Primal Wound

In my never ending quest for self-awareness and understanding, I’ve been going back to the issue of adoption. I stumbled across an email I was not supposed to see between some of my in-laws. In it, they were pondering the sources of my pain and wondering how far back my problem went and did it even start before I self-mutilated in college. The fact that too many people are discussing subjects that shouldn’t concern them is a topic for another discussion…so let me pretend that this email was okay and move on with the “source of my pain” discussion.

My first reaction was, “Geesh, of course my ‘issues’ go back further than just college, or high school…there had to be something within me to even give me a propensity towards inflicting violent pain on myself.” I went backward through the years and thought about milestones in my life…mostly negative ones as those are the ones that tend to shape anyone’s “issues” and/or “depression.” It led me back to the very beginning when I was separated immediately from my birth mother. The entire first month of my life was spent in a foster home. While I’m sure this person was a loving person (or at least I like to think so), it wasn’t my mother. As soon as I was born, I was taken. I’m not sure if she even got to hold me. I haven’t asked her that question. Then after being put into a foster person’s arms, one month later I was given to the people I now call my parents. Three rather traumatic events happened to me within the first month of my life. 1. Birth 2. Initial separation and foster care, and 3. another move into my parent’s home.

I was lamenting to a friend the other day after viewing hundreds (yes, hundreds) of pictures of their baby that I have no pictures of me prior to one month old. Well, I take that back, I think the foster mother took a couple of pictures of me to give to my parents. But I have never seen a picture of my natural mother pregnant with me. I never saw a picture of her in the hospital. I’ve never seen a newborn picture of me. And really, nothing until my parents took me home two days before Christmas.

I suppose many people who might be reading this are thinking, “For crying out loud! Talk about trying to find something to blame.” Let me address that. I read an interesting article about the “Primal Wound” or the initial separation between a mother and her baby. I came across an article with this commentary…

“Many people worry that the notion of the primal would fosters victim status in birthparents and adoptees. I propose that it simply acknowledges an existing condition through which we often already feel like victims! This same misperception is seen in adoptive parents’ worries about how traumatic the telling about his or her adoption might be to their child, without any consideration given to the fact that the adoptee was there, and felt it when it happened! (If you have any doubts as to what babies—even before birth—feel, sense and know, there is plenty of research available.) To try and pick oneself up by the bootstraps and ‘get on with it’ before having the chance to lick one’s wounds, to even see one’s wounds, that is when one’s life vitality is siphoned off, by any of myriad defensive coping mechanisms, by over-whelming feelings of hopelessness, helplessness, depression, and sometimes by thoughts—or more than thoughts—of suicide.”

Another article I read had this to say…
"The adoptee is often given very little information about her relinquishment. She is expected to leave the past behind and concentrate on her present and future. Out of respect for the adoptive parents, she will often not ask questions or talk about her adoption if it is an uncomfortable subject in her home. She will wonder about her relinquishment and her birth mother. To attempt to fill in the gaps she will create fantasies of acceptable scenarios of the circumstances of her conception, birth and relinquishment, that she can emotionally handle.”

I have often had a problem with the “chosen” child story. My well-meaning parents often said things like that or another common one “You were born from my heart.” I never quite knew why and in some respects still don’t, but to hear the word “chosen” on the other end means rejected. Not only that, but what does chosen in this context really mean? And really, that in and of itself is a misnomer. They didn’t get to pick me really. I was given to them.

As a result, I think I developed a perfectionism attitude that I need to live up to my “special status.” For a very long time, I played the part well. I grew up in a nice, Christian home where certain values were encouraged and enforced. I remember often feeling very guilty growing up. My mother took it as a personal affront to her as a mother if I misbehaved or acted outside the realm of what was behaviorally acceptable. I remember one time she asked, “What did I do wrong?” So, I began going out of my way to hide any infractions. I was “special” and I was “chosen” and my mom was personally devastated by my mistakes. I also felt guilty if I displayed a personality different from my parents or acted in ways they did not, or had talents neither of them understood. My mom likes to tell me how similar we are and that we are “on the same page.” She has especially taken to this recently. In reality, we are not similar. This is not something to be frowned on, but celebrated. I have thought for a long time that I get along with my parents better than most people get along with theirs because I AM adopted. I do not have the same genetic make-up and therefore can come at them and relate to them in friendship as opposed to a forced genetic connection. I love my parents out of choice, not because I have to. I think that is a beautiful thing…

Anyway, going back to what started this discussion in the first place… I am just now, at 26 years of age, grieving what happened to me when I was born and coming to grips with the issues that have been an undercurrent throughout my life: feelings of not belonging, perfectionism, a propensity towards self-blame and harm, difficulty identifying and communicating negative emotions and fear of truly being myself. I think that despite the well-intentioned people in my lives from start to finish, I have never felt free to just be myself. I have a different genetic make-up than the family who raised me, yet I have felt the need to conform to their social, familial and social structure and therefore denying some of my natural tendencies. Deep rooted feelings of abandonment paralyze moving forward to true emotional intimacy. Fear of rejection causes me to hide a lot of myself from people. And finally, a constant drive to be perfect nearly sending me over the edge and has left me traumatized.

I don’t know if any of this is necessarily makes sense. Maybe it sounds hokey… But I think there are a lot of things that happen to people and leave emotional scars that are never acknowledged and therefore, continue to be a problem throughout life with no understanding as to why. I see exploring this not as a blame game to continue destructiveness towards self or others, but as a way to recognize all parts of my life and experiences that have made me who I am so I can make progress towards healing and making lasting changes.

Empathy

I have drawn a conclusion about myself in the past couple of days. It is something that I've noticed for a long time but for whatever reason, never quite put the whole puzzle together. My revelation came in response to two incidents where serious discussions were had, but I was overly upset in response to a relatively calm tone and demeanor from the other parties. After a lengthy discussion with the second person this happened with, I finally realized what was going on. I was not reacting to what was being said or their spoken tone or demeanor. I was reacting to the energies they were emoting from the inside. After more discussion, I realized that I am abnormally sensitive to other's emotions...overly empathetic if you will. I can literally feel what other people are feeling without visual or auditory clues.

I guess I just thought my sensitivities were normal. Most people have sympathy for others. Many people relate to other's problems. Some even experience empathy towards others in particular situations...especially if the two people are close. But mine is different. I can feel things that others are not saying. I physically react to very strong outputs from others. My feelings get overly hurt because even if another person doesn't say or act in such a way, I can feel everything that they don't say. Sometimes people bring such a cloud with them, it literally oppresses me. One of our assistants at work is going through something. She wears her sadness like a piece of clothing to me. It is driving me nuts.

It is also aggrevating to me always knowing when people are being less than truthful or outright lying to me. When people lie, they put out strong waves of guilt...even if they are good liars otherwise. Aggitated and people with lots of nervous energy also affect me in a very negative way. It can take me hours to calm down from an encounter with such a person.

Sometimes I will get vibes off of perfect strangers. People I have encountered have been bothersome to me in a way that other's don't see. Sometimes there are voids around people that lead me to believe they are sociopaths. Ill intentions are often felt. Those feelings have saved me a couple of times. I also get needs from people. Case in point, I was recently on a business trip. When I got to my seat on the airplane, I got a sense that the other woman in the row with me really needed and wanted to talk. I had a choice of ignoring it and putting on my headphones or letting her strike up a conversation that I felt she desperately needed to have. I was right. She did need to talk and I felt she had a sense of calm by the time she got off of the plane that she didn't have when she walked on.

My mom has a variation of this "gift." She doesn't recognize feelings off of people in quite the same way that I do unless she has a bond with them, but she can absorb people's pain for short periods of time to give them some relief from various symptoms. It is quite the interesting phenomenon. I was having a particularly bad month of sleep and I was just exhausting myself. I stayed over at their house and finally had a wonderful night of sleep. The next morning, my mom asked how I slept and I replied "fantastic! I have no idea why I slept so well but I did." She smiled and admitted she took on my sleep problem so I could have some rest. She hardly slept that night. She's done that for friends and relatives several times in the past. I've actually witness it happening.

If anyone is reading this that experiences things in a similar way, I would be interested to know some of your experiences. Sometimes this gift is a blessing and sometimes a curse. Because I cannot actually tap into their mind, I don't always know what is causing their output. If I ask and they lie, I know that too. It is very frustrating. I can only help if people let me. Some people give me energy; others drain it. If I open myself up to the experience, I absorb a lot off of other people. I went through a period of 3 years of completely shutting myself off. That led to unhappiness as does opening myself too much. People can unknowingly and knowingly take advantage of me. I haven't quite found the balance of dealing with this ability.

I am interested in any insight readers of this blog might have.

Vomit

A conversation I recently had spurred me to really think about how many times I’ve thrown up since I started in with Bulimia. Additionally, my doctor pointed out in my last visit that the average person throws up maybe 2-3 times every 4 years from usually either the flu or from food poisoning.

In order to do that, I have to work backwards. This past January – March 2006, I’ve probably thrown up an average of once every two weeks or 6 times in 3 months. Last year, I would go up and down with major continuing episodes followed by periods of inactivity. Let’s just say an average of two times per week totaling around 104 times. August – December 2005, I was averaging 3 times per day. That’s 5 months with an average of 30 days/month. Vomiting total during that time was 450 times total. Prior to that, probably since I moved down to FL in Feb. 2004, let’s average it to 2-3 times per week for almost 2 years. You’re looking at around 200 times. In 3 years, I have thrown up around 650 times. The over 3 years prior to that, you’re probably looking at an average of once per week or about 160 times in those 3 years. Grand total times I’ve thrown up over 6 ½ years is probably somewhere around 920 times. 920 episodes of forcing myself to vomit. I really did not understand why my doctor kept saying how “lucky” I was not to have caused more damage to my body. In the context of me throwing up around 900 times in a little over 6 years vs. the average of maybe 4 times for the average person due to illness… Wow! Those numbers are quite scary.

It brings up another issue entirely of dear GOD how could no one have noticed how sick I was??? ONE person noticed. At least enough to say something. ONE! ONE! The dark, dark circles under my eyes and generally sick appearance was the tip-off. You would think that my husband might have cared enough to notice. You might have thought that my on-going sensitive stomach might have been a cause for concern. Nope. It was a relative stranger that saw and cared and was very instrumental to me in getting help. In fact, I will go as far to say that it saved my life. My body would not have lasted at the rate I was going prior to seeing a counselor in Feb. 2006 with averaging throwing up 3 times a day. Sometimes it was more. My heart could not have stood it. I have already put myself into a major danger zone. *sigh* But the important thing for me to keep in mind is that I HAVE made progress...lots of it. And that has to be what keeps me going.