375 - Self punishment 2 : emotional self-harm

During my research of images and material for the 1st part about my self punishment, I ran into Lilly Hope Lucario's entry here. I immediately realized that my medium-length entry wasn't enough and supposed I'd expand on the topic further. 

I'll avoid copy pasting anything from that link so you'll have to go back and forth between us if you want to keep up  - or if your memory's better than mine, read hers first and then see in what ways each type of emotional self-harm she discusses is reflected in my own case. 

Do be aware that in view of the topic, trigger warnings apply to both our entries. 

I'll start with those parts form which I didn't suffer : 

• blaming myself for the abuse - and I guess this is a rare occurrence. I knew perfectly well who done it, and since I was such a young child, I rather grew to hate my father for all his actions. 
• I didn't work too hard, but on the other hand, I didn't work hard enough - I mentioned in the 1st part of this new series that I am an under-achiever, and this is true also regarding my jobs. I held very few, but there are also other factors which limited my access (lack of studies and experience for instance). 
• I didn't over-exercise for the same under-achieving reasons above, and also results of my religious upbringing in that cult, where physical activities were prohibited (see here). 
• I also have the reverse problem regarding sex - I have difficulties with this aspect of life, due to my trauma. 
• Apart for the drugs my father had forced on me in his religious mania, I never did drugs on my own choice. I also realized the potential to become an alcoholic, so some  years ago I gave up on the little that I was drinking.

And now, to those from which I did, and still do : 

• Self hatred seems to be a particularly common form of emotional self-harm. In my case, it's more self-neglect and lack of self-love that tantamount to something similar, and results from having been not only neglected in my youth (in regards to both emotional and physical well being), but also the severe abuse, repeated scarring words which never gave me any kind of self-confidence. 
• During the first years after I left my father's cult, I had periods where self-hatred actually applied fully, but I think now it varies and it's only when my depression sinks deeper that I get back to such a position. 
• I discussed my maladaptive coping, which, to sum-up Lilly's entry, is an understandable consequence, as I lacked frames of reference and had no support systems for my entire life under my father's rule and thumb. Back then, I was too young to even understand what was going on in some aspects, and it took me a long time to even question if what I was seing and been told was normal or not. During that entire lapse, I had no capacity to cope, and I know now as an adult who reads about the topic, it has to do with a child's brain. 

• I felt anger and rage at quite a few aspects of my traumas : 

1. I was (still am) angry at my father for not fulfilling his parental duties of protection and nurture and for all the harm he did by abusing me, but also my mother, her parents, and anyone else who came in the way of helping me out of the situation he threw me into - this includes his own father to whom he was nasty more than once, in my presence, and even though I don't carry my step-mother in my heart, I'm angry at him for being nasty to her - as it probably caused her to be nasty to me in retaliation. 
2. I was, and to some extent still, angry that as a result of my trauma, my growth was severely hampered ; I couldn't go as far as I wanted in any field of life, and cost me many other hardships and struggles with mental illnesses that I wish on no one... no one nice that is! 
3. Learning to control this anger was tough ; I think I became somewhat apathetic to certain things, so I wouldn't say that I am healed from it at all. I learnt it enough so I could have relationships, I got married, found friendships, but, they are work in progress. At least, I don't get angry at them, though sometimes my mood swings make me snappish and that's also a negative side effect, it's a form of emotional double harm, to myself and to them. 

• I find the notion about understanding that healing is about the survivor and not the perpetrator to be an ideal approach, but I find it impractical. There is a need for justice in many cases, and since I know there is no such ideal justice in this world, I do have wishes that some bad things would happen to my father. I'll celebrate his demise, and damn to all societal norms about this. There are limits to the implied forgiveness about this. That being said, I'm not consumed with these thoughts. They are just out there, and I've said them, I can move on to the next point. 
• If you've ever read my blog before, you'll know that I lack self care. You won't know that I also lack healthy boundaries, as I haven't discussed this aspect. So, apparently these are common for child abuse survivors. I may have a somewhat healthy diet by being vegan, not smoking, not drinking, but my diet is also somewhat monotonous and I don't always eat all my fruits (I do eat enough veggies on the other hand). My body hygiene isn't the best, but not the worst either. Although I'm doing better caring for my appearance, this is a struggle.  These, as Lilly says, results from lack of self-worth, and again, you'll know this about me from other entries, or from twitter, or talks we had. 
• The only thing I'll say about lack of healthy boundaries shall be to acquiesce Lilly ; I did let toxic people in, first unknowingly, then knowingly, before learning to discern, and stand up for myself and create these boundaries. It's a topic I've been putting off for a long time, and shall try to address soon, and expand to other boundary issues and healthier formats. 
• The way I understand using an identity to cope and avoid dealing with the trauma, pertains either to my first psychotherapy, where I was locked in a victim status and never coming out of it ; or to my early teens and early adulthood, where I used my intellectual prowess to attract attention, but quickly learned no one was noticing me, so I had given up. 
• I don't think I use a persona, as I'm a what you see is what you get kind of person, but I certainly did get locked as an avoidant personality, most of my life. This has been in process of unlearning and learning better coping strategies since I changed psychotherapist, and a second stage was initiated when I started my CBT for social phobia.