Using Gut Feelings to Heal From The Impact of Child Abuse
Martha Love
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Abstract
" Mamie " asked me to write a post for her blog because she knows that I have had years of experience in counseling adults, many who have had child abuse in their backgrounds, and she thought I might have something else to add to tell all of you. But I must first say that Mamie has hit it right on the mark with her message "Never Give Up!" Rosemary "Mamie " Adkin's book "Reflections of Mamie " shares with the reader a powerful inner journey of healing from her own child abuse using the technique of memoir. Her work inspires us as she discovered over and over through writing her memoir that she is a survivor, an understanding that has given her strength and empowerment to move her life forward in a positive manner. And her message to anyone else who has experienced or is experiencing child abuse is that you too have the strength to be a survivor, so "never give up!" Child abuse often begins in the earliest years of our lives, prior to school age, even in our infancy. But try as we may, we cannot seem to find access to all of these very early memories (sometimes none at all) by simply thinking back in time to a very young age. Yet it is these horrific events of child abuse in our early lives that are still affecting us today in our feelings and perspectives, and even our lifestyle decision-making. Often we experience feelings of guilt, shame, and fear, even anger, as our feeling memories of child abuse are triggered in the present and current events of our lives. Therefore, in the present adult life, we often see our lives and ourselves through the lens of a child experiencing this abuse and so we interpret our relationships with others in the present time from the view of that old perspective. All of us want to be cleared of these difficult feeling so we may be more in the now.
