Nightmares

Pondering how surviving abuse might have affected my dream state…

Since I was a child, I have had nightmares on a regular basis. I never thought too much about it, because I’ve always been an avid dreamer, who also remembers her dreams very well. I guess, I just always assumed that nightmares were a normal part of everyone’s life and I am sure to a certain extend they are.

Over the days leading up to and on Halloween my nightmare rate increased and I was reminded of my lifelong history with them. Ever since I was a little child, like four or five years old, I’ve been dreaming about very violent things. ..Like dead bodies and dead bodies bing burned in my presence to cover the tracks of the murderer.

Like I said this had become a normality in my life, I guess I always thought that everyone had gory nightmares like that. Now I am aware that it is not actually everyone, although this may be hard to tell, as I have also noticed that a lot of people feel uncomfortable talking about their dreams in general. I can absolutely relate to that, too. Dreams are very personal, often weird and intimate. Our society doesn’t necessarily encourage us to share those aspects of our existence and experience.

But there are also other people, who remember their dreams well and who occasionally share them, maybe because they were weird in a funny and entertaining way, or maybe they would share them with a therapist in an effort to get to the bottom of their trauma.

But what I am only becoming fully aware of recently, is that it might not be ‘normal’ for a five year old to dream about dead bodies being buried and hidden. It is the proverbial skeleton in the closet, which you probably shouldn’t even have too many of, at that age.

Since I now know that I had been sexually abused at that age already, I can’t help but think that this gruesome dream image might relate to a popular line that pedophiles like to tell the children, they abuse: “This will be our little secret.” The secret that needs to stay hidden…buried.

It is an awful memory, accompanied by the memory of these gory dreams and I have to admit that writing this makes me feel particularly vulnerable and I sometimes wonder, if it is the right thing to do, putting myself out there like this.

But I also know, that children are out there right now, being molested and that it may be an extremely uncomfortable topic, but that we need to talk about these things going on in our world and what they do to people in the long run, anyway. Not addressing it at all, simply won’t help.

I chose to share this quite extreme nightmare, because I’ve come to believe that everyone, who has been abused in some way, shape or form – and I know, they are all horrible, no matter what it was in each individual case – might experience nightmares, accordingly. Whether they remember them or not.

They are scary, no doubt, and sometimes they’d make us feel weird and very uncomfortable with ourselves, but I also strongly believe now, that they are an essential part of recovery. A way of our subconscious mind to deal with what happened to us and maybe even the starting point of our healing journey.

Naturally, I looked up some interpretations of my particular nightmare and the bottom line seems to be that it is about mental discomfort and trying to hide or shy away from a certain part of ourselves. In a way that is almost poetic to me. As horrible as the experience was and as much as I had to suppress these memories for my mental wellbeing at a very young age, it was also important for them to come up in this way, for me to be able to address them later on. it is all about being able to heal.

Naturally, I looked up some common interpretations of a dream like mine and it usually seems to relate to an attempt to mentally disconnect to a certain part of ourselves and trying not to face it or deal with it.

Thinking about this, made me realise just how much my very young self couldn’t possibly deal with the experience in her conscious mind and it brought up some other examples of nightmares, that might stem from being abused.

Someone might relive the day their narcissistic ex left them, in a dream, over and over again. Someone in high school, might dream a couple of times each week about the bully, they face on a daily basis in school.

Someone might dream about a parent, who they officially have a good relationship with, being extremely violent in their dreams.

None of these dreams are particularly pleasant, but I also noticed that they occur less and less with time, when you face what you went through. May it be through therapy, talking to others about it or simply have a good, relieving cry. Those dreams showing up less and less in my experience -I take that as a sign that my healing keeps progressing and that no matter, what we went through, healing is possible.

So, I wanted to share this with you to let you know, that you have the power to survive whatever you had to go through.

We can do this, we will support each other and keep on fighting for our happiness.

Never give up

..is what someone told me a couple of years ago, without knowing what my story is or what my dreams are.

But this was a person, who had fought for decades to fulfil their childhood dream and succeeded in the end. Their journey was taken with many ups, but also with many downs.

So, if you need all of your energy today to just stay awake – that’s ok.

If you need all of your energy today, just to cope with your responsibilities – that’s ok.

If you need all of your energy today, just to drink some water – that’s ok.

If you need all of your energy today, just to eat a little bit – that’s ok.

If you need all of your energy today, just to keep breathing – that’s ok.

If you need all of your energy today, just to stay alive – that’s ok.

Because the ups are bound to show up again.

Surviving being the Toxic Systems Scapegoat (…or why I hate being called strong)

The scapegoat or the ‘black sheep’ is usually also the only one who understands the toxicity of the system they’re finding themselves in. They are the flashlight that shines a light on all the manipulation, unfairness and deceit. This system could be your family, your work environment, your circle of friends or other social groups.

The scapegoat often sees through the games and manipulation techniques (e.g. gaslighting) of the narcissistic or psychopathic individual in that group, who plays (or at least tries to play) the others like puppets on a string to achieve the most favourable outcome for them at all times. Most people in the system won’t be conscious of this – otherwise, it would not work.

Especially people who find themselves in a position like the ‘golden child’ have a much harder time to figure out, what is really going on.

In contrast to that, the scapegoat is a thorn in the eye of the abuser. They are the ones who could become dangerous and expose them. What they may not realise is that they often created this ‘danger’ themselves.Se, the abuser needs a scapegoat in the system. someone that is usually at fault, someone that will distract from their wrong doings. someone who is the odd one out – they don’t do or say as everyone else – the one, who never really fit in and also seemed a little weird, to take the blame if need be and them ostracise them and pull them out if they are needed to keep the system running. The abuser picking on them particularly diminishes the scapegoats self-esteem further, so that it becomes a vicious cycle.

The abuser may have the audacity to call the scapegoat ‘strong’ or ‘brave’. There are several reasons for this.

One, it makes it look like the abuser actually likes and acknowledges you – who doesn’t want to be called a strong individual, right?! Secondly, it creates doubt within the system about the narcissists or psychopaths relationship with you. What I mean by this is that if you will receive a compliment every now and then, even those members of the group who might have noticed that you hold a position of disadvantage, can now relax and see the good in the abuser since they are obviously being nice to you, pointing out your strength.

The third reason, I have personally experienced over and over again, is that by calling you strong/ brave, the abuser gives themselves permission to abuse you come more. After all you’re the strong one, so if anybody can take it – it’s you.

This might not make sense to everybody, but I can confirm in retrospect that I was often pushed even harder, neglected, ostracised or straight up abused a little more by those toxic people in my life, shortly after they pointed out just how ‘strong’ I am. To me this is not a compliment (at least not from those kinds of people), but it is one of the most sinister forms of gaslighting.

Being the systems’ scapegoat means that you do not get a real chance of getting to know yourself, especially if the abusive system is your family of origin. Your self-esteem might be very low and you will feel like you don’t really belong, like you are the outsider.

The good news about the latter is that because you will see through all the BS more easily and you might not feel like a valued part of the system anyways, the scapegoat is often the one to walk away.

The scapegoat might also be an empath, focused more on the emotions of other people and therefore losing themselves, as well as not feeling good enough for anything they’d want in life.

But walking away will open up those new possibilities and you will find not only yourself but (pun intended) also your strength… of course, what I really mean is courage! The courage to walk away from an environment that is simply not good for you, the courage to start over and go for what you really want and the courage to speak your truth.

This, just like other things I talk about on this blog, is not an easy thing to do. But you can do it and it will be worth it. That is what I know for sure.

Do it Your Way – Individualism is a Good Thing

“Don’t be trapped by dogma, which is living with the results of other peoples’ thinking. Don’t let the noise of others opinions drown out your own inner voice. And most important, have the courage to follow your heart and intuition. They somehow already know, what you truly want to become. Everything else is secondary.”
Steve Jobs – Stanford Commencement Address

I always felt like an outsider, I never really felt like I belong. Mostly because, I figured out quickly that my opinions, my personal take on life, my very own hopes and dreams did not match the ones of the people surrounding me. What was so strange to me though, was that being different in many ways made me a target. All my life, people have been telling me what I can and cannot do, how I am supposed to see things and even what I’m supposed to think and feel to a certain degree.

We live in times where anything seems possible and opportunities are boundless. We can choose whatever, we want to be. So many choices, so many career paths, so many places to live, do you want to get married – do you not want to get married? Do you feel like stying in the town/ place, you were raised or do you want to move away? Do you want to be employed – do you want to go into business for yourself? Do you want to rent or buy a house? Often, when we are little, we are being told that we can be whatever we want.

However, this paradigm seems to change quickly, once you’ve grown up. On the outside, it may look like we are enjoying more freedom than ever before in the history of mankind. At least that’s what I thought it would be like, when I grew up. In everyday life, however, it doesn’t always seem that way.

There is an awful amount of dogma, an almost sinister force of so called traditions and narrow mindedness at play. It starts with a believe that the place that you were born in determines who you are, that the colour of your skin determines who you are, that your personal goals and dreams deem you a fool, a whole lot of ageism and maybe worst of all a determination that those who not follow a life path which is similar to our peers and maybe dare to have a go at our dreams are not to be trusted and sometimes ostracised.

This dynamic really plays into the hands of abusive people. Because it pretty much ensures that their victims stay exactly where they are, more often than not in a submissive position. It is also easy for them to induce fear, when the abused get any ideas to change that, like making a change in their own life that might give them just a little bit more freedom, they would tell you things like ‘Are you sure you wanna do this? ‘, ‘I just wouldn’t want you to embarrass yourself!’, ‘Don’t you think you’re too old for that?’ or ‘Everyone thinks this is a bad idea!’….

Dogma is created under the assumption that everybody wants the same things – not true at all. And it has the unfortunate power to put people who have been abused into a deeper depression.

I was pretty horrified, when I started to notice recently that there are even many inspirational speakers out there who seem not all that free-spirited, as they claim to be and seem to try to put some kind of restriction on people.

But I also noticed the dogmatic comments from people who surround me in my every day life. Their overall conclusion seems to be, that everyone’s life should look similar. You should make similar choices in more or less the same timing. If not you’ll risk being snuffed at, ridiculed or even become an outsider.

This dynamic enables abusers, puts people who didn’t dare to follow their dreams in depression and to a certain degree makes society plunge into addictive behaviours (sugar, alcohol, work, sex…) when people feel like they can’t keep up. The constant comparison is toxic and the illusion is fed by those who profit, like abusive individuals, the pharma, food and other industries and of course the kind of people, who try to make themselves feel better by judging others.

“Go confidently in the direction of your dreams! Live the life you’ve imagined. As you simplify your life, the laws of the universe will be simpler.”
Henry David Thoreau

Maybe the number of choices can be intimidating but that doesn’t necessarily mean that there is anything wrong with choosing. As long as you don’t hurt anyone else, why shouldn’t you be you and live your own life? Individualism doesn’t have to equal egoism. Going your own way might be challenging sometimes, but man it is going to be worth it!

You have to have the freedom to let your heart guide you You also have the right to make mistakes along the way – you are human. But do not just let these social dogmas define you. Once you’ve stepped away from it – you might discover a whole new world.