Circumstantial wounds
I always knew I was adopted, but they never really told me the story behind it. I began to notice that I’m constantly afraid of being abandoned, including by my friends. As a result, I would always go way out of my way to help anybody, even if I knew it wasn’t quite right. I had a really hard time saying “no” to people. If someone were to ask me to lend them money, “Can you do this or that?” I would never say “no.” I never felt good enough for anything or anyone.
I was born with a serious health problem, and my mother would often take me to the hospital. It was traumatizing to go every couple of months and have tubes put into my sexual organs. I often wondered if something was wrong with me as a person.
My mother died when I was seven after being in the hospital for a long time. I was not allowed to go to the funeral. I was angry with her for leaving me, and then felt very guilty for being angry with her.
When we started to learn how to read, I could not read out loud and often could not follow along when the others were reading. I felt stupid, that there was something wrong with me, because I could not keep up with them.
I was very happy, big house, dog, nature, lots of laughing, learned to ski in the back yard. Everything seemed great, school, family, friends. Then out of the blue our parents told us that my father was leaving. I felt like I was gasping for air, crying. I was hurt, betrayed. I did not know this was a possibility. I felt that I had created it by being bad, that it was my fault.
Wounds do not only come from abusive parent-child relation- ships; the exigencies of life are such that one is unlikely to grow up without having received some kind of inner wounds. Fighting between parents, divorce, or death of a parent all cause wounds. Sometimes wounding can come just from careless words from a parent, such as, “Don’t be such a bad boy/girl,” or “Don’t be so stupid.” Wounds also come from a child’s sensing parental anxiety about not being able to be a good parent, or fear that the child will not be okay, feelings that seem to pass to the child virtually by osmosis. I do not know of any way to raise a child and never make a mistake. There will be wounds. The best a caring parent can do is to let the child know that they are loved without condition, that they do not have to prove or accomplish anything to be loved and listened to.
While home is the most likely place for wounding to occur, life provides many other opportunities. The next most common place is school, either from a particular teacher or from other students, or from having a learning dysfunction. I found in the stories I have listened to that boys tended, for the most part, to bully one another physically, while girls were more likely to tease one another emotionally.
And then, of course, there are all the myriad wounds that might that flow though being different from the dominant culture – social, racial, religion, culture, class, gender expression, gender identity, and/or sexual orientation
I was born with a serious health problem, and my mother would often take me to the hospital. It was traumatizing to go every couple of months and have tubes put into my sexual organs. I often wondered if something was wrong with me as a person.
My mother died when I was seven after being in the hospital for a long time. I was not allowed to go to the funeral. I was angry with her for leaving me, and then felt very guilty for being angry with her.
When we started to learn how to read, I could not read out loud and often could not follow along when the others were reading. I felt stupid, that there was something wrong with me, because I could not keep up with them.
I was very happy, big house, dog, nature, lots of laughing, learned to ski in the back yard. Everything seemed great, school, family, friends. Then out of the blue our parents told us that my father was leaving. I felt like I was gasping for air, crying. I was hurt, betrayed. I did not know this was a possibility. I felt that I had created it by being bad, that it was my fault.
Wounds do not only come from abusive parent-child relation- ships; the exigencies of life are such that one is unlikely to grow up without having received some kind of inner wounds. Fighting between parents, divorce, or death of a parent all cause wounds. Sometimes wounding can come just from careless words from a parent, such as, “Don’t be such a bad boy/girl,” or “Don’t be so stupid.” Wounds also come from a child’s sensing parental anxiety about not being able to be a good parent, or fear that the child will not be okay, feelings that seem to pass to the child virtually by osmosis. I do not know of any way to raise a child and never make a mistake. There will be wounds. The best a caring parent can do is to let the child know that they are loved without condition, that they do not have to prove or accomplish anything to be loved and listened to.
While home is the most likely place for wounding to occur, life provides many other opportunities. The next most common place is school, either from a particular teacher or from other students, or from having a learning dysfunction. I found in the stories I have listened to that boys tended, for the most part, to bully one another physically, while girls were more likely to tease one another emotionally.
And then, of course, there are all the myriad wounds that might that flow though being different from the dominant culture – social, racial, religion, culture, class, gender expression, gender identity, and/or sexual orientation