“The psychological rule says that when an inner situation is not made conscious, it happens outside, as fate. That is to say, when the individual remains undivided and does not become conscious of his inner contradictions, the world must perforce act out the conflict and be torn into opposite halves.”
Carl Jung, as quoted in ‘The ACoA Trauma Syndrome, The Impact of Childhood Pain on Adult Relationships’, Tian Dayton, PhD.
I had always seen the much shortened version of this quote - ‘That which we do not bring to consciousness appears in our lives as Fate’. The full quote above does much more complete justice to MY LIFE as I have experienced it.
I have, only very moderately speaking, experienced ‘fated’ events - but much more so I feel as though my life and the entire world I live in has been TORN APART. Torn from my mother’s womb by forceps in a 24 hour labor then abandoned and not fed for long periods of time. Neglected then given over to a nursemaid, who I adored. I found out much later my beloved Elena was just a 16 year old Ecuadorian girl on her first job. Never bonded to my parents, bonded to Elena, I was then at age 2, forcibly removed and carried onto a DC-3 airplane and ended up in Chicago.
Dayton’s book, which I’ve read about 4 times in the past 5 days, has been the most comprehensive reference and guide for the severe trauma I experienced. At last I can see why I have gone from one ‘addiction’ to another, because my inner trauma was unconscious, so I continue[d] to experience my world being torn apart. It’s not bad; it has made for FANTASTIC BIMs. Adventure after adventure - 14 trips to India, many for months at a time. I wouldn’t have it any other way and likely no one would want their life to be my way - traipsing off to India and Nepal for 5 months, arriving back and living with friends for years at a time, not owning a car for 12 years, ….
It all makes more and more sense to me AND on a feeling level I see I was much more abused than I can apprehend at this time because the pain I experienced was so severe I shut down my feelings. For example, crying for hours and hours, and possibly much longer, to be fed and left neglected and alone. I’ve mentioned my orthopedic surgeon pointing out my femur misalignment and bowing of my bones due to being left in heavy cloth diapers for LONG periods.
I’ve been studying my childhood stuff with such ardor that I’ve been afraid that I’d unconsciously become injured so I’m taking a week off from hiking as a precaution and I do have what I hope is only a slight strain in my hip. This could potentially be serious as I have had 2 total hip replacements AND ‘the unconscious is powerful’.
I only came to see clearly that my major life problem all along has been what I do not have - an experience of empathy and feeling that allows me to truly connect with other people. THAT’S what’s been missing and THAT’S what’s been so hard for me to see in myself - what’s missing. I have reviewed my life and come up with many important transactions with others in which other people were attempting to explain to me their feelings and I did not ‘get it’.
A problem I foresee is that based on my horoscope I have a capacity for feeling bigly, shall we say. Astrologically, the Moon is conjunct Pluto in my natal horoscope in my second house of finances and personal possessions. It also has the potential to bring huge wealth into my life. Because I am not conscious of my feeling nature it probably comes out in my public speaking, artwork, photography, healing arts that not many have experienced, and a seeming ability to ‘manifest’ stuff - like places to live, gurus, the right girlfriends. Were my feeling nature to now ‘wake up’ it could be problematic for me as I have so little life experience dealing with strong feelings of a personal nature. The few times I have ‘been in love’ that has brought with it all the unconscious drives from my childhood. Simplistically, I have more experienced and expressed ‘love’ through separation and turmoil because THAT’S HOW I EXPERIENCED CLOSENESS WHEN I WAS AN INFANT - THAT’S
MY TEMPLATE FOR CLOSENESS - TURMOIL AND SEPARATION.
My joke to my late girlfriend Bonnie was that we had
interlocking neuroses - she had a compulsive need to be taken care of and I had
a need to care for someone. It was the only way we could have a relationship.
She satisfied my need for separation as she was used to being left alone by her
first husband who, like me, took long hikes frequently. When Bonnie was younger
and in better health she attempted to accompany him and as a result submitted
every 14,000’ peak in California and climbed up to almost 20,000’ in Peru on
one of their smuggling trips.
“Anxiety disorders, chronic hyperarousal, and reenactments have now been described with some regularity in acutely traumatized children.”
“In addition to the reactions to discrete, one-time, traumatic incidents documented in these studies, intrafamilial abuse must certainly be included among the most severe traumas encountered by human beings .”
“Relationship ruptures are experienced as traumatic because we are neurologically wired for powerful relationship attachments; ‘neurons are genetically primed to support connections through the relational experiences we have with those closest to us. The patterns of energy and information laid down in these early moments of meeting develop the actual structure of these limbic regions’.
“We wire co-states or relationship dynamics into our very self and then we look to re-create both sides of those dynamics as we engage in relationships throughout our lives. The dynamics we experience as children template what we look for, expect, and re-create in adult relationships.
“Forty years of primate research has firmly established that early disruption of the social attachment bond reduces the long-term capacity to cope with subsequent social disruptions and to modulate physiological arousal.”
“In other words, when we have been traumatized in childhood within our primary relationships, we have trouble modulating the extreme feelings that adult intimacy brings up.” from Neurobiology of the ACoA Trauma Syndrome, in ‘The ACoA Trauma
Syndrome’, Tian
Dayton, PhD, Health Communications Publishers, page 84
Note the similarities to Spotnitz’s talk of ‘discharge patterns’ for the emotions.
https://ballantynesinspiredmusings.blogspot.com/2019/01/a-synopsis-of-my-writings-on.html
More on the neurobiology of Trauma. Breaking Trust: Stress and Rupture in Family Bonds.
“Love and attachment are the primary forces that ensure life; without these powerful mind/body drives, none of us would be here. How we learn to love in our early relationships forms the template for how we love throughout our lives.” pg. 51
“The child’s first relationship, the one with the mother or father, acts as a template, as it permanently molds the individual’s capacities to enter into all later emotional relationships.” pg. 52
“When portions of the brain responsible for attachment and emotional control are not sufficiently stimulated during infancy because the infant is neglected, these sections of the brain will not develop properly. This can result in a child who is impulsive, emotionally unattached, or possibly even violent.” pg. 52
“Our nervous systems are constructed to be captured by the nervous systems of others, so that we can experience others as if from within their skin. This is the biological basis for empathy and emotional connection. Nature designed us to have this emotional attunement so we can fit into the clan effectively and efficiently picking up on signals from those around us,
adjusting our behavior and adapting it accordingly.” pg.
53
“Through the acquisition of these actual experiences of self-regulation
[in the care of an adult nurturer] the child is able to learn to regulate their
emotions and other basic functions such as mood, appetite, libido, sleep,
motivation, and capacity for bonding.” pg. 53 This is why people have eating, sleep, mood…
disorders in later life. Humans are supposed to have learned these things from
their mother and other nurturers through limbic resonance, that is, by being
held. This stuff is largely transmitted by touch.
“Touch is the language of childhood.” pg. 54
“The level of stress in childhood permanently shapes the stress responses in the brain.” pg. 54 I have a permanently high level of stress from the template from my infancy. This is why I was able to go to India 14 times for months on end, this is why I could comfortably transit Howrah, the ‘Mother of all Train Stations’ alone with an 80 lb. backpack on, pressed against a wall so no one could pickpocket me, listening to announcements in Hindi which of the 78 tracks my train was going to be on. This is why my cars end up with some many miles on them. This is the why of the ACoA trait ‘addicted to excitement’, or perhaps more aptly, the founder’s original, ‘addicted to fear’.
“The threat of rupture between parent and child ... causes such stress …Because parent/child bonds are survival bonds, threatening them through the trauma of neglect, mental illness, addiction, or divorce can cause us to experience such rupture as traumatic…. When children of alcoholics/addicts fear abandonment by their primary caregivers, they can feel that their very lives are at stake.” pg. 56 For a long time I didn't see my fear of abandonment because I had two strategies to combat it: 1) I avoided getting close in the first place, 2) I would leave or abandon people first. “I got some money so I’m going to India for 5 months.”
Childhood abuse
Emotional/physical/sexual abuse
Emotional or physical neglect
Growing up in a seriously dysfunctional household as evidenced by witnessing:
--- domestic violence
--- Alcohol or other substance abuse in the home
--- Mentally ill or suicidal household members
--- Parental marital discord (separation or divorce) ok
--- Having a household member imprisoned
pg. 58
“The kind of toxic stress that pounds away at our auto immune system in childhood all too often results in fully developed disorders as adults.” pg. 61
I had many illnesses as a child, earaches, hernia, tonsils out, general malaise, finally a serious case of polio when I was 14. My poor two sisters died of cancer at the age of 21 and 41.
“We process emotions like fear and love, key to our human and animal experience, through the limbic system. [Reptilian or animal brain] pg. 65
“Lack of limbic regulation can manifest as depression, anxiety, or sleep disturbances. Limbic disregulation can cause difficulty in regulating mood, appetite, sexual responses, bonding, and motivation. Those affected by trauma (and a disregulated limbic system) can have trouble living moderately. Instead they vacillate between life’s emotional extremes.” pg. 66
“Intrafamilial abuse must certainly be included among the most severe traumas encountered by human beings. Relationship ruptures are experienced as traumatic because we are neurologically wired for powerful relationship attachments, neurons are genetically primed to support connections through the relational experiences we have with those closest to us … The dynamics we experience as children template what we look for, expect, and re-create in adult relationships.” pg. 84
In other words, when we have been traumatized in childhood within our primary relationships, we have trouble modulating the intense feelings that adult intimacy brings up. pg. 84
“Repetition compulsion is a psychological phenomenon in which we repeat the emotional, psychological, or behavioral aspects of a traumatic event over and over again without awareness, re-creating pain from yesterday in relationships and circumstances of today. (Freud 1922) pg. 113
“Another scenario that can make CoAs feel alone is if the non-addict parent is narcissistic. When this is the case, children can have a very complicated time meeting their own needs because they have a lot of people to tend to first. They have two very self absorbed preoccupied parents.” pg. 123
“We pick up the moods of others through the phenomenon of limbic resonance . Our nervous system extends beyond the borders of our bodies, they link with those of the people close to us in a silent radiating rhythm that helps regulate everyone’s physiology. Children require ongoing neural synchrony from parents in order for their natural capacity for self-directedness to emerge … Human physiology does not direct all its own functions; it is interdependent. It must be steadied and stabilized by the physical presence of another to maintain both physical and emotional health
… The limbic system plays an important role in guiding the emotions that stimulate the behavior necessary for self-preservation and survival of the species. It is responsible for such complex behaviors as feeding, fighting, fleeing, and reproduction, and it also assigns free-floating feeling of significance, truth, and meaning to experience.”
“Destruction of parts of the limbic system abolishes social behavior, including play, cooperation, mating, and care of the young.” pg. 130
“Their [narcissists, those not nurtured when young] “we
state” … appears to
be undeveloped.” pg. 131
“Because the damage done to the narcissist occurs in early years, it is my feeling that it profoundly affects the ability to be close and attuned but minimally affects intelligence . By the time narcissists are at the stage of intellectual development where there brain allows them to abstract, they are in school, learning and probably getting plenty of opportunities to grow. It is emotional learning that seems missing, not intellectual learning.
This makes narcissists all the more confusing: they can think clearly, piece together such seemingly attractive personas, but the feeling connection is underdeveloped. In a relationship, this means that the narcissist can observe you, sometimes very perceptively, but does not tune into your inner world.” pg. 132 Talk to my girlfriends 6 months into a relationship with me. This what was so hard for me to figure out about my own case: the stark distinction between EMOTIONAL intelligence and INTELLECTUAL intelligence. Without knowing it, I CREATED a “Seemingly attractive persona” and faked the rest of it ─ probably like my parents from whom I acquired that template of being although my parents were much more emotionally mature than me as they did not experience the early life birth, environment and language disruption I did.
“When ACoAs cannot cope with the pain they are in they often reach for some sort of mood-altering substance or behavior to do that for them. The habit of self-medication can start very early. One of the misconceptions about addiction is that when the substance is removed, the addict’s troubles are over. But we don’t learn what the pain is trying to teach when we silence its voice. Addictions to mood-altering substances such as alcohol and/or drugs are called substance addictions. Addictions to mood-altering behaviors or activities, such as sex, eating, spending, and/or gambling, among others, are called process addictions.” pg. 140 [I was an adept candy maker (and sugar addict) by the time I was 6 years old.]
Dayton then recounts several stories of people who had suddenly lost relationships with nannies and care-givers other than their mothers and the traumatic rupture that had caused. This is exactly my story. My long-time joke has been I lost my parents at an early age AND I had to live with them also.
“The trap of privilege. Being the child of someone whose primary focus in life is that of attaining wealth and/or status can be a disillusioning and disheartening experience. The family wealth or status can become a primary source of identity which family members develop a deep dependency.” pg.
176
Recovering from the ACoA Trauma Syndrome: Reclaiming the Disowned Self. “Change is not only intellectual. When it comes to trauma, we need to create a new body to live in.” pg. 181 I have been forced to do that using yoga and severely disciplined eating.
“For every year older you get you have to eat 1% less food just in order to stay the same weight. When you get to be 100 you stop eating and you die.”
Russ, my first OA sponsor.
“Talk alone does not reach the parts of the brain that process trauma. Healing trauma requires a combination of therapy and lifestyle changes. Because emotional and sensory memory are processed by and stored in the body, the most successful forms of therapy for trauma are experiential.
Experiential forms of therapy and therapy “supports” like journaling, exercise, guided imagery, walking, yoga, and breathing have been finding their way into treatment programs … Psychodrama - a role playing experiential from of therapy - has become a therapy of choice in addressing the mind/body issues of trauma.” pg. 183
“The only time he allowed me to open my mouth was when he wanted to stick his gigantic penis in it. Gigantic because I was three and my father was a grown man…” pg. 186
“Kathy [the little girl above] has now been at her current job for three years and is very happy, effective, and valued.” pg. 194 Dayton’s description of a client after a successful course in therapy. My margin note - ‘Always the fucking job’.
“The inventiveness of those who have thrived in spite of the odds can be quite remarkable in dealing with problems. Because they have had to “think outside the box” to solve complex family situations, these thrivers can be highly creative and original, which are real assets both at home and in the workplace.” pg. 206 Dayton discussing the qualities of those who survived their severe trauma issues.
“When I stand before thee at the day’s end, thou shalt see my scars and know that I had my wounds and my healing.” Rabindranath Tagore pg.215
“Being the grandchild of and alcoholic/addicted family can be as if not more confusing than being the child of an alcoholic/addicted family. Grandchildren experience the residue of the parent’s untreated PTSD issues, but there's no obvious culprit causing it: after all, no one is drunk, right?” pg. 248
“Children absorb their parent’s love, joy, and pleasure in life through the natural phenomenon of limbic resonance . They also absorb sadness, guilt, and anger; whether it is spoken or not, they “carry their children’s pain.” pg. 249 [I was flabbergasted the first time I met my now son-in-law. I had been in recovery for years when my daughter was born, had lost almost 100 pounds of weight, and had a good job, drove a BMW in the 70’s. My son-in-law to be was a replica of me 15 years before - 5’ 11”, maybe 260 pounds, super-strong, and only marginally employed. Limbic resonance.
“The gift of trauma is that it deepens us layer by layer. It pushes us to our psychological, emotional, and spiritual limits and teaches us to hold more emotion than we are used to holding, to see more than we are used to seeing, to contain, observe, and look for meaning. pg. 268
I do have an extremely interesting case study going on. A woman on Match.com in Sedona was born 1 day after me in the same year, so her horoscope has many similarities to mine. I have attempted to ‘do stuff’, go for a walk, …. and she comes up with a “No” for everything. Fascinatingly, she was due to get a hip replacement when I first met her and I offered to drive her to LA to use my doctor. She had a reason why not. She has suffered terribly from her hip replacement she had in Flagstaff, AZ; a year of constant pain. My point is, some “Nos” can have SERIOUS consequences. I try to schmooze with her periodically just to remind myself how I am. One of my former spiritual advisor’s best lines to me was, “Carlos, just say ‘YES’ to life”, as I had told her “No” about some suggestion she had for me. Oh, this woman has the same bowed femurs I do from cloth diapers from our generation. When I mentioned what my surgeon had said she ran and got her X-rays and we looked at them and sure enough!
The best I can figure at this late stage of my life is that the trauma I suffered when young was much more severe than I can imagine. My limbic, or feeling system, was disabled from the aloneness, abandonment, and lack of nurturance, including food and touch. I can be a very alone person, more so than anyone I know or have observed. I lived with an older woman once for about a year and she called me the most alone person she had ever met.
This was a savvy girl, had raised 6 kids and worked as a nurse for many years; she was an expert on the human condition.
The reason I don’t feel alone is because I don’t feel at all and I trained myself to make it on my own in the dysfunctional, non-feeling family I was born into. I am the person who flew alone into the small airport near Mt. Everest and just waited for something to happen. In all my Himalayan trips I don’t think I've ever met another solo traveler up there.
I still clearly remember the first time I relaxed. I was 42 years old and was in Kashmir travelling with a woman I met on my first day in Kathmandu in 1985. I took an early morning walk while Tanya slept in. I walked to the top of any snow-covered hill near our lodge and felt, for the first time in my life, a deep sense of relaxation and lack of worry. I had been carrying trauma and a sense of being shocked all my life until that point. Stopping working at age 39 was also a huge benefit for my survival from my childhood trauma as I over concentrate on work or tasks and attempt to do them perfectly. The family system I grew up in rewarded intellectual accomplishments, like work, with the limbic system, or feeling nature, ignored.
What has been ‘wrong with me’ my whole life is that my early trauma substantially destroyed my feelings system so I am not able to make the kinds of connections, on a feeling, limbic, level that would have enabled me to comfortably be with other people (or, for example, sell real estate). I only began to recognize this failing when I was a very successful computer consultant and saw that to progress I would need to start a company and work with others and I saw I was not equipped to do that. Savvily, I stopped working altogether, dropped out and began travelling to India, where I had a Guru with whom I could hang around. In India I was expected to join in with my other brother disciples and participate, like in morning meditation. I did not do that but inveigled my way into a position as Gurujii’s sort of right hand man; I bought the plane tickets for his yearly summer trip to the USA.
I was his enabler.
As Dayton says, being close brings up my terrible terror of being abandoned (again) as I was before being 2 years old, and so it’s a survival issue for me.
Again, the reason this has all remained hidden from me for so long is that my entire feeling side was disabled by my early trauma. I am starting to have vague feelings that an incident that may have happened to me is being left alone for days, unfed and uncared for. It’s hazy and I will probably never be able to prove it but I can sense there is plenty in my very early memory banks I cannot access, at this time.
My early trauma all fits together so well it’s like I endured a special kind of programming as an ultimate loner and advrnturer. Most people like me, so isolated from society, cannot survive, but I have been able to turn every disaster, like a severe case of polio at age 14, into an asset. A particular problem is that loners like me are unable to seek out and get help - they’ll continue to do it on their own, which isn’t possible.
Sweet are the uses of adversity;
Which, like the toad, ugly and venomous,
Wears yet a precious jewel in his head.
As You Like It Act 2, scene 1, 12–17 , Shakespeare
And very few also are they who have dug into their childhood stuff as I have and come out the other side still searching. It took me until I was 72 before I began, with outside help, a 12 Step program.
“Your mother was your Guru.”
I am extremely blessed to feel grateful to have suffered the abuse I did as I would NEVER have been forced to work on myself as much as I have: I’d have wasted my life over-working. I mentioned a few years ago doing yoga exercises one morning thinking of all the abuse I suffered from my Indian Guru - it was never good enough, get a job, stay away from women, don’t eat so much sugar,,,,
As I was about to get into the headstand pose a loud voice came in my ear, “You mother was your Guru.”
Oh, My God! I gasped. Of course. How could I have so completely missed this. Just the eating thing alone. Had I not been starved early on I would never have developed the severe eating problems I did which forced me to seek help, get straightened out and finally to lose ALL the weight I have to be in a position to achieve longevity, if I’m meant to. Had I not had that ‘heart attack’ in Florida, I never would have sought out and followed Esselstyn’s vegan, non-fat, food plan. Sweet are the uses of adversity; On my last trip in the Himalayas I got down to about 130 pounds at 5’ 10”, I’ve gained back about 15 since returning.
Marriage
I had the insight just a few days ago while rock climbing that in many cases,especially in older age and with a second, third, or more, marriage is used as an avoidance mechanism for dealing with early life issues. Dayton does not mention anything about marriage.
Jobs
Your time is limited, so do not waste it living someone else’s life. Don’t be trapped by dogma ─ which is living with the results of other people’s thinking.
Don’t let the noise of other’s 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. Steve Jobs, as quoted in Dayton, ‘The ACoA Trauma Syndrome’.
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