I know the feeling Kevin talked about on his blog last night all too well. For all the guilt and depression I suffered through all the years of abuse, none of that feels as bad as disappointing a wife so worthy of my love and care.
Hang in there Kevin, the best thing about our wives is how much they see the good in us even when we don’t.
Pin Nothing tells me that we still have a long way to go when it comes to stigma like learning about a clearly distressed young man getting killed on a subway while other passengers sat and watched. Because his situation was uncomfortable. His manic behavior made them uncomfortable and all of the compassion for other people who struggle with mental health issues went right out the window in this case. This wasn’t a well-put-together person speaking calmly, this was very different. The same core issue – mental health – but different results. One group is acceptable. The other not so much.
That’s stigma.
I realized the other day that this blog has been pretty quiet recently. I’ve been posting stuff to my other blog, the reviews blog has kept up a steady pace of stuff, but this blog has been a little slow. Given that, I thought it’d be a good time to let you know how things…
A couple of weeks ago I found myself sitting up late one night watching Good Will Hunting, and thinking about abuse survivors. If you’re not familiar with the movie, Matt Damon’s character is a survivor of abuse in a foster home who just happens to also be a mathematical genius. Only he works as a…
Pin Of course, one of the tell-tale signs of depression, and unhealthy responses to trauma, like abuse, is overly black and white thinking. Going to extremes, if you will. So, it’s easy for many of us to fall into these toxic traps. It’s easy to think that we should feel shame about what happened to us, or that we can somehow rid ourselves of that shame, and anger, by simply refusing to do anything but be positive. But neither one of these is real healing. Real healing, like real emotions, and real people, are messier than that.
It’s still worth it though, as are a lot of those messy emotions and people too. If you let yourself get out of the black and white thinking, you just might see that too.
If you’ve been following the comments on this older post about support for spouses this weekend, you know that “Nikki” asked for some advice in being involved with an abuse survivor, and in response to my suggestion to find a professional to talk to herself, she asked that I keep her in the loop if…
My wife and I went to see A Beautiful Mind tonight. It was a good movie, but a difficult one for me to watch. Anything that reminds me of the complete emptiness that losing time created in my soul is tough for me to swallow. Watching John come to grips with his delusions, and the…
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Hi, I just wanted to leave a comment, and say I think it is nice that you would donate raised money and that of your own to help others.
I am a survivor of abuse, and wish I could do more for others who are hurting…
Just wanted to say I think it is great that you are reaching out.
Melody
Thanks, Mike. You were right.
You know, the thing about life that I notice the most is that it is a two way street.
Relationships are a give and take thing, no matter who you are or what your past represents for you.
Sometimes it is hard to be there for someone else when you can’t even be there for yourself, but if you are lucky, like I know you are…you have someone who really loves you and someone who will stay even during those times.
Im waiting for my day in court I hope I can be as brave as Kevin. My wives couldn’t handle me. Now that I have healed somewhat I have tried to make amends to them for my “Toxic” behaviour. I wish all servivors the best of luck, we will need it. gardinerjr@rogers.com