Beverly Engel Breaking The Cycle of Abuse (pdf)

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Because the wounds that result from the pain of rejection are espe-
cially difficult to heal, those who have experienced intense rejection
are often dominated by a desire to avoid further acts of rejection. They
do this by building defensive walls around themselves, walls that keep
out rejection but at the same time keep out intimacy and love.
Choosing Guilt over Shame
Since shame is so debilitating it makes sense that we would do almost
anything possible to try to avoid it. Human beings strive to remain in
control. We are raised to believe that we are responsible for what hap-
pens to us and that we can control our own lives. When something
goes wrong we tend to feel ashamed about the fact that we have lost
control of our lives. This is especially true of trauma victims who,
instead of simply believing that something bad just happened, tend to
believe that they somehow caused or contributed to the events and are
therefore responsible. Being victimized causes us to feel helpless and
it is this helplessness that leads us to feel humiliated and ashamed. As
a protection against feeling this helplessness and shame we take per-
sonal responsibility for our own victimization, in other words, we
trade guilt for shame.
Shame is often confused with guilt but it is not the same emotion.
When we feel guilt we feel badly about something we did or neglected
to do. When we feel shame we feel badly about who we are. When we
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Learn How to Identify and Manage Your Shame 93
feel guilty we need to learn that it is okay to make mistakes. When we
feel shame we need to learn that it is okay to be who we are. Another
distinction between guilt and shame is that shame comes from public
exposure to one s own vulnerability whereas guilt is private. It comes
from a sense of failing to measure up to our own internal standards.
When others discover or know that we were once helpless, we tend to
feel ashamed. We also feel exposed. If, on the other hand, we feel we
caused our own problems, we cease to feel as vulnerable, or as
exposed.
Shame to Anger
Turning shame to anger can actually be a positive way of reacting to
shame. Instead of taking the negative energy in, against oneself, the
energy is directed outward, against the person who is doing the sham-
ing or causing the shame. Most children are unable to do this because
of their tendency toward self-blame.
Rage occurs spontaneously and naturally following shame. It
serves a vital self-protective function by insulating the self against
further exposure and by actively keeping others away to avoid further
occurrences of shame. Extroverted children are more likely to express
rage at being shamed while introverted children often tend to keep
their rage inside, more hidden from the view of others (we ll discuss
this distinction further in the following chapter on anger).
Humiliation can be a fertile breeding ground for hatred and for
revenge-seeking. By hating one s oppressor and nursing revenge fan-
tasies, the shamed and wounded person can salvage something of his
or her dignity. To do otherwise, to give in to the power of others, may
feel to some like a relinquishing of one s integrity and in doing so, a
loss of respect for oneself.
Identifying with the Aggressor
A related way that victims suppress their feelings of helplessness is
identifying with the aggressor. We discussed this phenomenon earlier in
this book. We find the phenomena of identifying with the aggressor to
be particularly common with boy victims. In most societies it is not
acceptable for males to be perceived as victims. A boy who is sexually
molested, for example, will likely blame himself rather than face the
shame of having been a victim. He will also be less likely to tell anyone
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94 Breaking the Cycle of Abuse
about it, for fear of being further shamed. Because he has told no one
and because he begins to blame himself and even to convince himself
that he may have wanted it, he may also begin to identify with the
aggressor that is, become like his abuser. The only way left for him
to discharge his shame and aggression is to do to others what was
done to him.
Your Shame Inventory
The following inventory will help you understand how shame has
affected you in the past and in the present.
1. How did you react to the shaming experiences of your child-
hood? Did you blame yourself? Did you become angry?
2. Notice what triggers shame in you today. Is it criticism from
others, being called on your stuff (or as one client described it,
Having my covers pulled, ) or is it being rejected?
3. When are you most likely to feel shamed? Is it when you are
feeling the most insecure? Is it when you are trying to impress
someone?
4. Who is most likely to trigger shame in you? Is it the people
you care about the most? Or is it those you are trying to
impress? How about the people you feel inadequate around or
those who have rejected you in the past?
How Shame Can Cause You to Develop Abusive
or Victimlike Patterns
The inner experience of shame is to feel seen in a painfully dimin-
ished way. The self feels exposed and it is this sudden, unexpected
feeling of exposure and accompanying self-consciousness that char-
acterizes the essential nature of shame. Within this experience of
shame is the piercing, overwhelming awareness of ourselves as fun-
damentally deficient in some vital way as a human being.
In addition to feeling deficient when we feel shame we also tend
to feel impotent because it feels as though there is no way to relieve
the situation. It is easy to see, therefore, that those who were heavily
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Learn How to Identify and Manage Your Shame 95 [ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]

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