What about forgiveness? Part 2

Let's recap....winter does not seem to be over this far into spring. For the people who know me, they know that I am just itching to get outside for some gardening and less than well thought out DIY to my house.

But, seriously, let's recap. Forgiveness is a private and personal decision that is made solely by the victim. Forgiveness is not an obligation to the transgressor from the victim. Forgiveness is not a transaction that the victim makes in exchange for 'nicer' treatment from a perpetrator. Forgiveness is made in the heart of the victim for themselves as a release from self loathing and toxic shame. Forgiveness is a gift that the victim graciously extends to themselves.

The first step to forgiveness is to decrease the suppression of the feelings and negative self perception through acceptance of the trauma/neglect. ***I will revisit the story of the person who was physically assaulted by their father and suffered a dislocated shoulder and broken collar bone. At the first telling of this story, they were talking about it like it was a matter of fact. They were stoic and composed; almost numb but a little emotion was there. It is very typical of victims of violent crimes to tell their story without much emotion. Emotional numbing is a coping skill to communicate the event that had occurred and to be able to function through the daily grind of life. In order to numb those feelings the victim has to exhaust a lot of energy to suppress the emotions of terror, anger, more terror, helplessness, rage, and betrayal from the self and the perpetrator. Victims of Developmental Trauma can live cut off or in suppression from their bodies/feelings for years or decades of their lives just to be able to function within some kind of continuum of living; they are living in their brainstems in fight/flight/freeze/submission. Sometimes substance abuse can enhance suppression. Or constant work can be a friend to suppression. Self harm in all of its forms likes to hold hands with suppression. But during this suppression, other systems of the body and mind connection are damaged or become ill. This is where the ACES study looks at how trauma affects the quality of life and where autoimmune illnesses come into play (http://aceresponse.org/who_we_are/ACE-Study_43_pg.htm).

Decreasing suppression occurs as the victim becomes more comfortable with accepting the truth of the trauma/neglect. ***As this person worked at healing parts of their system, acceptance of the vast feelings of being alone in this violent act increased. During the retelling of the story the suppressed feelings and energy of being victimized were set loose from their body. The energy and the pain was palpable. As Bessel Van Der Kolk says, "The body keeps the score" and it had its own story to tell that was different from the composed narrative of earlier. The body's narrative was, "I thought he was going to kill me. I knew nobody would save me."

At this time, the acceptance that no one in this family would stop this violent act was known. The acceptance that this violence at the hands of their father, who was clearly emotionally, physically and legally out of control, would have to be endured because they were too small and not strong enough to escape or to fight back was the truth and meant nothing bad about themselves. The acceptance that if they allowed younger siblings to help ("No, sit down, please. I'll be okay") then who would be left to protect them? The acceptance that they did it for their younger siblings was a thought distortion to make this violent act more of an existential service was known ("This really had nothing to do with me or my [siblings]. I was there and I was the scapegoat"). To accept that they can hold all of this pain and truly honor and be grateful for this version of themselves for surviving was the first step in forgiveness and that it had little to do with the perpetrators of this violence. The acceptance had all to do with the self and the parts of the system who held a different level of respect and gratitude for the part who endured this violent act.

Forgiveness is complicated and messy. Forgiveness has nothing to do with abusive people and everything to do with self love and gratitude. Acceptance and forgiveness are not static either. Some days are better than others and we need to remind ourselves of our self love and self acceptance to keep those feelings of toxic shame as small as possible. Most of the work for the victim is inside of their own hearts. We have to help them to get there. We have to help them to know how to return to their hearts after being triggered.

***All identifying information has been changed to protect confidentiality. Permission was granted by the person to share in this blog and we thank them for being so candid.