Dead emotions

[Ayanna]

This morning is a so called beautiful morning. The birds sing so many different songs, the music plays, the air is clean and fresh, the garden is green, the neighbor’s cat pays me a visit, I have a cup of tea ….
I notice all this around me, but I cannot feel anything.
I know what I should feel. I remember this from the past.
A while ago I asked someone about my lost feelings and she said that they would return and that this is normal after what I have been through …
It is a long time. When will they return?
The only feelings I have are anger and anxiety.

[SaharaD]

I felt numb for a long time but I forced myself to interact with people and it seemed to return my emotions. Women’s DV/DA group was very good for that. Also a female befriender.

They helped me to get out of my head. When they laughed I laughed. When they cried I cried. When they were worried I was worried.

Sitting in a room with people who have experienced the same thing you have just seems to activate all of the senses, seeing tears, hearing crying, feeling tension in the air, smelling coffee or tea (most of these groups were in the morning) and tasting the treats sometimes the facilitators used to bring for us.

We are not designed to be alone. If you check Maslow’s hierarchy of needs we need to feel love and belonging from other people. Otherwise we don’t function as we should psychologically.

Sitting with these other women in a safe place gave me a sense of belonging.

I had to travel over an hour to get to these women’s groups at first and now I have found one within walking distance. I’ve been going to these women’s groups after 4 months of leaving and I’m now out over 2 years.

There is healing power in the sisterhood.

[Serenity]

I agree with Sahara that reaching out to people who are not perpetrators is the way to healing.

You will feel your experiences validated by support groups, you will be listened to a feel valued by this, you will see how much human beings are valued by others are hen you witness good relatiinshios with others and see them helping those in need.

Being with people who are different from your abuser. Witnessing and experiencing kindness, gentleness, altruism, passion for others’ needs and rights, justice, peace, generosity, integrity…all these things will help you to feel fully human again.

Sahara, I often think that my ex tried to prevent me from reaching the self-actualisation shown in Maslow’s pyramid. He kept me at the bare minimum of clothes and warmth and tried to stop me from feeling a sense of belonging in the world and denied me my efforts to reach my potential! x

[SaharaD]

Serenity I totally agree I was reaching self actualization when his abuse increased dramatically. I think he was stuck at trying to feel loved and belonging with other people and his low self esteem.

They know when you reach your full potential you won’t put up with their c**p anymore.

Think mine was genuinely shocked that I had the guts to leave him.

[Bridget Jones Is Free]

This is music to my ears, I also feel denied the right to feel and when I do, the feelings are like multiplied by huge exaggeration, I almost feel ashamed, or a fraud, because deep down when i show empathy to someone it’s as though I was expressing it for me to.
He once told me out of the blue I want to be the centre of attention and take over every situation…he shouted at me that day in the garden, frightened me with his finger waving over my head as I was sat down and his warning came totally out of the blue. It made no sense and it really scared me…

[White Rose]

I think you need to be ready to accept you can feel emotions again. So long we’ve had our love thrown back at us and our positives made negative. We’ve had emotions beaten out of us so even when we’re hurting we can’t show it as it will make things worse.
I’ve tried to “accept” what happened to me to believe it was awful but NOT my fault and I’ve parked it away somewhere locked the door on
it and I’m now heading away from it. I know I can’t change it but I can’t let it rule my life or define me. If I do that he’s still in control. I may want to go back but I’m making sure I don’t open the door on it again.
I’m me. I’m strong. I can and will get through this and I can now begin to feel emotions. I posted this morning about feeling a strange new emotion I identify with happiness and it feels good. I won’t be happy everyday I know and he’ll still make me angry simply by existing on the same planet but he will not destroy my future or that of my daughter.
Baby steps soon add up to put you further away from the bad times xxxx

[Ayanna]

I went to the Freedom Programme for three months last year. I interact a lot with people at work. And I know the abuse was not my fault. Still nothing has changed.
Can anybody tell me where to find these women support groups? I cannot find any of these groups. Who runs them?
My local WA runs the Freedom Programme that I already completed, but they do nothing else.
And how do so many of you get specialist DV counseling? What did you do to get that?
I have been phoning all charities and asking doctors for years now to help me and I am being blocked without explanation.
I watch myself going into he wrong direction.
All I get is punishment and shouting, telling off and forced medication when I mention it. Why do they treat me like that?

[Serenity]

Hi Ayanna,

My local DV outreach is organising drop in sessions/ support groups.

After my Pattern Changing course ended, a few of us agreed to keep meeting every few weeks as a support group. You can even start your own, in a safe venue.

My local DV outreach directed me to DV counselling.

Abusers make us lose trust in other people and the world, and whilst we must not have our blinkers on, we can’t lose faith in the goodness that exists in many people. Without faith, hope and trust, there is nothing.

“No matter where life takes you, the place that you stand at any given moment is holy ground. Love hard, love wide and love long and you will find the goodness in it.” ( Susan Vreeland.)

Look up the website grateful.org

It helps me be more positive xxxx

[SaharaD]

Work is not a safe place for your emotions…. Ever. There is always an ulterior motive there.

My female befriender was from a local mental health charity that I found over the internet. My first women’s support group and female specialist dv counsellor was attached to the perpetrator programme that my abusive husband went on. They contacted me. The freedom programme I went to allows you to go for more than three months. I think there were women there who had been coming for 2 years. I was reading my local newsletter and that is how i discovered the current womens group I go to. It is run by the council with links to social services, drug & alcohol and victim support for the local area. I go to a local community centre that has sessions only for women to do craft and other creative activities and just chat. The womens football is connected to a local church.

I don’t work full-time because I know I need the support only available mostly 9-5.

[Author]

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