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Language of Abuse.

I am reading "The Unsayable" by Annie G. Rogers. It is her view of how abused children live their lives after the trauma, when it goes unnoticed, unheard and unaddressed, how we live our lives in code, repeating the abuse over and over to be heard.

I know it sounds insane, but the unconscious wants to be seen, to be reconciled with the reality of what was, and is relentless so that you and your life are at peace, where the columns are in harmony; where negative is in the negative column and positive stands under positive.

"Trauma is so much like tipping a snow globe and watching the snow descend on the same scene in the same way. Whatever is unresolved and unsayable repeats." Annie

This is what is so tricky and so relenting, that it doesn't matter if you accept and acknowledge and fully bring in the abuse; you will repeat it, until you fully understand all the nuiances of it.

What is incredible to me that even if you are not willing to talk about it, and will not resolve your life, your life will reflect that which you are not wanting to see. It is there in full view.

You are living your unconscious truths, even if you your self are not willing to know you. It is there in full living color each day.

"She tacked back and forth between resistance and speaking and I saw that it wasn't simply that she didn't want to speak or remember. Tasha wanted to speak and to avoid speaking (and remembering) simultaneously. I began to hear the "unsayable" as something that moves toward speech and away from speech at the same time." Annie

What Annie is so briliant at, is to hear and discern what isn't being said and to read the code by behavior and even the words that are repeated in the context of talking about that which you don't want to talk about.

I do get this. I notice what excuses are being used, how we speak but don't say…yet say by what we do. What people are drawn to and away from…all are messages.

If this sounds confusing it clearly is. But, it also clearly shows how most of us live.

I found great comfort in that the actions after the trauma are here to be heard, that we don't repeat this behavior for no other reason. That the truth is working its way into our awareness, if you are willing to see who you truly are. How you were built and why.

She also says how we are born into this language….

"While every child is assigned a place in language by being given a name, and every child is born to fill what Lacan calls a "Lack", an unconscious hole left by a previous generation, the lack Ellen was required to fill was born of horror. Her very name, its "el" sound, pointed back to Helen and Helene. Ellen arrived to fill a hole or lack in her mother, passed down from her mother, by her grandmother."

This does make sense to me. I saw and felt that we were there to serve thy mother…and not to have our own life. It is that there is a gapping hole that needs to be filled and taken care of, before you are free to live your life. But, only to find out while you are filling her hole, your own hole is left empty. And her hole will never be full. She will always need. That is the language.

Not only is there a hole to fill, but we use our children to fill it up.

My emptiness was my children's problem. My insecurities were theirs to make better. The insanity would have continued, if I hadn't become aware of my unawareness and what it was trying to tell me.

I lived the language I was born into until I understood the language. Once I understood that my actions were serving to keep abuse alive and well, and that I was an active participant by not seeing etc….I had to begin speaking differently in all my words and deeds…and to be extremely aware of what my feelings were and what I expected of others.

I wasn't free until I was free from believing that others need to fill my hole.

Until I recognized that I was responsible for building me…and for tearing down the old me.

Her books are brilliant not only in showing how we were built, but also in de-coding and how to live differently.

I love how it explains me…and how it explains how abuse thrives. It is the language of abuse.

August 24, 2012
Welcomed there!

Each new beginning comes with growing pains and a new perspective, as well as knowing what to focus on and what to let go.

The first meeting of the WIND was beautiful, and yet when it was over, we tossed around who the focus would be on and how they would be defined.

A victim group?

A survivor group?

What was the direction of the WIND?

I am quite certain this isn't an issue in most groups that are formed, for they are formed around a mutual interest…and it is pretty narrow, EVEN if the individuals in it are varied. The focus is the action, NOT the make up of the women involved.

The WIND on the other hand, seems to be flipped around, due to the fact that I, a victim of abuse, a survivor of abuse…who wants to give back by starting this group… The focus is on who will attend, NOT what we will do.

The twist is, if you advertise as a victim's group or one for survivors it will kill the group before it starts.

What hit me like a tidal wave tonight, was that the very thing people are pushed back and away from are the labels I was given as a child. Victim of abuse.

It feels like I am wrong, due to a wrong that was done to me…when we have to hide those words. For shame…that they are not attractive.

Once again, I am on the outside trying to make it pretty….when in actuality it isn't me. I can't make incest, rape and sexual assault pretty and inviting. I can't.

And nor do I want to.

I want it to be uncomfortable. BUT, I don't want me to be uncomfortable.

I want victims to feel that the words don't make them bad, that by speaking out and using them in the correct context, you can get out behind them and stand tall proud of who you are…even if you happened to have experienced abuse.

The fight that I feel pushed up against is to USE the words and to change the perspective.

For up until now, victim and survivors of abuse are seen as less than. No one one wants to OPENLY associate with them.

In the past 7 years I have had many people contact me in secret, and some who will silently endorse me.

But, now I guess, I am asking to openly support and stand with women who are victims of abuse. Come and join me, a victim and a survivor and help others become proud of who they are and that they are not the experience. They are not the rape…and incest etc. Let us mentor them back to feeling who they are beyond the shame of abuse.

It took me a while to understand that by not using the words victims and survivors, I was disowning a huge part of my truth.

I, who exemplify a victim, can't speak it? I will not use the V word? Really?

It can't be.

I want there to be a movement that will right this wrong.

Victims are not the ones who are wrong.

They have had a wrong done to them.

I want victims to be able to live loud.

To say the unsayable…that abuse is wrong, not them.

I truly do not believe that we can fool anyone that the WIND is 'just a women's' group.

And why should we.

Victims have spent centuries being seen as the villans. While the abusers live large, we hide behind what was done to us.

If I can't be the example of being a women who had the experience of abuse and how it affected me and then what I did to get out from beneath it…who will?

There are no victim groups out there now that are being headed by a victim. One who has walked 7 years of gaining back my sense of self…who can help steer them along the way.

But, I can't do this if I can't say what my group is about.

It is my belief, that we are all victims of something. We all have barriers and walls that hold us back.

WIND is there to help you reach beyond…to push and encourage you to be authentic, and truthful in accepting all of you.

How can I do that IF I hide the victim parts of me?

I want my victim parts to be the stepping stone that has brought me to who I am today. And it has.

I would not be the person I am today, had I not walked the past 7 years out of dysfunction.

I can't take the victim out of me, but I can no longer let myself be defined by what happend to me.

There is no part of me that I am ashamed of.

I will stand in WIND as me!

All of me.

No parts will not be welcomed there!

August 22, 2012
Harness the WIND!

We had some very young inspiring energy at the WIND last night, they came in with my friend…as a reminder of the free spirits within us all.

Seeing an open window display in need of human expression, they jumped right in and took up a pose!

Each moment we are on the Stage of Life, what is your pose?

This is a rock that Teddy painted for me.

And here it is with the Artist, Teddy!

Both beautiful works of ART!

And here is another rock, a gift from Laura Z.

I love them both!

All the extras added spice to an already wonderful night. Good energy and great inspiration! Women in new directions….feeling the eagerness to try new things with the courage and freedom of the youth! Escaping the confines of rules and all the things women have to do each day….to come together and play!

In our play, we will find all the things we love to do! What we have forgotten to express, the spontaneity of life. I looked up the word spontaneity and found, "Voluntary or Undetermined Action" a great definition for WIND!

The uncontrolled open space for us to be…is my intention. Where you come and play voluntary without a definition of what our actions need to be. Play can't be defined or put into a box….nor can you harness the WIND!

August 22, 2012
We All Get to Play!

And so the WIND began…

It was perfect.

Inspiration, words, images, ideas, women, conversation, creativity, connection, visions, self, expressions, friends….

In comfortable ease, we cut, we glued, we read, we searched, we found, we pasted, we listened, we talked, we dreamed, we shared.

We were all students of the Collage. And collages we made!

Dreams, goals, ideas, wishes, desires.

Sharing our selves with each other in Art…it was comfortable fun.

This one is mine, before I glued it down. It was fun. I will add to it as I now read magazines. Looking for the one right word, the sentence that catches you, the place that you long for, the idea that nags to be done….

The WIND was exactly as I had envisioned and more. It was ease and like great Art, moved without effort. What I love is that we all get to play!

Next meeting is September 4th at 6pm. We will be painting with pastels!

August 21, 2012
Organically Like Art.

Tonight is the first meeting of WIND. I am excited. I have no idea how this will go, where it will bring us, but my intentions are for it to be a mentoring women's group, with lots of action.

Due to my own background and speaking out about Abuse, leads some to think it will be the typical support group for victims. But, it will actually be my greatest intention to make it a complete opposite.

I envision a very active and inspired bunch!

I see us as a group of women of all ages and in different parts on this journey called life…meeting and doing new and different things. Expanding and growing and reaching towards exciting personal goals. Defining our selves from the inside out!

It matters not where you are, where you came from, but it does matter that you are eager to move in a new direction. To wiggle free from what is holding you back…and we will cheer each other on as we stretch into new areas.

You can come and play twice a month with us…it is a play date for women!

Who knows where the WIND will take you!

This is my latest quilt design, one that I am using my hand-dyed fabric. I love the way the dyed fabric adds art to art. I can't know how this will end, but I love the beginning!

This is how I see the WIND moving…organically like Art.

I can't know what this piece will look like, but I am fully excited about its beginning. Just as my feelings about the WIND!

August 21, 2012
Unsayable is in the Art!
In the past few days, I have gotten to see the actions of abuse in the language of actions, even if the words were silent. Now, I am reading another book by Annie G. Rogers, "The Unsayable- The hidden Language of Trauma".

What is totally connecting to me is the way we as humans speak, either in action and words, and actually how actions are much clearer and more accurate than the spoken word.

To walk the talk isn't that easy, when our bodies and unconscious knowing are not that easily controlled…for our bodies and our unconsciousness want to be known.

Annie writes,

"This book reveals specific aspects of my work toward one end; to write history where silence reigned, where silence was broken by an undeciphered cry that went unheard. When all the traces of history have been erased and the body itself is inscribed with an unknown language, how does a child begin to speak? How is it possible to listen so that the child comes to know something vital, and speaking freely becomes possible, so that living inside one's own body is no longer a nightmare? These are the questions that would guide my listening."

"This book carries stories of terrible anguish girls have lived. They are stories of how something real impinges on us and marks us in our bodies. This thing – I'll call it trauma – enters our speech as if by stealth, through the back door, in the night. Then it sounds as though we are speaking in code to one another and to ourselves, and that code is both the mark of trauma and is, itself traumatizing." Annie

Her book, as well as the movie, "The Celebration" by Thomas Vinterberg, are clearly making me see that when you are not allowed to talk about abuse, when your mind has shoved it far away out of reach of memories, Your body and life's actions will still be screaming out your correct past.

Annie, also gave me an insight about abusers. How their ACTIONS are showing what happened to them. How they are speaking their trauma in actions. It makes sense to me.

So, what is so thrilling in a horrifying way is that we are all speaking, just that no one is listening, for we are concentrating on what is being said, and not what is being acted out.

What Annie came to know, is that in a group dynamic of the old therapy ways, where you all sit around and 'share' your story, the story wasn't being told. But, put them in a room doing art, without rules, just giving them the supplies and a few words, incredible things would show up. The body and unconsciousness would be doing the art!

I know this to be true in my experience; my quilts were done without direction, plan or words.

Unsayable is in the Art!
August 20, 2012
Weekend Fun!

I started the weekend, making Salsa with my daughter…we made two batches, ending up with 14 quarts.

She picked up our ingredients from the Farmers Market in Green Bay.

On Sunday, Ann and I dyed about 8 yards of fabric…7 hours flew by. Two women totally immersed in dyeing, just like the fabric.

I turned my kitchen into a play area…with the counter's covered, we could just focus on dye and how we wanted to manipulate the fabric. Spills and drips didn't matter.

Here are our first two pieces in the dye water. Immediately we loved the color.

Meanwhile outside is our soda ash treated fabric drying….

The before and after is striking. How can you not love the process of dyeing? Seeing the fresh colors is incredible, and of course my favorite part to see them hung on the line.

Loving the Orange!

It is always a surprise to see what comes out…how the way we twist and fold the fabric creates a wonderful design.

My favorite piece of the day is this one. I love how it formed by twisting it around a dowel and then scrunching it down and tieing it with floss. It will be water on a quilt soon.

Thanks girls…I will enjoying using what we made!

August 19, 2012
Talking Crazy!

I watched the movie, "The Celebration" twice…although once through would have been enough… it is brilliant in depicting the dynamics of how covering up abuse is impossible; only the eye of denial sees it as gone. For in reality you can't cover up how you have been altered…your untreated wounds continue to rule your life.

I saw denial at its truest form being played out within the family…its response is what clearly marks its insanity.

How the truth enters in and then the response. A response clearly rehearsed from eons past…expected. Demanded. Needed.

The orchestration of denial has everyone playing their part, except one.

One is singing off key….

He is the problem.

He isn't following the family plot.

He dares to stand up and say what everyone is trying so hard to not say, while screaming it.

He becomes the problem…a bigger problem than the one they are all working to keep hidden.

He becomes the source of their wrath and anger, physically or silently opposing…for their very lives depend upon silence, and denial. Denial is who they are. They don't have another person to change into. Who would they be without the pretty story that they overlaid upon the wretched truth?

To see the abusers mother singing a haunting religious melody…echoes the FALC.

To see the wife focusing on the 30 year marriage, that she has always gotten what she needed.

To know that the weakest, or perhaps the strongest killed herself to exit out of the false reality.

To be the one called crazy for standing up and saying the truth.

The truth wasn't challenged.

But, the person uttering it was…he had to be crazier than the truth.

At the end, the abuser apologized and knew he would be left alone outside of the family, the wife let him go, alone and she stayed with her children…. LIKE HE was the ONLY Problem….Not her.

Not her who witnessed her son being abused….and did nothing.

The siblings did an about face in a couple of hours….and all was well with thee.

What it doesn't show is how you then have to work like hell to eradicate the denial files in your head, your beliefs and your relationships. How your denial self is all you have and you then have to walk and find your true self.

Who am I if I am not acting to cover up abuse in my childhood? Who am I when I am not crippled by the affects of not being with my own truth?

It shows a family in complete agreement that "one man" is the problem, when in fact the wife is his equal and the children who hold the secret their army.

All soldiers giving up their lives in order to preserve the father's innocence….and mother's. To Honor, Love, and Obey thy parents…always and forever. To never ever say the truth about what happened to you.

In your silence you hold their honor. It isn't so much that you speak for them, but rather that you don't speak for me. You don't not call me crazy.

Yet the silence of words does not matter when it comes to the picture of the family.

The movie shows the actions of the adult children of abuse, how it SCREAMS I am abused, confused and wounded.

No matter how we close our mouths, the abuse leaks out by what we have to do to cover it up.

What this movie left me with the most, is that no matter if you say it out loud or not, it is running your life, by how your denial has to be stronger than the abuse.

The sister who took her own life, couldn't find nothing strong enough to cover up her abuse.

It kept shining through. In her dreams, it happened time and time again.

What I know, is that if you accept the truth, the truth will not haunt you.

What I would love all Huhta's to do is to watch this film and see who they resemble…see who matches your behavior? And how do you feel our story ended, in comparison to how this movie ended.

It is not a realistic ending. The years of denial have left deep ruts into the psyche of generations of a family, and it can't be undone over night. It is years in the correcting. Yet, if you are willing to start leaning towards the truth and away from abuse, the Universe will support you.

The difference between this movie and my truth speaking, is that I was asked to leave, by the silence. No one stood up and asked my father to leave. Instead, they paid his defense fees, they drove his truck, provide him with a home to live in, they did everything for him. I was the one who knew I would not see them again.

Not as long as I was talking crazy.

August 19, 2012

Files you Mislabeled.

"In any treatment situation, it is the therapist who is responsible for holding two stories, or two plays, together. The work of sustaining a therapeutic relationship demands a two-sided or perspective in order to understand both stories. And the deepening of this relationship over time demands honesty and intimacy and sometimes extraordinary courage. Knowing that we are human, and therefore limited in our understanding and courage, we can be overwhelmed by these responsibilities. We can then create a greater distance to protect ourselves, and even appear to be unmoved by our patients’ responses to that distance. But the effect on our patients is deadening whenever we show them that they do not affect us. Or, alternatively, we can create an illusion of intimacy by making false promises, unwittingly seducing patients to reveal their deepest and oldest wishes, as if we could somehow mete out the right responses and withhold what would be harmful, as if we really knew that difference. But neither of these strategies really protects us from the terrible responsibility of holding another’s heart in our hands, at least for a time, while not forsaking ourselves.
As I write this sketch of my observations about clinical practice, I see that, rather obviously, they carry the story of the book as a whole. I hope that others—parents, teachers, patients of every age, but clinicians especially—will read this story as if standing outside a house at a window at night, peering into a room at once familiar and unfamiliar, and watching an unfolding drama that adumbrates their own knowledge of relationships in psychotherapy."

From Annie G Rogers, "A Shining Affliction - A Story of Harm and Healing in Psychotherapy"

To me, it isn't just in the world of therapy, but in life in general. We are both responsible for holding the story and play of our lives together. Being engaged with another human is to be fully present, to be the witness of their truths…to have the courage to be true.

What is so amazing about Annie, is that she was a victim, she healed her wounds and can now be extremely affective as a therapist, for she can know what is helpful, what is needed…and that she must show up completely.

The key is always…I see you. And in my experience, until I saw myself completely, there was no way I could see others. We see only as far as we see ourself.

There are victims out there who are trying to help others, who have not dealt with their whole lives, especially perpetrators who focused only on their victim days and did not address their abusive ways. If you can't see how your past is playing out in your present, you are not aware…and are repeating the past in the present.

This is how the legacy continues. The lack of seeing the past, the past shows up in the present to be seen. You don't see it, and the pattern goes on and on.

The only way to stop the past from repeating is to see it.

See what actually happened there, not what your mind would like you to believe. To see reality in the past, will stop the past from living in your present day.

I know this will be argued, but look around. And see in families the dynamics being played out verbatium.

If you can find a therapist who will challenge your past in your present, you will be on the road to recovery. Recovering your past and correcting all the files you mislabeled.

August 17, 2012

Wearing the Label “Therapist”.

I just finished Annie G Rogers book "A Shining Affliction – A story of Harm and Healing in Psychotherapy"…it is brilliant in the understanding of how the past arrives in the present, until the past is corrected, and it shows the delicate balance between therapist and client. How the truth can be manipulated by either side…

Healing will take two people facing the truth.

"The psychotherapy relationship is two-sided, whether we acknowledge it is or not. Each person brings to that relationship whatever is unrecognized, unknown, and unapproachable in her or his life, and a wish for knowledge of truths and wholeness." Annie

This alone is the key as to why some therapy works and others don't. It isn't the total blame of the client, it is a relationship, where one person fails to show up fully, authentically…and I wonder what is the percentage of failures…Client or Therapist?

Blaming the client only will no longer be acceptable. How many folks have a relationship with the 'crazy' one and who are not truthful? How many times does the 'crazy' one get left standing alone, unsubstantiated?

What truly drives us crazy is not so much the actual facts of our history, but rather the lack of integrity of those who are 'helping' us….or our family and friends. It is easier to put me into the category crazy, by my self. But, it has more to do about their story than mine.

I love the title, HARM and Healing.

For what most automatically believe is "If she would just get therapy, she would be healed"…and not take into the equation the other person in the therapy relationship…that there can be more harm being done in therapy, if the therapist doesn't see the client.

It is amazing that you can continue on your path of being a victim….just being victimized by the therapy world. Ugh. How can you know?

I instinctively have hung back from therapist, well actually from people…as someone I could rely on to tell me my truth. I had followed folks for my first 46 years and they led me astray from reality. Now, I was hell bent on going it alone. Forcing myself to see that which I hadn't seen, feel what I had pushed away. Being aware instead of blindly following.

I love how Annie shows the nuances of the client and then the harmful behaviors of the therapist as well as what is healing.

It is my belief, that we are now on the cusp of recognizing that the crazy one isn't the only one who is misleading the healing, but that rather it is at the mercy of courage of the therapist.

In the past, the one with the most college credits or the one who sat behind the desk was seen as the wisest.

That no longer will be the case.

I am thrilled that there are books like this one out there.

To show the way of not only how the past is repeated in our present, but how to get out of the cycle….and that it will take the right kind of person wearing the label "Therapist".

August 16, 2012

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I M Perfect, and it is impossible not to be.

Silence is upon them.

That is Me.

Feel Kind

Where Love Lives.

My Wonderful Life.

Where the Heart Lives

Signs of Change.

His Daughter to Live hers Well.

New Blog Site

Your Inner Spark