My mother used to tell me that my memories were just dreams. That was one of her many methods she used to invalidate me. However, there is a fine line between dreams and reality. Our dreams have a way of telling us what is happening in our unconscious. The dream I had last night is case and point.
I was living in a castle with my parents. This castle was ancient. Only the stone walls barely stood. There was no roof and no doors. My parents were sorcerers. They mixed potions and used them to meet their needs. I spent much of my day attempting to replicate their potions. Even though I usually knew exactly what the potions contained, I never succeeded, because the potion ingredients would constantly change.
This dream represents many aspects of my childhood. An old and crumbling infrastructure with no privacy describes my home life quite well. The inconsistency of the requirements within my household was a constant source of frustration when I was a child. I wanted to be good. I wanted to be successful. But it just wasn’t possible.
However, the aspect of this dream that I examined most closely was my parents’ sorcery. I found it fascinating that I considered my parents to be magical in this dream. That judgmental part of me spoke up very quickly. “Why would I think they were magical? That’s stupid.” But honestly, why would I not think they were magical? I was a child. And children believe in magic. They believe a man in a red suit can travel the world in one night. They believe bunnies leave us eggs. And they are pretty sure their mothers have eyes in the back of their heads. My kids are very sure.
And because of my need to dissociate, I took the magical world to a new level. I would talk to stuffed animals and real animals. I had imaginary friends. I would search my natural surroundings for creatures like fairies and unicorns. I do believe all children do this, but for me, it was a survival technique. If I could not find meaning in the real world, I would find it in another world, a world I could understand, a world where evil did not exist, or at least never won.
And to be honest, unlike most parents, my parents were attempting to deceive me. They wanted me to believe they were all powerful. It was critical to their success in breaking me. If I thought there was even one small weakness, I would have used it to escape my situation. They knew that. I knew that. My entire childhood was one long conversation in which they convinced me they were perfect and all powerful. And they did convince me. Until I started my recovery, I was sure of it. How can you argue with perfect people? Even worse, how can you defy them?
Even after all of these years, there is apprehension about my separation from my parents. I have always felt that they would come after me in one form or another. Maybe they would make life difficult through other people. Maybe they would create confusion in my life. Maybe they would stalk me. Maybe they would attempt to hurt me. Honestly, these are very real fears because they have done all of these in my childhood.
But underneath all of it was this belief that they had more control over my life than is actually humanly possible. This belief that they are indeed magical, that they can impact my life karmically, has inhibited me in my own growth and recovery. It feels as though they are watching me even though they are nowhere near me. It is what paranoia comes from. And for me, there has always been a paranoia that runs my life from the unconscious.
So, I will work with this child part who thinks my parents are magical. When things go wrong in my life, I will work to understand them as a part of life and not the product of karmic punishment handed down by my scorned parents. The more I do this, the less I will feel overwhelming emotional responses to everyday inconveniences. I know my anxiety will be lessened through this integrated understanding.
It is interesting how the most morally vacant people on the planet work so hard to convince others of their power. They build up an amazing house of cards (or crumbling castle) to convince the rest of the world they are perfect in every way. And the children believe them. Because why would they lie? How else could they have known that? How else could they fool the entire world? And those same children spend a lifetime unraveling the real story from the web of lies. Some never do. But those that do come away with an amazing perspective. There is good. There is evil.
And neither side gets to claim perfection.
I have just begun my journey of healing…thank you for chronicling yours
I wish you grace in your journey. Feel free to reach out at any point.
I really started my healing journey last year consistently as well as openly and being honest with myself sharing what I could.
The perfection I associate with my OCD issues.
I thank all for sharing as it helps a great deal with the healing process.
Peace & be well to all.
Happy as well as healthy healing as well.
I find your dream fascinating. I agree that they can be revealing. I’m understanding more about my dreams now and I know there are clues in their language and symbols. I find it interesting when you say that if your parents had shown any signs of weakness they know that would have helped you to see the situation for what it was, so they created an all-powerful persona…that resonates with me. Thanks for your insights.
Thank you Jane!
Yes me too Jane. My mother left my father for the second time 2 years ago because of his abuse. Both times she stayed with me. She is trauma bonded to my dad who verbally, emotionally, physically and spiritually abused me and did all but physical with my mum. (In fact that’s how he justifies it; “but I never hit your mother”) He invalidates my abuse By denying or minimising it. I was the scapegoat. In order to frighten me into ‘stopping my mum from going back to him’ as he saw it, he threatened to kill me with a shotgun to people he knew would tell me because they were worried for me. Myself and the police took those threats seriously. He suddenly started coming into the town where I lived, decided he would go for ‘therapy’ with my therapist and sat in the same sofa that I did. I wasn’t aware for some time and neither was my therapist due to different surnames. My sister told him to go elsewhere because of what it would do to me if I found out but as usual, it’s all about his rights. I couldn’t go back so changed therapists. He came to my place of worship knowing it would intimidate me and my mum. He never gave up and constantly love bombed my mum, told lies or twisted truths about me to her, used many flying monkeys to get her back and she listened to it. She convinced herself he had changed and it was just because he’d suffered rejection as a child. Now she’s rejected him, he’s not coping. Nope, his supply left him and, in his mind, I now controlled her. The unforgivable sin. Smear campaigns, lies, threats to kill; he had to keep them up. As a child I knew he would kill me one day by going ‘too far’ so this became my belief system; keep daddy happy or this time he drives dangerously with you in the car to frighten you into submission he’ll lose control and kill you or this time he beats you he isn’t going to stop. I believed my father had the capability to kill. I saw what he did to my family and every animal that came into my family. (The last dog had a nervous breakdown becstse of how he beat, kicked her etc) My mother went back again in may last year. He had escalated his behaviour with threats, ultimatums, another woman intimidation and threats by proxy and promising my mum material things and some things she’d always wanted but he would never agree to. And my mum knew what he’s done to me in the past and now. We warned her as a family that he would use her to get to me and it would end up no contact because she never protects her children, never has. And that he would find ways to isolate her from me to prevent me from screwing it up in his words. As children, whilst he was abusing us all, she was telling everyone what a wonderful man he was/is. I went completely no contact in September because she went straight back into her flying monkey role and he used her phone to reach me which we all knew would happen. Like us all, I could go on and on but the point is this; I try to speak positively about my father to others. I don’t speak up openly about the abuse because when it gets back to him, it’s further proof I’m crazy. I still hold the internal belief that my father is all powerful, all seeing and something I say could send him over the edge and he kills me. My belief system tells me my mum wouldn’t help because she never has. What I discovered in my parents was a codependency/addiction to their perception of what love is. (Elizabeth spoke about this in the live video yesterday) my dreams have played this out many times since a child. I disassociated (and still do every day) to cope. I read books, made up stories to people who didn’t know me about a life I never had. Anything to escape the truth of abuse and the feelings My family projected on me of being crazy, broken, and something really wrong with me and my dad telling me everything that’s ever happened to me that was bad was my own fault. All of this programming by my father and mother was necessary to them to keep that all powerful persona and control paramount in my mind so that I ‘don’t tell’ and ruin the public image; the image my mum is back to telling everyone about. “He’s a changed man, he’s wonderful, Lisa’s just sick and crazy and needs a lot of help”. Shes listened to his constant rantings about me and has to say those things to justify going back. The abuser has to create the all power illusion to keep us from seeing the truth. I have to keep reading blogs like Elizabeth’s to keep grounded in reality. Otherwise, my inner belief system starts to take over and my paranoia gets out of hand. I’m working with my therapist on a programme set up by amnesty international to Help victims of psychological torture/kidnap etc. The target is to reprogram my brain and my belief system and try to heal from the feeling of ever present control by my father. It’s very good but challenging. I hear from others that it can be done but I’m not there yet. Keep going everyone!
Thank you for sharing your story Lisa. It is so understandable that you struggle with your reality with so much brainwashing and hiding of the truth. I am sending love and light to you on your healing journey.
Thank you for your concern and validation Elizabeth. I hadn’t realised until I read it back just now how long that post was! Others sharing their stories has helped me so much. Keep up your hard work. It means so much. Wish you healing and love. ❤
We often think our parents get up early to put the sun in the sky because when we are little they do seem all powerful. I know I always thought my parents had all the power in the world. They certainly had all the power in my little world. Like you, I tried to escape, but I used books. I inhabited other worlds where parents didn’t hit their children through the books I read. For the first time, I realized what my parents were doing wasn’t the norm!
We really are escape artists in so many ways. It is the only hope we have.
I really relate to the part where you searched your natural suroundings for creatures like unicorns. For a long time growing up I believed in unicorns. I believed their presence could only be felt by the pure of heart (sexually abused children.) When I was little I always had white hair and blue eyes and pale skin and my grandpa who was one of the few wonderful people in my life always said I reminded him of a blue eyed unicorn, so I figured if he talked about them they had to be real. I had a stuffed one I took everywhere when I was little. My daughter has one just like it now. I steal it sometimes on bad days when she is at school and I need a reminder that I had my grandpa until I was 8 he lived far away but my dad was great when he would visit. Thanks for sharing this it made my unicorn thing seem not so weird.
Maybe I will do an unofficial study of survivors to see how many were obsessed with unicorns. The unicorn represents healing, which is what we are all hoping for, so it makes sense that we would be fascinated by them.
I never knew that. I really never took the time to look into it.
I went through an animal totem phase. 🙂
I like this because it says the unicorn has the power to restore broken spirits. How fitting is that? http://www.linsdomain.com/totems/pages/unicorn.htm
This is an incredible message: those who can see it and overcome it are blessed with perspective. One of the positives to claim, when they are so few and hard to come by.
Blessings.
Thank you so much. We have to get something out of this journey. From what I can tell, it is a better sense of who we are. 🙂