With insecure attachments, a child unwittingly memorizes the precise lesson of that troubled relationship: that love is suffocation, that anger is terrifying, that dependence is humiliating, or one of a million crippling variations. —Peg Streep Denying the truth doesn’t change the facts I am sitting having my coffee listening to my Reiki healing music. The […]
Category: Dysfunctional Family
Childhood Emotional Neglect
It is easier to build strong children than to repair broken men. —Frederick Douglass Childhood Emotional Neglect (CEN) | Harmful as physical abuse! It’s harmful. It is an invisible abuse. Something we often do not talk about. But now science is telling us that it is just as harmful as physical abuse. Oh yes—I think […]
Stonewalling
Children of emotionally unreliable mothers who may appear caring one moment and then unavailable the next—leaving the child in a quandary about whether the Good Mommy or the Bad one will show up— also pull back at the first sign of discord. These children use withdrawal as a way of self-protection and grow up to […]
Dysfunctional Family Roles
In troubled families, abuse and neglect are permitted; it’s the talking about them that is forbidden. —unknown Children’s Roles in Dysfunctional Families For some of you that are reading this who do not know me, I will start out by saying I am not a therapist or psychologist. What I am, is a researcher. I […]
Bullying is An Epidemic
Mental health outcomes are not good from being bullied in childhood. Studies now validate it.
Mother. Stonewalled.
Farrah asked me what sending the letter did for me. I told her that, first, I felt I had finally stood up to my brother and ended the secrets. And second, I wanted to see if my mother would finally do what a mother should. Protect me. I found out my answers. I had to […]