Originally Posted by
sugarangel 
"Shame - Faced"
" Shame and addiction are Siamese twins. One rarely exists without the other. You cannot find an addict without shame - - - or a shameful person without an addiction. Shame and addiction are attached at the heart, sharing the same blood that keeps them alive. Where one leads, the other must follow. Both exist behind walls of denial, growing like cancer, sucking out life. And, both are destined to the same deadly spiral.
Shame's most important objective is to not be exposed. Most people who are 'shame - based' don't know it. They can't. It's slippery. Sometimes it comes on so slowly, you won't know when you started to feel this way. And, it is most often disguised as what it is not; irrational white rage, indifference, the overwhelming need to control, depression, confusion, flightiness, the obsession to use, numbness, panic, and the need to run. We will grasp whatever defense we can to survive slipping into the bottomless pit of shame.
Ironically, these very defenses saved us during our darkest moments. They may actually be the reasons we are alive today, and we can think of them as healthy reactions to very unhealthy circumstances. We can admire and respect ourselves for having them, before we lay them down and begin living a new life that no longer requires such reactions." - Stephanie E.
Man, it felt like I'd been exposed when I read this. It explains so much for me personally.
Thx for sharing this SugarA. It is so true!
I have LONG felt that shame is such a major road block to many things, including getting the healing process going; to getting help; to reaching out; to being HONEST. For as long as one is so ashamed the tendency to want to hide the TRUTH, because the truth reveals too much that would cause a person to feel ashamed. But it is in getting in touch with the truth; first with yourself that we can start to take the steps we need to take to get the help we need to take the steps we cannot seem to start taking without some help from others. You know, I really don't know all that many people who would deny helping someone in need if they really saw it and if someone came to them asking for help. If they cannot help them, they will try to find someone else who CAN. It might be easy to become jaded because of previous bad experiences by certain people who like to kick you when you're down....but I believe in this world there are FAR more people who would like to give you a hand to help you up when you are down; rather than kick you or jab you.
I had an experience a couple of years ago by being helped by a few bystanders [total strangers] and it opened my eyes to the possibilities!! It was rather heart-warming. I still refer to them as my everyday heroes...or maybe not so everyday heroes. That same man did another amazing feat earlier this year that got him in the paper and on the evening news and when I saw that I was like; oh my gosh! That's the same one that helped me out that day. Simply amazing. There really are many good people in this world. It really is hard when someone in your family like that is one of the ones doing painful things to you, but maybe just remind yourself she just is not right in the head.