Posted by RealMe on October 7, 2007, at 20:50:32
In reply to Re: What is the silver lining of child abuse? » Dinah, posted by happyflower on October 7, 2007, at 17:12:16
Besides giving me strengh in adverse times, I think that my past history of abuse has made me more empathetic to others no matter what. I suppose it had a lot to do with me becoming a psychologist. When I was a therapist, I believe I was a good therapist. So I was told by some of the best in the country at Menninger's. When the abuse stuff came back up for me, I was not doing therapy anymore, just evaluations, and perhaps at some level that allowed me to address what I did not want to address earlier.
So, for one thing, I think what happened to me in my past helped to make me more empathetic and to recognize and feel the pain that others experience. I also don't judge people, and so when I do an evaluation on a sex offender, I can truely empathize with what was horrible in that person's life growing up too. I don't condone what they did, and most are miserable about what they did too. Some are not, and they need to go to prison as far as I am concerned. And for a long time. I evaluate a lot of women too who have horrible histories of sexual, physical, and mental abuse, and they have taken to drugs and alcohol to obliterate the pain. I don't recommend that, but I can undertand why they have done this. It is painful to hear. It is even painful to listen to a parent who has killed an infant or child. They are in deep pain, and I can be there to help them see that someone does not hate them.
For me, what someone does--good, bad, or otherwise is not who that person is. A person is not just their actions. I did very well in school, but that does not make me special. I am who I am and for lots of reasons and experiences, not just for being smart and training at the best place in the country at the time. I am grateful for that. The fact that I was first a patient there due to my abuse and difficulties at the time, I likely would not have gone to Menninger's for postdoctoral training. So I guess you could say my abuse has taken me down a path to being able to work and be trained by some of the best people in the country at the time, at Menninger's. Would that have happened had I not been abused?
Here is my response; I think my path would have been different had I not been abused and not wanted to desperately get away from not only home but also my home town with all sorts of horrible memories. Would I have gone to college. Probably I would have, but I would have stayed a biology major and chem minor and gone into microbiology or pathology, and so I would never have worked with people and postively impacted on their lives.
So, in that sense, the abuse took me down a certain path. Could I have become a better clinician? I just don't know and never will obviously. Later, if I think of more.
RealMe
poster:RealMe
thread:787547
URL: http://www.dr-bob.org/babble/psycho/20070929/msgs/787707.html