Dear Ash:

There are all kinds of illnesses/ diseases, all kinds of wounds, some visible, others not so visible. And from each one we need to heal.

You wrote earlier: “Growing up, I was often beat and then almost instantly he would apologise and the cycle would repeat all over again”- the little girl that you were, innocent, loving, reaching out for the love of your mother, your father, looking up to him, hoping, that little girl was severely injured (how could she not) when her father, instead of tending to her lovingly, betrayed her trust and beat her up. When he apologized she surely hoped for that love, reached out again, only to be beaten again.

That is injury happening again and again.

You wrote earlier that you “associated love/ affection with sex”- a child will interpret anything resembling love to be love. As I wrote before, a child beaten by a parent ten times a day, if fed once, will consider the feeding to be love. In a similar way, an adult will consider sex to be love.

I hope you post again with your thoughts and feelings.

anita