Abuse is what happened to you; it’s NOT who you are. The pain you carry—the sense of damage and shame—is a secret you have carried with you ever since the abuse began. The pain is deep and it is real. It can affect your relationships, your ability to be intimate with another, the way you relate to those with whom you work, even your ability to care for yourself. Therapy is a way to acknowledge what has happened to you, to validate who you are today, and to place what happened to you firmly and safely in the past so you can create a rewarding and fulfilling life, a life free of your terrible burden.
Actually, you are already on this journey: you have survived. You are past the abuse, if not the memory of it. What’s more, you’re not alone. As isolated as your experience may sometimes make you feel, many people—including people you know—have been through abuse, too. The way you put the burden down, the way you leave it behind at last, is by talking about it, making it a secret no longer. The way to do this successfully is with the help of someone knowledgeable who understands, who you can trust, who's done this before, and who knows you can be healed.
What I want you to know is that survivors of abuse can and DO heal. You can heal. Indeed, you can grow from it. And here’s the thing: you do not have to relive every awful thing that ever happened to get better. You do not have to remember every detail. But you do need to tell your story as you understand it, and to tell it to a caring witness, someone who will be there with you through the entire process, someone who knows you can make sense of what has happened and find meaning in your life. |
