asking for sex and using it to manipulate a man.
Talk about blaming the victim.
Thanks for joining in this discussion and I hope I haven't gone on for too long - I can really do with the contact at the moment.
Julia
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Mandy
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Posted: Thu Mar 27th, 2008 01:34 am |
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For years the fear of creating false memories kept me from admitting that anything happened to me. The media did such a good job at portraying it all about a victims problem and I never dug any deeper. Well now I realize that there is no positive pay off to making up memories of abuse. Trying to combat every angle, even if I was to "make up" memories for attention, who would want that kind of attention? It doesn't make any sense. It makes me really angry that new information is being put out there justifying this belief. It's hard enough to move forward without getting knocked back down everywhere we turn. Grrrrr!!!!  Ok, I guess that I'm starting to identify with the anger.
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Kate
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Posted: Fri Jun 13th, 2008 08:47 pm |
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Hi Breaking the Shell,
You wrote "Would you have any references to memory loss being documented as a coping method in non-sexual abuse cases?"
I became aware I had something wrong with me when many years ago I met a retired police officer who told me his story. He said that he had been involved in the investigation of an aircraft which had crashed on Mt Erebus in the Antarctic with the loss of all on board. His trouble, he said, was that he didn't remember anything about it. His wife and family and police colleagues knew he had been there, but he didn't.
He said that about 5 years after the investigation, he started to "fixate" on, for instance, someone's thumb or their ear or some other small body part. He said people would be talking to him and he would be staring at their nose and not hearing what they were saying. He said at that moment he would feel very focused as though there was nothing else in the universe except what he was staring at. He said he also found it embarrassing to fixate on "bits" of people, but he couldn't stop.
He told a colleague of his about it, and his colleague suggested he may be suffering from PTSD, so he went off to see the police psychologist who confirmed the PTSD.
Whilst listening to his story, I realised that I "fixated" on dark haired men. I never mentioned this to anyone, but about 3 years later my (dark haired) father died and the memory flashes started.
I hope this helps.
Kate.
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Lea
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Posted: Fri Jun 13th, 2008 11:36 pm |
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Kate that is a really powerful story. Thank you for sharing it. I've heard and read about so many stories involving loss of memories surrounding abuse.
It still feels like such an incredible validation though, to hear of someone's experiences outside this realm.
Thanks.
Lea
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Breaking the shell
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Posted: Mon Jun 16th, 2008 09:26 am |
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Thanks Kate. Stories like this are good to know about, and if anyone else wants more, I really recommend the book that Lea mentioned 'Trauma and Recovery' by Judith Lewis Herman.
For the best part of the last year (since the memories started coming back) I was under the belief that anyone who had any knowledge of me or my childhood knew better than me what had or hadn't happened. My almost complete lack of memory made me very vulnerable and unable to trust myself.
I don't know if it was the book, my therapist or time (probably a combination of all 3) but suddenly one day I realised that no-one but me could know. Others could deny it all they wanted, if they wanted; but they weren't there in the room, so how could they know?
Previously I thought that if people didn't believe me, it must be me who was wrong. Now I still want those I care about to believe what happened; but if they don't then I no longer think it must be because I am mistaken. It is them who have it wrong.
Looking back, I now realise what a major step this was. Without it, I could not have talked to my brothers, all 3 of whom have been supportive.
Julia
Last edited on Mon Jun 16th, 2008 09:26 am by Breaking the shell
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Lea
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Posted: Mon Jun 16th, 2008 01:08 pm |
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Julia that is wonderful! I'm so glad you have gained this insight. What a powerful discovery.
Lea
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Breaking the shell
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Posted: Mon Jun 16th, 2008 03:27 pm |
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Thanks Lea - it is. Although I am very happy that it hasn't been tested yet!
Could you take what you say about Judith Herman's book earlier in this thread and put it on the 'Resources' pages of this forum? They're not really being used, but I think they could be so useful.
Julia
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