The Necessity of Feeling
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The Necessity of Feeling
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For you to heal completely, the trauma must be reworked not only on the mental level, but on the emotional level as well. This necessitates two further processes:
· First, the feelings generated by the trauma that were nor felt at the time need to be identified.
· Second, and more difficult, the feelings must be experienced, at least in part, on a gut level.
No matter how objectively you have come to view the trauma, the fact is that a life-threatening event occurred. Not only did it happen, it happened to you or people you care about-not to strangers on television. You may think of yourself as relatively unemotional or as someone who is cool and collected, not easily rattled. But no matter how self-possessed you are, the traumatic event inevitably generated feelings in you.
The feelings trauma generates are perhaps the most powerful feelings known to human beings, among them fear, anger, grief, and guilt. If you think you don't have these feelings, think again. Do you still have PTSD symptoms? Are you struggling with an addiction? Do you have headaches, backaches, stomach problems, or other physical symptoms of unexplained origin?
If so, this suggests that even though you may not want to deal with your feelings, your feelings are dealing with you.
There are two kinds of courage: courage to act and courage to feel. Many people who have demonstrated incredible courage in their actions, quail at the idea of feeling their emotions. For example, in my work with veterans I have known several who withstood overwhelming numbers of the enemy or endured enormous physical pain, but were utterly panicked at the prospect of confronting their feelings.
If war heroes such as these men can fear their feelings, then it is no wonder that you might also be afraid of feeling your emotions.
Fear of Feeling
Fear of feeling is often associated with two other fears: fear of losing control of oneself and fear of suffering. When you take the risk of feeling your emotions, periods of suffering are almost inevitable. And suffering takes courage.
If you're thinking, I'm not that brave, don't be so sure. You might be more courageous than you think. What about any acts of bravery you performed during the trauma or afterwards? Consider also the courage you have displayed in simply surviving, and in surviving everything you've had to endure since the trauma. Even picking up this book and reading it requires courage.
The other of these two fears, that of losing control, is also common. Even nontraumatized individuals fear that giving in to their emotions will render them out of control.
For PTSD sufferers this fear is even more pervasive, and devastating, for two reasons:
· The emotions surrounding the traumatic event (and its aftermath) are extremely powerful, because trauma and secondary wounding experiences, by their very nature, are physically and emotionally powerful events.
· The feeling of being overwhelmed by emotions can recreate the emotional climate of the original traumatic event, in which the survivor felt overwhelmed, not in control, and helpless in the face of an attacking person or force.
But being afraid of losing control and actually doing so are two entirely different things. If you've been successful at "keeping a lid" on your feelings until now, it's likely you will also be successful when you begin to let them out-although it won't necessarily be easy.
In the introduction to this book, an analogy was made between beginning to feel the feelings associated with the trauma (the emergency stage) and natural disasters-earthquakes, floods, fires. And although each insight and revelation may bring a strong surge of emotion, especially if you are a multiple-trauma survivor or a survivor of child abuse, not every one will be as intense as the initial emergency stage. Subsequent feelings may emerge as tremors, as small trickles of pain and sadness, or as flickers of anger rather than infernos of rage.
It's also important to remember, as you pass through the emergency stage and at other times of strong feeling, that the emotionality you are experiencing is temporary. It will pass. The human organism simply cannot sustain a state of such intense feeling for a prolonged period of time without shutting down for a rest.
Don't be surprised, therefore, if after an emotional day or two, you suddenly feel numb and exhausted. For hours, perhaps even a few days, you may be able to feel very little. The strong feelings have drained you, and you need time to recuperate.
Take Your Time
Don't push yourself to feel, or allow others to push you (not even your therapist). Allow your own internal healing process, not outside pressures or sources, to bring your feelings to the surface. If you become overstimulated emotionally, the emotions may emerge too soon, before you are ready to handle them. Your emotions should come forth when they are ready, not when your therapist, family members, friends, or even you think that they should be ready.
Some of your feelings regarding the trauma, like some of your memories, may need to stay buried for the time being, for many months, maybe even forever. Even if you diligently complete every exercise in this chapter and work hard in therapy, your feelings will not necessarily surface. You cannot will them to do so. Your feelings will manifest themselves in their own time, in their own way.
If some feelings never surface, perhaps this is what is best for you. Healing does not necessarily require that you remember and become emotional about every single aspect of the trauma. In fact, you can read this entire book and not have any of the emotional experiences described-and still benefit.
Most likely, however, someday some of the feelings will emerge. For now though, they may be staying in the background for one of four reasons:
· You are already on overload-emotional, physical, or otherwise-due to present life stresses, and it would be nonproductive, if not destructive, for you to also be dealing with the trauma.
· For one reason or another, you are not emotionally ready to handle these feelings.
· You do not have an adequate support system to help you when you start to hurt.
· You have fears and concerns about your emotional side or about specific emotions that are preventing your growth in this area.
Just as you cannot will or force yourself to remember the trauma or to get over it within a certain time period, you cannot force yourself to feel the feelings and get rid of them by such-and-such a date. You can, however, aid yourself in the emotional aspects of the healing process by reading about how other trauma survivors in your situation have felt, as well as by building a support system.
For example, you can begin to search for a mental health professional with whom you feel comfortable and in whom you have confidence. Similarly, you can also search out other survivors and friends you can share your experiences with and can expect to be supportive
.
When the feelings do begin to emerge, it may mean that your routine is temporarily interrupted. For example, spending an hour, an evening, or even an entire day crying or angry, unable to concentrate on anything but your emotions, is to be expected. However, if the following symptoms appear, you should seek immediate professional attention:
· Fainting spells
· Hallucinations
· Total immobilization for more than 2 to 3 hours
· Feelings of being out of touch with reality
· The urge to hurt yourself
· Suicidal or homicidal thoughts or behavior
· Being unable to function at all for more than a day
Keep in mind that if you become low on courage during the healing process, you can always "borrow" it from others. For example, your family, friends, or your therapist or support group might be glad to encourage you if you ask. In addition, you may turn to a spiritual source for guidance and courage, if such is your belief.
Managing Your Emotions
Feeling your emotions may seem a little less frightening to you once you realize that experiencing an emotion does not mean that you necessarily have to act on it. Any emotion can temporarily dominate your consciousness. Yet this does not mean that you have to act on this particular emotion or give it the power to control your actions. All you have to do when you feel an emotion is to feel it. You don't even have to share it with anyone unless you choose to do so.
Many people fear that if they have an emotion, it will take over. While this may sometimes happen, it is a temporary condition. In most cases, the opposite is true: only when emotions stay denied do they exert massive control over human behavior.
Mastering your emotions does not mean that you can make them go away. Neither does mastery imply that you can reduce or lessen the intensity of your emotions at will. In the emotional realm, mastery means that you can tolerate the intensity and duration of your feelings without abusing yourself or others. It also means that you can decide which emotions you wish to do something about, and which you wish simply to experience and nothing more. In fact, the more you identify and "surrender" to your emotions-allowing yourself to accept that you have them and feel them-the more you will ultimately be able to exert control over your life.
You may be repelled by the word surrender. In your work, perhaps even in your mind, strength is equated with victory and success, not surrender. However, unlike the world you work in, in the emotional world surrender leads to victory. Not surrendering to emotional truth leads to defeat in the form of crippling symptoms, life-threatening addictions, or a chronic anxiety that can permeate everything that is meaningful to you-from your work to your love relationships to your self-esteem.
For you to heal completely, the trauma must be reworked not only on the mental level, but on the emotional level as well. This necessitates two further processes:
· First, the feelings generated by the trauma that were nor felt at the time need to be identified.
· Second, and more difficult, the feelings must be experienced, at least in part, on a gut level.
No matter how objectively you have come to view the trauma, the fact is that a life-threatening event occurred. Not only did it happen, it happened to you or people you care about-not to strangers on television. You may think of yourself as relatively unemotional or as someone who is cool and collected, not easily rattled. But no matter how self-possessed you are, the traumatic event inevitably generated feelings in you.
The feelings trauma generates are perhaps the most powerful feelings known to human beings, among them fear, anger, grief, and guilt. If you think you don't have these feelings, think again. Do you still have PTSD symptoms? Are you struggling with an addiction? Do you have headaches, backaches, stomach problems, or other physical symptoms of unexplained origin?
If so, this suggests that even though you may not want to deal with your feelings, your feelings are dealing with you.
There are two kinds of courage: courage to act and courage to feel. Many people who have demonstrated incredible courage in their actions, quail at the idea of feeling their emotions. For example, in my work with veterans I have known several who withstood overwhelming numbers of the enemy or endured enormous physical pain, but were utterly panicked at the prospect of confronting their feelings.
If war heroes such as these men can fear their feelings, then it is no wonder that you might also be afraid of feeling your emotions.
Fear of Feeling
Fear of feeling is often associated with two other fears: fear of losing control of oneself and fear of suffering. When you take the risk of feeling your emotions, periods of suffering are almost inevitable. And suffering takes courage.
If you're thinking, I'm not that brave, don't be so sure. You might be more courageous than you think. What about any acts of bravery you performed during the trauma or afterwards? Consider also the courage you have displayed in simply surviving, and in surviving everything you've had to endure since the trauma. Even picking up this book and reading it requires courage.
The other of these two fears, that of losing control, is also common. Even nontraumatized individuals fear that giving in to their emotions will render them out of control.
For PTSD sufferers this fear is even more pervasive, and devastating, for two reasons:
· The emotions surrounding the traumatic event (and its aftermath) are extremely powerful, because trauma and secondary wounding experiences, by their very nature, are physically and emotionally powerful events.
· The feeling of being overwhelmed by emotions can recreate the emotional climate of the original traumatic event, in which the survivor felt overwhelmed, not in control, and helpless in the face of an attacking person or force.
But being afraid of losing control and actually doing so are two entirely different things. If you've been successful at "keeping a lid" on your feelings until now, it's likely you will also be successful when you begin to let them out-although it won't necessarily be easy.
In the introduction to this book, an analogy was made between beginning to feel the feelings associated with the trauma (the emergency stage) and natural disasters-earthquakes, floods, fires. And although each insight and revelation may bring a strong surge of emotion, especially if you are a multiple-trauma survivor or a survivor of child abuse, not every one will be as intense as the initial emergency stage. Subsequent feelings may emerge as tremors, as small trickles of pain and sadness, or as flickers of anger rather than infernos of rage.
It's also important to remember, as you pass through the emergency stage and at other times of strong feeling, that the emotionality you are experiencing is temporary. It will pass. The human organism simply cannot sustain a state of such intense feeling for a prolonged period of time without shutting down for a rest.
Don't be surprised, therefore, if after an emotional day or two, you suddenly feel numb and exhausted. For hours, perhaps even a few days, you may be able to feel very little. The strong feelings have drained you, and you need time to recuperate.
Take Your Time
Don't push yourself to feel, or allow others to push you (not even your therapist). Allow your own internal healing process, not outside pressures or sources, to bring your feelings to the surface. If you become overstimulated emotionally, the emotions may emerge too soon, before you are ready to handle them. Your emotions should come forth when they are ready, not when your therapist, family members, friends, or even you think that they should be ready.
Some of your feelings regarding the trauma, like some of your memories, may need to stay buried for the time being, for many months, maybe even forever. Even if you diligently complete every exercise in this chapter and work hard in therapy, your feelings will not necessarily surface. You cannot will them to do so. Your feelings will manifest themselves in their own time, in their own way.
If some feelings never surface, perhaps this is what is best for you. Healing does not necessarily require that you remember and become emotional about every single aspect of the trauma. In fact, you can read this entire book and not have any of the emotional experiences described-and still benefit.
Most likely, however, someday some of the feelings will emerge. For now though, they may be staying in the background for one of four reasons:
· You are already on overload-emotional, physical, or otherwise-due to present life stresses, and it would be nonproductive, if not destructive, for you to also be dealing with the trauma.
· For one reason or another, you are not emotionally ready to handle these feelings.
· You do not have an adequate support system to help you when you start to hurt.
· You have fears and concerns about your emotional side or about specific emotions that are preventing your growth in this area.
Just as you cannot will or force yourself to remember the trauma or to get over it within a certain time period, you cannot force yourself to feel the feelings and get rid of them by such-and-such a date. You can, however, aid yourself in the emotional aspects of the healing process by reading about how other trauma survivors in your situation have felt, as well as by building a support system.
For example, you can begin to search for a mental health professional with whom you feel comfortable and in whom you have confidence. Similarly, you can also search out other survivors and friends you can share your experiences with and can expect to be supportive
.
When the feelings do begin to emerge, it may mean that your routine is temporarily interrupted. For example, spending an hour, an evening, or even an entire day crying or angry, unable to concentrate on anything but your emotions, is to be expected. However, if the following symptoms appear, you should seek immediate professional attention:
· Fainting spells
· Hallucinations
· Total immobilization for more than 2 to 3 hours
· Feelings of being out of touch with reality
· The urge to hurt yourself
· Suicidal or homicidal thoughts or behavior
· Being unable to function at all for more than a day
Keep in mind that if you become low on courage during the healing process, you can always "borrow" it from others. For example, your family, friends, or your therapist or support group might be glad to encourage you if you ask. In addition, you may turn to a spiritual source for guidance and courage, if such is your belief.
Managing Your Emotions
Feeling your emotions may seem a little less frightening to you once you realize that experiencing an emotion does not mean that you necessarily have to act on it. Any emotion can temporarily dominate your consciousness. Yet this does not mean that you have to act on this particular emotion or give it the power to control your actions. All you have to do when you feel an emotion is to feel it. You don't even have to share it with anyone unless you choose to do so.
Many people fear that if they have an emotion, it will take over. While this may sometimes happen, it is a temporary condition. In most cases, the opposite is true: only when emotions stay denied do they exert massive control over human behavior.
Mastering your emotions does not mean that you can make them go away. Neither does mastery imply that you can reduce or lessen the intensity of your emotions at will. In the emotional realm, mastery means that you can tolerate the intensity and duration of your feelings without abusing yourself or others. It also means that you can decide which emotions you wish to do something about, and which you wish simply to experience and nothing more. In fact, the more you identify and "surrender" to your emotions-allowing yourself to accept that you have them and feel them-the more you will ultimately be able to exert control over your life.
You may be repelled by the word surrender. In your work, perhaps even in your mind, strength is equated with victory and success, not surrender. However, unlike the world you work in, in the emotional world surrender leads to victory. Not surrendering to emotional truth leads to defeat in the form of crippling symptoms, life-threatening addictions, or a chronic anxiety that can permeate everything that is meaningful to you-from your work to your love relationships to your self-esteem.
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Preparing Yourself
Even if you are desperate for the healing to begin (and to be finished), you cannot force yourself into an emotional experience. However, you can prepare the way for your emotional healing by identifying and critically examining any fears or obstacles you have regarding the emotional side of your personality. The following exercises are designed to help release you from any unnecessary fears you might have regarding your emotional side.
Exercise: Identifying Your Fears About Feelings
Although you cannot force yourself to feel, you can prepare the way by beginning to identify some of the fears you have about feelings. In your present life-at home, at work, and in social situations-you will be required at times to interact with others on an emotional, as well as an intellectual, basis. Therefore, awareness of your fears about emotionality and overcoming some of those fears is critical, not only to your emotional healing from the trauma and its aftermath but to the entire quality of your life.
Begin by reviewing the Feelings List in Chapter 3 and your journal entries on distinguishing feelings from thoughts. As you proceed through this chapter and throughout this book, remember that feelings are rarely pure. At any given moment, you are probably experiencing not just one but several feelings at a time.
Now, in your journal, take time to list some of the fears you have come to associate with feeling or showing emotions. As you write, consider the following questions:
1. Were you ever told by someone important to you that being emotional or showing your emotions was wrong, shameful, weak, sinful, slothful, unpatriotic, or a sign of mental or emotional instability or a lack of faith in God?
You could have been given this message as a young child, teenager, young adult, or at any other time in your life. The important persons could have been either authority figures or nurturing ones, for example, a parent, teacher, caregiver, friend, lover, or a religious, military, police, or court authority.
2. Are emotional reactions for you associated with a loved one or caretaker
· hurting you or someone close to you?
· hurting themselves?
· damaging or destroying property or pets?
· making threats?
· entering a mental ward or seeking psychiatric medication?
· committing suicide?
· committing homicide?
3. What emotions did this individual display? Was he or she angry, sad, or afraid, or was some other emotion dominant? Did you as a result come to fear certain emotions?
If the answer is yes, which emotions have you come to associate with the negative events surrounding this individual's emotional expression or display?
4. Was that person's behavior an expression of his or her true feelings, or rather of
· a mental or emotional disturbance, for example, an organic brain tumor that caused memory and other problems, or a psychotic condition such as paranoia or hallucinations?
· an addiction, such as alcohol or drug abuse, pathological gambling, compulsive overeating, bulimia, or anorexia nervosa?
· a medical problem? (For example, hypertension or hyperglycemia can create extreme irritability, even violence.)
· a display of anger that covered up the person's true feelings of grief, hurt, disappointment, sense of failure, sense of powerlessness, or frustration with life?
5. Were you ever verbally abused, physically punished, abandoned, rejected, or otherwise shamed for being emotional or showing your emotions?
If so, did the verbal or physical humiliation follow your expression of any emotion at all or certain specific emotions? For example, were you punished for being angry, but not for crying, or punished for crying, but not for being angry? Or were you punished for showing any feeling whatsoever, even joy?
List the ways in which you were punished. Be specific. What type of physical punishments were used? What names were you called? Did you internalize (come to believe) the names you were called? If you were physically abused as well, did you eventually come to believe that you deserved physical abuse because you committed the "sin" or displayed the "weakness" of showing emotion?
6. Are you afraid of losing control? In the past have you actually lost control, or is this a possibility that so far has not materialized? Just because this fear has not materialized does not mean your fear is unfounded.
Have you ever come close to losing control? Can you specify which emotions, or mix of emotions, you feel would contribute to or cause you to lose control?
Examine your fear of losing control closely. What are your fantasies or thoughts about what you would do or how you would feel if you did indeed lose control? How dangerous or costly would it be if you lost control that way? Consider the emotional, social, vocational, and financial costs not only to you, but to your family or others you care about.
7. If you have actually lost control of yourself when you allowed yourself to be emotional, what forms did the loss of control take?
· Did you suffer memory loss, inability to concentrate, fainting, dizziness, paralysis, or unexplained, unexpected, or intense pain in some part of your body?
· Did you cut, burn, bruise, or otherwise mutilate yourself?
· Did you hurt yourself by abusing alcohol, drugs, food, or some other addictive substance or behavior?
· Did you attempt to or succeed in damaging property or pets or in hurting another person?
· Did you make rash decisions, forget to show up for an important appointment, or act in ways that betrayed your moral values or resulted in lowered self-esteem?
8. Under what circumstances did you lose control? Were you alone or with others? Were you practicing an addiction? Were there other stresses in your life besides the trauma or a secondary wounding experience? Do you think you would have lost control if you had not been in these particular circumstances? More specifically, do you think you would have lost control if you were with supportive individuals, if you were addiction-free, or if you were not burdened by multiple stressors?
9. Can you identify what feeling or feelings seemed to trigger the loss of control? (Refer to the Feelings List in Chapter 3, if necessary.)
10. Do some of your fears of feeling stem from the trauma? From your perspective, did something negative or terrible happen during the traumatic incident because you became emotional or showed your feelings? Consider also your secondary wounding experiences. Do you believe that you were in any way unfavorably treated or otherwise the object of victim-blaming attitudes because of your emotional state? What evidence do you have that your emotional state or actions caused or contributed to any negative outcome during the traumatic event or a secondary wounding experience?
Even if you are desperate for the healing to begin (and to be finished), you cannot force yourself into an emotional experience. However, you can prepare the way for your emotional healing by identifying and critically examining any fears or obstacles you have regarding the emotional side of your personality. The following exercises are designed to help release you from any unnecessary fears you might have regarding your emotional side.
Exercise: Identifying Your Fears About Feelings
Although you cannot force yourself to feel, you can prepare the way by beginning to identify some of the fears you have about feelings. In your present life-at home, at work, and in social situations-you will be required at times to interact with others on an emotional, as well as an intellectual, basis. Therefore, awareness of your fears about emotionality and overcoming some of those fears is critical, not only to your emotional healing from the trauma and its aftermath but to the entire quality of your life.
Begin by reviewing the Feelings List in Chapter 3 and your journal entries on distinguishing feelings from thoughts. As you proceed through this chapter and throughout this book, remember that feelings are rarely pure. At any given moment, you are probably experiencing not just one but several feelings at a time.
Now, in your journal, take time to list some of the fears you have come to associate with feeling or showing emotions. As you write, consider the following questions:
1. Were you ever told by someone important to you that being emotional or showing your emotions was wrong, shameful, weak, sinful, slothful, unpatriotic, or a sign of mental or emotional instability or a lack of faith in God?
You could have been given this message as a young child, teenager, young adult, or at any other time in your life. The important persons could have been either authority figures or nurturing ones, for example, a parent, teacher, caregiver, friend, lover, or a religious, military, police, or court authority.
2. Are emotional reactions for you associated with a loved one or caretaker
· hurting you or someone close to you?
· hurting themselves?
· damaging or destroying property or pets?
· making threats?
· entering a mental ward or seeking psychiatric medication?
· committing suicide?
· committing homicide?
3. What emotions did this individual display? Was he or she angry, sad, or afraid, or was some other emotion dominant? Did you as a result come to fear certain emotions?
If the answer is yes, which emotions have you come to associate with the negative events surrounding this individual's emotional expression or display?
4. Was that person's behavior an expression of his or her true feelings, or rather of
· a mental or emotional disturbance, for example, an organic brain tumor that caused memory and other problems, or a psychotic condition such as paranoia or hallucinations?
· an addiction, such as alcohol or drug abuse, pathological gambling, compulsive overeating, bulimia, or anorexia nervosa?
· a medical problem? (For example, hypertension or hyperglycemia can create extreme irritability, even violence.)
· a display of anger that covered up the person's true feelings of grief, hurt, disappointment, sense of failure, sense of powerlessness, or frustration with life?
5. Were you ever verbally abused, physically punished, abandoned, rejected, or otherwise shamed for being emotional or showing your emotions?
If so, did the verbal or physical humiliation follow your expression of any emotion at all or certain specific emotions? For example, were you punished for being angry, but not for crying, or punished for crying, but not for being angry? Or were you punished for showing any feeling whatsoever, even joy?
List the ways in which you were punished. Be specific. What type of physical punishments were used? What names were you called? Did you internalize (come to believe) the names you were called? If you were physically abused as well, did you eventually come to believe that you deserved physical abuse because you committed the "sin" or displayed the "weakness" of showing emotion?
6. Are you afraid of losing control? In the past have you actually lost control, or is this a possibility that so far has not materialized? Just because this fear has not materialized does not mean your fear is unfounded.
Have you ever come close to losing control? Can you specify which emotions, or mix of emotions, you feel would contribute to or cause you to lose control?
Examine your fear of losing control closely. What are your fantasies or thoughts about what you would do or how you would feel if you did indeed lose control? How dangerous or costly would it be if you lost control that way? Consider the emotional, social, vocational, and financial costs not only to you, but to your family or others you care about.
7. If you have actually lost control of yourself when you allowed yourself to be emotional, what forms did the loss of control take?
· Did you suffer memory loss, inability to concentrate, fainting, dizziness, paralysis, or unexplained, unexpected, or intense pain in some part of your body?
· Did you cut, burn, bruise, or otherwise mutilate yourself?
· Did you hurt yourself by abusing alcohol, drugs, food, or some other addictive substance or behavior?
· Did you attempt to or succeed in damaging property or pets or in hurting another person?
· Did you make rash decisions, forget to show up for an important appointment, or act in ways that betrayed your moral values or resulted in lowered self-esteem?
8. Under what circumstances did you lose control? Were you alone or with others? Were you practicing an addiction? Were there other stresses in your life besides the trauma or a secondary wounding experience? Do you think you would have lost control if you had not been in these particular circumstances? More specifically, do you think you would have lost control if you were with supportive individuals, if you were addiction-free, or if you were not burdened by multiple stressors?
9. Can you identify what feeling or feelings seemed to trigger the loss of control? (Refer to the Feelings List in Chapter 3, if necessary.)
10. Do some of your fears of feeling stem from the trauma? From your perspective, did something negative or terrible happen during the traumatic incident because you became emotional or showed your feelings? Consider also your secondary wounding experiences. Do you believe that you were in any way unfavorably treated or otherwise the object of victim-blaming attitudes because of your emotional state? What evidence do you have that your emotional state or actions caused or contributed to any negative outcome during the traumatic event or a secondary wounding experience?
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Exercise: Reexamining Your Fears About Feelings
Respect all your fears, both those you think are rational and those you believe are not-the distinction between rational and irrational is almost irrelevant when it comes to fear. Fears grounded in emotional threats, such as rejection and shame, may seem trivial compared to fears grounded in threats to life and limb; however, those grounded in emotional issues can be just as controlling and destructive as threats to physical survival.
For example, emotional fears can lead to addictions or other self-destructive behaviors that, in the final analysis, can cause physical disease and even death. According to 12-step programs' philosophy, fear is one of the major roots of addiction. Untreated addiction ultimately leads to emotional, if not physical, death.
Your task in this section is to critically examine each of the fears you listed in the preceding exercise for the purpose of determining which of them are realistic, on the basis of either psychological or physical threat, and which are dinosaurs from the past. With some assistance, you may choose to discard some of these "dinosaurs."
For each of the fears listed in your inventory, consider the following questions:
1. To what extent does this fear reflect your fear of rejection, abandonment, disapproval, or some sort of punishment by others, as opposed to a genuine fear of emotionality or of a specific emotion?
Imagine, for example, being in a situation in which the people around you accepted or even applauded, rather than rejected or disapproved of, your emotional state. Would you still be afraid of your feelings?
If your fear of feeling seems primarily based on the negative responses of others, rather than in some internal fear of emotionality itself, your task is to find people who will be supportive of your emotional life.
2. If you showed your emotions today, would you be punished physically, emotionally, or financially? Are you still living with an abusive person who verbally or physically hurts you when you show certain feelings? Do you have an employer who is intolerant of emotional expression?
If so, then you need to adjust your behavior accordingly. For example, you need to find a safe place to get in touch with your emotional self. However, if you are still being abused by a family member or caretaker, it may be difficult for you to find the necessary privacy.
If you are in an abusive relationship, there are no easy routes to obtaining privacy, just as there are no simple means of eliminating the abuse without also terminating the relationship. If the abuser is rigid and not amenable to discussion and compromise, sometimes a seemingly simple matter, such as obtaining the minimum of privacy and dignity within the relationship, may involve much larger and more serious issues, such as considering the option of leaving the relationship temporarily, if not permanently. Chapter 13, on domestic violence, considers some of these issues in more detail. (Additional resources for abused persons are listed in Appendix B.)
3. If you were taught that being emotional or having certain emotions is shameful, wrong, weak, sinful, or a sign of mental or emotional instability, make a list of all the persons who taught you these views. As best you can, write about why these individuals hold such attitudes. Do their attitudes stem from their personal fears and difficulties with emotions, from certain religious or cultural traditions, from some other outside force or necessity, or from some combination of these factors?
In some cases, fear of showing emotions arises for reasons of survival. For example, according to psychologist Erwin Parsons (1985), historically slaves learned to keep their thoughts and feelings to themselves to minimize the extent that they could be manipulated by their masters. Also, in many instances, the inner life of a slave was the only possession that could not be taken away. This historical necessity for "wearing the mask," as Parsons calls it, can persist into the present among formerly enslaved groups such as African Americans.
You may or may not have a clear idea why the individuals on your list held such negative views toward emotionality. However, the goal in trying to understand their reasons is not so that you can judge these people or become an amateur psychoanalyst. Rather, the goal is to help you distance yourself from their attitudes. Once you realize that their attitudes may stem from their own personal considerations or outside pressures, not from some inherent truth about the negativity of emotions, you can give yourself the freedom to make your own decisions. In the present, unless these individuals can still harm you, you can work toward choosing which of their values regarding emotionality you would like to keep and which you would like to modify, or even discard.
4. Is your fear grounded in an expectation based on a sex role? We live in an age of women's and men's liberation, yet traditional sex role stereotypes die hard. Some men and boys still feel they need to always be strong and never cry. Some girls and women feel they must always be "sweet" and never get angry.
Yet the male survivor needs to grieve his losses, and the female survivor to experience her anger and rage.
Respect all your fears, both those you think are rational and those you believe are not-the distinction between rational and irrational is almost irrelevant when it comes to fear. Fears grounded in emotional threats, such as rejection and shame, may seem trivial compared to fears grounded in threats to life and limb; however, those grounded in emotional issues can be just as controlling and destructive as threats to physical survival.
For example, emotional fears can lead to addictions or other self-destructive behaviors that, in the final analysis, can cause physical disease and even death. According to 12-step programs' philosophy, fear is one of the major roots of addiction. Untreated addiction ultimately leads to emotional, if not physical, death.
Your task in this section is to critically examine each of the fears you listed in the preceding exercise for the purpose of determining which of them are realistic, on the basis of either psychological or physical threat, and which are dinosaurs from the past. With some assistance, you may choose to discard some of these "dinosaurs."
For each of the fears listed in your inventory, consider the following questions:
1. To what extent does this fear reflect your fear of rejection, abandonment, disapproval, or some sort of punishment by others, as opposed to a genuine fear of emotionality or of a specific emotion?
Imagine, for example, being in a situation in which the people around you accepted or even applauded, rather than rejected or disapproved of, your emotional state. Would you still be afraid of your feelings?
If your fear of feeling seems primarily based on the negative responses of others, rather than in some internal fear of emotionality itself, your task is to find people who will be supportive of your emotional life.
2. If you showed your emotions today, would you be punished physically, emotionally, or financially? Are you still living with an abusive person who verbally or physically hurts you when you show certain feelings? Do you have an employer who is intolerant of emotional expression?
If so, then you need to adjust your behavior accordingly. For example, you need to find a safe place to get in touch with your emotional self. However, if you are still being abused by a family member or caretaker, it may be difficult for you to find the necessary privacy.
If you are in an abusive relationship, there are no easy routes to obtaining privacy, just as there are no simple means of eliminating the abuse without also terminating the relationship. If the abuser is rigid and not amenable to discussion and compromise, sometimes a seemingly simple matter, such as obtaining the minimum of privacy and dignity within the relationship, may involve much larger and more serious issues, such as considering the option of leaving the relationship temporarily, if not permanently. Chapter 13, on domestic violence, considers some of these issues in more detail. (Additional resources for abused persons are listed in Appendix B.)
3. If you were taught that being emotional or having certain emotions is shameful, wrong, weak, sinful, or a sign of mental or emotional instability, make a list of all the persons who taught you these views. As best you can, write about why these individuals hold such attitudes. Do their attitudes stem from their personal fears and difficulties with emotions, from certain religious or cultural traditions, from some other outside force or necessity, or from some combination of these factors?
In some cases, fear of showing emotions arises for reasons of survival. For example, according to psychologist Erwin Parsons (1985), historically slaves learned to keep their thoughts and feelings to themselves to minimize the extent that they could be manipulated by their masters. Also, in many instances, the inner life of a slave was the only possession that could not be taken away. This historical necessity for "wearing the mask," as Parsons calls it, can persist into the present among formerly enslaved groups such as African Americans.
You may or may not have a clear idea why the individuals on your list held such negative views toward emotionality. However, the goal in trying to understand their reasons is not so that you can judge these people or become an amateur psychoanalyst. Rather, the goal is to help you distance yourself from their attitudes. Once you realize that their attitudes may stem from their own personal considerations or outside pressures, not from some inherent truth about the negativity of emotions, you can give yourself the freedom to make your own decisions. In the present, unless these individuals can still harm you, you can work toward choosing which of their values regarding emotionality you would like to keep and which you would like to modify, or even discard.
4. Is your fear grounded in an expectation based on a sex role? We live in an age of women's and men's liberation, yet traditional sex role stereotypes die hard. Some men and boys still feel they need to always be strong and never cry. Some girls and women feel they must always be "sweet" and never get angry.
Yet the male survivor needs to grieve his losses, and the female survivor to experience her anger and rage.
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If you are a man, do you fear that others will see you (or that you will see yourself) as a "weakling" or a "sissy" for expressing emotions? Do you have special problems acknowledging and coping with sadness, tenderness, or self-doubt? If you are a female, do you fear that someone will label you (or that you will label yourself) as "unfeminine," "aggressive," or "masculine," if you experience the power of your anger?
5. If you indeed lost control when you became emotional or had specific emotions, can you identify the source of the loss of control? Did it stem directly from the emotional experience itself, or did it instead come from your fears about how others might react to you if they knew (or saw) how you felt?
When you lost control, did you experience physical symptoms: hyperventilation, dizziness, or any of the warning signs listed in the "Cautions" section of the introduction?
Did you become disoriented, out of touch with reality, destructive toward yourself or others, or otherwise undergo significant psychological or physical distress during your last emotional experience? If so, you need to discuss your situation with a mental health professional before continuing on in this book.
For example, if the last time you truly felt your pain you lost consciousness, became delusional, wandered off for days at a time, sat immobilized in your bed for a week unable to eat, or found yourself incoherent, stop reading this book immediately and seek help.
However, if your loss of control stems from anticipated rejection, shame, or punishment from others, or from internalized prohibitions against being emotional, you may continue.
You have just examined your original list of fears in terms of some additional considerations. Now review your revised list and decide which of your fears are so unfounded that you can discard them, and which you feel are realistic or strong enough to warrant further discussion with a qualified therapist or supportive, knowledgeable friend.
PTSD-Anger, Grief, or Helplessness?
On the psychological level, PTSD is basically a problem of unresolved anger, unresolved grief, and feelings of helplessness. Some experts feel that the fundamental issue is the grief. Others argue that it is the anger or the helplessness. To date, the debate has yet to be settled.
In my view, the relative importance of grief versus anger versus helplessness varies from one trauma survivor to the next. You may be volcanic in your rage but have yet to shed a single tear over your losses. Or you may have grieved profoundly but have yet to confront your rage. Perhaps you are still stifling it with alcohol, drugs, or some other substance, or distracting yourself from it with overwork or some other compulsion. Feeling helpless can generate both anger and grief, and feeling intense anger and grief can also make you feel helpless to cope with the power of these emotions. Or you may be out of touch with your grief, feelings of helplessness, and anger, along with many of the rest of your feelings. If your numbing is this pervasive, for you, reading this book is more of an intellectual exercise than an emotional experience.
In any case, wherever you are emotionally today is fine. Do not fight or berate yourself for feeling or not feeling angry, for grieving or not grieving, for feeling helpless, or for feeling very little. Accepting yourself as you are emotionally is the first step toward moving on. Don't you have enough to cope with without going to war with yourself too?
Anger and Grief-The Intimate Connection
For trauma survivors, anger and grief are intimately related. The losses endured as a result of the trauma inevitably generate a lot of anger, especially if the trauma involved some form of social injustice. Hence, on one level, the anger is pure rage at whatever force caused damage or death. On another level, however, the anger reflects grief for personal losses, as well as sorrow and disappointment over the failure of certain government, religious, or other institutions to live up to their stated purposes and standards.
For example, a decade ago drunk drivers who were responsible for the deaths of pedestrians or other motorists frequently received ridiculously light sentences by today's standards. Relatives of the victims were consequently enraged not only at the drunk driver but at the court system. Even more infuriating was that sometimes the courts did not even order the guilty drivers to receive treatment for their drinking problem. Many drunk drivers would leave the court free to drink and drive again, perhaps to kill more innocents, and themselves.
As with relatives of victims of drunk drivers in the past, some of your anger may be a legitimate response to victimization and secondary wounding experiences-and some of your anger may be a defense against your grief.
Isn't it easier to be angry than to be sad? When you are angry you feel powerful and full of energy. In contrast, when you are grieving, you feel weak and helpless. Grieving involves mourning not only specific losses but your helplessness. In grieving, you are acknowledging the devastating reality that nothing you do can resurrect the dead or give you back what you lost. Your anger, no matter how intense, is impotent. Some of your losses, if not all of them, are permanent.
5. If you indeed lost control when you became emotional or had specific emotions, can you identify the source of the loss of control? Did it stem directly from the emotional experience itself, or did it instead come from your fears about how others might react to you if they knew (or saw) how you felt?
When you lost control, did you experience physical symptoms: hyperventilation, dizziness, or any of the warning signs listed in the "Cautions" section of the introduction?
Did you become disoriented, out of touch with reality, destructive toward yourself or others, or otherwise undergo significant psychological or physical distress during your last emotional experience? If so, you need to discuss your situation with a mental health professional before continuing on in this book.
For example, if the last time you truly felt your pain you lost consciousness, became delusional, wandered off for days at a time, sat immobilized in your bed for a week unable to eat, or found yourself incoherent, stop reading this book immediately and seek help.
However, if your loss of control stems from anticipated rejection, shame, or punishment from others, or from internalized prohibitions against being emotional, you may continue.
You have just examined your original list of fears in terms of some additional considerations. Now review your revised list and decide which of your fears are so unfounded that you can discard them, and which you feel are realistic or strong enough to warrant further discussion with a qualified therapist or supportive, knowledgeable friend.
PTSD-Anger, Grief, or Helplessness?
On the psychological level, PTSD is basically a problem of unresolved anger, unresolved grief, and feelings of helplessness. Some experts feel that the fundamental issue is the grief. Others argue that it is the anger or the helplessness. To date, the debate has yet to be settled.
In my view, the relative importance of grief versus anger versus helplessness varies from one trauma survivor to the next. You may be volcanic in your rage but have yet to shed a single tear over your losses. Or you may have grieved profoundly but have yet to confront your rage. Perhaps you are still stifling it with alcohol, drugs, or some other substance, or distracting yourself from it with overwork or some other compulsion. Feeling helpless can generate both anger and grief, and feeling intense anger and grief can also make you feel helpless to cope with the power of these emotions. Or you may be out of touch with your grief, feelings of helplessness, and anger, along with many of the rest of your feelings. If your numbing is this pervasive, for you, reading this book is more of an intellectual exercise than an emotional experience.
In any case, wherever you are emotionally today is fine. Do not fight or berate yourself for feeling or not feeling angry, for grieving or not grieving, for feeling helpless, or for feeling very little. Accepting yourself as you are emotionally is the first step toward moving on. Don't you have enough to cope with without going to war with yourself too?
Anger and Grief-The Intimate Connection
For trauma survivors, anger and grief are intimately related. The losses endured as a result of the trauma inevitably generate a lot of anger, especially if the trauma involved some form of social injustice. Hence, on one level, the anger is pure rage at whatever force caused damage or death. On another level, however, the anger reflects grief for personal losses, as well as sorrow and disappointment over the failure of certain government, religious, or other institutions to live up to their stated purposes and standards.
For example, a decade ago drunk drivers who were responsible for the deaths of pedestrians or other motorists frequently received ridiculously light sentences by today's standards. Relatives of the victims were consequently enraged not only at the drunk driver but at the court system. Even more infuriating was that sometimes the courts did not even order the guilty drivers to receive treatment for their drinking problem. Many drunk drivers would leave the court free to drink and drive again, perhaps to kill more innocents, and themselves.
As with relatives of victims of drunk drivers in the past, some of your anger may be a legitimate response to victimization and secondary wounding experiences-and some of your anger may be a defense against your grief.
Isn't it easier to be angry than to be sad? When you are angry you feel powerful and full of energy. In contrast, when you are grieving, you feel weak and helpless. Grieving involves mourning not only specific losses but your helplessness. In grieving, you are acknowledging the devastating reality that nothing you do can resurrect the dead or give you back what you lost. Your anger, no matter how intense, is impotent. Some of your losses, if not all of them, are permanent.
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Join Date: Jan 2003
Location: Dreaming Summer
Posts: 821
Sometimes don't know what's worst.The actual traumas..the torture and the terror....or all the days beyond.Trying to cope.Trying to hide.Trying to escape.Trying to turn and face it and build a new life.Being ashamed when the fear gets in the way of normal pleasures such as a hug from a friend.Going to meetings and seeing everyone else enjoy the hugs and being relegated to the "handshake only" class,because people don't want to frighten me.
Then there are the little victories.Taking my motorcycle all the way to Kansas for the VBMO Oz run.Last year I did it,and was terrified to let anyone near me.Terrified of my smiling teddy bearish biker family.Trembling through the hugs.Going off alone when it got too intense.This year was much better.By the second day I was not nearly so afraid.It does get better.
phoenix
Then there are the little victories.Taking my motorcycle all the way to Kansas for the VBMO Oz run.Last year I did it,and was terrified to let anyone near me.Terrified of my smiling teddy bearish biker family.Trembling through the hugs.Going off alone when it got too intense.This year was much better.By the second day I was not nearly so afraid.It does get better.
phoenix
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