Shaming Children Is Emotionally Abusive

Shaming and humiliating children is emotionally abusive… It is not ok to smack children physically or with words. Young people deserve and are entitled to reach out, attach and bond with their caretakers. It is an expectation that the parent will provide safety, protection, acceptance, understanding and empathy. When this does happen, children grow up knowing their worth and demanding respect from others and themselves. When children are emotionally or psychologically abused, they grow up feeling unloved, unwanted, and fearful. Normal development is interrupted and it sends the wounded child into exile. This is when negative internal messages are developed and why we have so many adults today feeling “not good enough.” As children become adults, they parent themselves in the same manner they were parented. Messages internalized from childhood are now ingrained in the adult. Those messages play like repeating endless tapes. “How could you be so stupid?” “ You can’t do anything right.” “ This is why no-one likes you.” Shaming and humiliation causes fear in children. This fear does not go away when they grow up. It becomes a barrier for a healthy emotional life and is difficult to eradicate. If these same children become parents, the possibility also exists that the fear and negativity can be unwittingly passed through the generations. When we talk about disrespectful children, we must look at parenting. Solid parenting shows children respect and empathy. When a parent truly gives respect to a child, they receive it back. When this becomes the norm for the household, we see young people grow up with a loving value system that makes a difference in the world. However, when children are shamed, humiliated and then silenced, it represses the harm that may re-surface later in life. If this happens, it can be in the form of self-destruction or cruelty to others. By Karyl McBride, Ph.D. http://www.psychologytoday.com/blog/the-legacy-distorted-love/201209/shaming-children-is-emotionally-abusive

Children aren’t coloring books.
You don’t get to fill them
with your favorite colors.
Khaled Hosseini

Legacy of Distorted Love

I recently attended a social gathering with friends, family, strangers and a bunch of cute kids. As the day ended and goodbyes were shared, I over heard a six-year-old quietly ask her mother for something. Suddenly, in front of the crowd, the mother exploded and yelled hysterically at the child. The little girl was silenced with tears streaming down her cheeks. It looked like a familiar scene for mother and daughter. The crowd silenced too, but quickly acted like nothing happened. This example of shaming and humiliating a child can have long-term devastating effects. Will this little girl grow up to respect her mother? “ Wherever I look, I see signs of the commandment to honor one’s parents and nowhere of a commandment that calls for the respect of a child.” Children respect those who respect them. The above quote comes from my colleague, Alice Miller, who passed in 2010. Her deeply thoughtful and profound work continues to inspire. She’s considered the most articulate child advocate in the world. Adult children raised by narcissistic parents frequently tell similar childhood stories of shame and humiliation. Often these shaming acts take place in front of other people. Treating children badly and without respect is not the golden rule for parenting, but why do we see this so often? Just today, a friend shared a similar story. Her brother frequently shames his children. When the family gets together, he loudly announces the wrong doings of his children, with no insight to the damage it does. The children stand listening with eyes cast downward. Is it any wonder that young people in these situations grow into adults with self-doubt, depression and anxiety? Karyl McBride, Ph.D. http://www.psychologytoday.com/blog/the-legacy-distorted-love/201209/shaming-children-is-emotionally-abusive

Children must be taught
how to think, not what to think.
Margaret Mead

Cherish the Presence

Love, and especially passionate love, should have a place in our life, but its nature and extent may vary in light of external circumstances. People should search for it at the beginning of a relationship; marrying out of compromise may lead to frustration or decrease the little passion that was there. Having affairs retains passionate love, but has the disadvantage of deception. As it turns out, most people cherish the presence of passionate love in their relationship. Indeed, most people are “romantic” in the sense that they say that they would not marry a person possessing all other qualities they admired, but with whom they were not in love. In the mid-1960s men were more “romantically” oriented in this sense than woman, but some twenty years later, women were found to have grown significantly more romantic and had closed the gap with men. This may be due to the fact that women have become less dependent on the institution of marriage for their economic survival and can “afford” to marry for purely romantic reasons. These changes indicate the lesser role of external circumstances in the decision to marry a person, and a greater role for the romantic argument. By Professor of Philosophy Aaron Ben-Zeév http://www.psychologytoday.com/blog/in-the-name-love/201105/i-married-because-external-circumstances

…lasting love is something
a person has to decide
to experience. It requires
what, for lack of a better term,
we can call an act of will…
Robert Wright

Emotionally Hidden

Why Do People Bottle Up Their Emotions?
* They are unable to fight back in an argument situation (eg the “opponent” is more dominant or it is someone of authority that it may impact their employment).
* They think that if they show their emotions it is a sign of weakness.
* They believe it is not normal to be feeling a certain way, so try to conceal their emotions from others.
* They are afraid of what other people might think.
* They feel that they have to deal with their emotions or problems on their own because “no one else will understand”.
* A situation may have occurred that has placed someone in shock and they just don’t know how to deal with it or they just block it out because don’t fully understand it makes them feel (or don’t feel) a certain way.
* They feel they have to be “the rock” for others.
* They don’t want to be hurt so they swallow their emotions back down.
What Happens When You Pent Up Your Emotions
* You can become crabby to be around & start snapping at other people for now reason.
* You get to a stage where you have bottled up your emotions to the point you “explode” – often the victims are loved ones, friends, co-workers.
* You turn to escapism (alcohol, drugs) for short-term solutions, to avoid confronting your emotions.
* You become depressed and numb and don’t know how to get out of the situation.
* Often the pent-up emotions will manifest themselves physically in the form of diseases…
* Some people commit suicide because they see no other way out. http://marcofratelli.hubpages.com/hub/Ways-To-Release-Your-Bottled-Up-Emotions

Man is not what he thinks he is,
he is what he hides.
Andre Malraux

The Sweetness of Life

A married couple who stays passionately in love is indeed fortunate and has the best of all worlds. But those are the minority (according to some research, less than 10% of cases). There are marriages in which there is neither passionate love nor companion love and the two people suffer a lot while being with each other. For these people, there is no doubt that they should not continue being together while mentally torturing each other. Life is too short to allow such kind of living. The dilemma is more profound for couples who are, on one hand, not madly in love with their partners but who, on the other hand, are having a reasonably comfortable life together. Given that the odds of passionately loving each other for a long time are low, there are several available alternatives: (a) keep searching for passionate love and not get or stay married without it, (b) settle from the beginning for companion love with some traces of passionate love as well, or (c) completely separate the two and have passionate affairs to compensate for the lack of passion in the relationships. There can also be some combinations of these alternatives. In all the above alternatives there is some kind of compromise, and the question is which of them is the least painful. Choice (a), above, emphasizes the Romantic Ideology which assumes that “there is no mountain high enough and no ocean deep enough” to stop our love, and there is nothing “our love couldn’t rise above.” In opposition to this ideology external circumstances play a role in our life and should be taken into consideration, especially in light of the risk of the disappearance of passionate love. Indeed, many people in many traditions assume that raising children (and not love) should be the primary factor underlying a successful marriage. Passionate love may also be absent in arranged marriages when the two do not know each other before the marriage. Giving up passionate love altogether is giving up the sweetness of life. In contrast, completely disregarding reality is also not wise, as after all we do live with day-to-day realities. By Professor of Philosophy Aaron Ben-Zeév http://www.psychologytoday.com/blog/in-the-name-love/201105/i-married-because-external-circumstances

It’s true that nothing in this world
makes us so necessary to others
as the affection we have for them.
Johann Wolfgang von Goethe

Can’t Say “I Love You”

If he feels it, why won’t he say it? Just because your husband is afraid to say “I love you” doesn’t mean he doesn’t. And pressuring him to say it isn’t going to make him want to say it any sooner. So what’s going on? Why can’t men say “I love you?” Most men feel self-worth based on how much responsibility they can take on, but feel a threat to self-worth if they take on responsibility and then disappoint people. Part of their hesitation to say, “I love you,” is that it starts them subconsciously down the road to increasing responsibility with the next steps being: “Let’s live together,” “Let’s get engaged,” “Let’s get married,” “Let’s have kids,” “Let’s buy a house.” This sequence makes sense from the woman’s point of view when building a family and life together. (It is actually analogous to how a man builds his career, i.e. get the job, told you’re doing a good job, expect raise and/or promotion, expect bigger and better titles, etc.). Here’s the problem. If the man has already had failures in his life — with marriage, divorce, guilt about kids now coming from broken home, child and spousal support, etc. — he is hesitant to add more commitments to the list of things where he thinks there is a likelihood that he will disappoint even more people. What to do with this insight? Check it out with your man to see if it is true. If it is and if you show you understand him, he may be able to exhale and when he exhales and relaxes into your understanding it will replace his feeling tense when he feels pressured by you. Exhaling and then relaxing will open his mind and create more mind space to see how he can take on more responsibilities without getting freaked out. Because you have been empathic and understanding vs. nagging him, he will feel grateful and be more likely to show generosity to you by making more commitments. He may even start to say, “I love you.” And best of all, he’ll mean it. Dr. Mark Goulston http://www.peoplejam.com/blog/16548/why-men-cant-say-i-love-you

If equal affection cannot be,
Let the more loving one be me.
W.H. Auden

Living Together Without Love

An ideal marriage is considered to be the one which is based on passionate love. As Frank Sinatra told us, “Love and marriage, go together like a horse and carriage… You can’t have one without the other.” However, this is not entirely correct. There are good marriages which last for a long time without profound love. Consider the following real story of Dan, who is now in his mid-seventies and celebrating the 50th anniversary of his marriage. Dan was single and in his mid-twenties when he was living abroad and met Mary, a woman in her early twenties who came from his country. They were alone in the new environment and connected quickly. They had greater loves before, but became attached to each other, and after a short period they decided to get married. They did love each other, but it was not as passionate as some of their previous relationships. Dan told me that he married because of external circumstances related more to their given situation than to intense love-though they did care for each other. Their marriage had ups and downs and each of them had a few affairs, but they stayed together and were great companions over the years. Dan does not regret his marriage. Some people marry because of external circumstances (such as the wish not to be alone or the wish to have children). Others refrain from marrying or divorce because of external circumstances (such as the possible damage to their present families and work). In all such cases, there are compromising circumstances. The dictionary meanings of compromising circumstances refer to “situations which are likely to expose somebody to danger or disgrace.” The potential danger in situations like Dan’s is obvious: living together without love means possibly giving up the sweetest experience of life and thus ruminating about a possible better alternative. By Professor of Philosophy Aaron Ben-Zeév http://www.psychologytoday.com/blog/in-the-name-love/201105/i-married-because-external-circumstances

…do anything
rather than marry
without affection.
From “Pride and Prejudice”
  by Jane Austen

She Will Leave

Emotional abuse is elusive. Unlike physical abuse, the people doing it and receiving it may not even know it’s happening. It can be more harmful than physical abuse because it can undermine what we think about ourselves. It can cripple all we are meant to be as we allow something untrue to define us. Emotional abuse can happen between parent and child, husband and wife, among relatives and between friends. The abuser projects their words, attitudes or actions onto an unsuspecting victim usually because they themselves have not dealt with childhood wounds that are now causing them to harm others. In the following areas, ask these questions to see if you are abusing or being abused:
1. Humiliation, degradation, discounting, negating, judging, criticizing:
– Does anyone make fun of you or put you down in front of others?
– Do they tease you, use sarcasm as a way to put you down or degrade you?
– When you complain do they say that “it was just a joke” and that you are too sensitive?
2. Domination, control, and shame:
– Do they treat you as though you are inferior to them?
– Do they make you feel as though they are always right?
– Do they belittle your accomplishments, your aspirations, your plans
3. Accusing and blaming, trivial and unreasonable demands or expectations…
– Are they unable to laugh at themselves?
– Do they have trouble apologizing?
– Do they blame you for their problems or unhappiness?
– Do they continually have “boundary violations” and disrespect your valid requests?
4. Emotional distancing… isolation, emotional abandonment or neglect:
– Do they use pouting, withdrawal or withholding attention or affection?
– Do they play the victim to deflect blame onto you instead of taking responsibility for their actions and attitudes?
– Do they not notice or care how you feel?
5. Codependence and enmeshment:
– Does anyone treat you not as a separate person but instead as an extension of themselves?
– Do they not protect your personal boundaries and share information that you have not approved?
– Do they disrespect your requests and do what they think is best for you?
By Maria Bogdanos http://psychcentral.com/blog/archives/2013/02/20/signs-of-emotional-abuse/

She will cry and get over it,
she will hate you
then love you again,
but one day she will leave
and won’t come back.
anonymous

For A Torture to be Effective

There are people who are never content, never appeased, forever dissatisfied; who continually look to what escapes them, convincing themselves that if only they could attain that one desire outside of reach, they would be happy. It seems almost pointless to give to these people because their eyes immediately shift from the gift to stare miserably at the portion held back. Their wants, demands, expectations, appetites are never satiated, thus, they refuse to be happy. And you cannot make them so. Richell E. Goodrich

Millions of couples out there practiced the art of sadomasochism every day, without even realizing it. They went to work, came back, complained about everything, insulted their wife or were insulted by her, felt wretched, but were, nonetheless, tightly bound to their own unhappiness, not realizing that all it would take was a single gesture, a final goodbye, to free them from that oppression. Paul Coelho

The only thing that feels worse than being stuck in a situation that makes you unhappy is realizing that you are not ready or willing to change whatever it is. Ashly Lorenzana

For a torture
to be effective,
the pain has to be
spread out;
it has to come
at regular intervals,
with no end in sight.
Yoko Ogawa

An Imaginary Line

Boundaries are sort of an imaginary line between you and others. It divides up what’s yours and somebody else’s, and that applies not only to your body, money and belongings, but also to your feelings, thoughts and needs. That’s especially where codependents get into trouble. They have blurry or weak boundaries. They feel responsible for other people’s feelings and problems or blame their own on someone else. Some codependents have rigid boundaries. They are closed off and withdrawn, making it hard for other people to get close to them. Sometimes, people flip back and forth between having weak boundaries and having rigid ones. A consequence of poor boundaries is that you react to everyone’s thoughts and feelings. If someone says something you disagree with, you either believe it or become defensive. You absorb their words, because there’s no boundary. With a boundary, you’d realize it was just their opinion and not a reflection of you and not feel threatened by disagreements. By Darlene Lancer, JD, MFT http://psychcentral.com/lib/2012/symptoms-of-codependency/

People who violate
your boundaries
are thieves.
They steal time
that doesn’t belong to them.
Elizabeth Grace Saunders