October 15, 2024
Where do I begin? I am back on here because I want to share my story and maybe it can help or inspire someone out there.
I feel like I can say that I am finally starting my healing journey. I am realizing things about myself that I didn’t know and I am almost 40 years old. What I am talking about is childhood trauma and the effects of having emotionally unavailable and emotionally negligent parents.
Childhood trauma also known as “ACE” which stands for Adverse Childhood Experiences. These events can be traumatic for some children for example, divorce, moving around a lot, witnessing something traumatic, witnessing death, natural disasters, emotional neglect and more.
The problem with emotional abuse and neglect is that it is very subtle and for me it was more about what my parents were NOT doing rather than what they were doing. It was the absence of comfort and security. It wasn’t like it was being withheld on purpose, it just wasn’t nurtured. In my family showing big emotions weren’t acceptable. What I mean by that is crying was unacceptable in my household and if you did cry you would be punished for it either by reprimanding us or threatening to spank us with the belt.
I remember one morning when we had just moved to the states from Scotland. I was sitting at the breakfast table, eating cereal and sobbing. I missed my friends in Scotland and I was really nervous to be the new kid at school plus, I was starting after the new school year began. I remember feeling scared. I remember my dad standing in the kitchen looking at me with disgust. He hated it when I cried and his response was contempt or lecturing me. It made me feel like it’s not okay to express my emotions and it made me feel like I was disgusting. It made me feel ashamed. I was vulnerable, I was in distress and the response from my dad was to ignore me.
The trauma from moving to a new country plus the big feelings I had made an impact on me and who I am today. The big feelings I had were never addressed, no one ever sat down with me and helped me to regulate my emotions. The only thing I knew how to do was cry. I did not know how to express myself when I was feeling flooded with emotion.
It may not seem like a big deal to some people but the truth is, everyone is different. Everyone responds differently to life events. It depends on the child’s age, gender and temperament. I can speak for my brother when I say this, growing up living abroad was not easy in fact, it was chaotic. We were constantly being uprooted. We never had one stable place we could call home.
We traveled a lot. There were countless car rides where my brother and I were getting into it and my dad would pull over the car on the side of the road and pull us out of the car, threaten to hit us with the belt and reprimand us for not getting along with each other. He would yell at us about it and when I would start to cry he would get triggered. It was like his loud tone triggered me to start crying and then my crying triggered him to yell at me and threaten me saying things like, “I WILL GIVE YOU A REASON TO TRY CRY!” I used to hate when he would say that to me. It never failed though, as soon as he raised his voice the tears followed.
We didn’t grow up in a violent home, our parents were not alcoholics or drug addicts. We weren’t homeless or malnourished. My parents were two responsible adults raising my brother and I. There wasn’t any physical or sexual abuse or anything like that. There was however, psychological abuse and neglect. You may not think mental abuse is that big of a deal but I am here to tell you that’s not the case. Every child is different. My brother and I were chronically traumatized our whole childhood from constantly being uprooted.
Then fast forward 13 years later in 2003 my parents divorced. I was a junior in high school and my brother was in 7th grade. I was 16 and my brother was 13. My parents separating was an ACE, it was a traumatic event for me and for my brother. The family we only knew was now separated. We both felt abandoned by my mom for leaving the family.
It all comes back together to substance abuse. Hear me out. People who abuse substances are trying to fill a void, they are trying to escape. The people who are trying to escape are doing this as a coping mechanism. It all stems back to childhood trauma. The people who experience adverse experiences in childhood are more likely to abuse mind altering chemicals. This is because they are trying to fill a void.
Inevitably, I tried marijuana and after that, I experimented with all drugs under the sun. I played around with mind alternating chemicals and alcohol for about 5 years, from ages 16-21. I remember wanting to feel like escaping. I remember getting so high and just jamming out to The Doors, Led Zeppelin or Portishead. My boyfriend in high school was my main source for drugs. We would get so messed up out of our minds and blast music. My two best friends in high school both came from an ACE background. We were a trio, the three of us. In our spare time we got high and partied.
After I graduated college, I continued to use marijuana and drink alcohol occasionally but I stayed away from all of the hard stuff. When I first started college I got a DWI so that really tamed me. I was afraid to drink and drive, so the punishment was effective. I was on probation for 18 months and had to have a breathalyzer in my car for 90 days plus take drug and alcohol classes.
It was when I got pregnant, I was 27 at the time, in 2014. I stopped smoking cigarettes, drinking alcohol and smoking marijuana all together. Having my son really calmed me down. I became a lot more responsible and selfless.
After my son was born I continued (I don’t anymore) to smoke and drink occasionally. I was also (and still am) on prescription drugs for ADHD and depression.
Five years later I had my first psychotic episode. This was the most traumatic event of my entire life. The event was traumatic for me, and my son was a witness to it. So not only did I get traumatized, I also traumatized someone I really love and care about.
After my initial psychotic episode, I was diagnosed as bipolar type 1 with psychotic features. I was also being treated for ADHD, depression and anxiety.
I was diagnosed with ADHD when I was 8 years old. ADHD is a development disorder. It is from trauma to the brain that causes brain damage. If the trauma is not resolved it can lead to development delays like ADHD. I do believe my childhood trauma (that started from age 1) was the underlying cause of my ADHD diagnosis.
Since I was 8 years old I have received several mental health diagnoses. People with mental illness usually have a history of ACEs. This means that childhood trauma can lead to mental illness. What does that mean though?
My dad’s dad was an emotionally abusive alcoholic. And my dad would argue that he had a traumatic childhood but that he turned out to be a well off mechanical engineer. That he turned out okay. So that it must be that the person is “faulty”. Not everyone who has childhood trauma is necessarily adversely affected by it but a lot of these people do become adults living with some type of mental illness.
If you experienced ACE then there is a high probability that you also live with some type of mental illness. Take me for example, I grew up with ACEs and I am living with schizoaffective disorder, ADHD, depression and anxiety.
From the time I was about 13 until 16 years old, I dreaded the nights my dad would “help” me with my math or science homework. It would 9/10 end up in me sobbing and my dad yelling at me, “WHAT DON’T YOU GET? WHAT DON’T YOU UNDERSTAND?” He would get so mad at me for not being able to grasp the material. He knew I was diagnosed with ADHD and that it is a learning disability and perhaps I learn differently. No, I was punished for not knowing how to do things the traditional way. I am a visual hands-on person. And at the time the way he was teaching me the material was not clicking. I remember time and time again I would lie to him and say “yeah, I get it” but in reality i did not get it. Then he would test me and get so pissed off when he discovered that I didn’t get the equation right.
Looking back I wonder why was it so hard to sit down and solve the problem with me. He knew I was ADHD and he could have tried alternate ways of teaching me the material but instead he reprimanded me, accused me of lying and screamed at me for not comprehending the material. This made me feel really shitty about myself because deep down I knew that I wasn’t just fucking off and messing with him, I really didnt understand the material and in my heart I knew I wasnt being malicious or uncooperative. I knew I was trying my best.
My dad would say things like, “if you had two brain cells, they could be friends”. He would also say things like “don’t hurt yourself” if I was thinking of an answer to a particular question. He would like other times and call me a “dummy”.
Now I have his voice in my head talking mad shit. He made me feel like I was inadequate because I truly was struggling with something but he was just mad that I didn’t understand. Why didn’t he try explaining it to me another way? I do not get it.
So crying over homework, moving around, emotional/physical abuse/neglect, divorce, and psychosis have been the four major traumatic events in my life.
Another time I experienced trauma was when I was a senior in high school. I was 17 at the time. My boyfriend and I were relaxing in his hot tub on a weekend afternoon. We were getting high and having a good time. One thing led to another (it’s a LONG STORY— for another time!) and my boyfriend called me a “whore” and then slapped me across the face.
My dad, or not any of my family defended me. Yes, I was high on pills but I still had been physically hit by my boyfriend and no one in my family seemed to care. It was just like, “oh, you know how Bianca is”. They just ignored me.
Looking back, my dad not defending me in that situation of comforting me or showing me signs of empathy was hurtful to my person because it made me feel invaluable. Like I dont matter. That it’s okay for someone to slap me around. And that I am just being dramatic.
What’s crazy is in retrospect, I knew my ex boyfriend had anger issues. I don’t recall if he had ACEs but I know he had punched several different holes in his bedroom walls. Looking back, I see now how this is a red flag. At the time I thought it was sexy and sort of attractive, like he was so angry and passionate that he did that. And really he was out of control, I just couldn’t detect that at the time.
So I continued to date an abusive man in this situation. It wasn’t until after he slapped me that our parents forbid us from talking to each other. It was just too much drama with the violence and everything.
My dad never gave two shits about who I dated. He just didn’t show any interest. And now looking back I see this and it makes me feel sad and abandoned by him. He was never sweet or overprotective of me.
I now see that my attachment style with my dad was disorganized. Fortunately, I had somewhat of a secure attachment style with my mom. Although, my mom was emotionally absent most of the time.
Do you see how childhood trauma and mental illness are related?
I feel like I am finally in a space where I am healing. It has taken me almost 4 years to get to this place.
In the recent past, my past two relationships, the first one he is psychologically abusive and physically abusive and the other is that plus emotionally unavailable. I have been attracting these types of men into my life because it feels familiar. Looking back, there are so many red flags and signs of abusive behavior that I just didn’t pick up on at the time. I didn’t know it was abuse or that it is a red flag.
I’m noticing a pattern in the type of men I am allowing into my life. And I now know that I don’t want emotional abuse/neglect. I need a strong minded man, with a stable life and who preferably doesn’t have any ACEs.
I have to work on myself first. And that’s why I am documenting my healing journey here.
My ACEs may have led to my mental illnesses but that’s not stopping me from being the best version of myself I can be. I think that starts with reparenting myself. And using therapy to process and heal from trauma/PTSD.