Dear shadeinthesummer:

I am glad you made friends that are helpful to you and that you agree you need calm people in your life.

What I am writing next is going to be difficult for you to read, so if you do, please take a deep breath. And if you choose to read it and you start getting anxious, stop reading and calm yourself down. I am writing the following (already wrote it but came up here for a warning) because healing is about seeing reality, the reality already known to you but split from full awareness, and so I promote seeing reality for what it is:

No one is more motivated than a child to view their parent/s in the best way possible, no matter the facts, no matter reality. This motivation is there because the child needs to feel safe. When the parent is dangerous, the child will perform all kinds of brain acrobatics to view the dangerous parent as safe.

True to an adult child, as long as there is not enough healing to see reality, the adult child will hold on to the view of the parent that seems most safe. It seems safer to view your father as a good man. To believe he didn’t remember his abuse of you, that he wasn’t aware, and so, after all, he is a good man.

And the child takes “evidence” to indicate that the safer version is true. For example, he wants you to stay in the house, to not leave, that means he loves you… maybe not. Maybe he wants you in the home so that your mother will keep directing her anger at you instead of him.

You wrote it yourself in the above post: “. I am scared of repeating my behavior as a child: so desperate for approval that I overlook the other persons behavior completely”- you overlooked your father’s behavior for what it was: cruel.

Post anytime.

anita