Every Stone a Story

Before Christmas, I was in correspondence with a very pleasant, intelligent person who took exception to the “Are you ruined?” survey I had, in a spasm of anger, written and posted. That meme listed some handicaps—in the racing sense, the extra burdens placed on some runners—that poverty and dysfunction might lay on individuals. (It was in response to the “Are you spoiled?” meme then current.)

Although that meme touched a lot of people, I’m the last person to defend it as fair or balanced. It was begun as a corrective to the assumed privilege of the other survey but rapidly became the expression of some very old rage. Much of it was written in a white-hot fury, and I didn’t edit it before I posted.

One thing in particular bothered my correspondent: the inclusion of one of the final questions about whether your childhood left you with PTSD.

At first I couldn’t understand why the question about PTSD should be the big issue. Anybody who has been through that particular kind of hell has a higher than average likelihood of having PTSD. I couldn’t see why naming the syndrome would be a problem.

Then I realized that most people’s exposure to the concept has been strictly as a form of insanity defense: part of the culture of victimization and an all-purpose ticket to do nothing, take no responsibility, and mistreat other people while maintaining the moral high ground.

This is so very far from the way I use the concept (and the way most therapists and PTSD sufferers do) that it took me a while to even see the possibility.

PTSD is not a license to abuse other people or waste one’s own life. It’s a useful description of what happens to some people (not all) under extreme circumstances, and because it is an impersonal diagnosis, it helps the survivor separate the scars from the self. Once you’ve done that, it’s much much easier to find the strength to heal and change and grow. Instead of believing myself evil and dangerous, for example, I can see the ways my life made me think that I was—and therefore free myself from that crippling perception.

The diagnosis also helps explain a lot of things that frankly terrified me when I was younger. In 1980, for my 21st birthday, I went to see my first therapist. (When I was 14 I did tell a family doctor that I was crazy; the response was that I should be a better Christian.) When I told the psychiatrist about the flashbacks I was experiencing, he (literally) patted my head and told me that a young lady with such a dramatic imagination should go on the stage. In 1980 very few doctors understood PTSD, and the ones who did were working with Vietnam vets.

As a child, I carried unbearable loads of responsibility. I still take the blame for almost everything bad that happens to me—even things that were not really within my control. And trying to remember that responsibility is not identical to blame is something I’m still working on.

In psychological terms, my locus of control (who I think is responsible for my life) is firmly within myself. I don’t think it’s luck or circumstances or that I’m controlled by either the past or a mental illness. Believing that I had power is one way I survived; recognizing how vulnerable I really was would have killed my hope and thus been insanely dangerous. I needed to be competent. And God help me, I was thoroughly competent.

So now, as an adult, I have to unwind those threads of belief and experience in order to get a clearer idea of what really happened. For whatever reasons, for me, it is very important to be able to name and recognize the damage done to me. IMX, it helps me heal. I know that other methods work well for other people. This one has worked for me.

So when I talk about what was done to me, or enumerate the horrors of my childhood—or even the ways in which my life fell short of the ideal, like not having decent guidance counseling in school, for example—none of this is intended to excuse me for anything I have done or not done.

What it is intended to do is to remind myself that if I haven’t gotten as far as I would have liked, I have come a hell of a long way from my origins. Some of that is attributable to sheer good luck in having books around to teach me what my parents couldn’t, brains to help me think of alternatives, and a profound faith in God that made me feel sometimes that my life could be redeemed. But some is because I have worked damned hard at surviving and making a decent life for myself, and because I never gave up.

Moreover, a big part of my vocation is to help other people who have suffered the same way I have. That’s why I talk about it. Not to keep us all mired in the past, but to show realistically that it’s possible to drag ourselves up from it. “Realistically” is the key here. That means showing that I still struggle. That the pain comes back sometimes. But that it’s possible to fight it and win, to make a decent, loving, productive life.

I struggle with this shit. Someone might as well benefit from that struggle. And I do, too—when things are hard for me, I can go back and reread some of the things I’ve written and some of the comments I’ve gotten, and be comforted. My life has made a difference.

ETA I recognize that this is not the only healthy way to deal with a difficult past, whether that's long-term abuse or a single traumatic experience. Everybody approaches these issues differently. I am not prescribing my tactics for anyone else. It's what works for me right now. Later, I may do other things. And everyone else is free to do what works for them.