I am an Emotional Abuser- I have been Told

One of my children has told me within the last week that I am an emotional abuser. She is dealing with emotional trauma!

I am riveted.

Shell-shocked.

Numb in my  core.

I was born into a horrific abusive family, one that was like a concentration camp. I witnessed and was abused in every category possible. For fifty years I have dealt with the impact of childhood trauma. However, my child says I have victim abuse complex.

The dreaded words I never wanted to hear: that I myself am an abuser.

I did everything within my human capacity and desperately tried to rely on God spiritually to mold me, enable me and heal me so that I would not continue the cycle of abuse.

And now I know I failed... at least one out of three.

According to my child, I am an emotional abuser. I am the cause of her dealing with emotional trauma.

I have been devastated to hear these words. My child says I am sulking, depressed, and bringing those around me down.

However, I am confused, conflicted, and deeply saddened.

I feel like a failure. Everything I have done for the past two decades, all the hard work and commitment I gave to brain trauma therapy for the purpose to change and to become a better mother, wife and person. I failed my little child who is now a young adult. My child says I am the reason for the anxiety and panic attacks -- that I caused this fear within the soul.

How does a survivor of severe child abuse escape the damaging consequences of hurting others? 

Like a building shattered by war, my child walked about and got injured on the broken glass and rumbling walls of my soul that had not yet been restored. My child saw others step onto IEDs hidden and then blown. Second-hand abuse is what it is called or vicarious trauma.

I have read the words of my child written in an email to me. Why do I torture myself reading it again and again? My child does not like me as a person, sees me as obnoxious, unfiltered, embarrassing, mean, unkind, and so many more negative descriptions. I am hated, but my role is supposedly respected, like one should respect the office of the President regardless of the person who serves.

I question: why God made me, why did he allow me to give birth to children, why am I still living, what is my purpose, what is my worth?

And through the darkness, as hurt and mixed messages flood my brain, I lean in to God to hear His words. There can be so much pain in parenting.

I need to release and refocus -- my view is too tight. This present moment compared to eternity is a flash, a second, or a breath.

I know these truths in my mind but not yet in my emotions: God is in control. He is doing a great work in everyone’s life. He who began a good work will be faith full to complete it. It is not about me but about HIM. My value is set by HIM. My child’s value is also set by HIM. We are both in His providential hands.

I will have to progress through this. The words, the pain and the confusion about what my role is today does not instantly get resolved. I need to keep pressing into God to get out of the guilt ridden cycle of being rejected by my child. I never wanted my own child to have to deal with emotional trauma.

I stumble figuring out how do I interact with my child who lives across the hall from me who does not like me and who accuses me of abuse. What do I say? I feel like I want to disappear and I have been told by this child he/she wishes I would.

This is my new stage of dealing with life after being a survivor of child abuse myself. I don’t like this anymore than I liked being an abused child. However, I am learning that it is part of the impact of childhood trauma on the next generation.

Maybe I can learn to empathize. I want to try without destroying myself. Oh, how hard this is.







Photo Credits: untitled by robot s daluyf4 and d une waste prison mite le  and trapped by lynnwolfe on deviantart