"On Healing" October 2005

Posted on Mon, Oct. 31, 2005
Guilt may result from feeling helpless
By Dan Gottlieb

Dear Dr. Dan: For many years I have been struggling with my mother, who makes me feel guilty. As long as she was married, she was fine. But now that she does not have a husband, it seems as if she expects my husband and me to take his place.

She also will not ask for what she wants but will try to manipulate us into meeting her needs. I have tried to distance myself from her, but if I do not see or call her for a while, she becomes even worse.

She is a negative and unhappy person. She has had a history of depression in her family, but she refuses any therapy or medication. She is 83 years old and in great health. She could have a good life but all she does is complain and make everyone feel guilty.

I feel bad that she is so miserable, but it is hard for me to want to be around her when I am continually made to feel guilty.

I am at a loss as to what to do. My guilt keeps me from cutting communication altogether. I know this will get worse as she gets older and I do not want to spend my life feeling guilty. Maybe you can help.

- Meryl

Dear Meryl: Although your mother sounds pretty angry and manipulative, a woman in distress lives underneath her distasteful behavior. Given her history, she probably has a clinical depression, which is often associated with very low self-esteem and anxiety.

Anxiety demands comfort and nurture, but her low self-esteem probably renders her unable to say what she wants directly; hence the manipulation.

Ideally, she would see a good geriatric psychiatrist who could evaluate her and maybe recommend some medication. In addition, some wonderful programs exist that could help her manage her anxiety. She could also get involved with some friends to socialize or volunteer. This would help change her focus from inside to outside. From what you describe, she will not take a simple recommendation, so the message needs to be different.

Your mother sounds more scared than mean.

The guilt, though, is coming from you. My hunch is that you feel guilty because you tell yourself you should be doing more to make her happy. When that doesn't happen, you feel guilty and you get angry at yourself or at your mother. So while her suffering comes from depression, yours comes in part from your own expectations and maybe from your mother's. You cannot cure her anxiety, nor can you change her depression. Often, guilt is a reaction to one's sense of helplessness. This may well be what's happening with you.

You said she is 83 and could have a good life. But what if you were wrong and the life she leads is the one she always will have? What if you could give up the fight to make her less anxious and more independent?

Usually what harms people and their relationships is not what they feel, it's when the feelings are unspoken. Because then we cannot learn from one another.

Imagine what would happen if you stopped fighting with your mother and asked her what she is feeling when she is alone. Invite her to say more than simply "lonely" or nervous. Ask about her fears and how long she has had them. Ask her to describe the pain of her loneliness. I'll bet it sounds a lot like yours.

Please don't try to reassure her that she will be OK or that you will be back soon. Just listen. If your mother could speak about her anxiety and you could talk about your helplessness and sadness, the relationship might shift dramatically. Her anxiety would not go away, nor would your helplessness. But the struggle might end.

Perhaps then you could both go into therapy together to work on your relationship. Then maybe your mother will understand that her depression, like all depressions, causes pain to loved ones also. Remember that first the emotions you both carry need to be faced, not fixed.

Posted on Mon, Oct. 17, 2005
Experience shows: Healing is within you
By Dan Gottlieb

My last column responded to the Catholic Church scandal by examining the impact of pedophiles on their victims. I reviewed a treatment model in which the perpetrator publicly apologized after understanding the harm he had done to a child. In response, Evelyn, who was abused as a child, sent the following letter:

Thanks for your article. I read with interest the part about the perpetrator of sexual abuse seeking forgiveness from his victim. Do you have any ideas about how to suggest this to one's perpetrator? I'd like a face-to-face meeting with the man who molested me, but I don't know if he acknowledges that he was wrong. I myself have forgiven him, but perhaps he fears further accountability and restitution for the damage done.

I wrote to Evelyn:

What you are seeking can be complicated and dangerous. So let's be protective of you. What I wrote was that the perpetrator should apologize to the victim, not seek forgiveness. The reason for the distinction is because the perpetrator has already taken something from you, and he cannot ask for anything more - even forgiveness. That is your prerogative, not his.

To be honest, if you have really forgiven him, why do you want the meeting? You risk being reinjured if he feels no empathy, compassion or regret.

Evelyn told me the meeting was not about forgiveness; it was about courage. As a girl, she could not protect herself from the perpetrator, and now she would like to know that she could meet him without losing her dignity. She wants to see him without the distorted impressions she had as a girl, though she doubts this will happen. She was abused by a Christian brother in the Philadelphia area more than 30 years ago, and has been unable to get access to his files.

Here's what I told Evelyn:

As I read your last two e-mails, I kept wondering what you needed to make this horrible event recede into history. And then I got an answer. You need information so you can see him as neither devil nor deity but as a broken man. I know you cannot get this information through a psychologist, and I don't know whether a lawyer could help. So now what?

To begin with, I would recommend seeing The Woodsman with Kevin Bacon. This movie was released last year and is the most honest portrayal of pedophilia I have ever seen. It shows the seductive danger of all pedophiles and the humanity of those trying to get better. You could get sexual-abuse information from a program such as the Joseph J. Peters Institute in Philadelphia, at 215-701-1560 or www.jjp.org.

When I was 12 years old, my seventh-grade teacher molested me. As I grew, I spent many years trying to understand this man I once idolized. I never had the opportunity to learn more about who he really was because he committed suicide several years later when he was discovered. So despite what felt like a desperate need to discover his humanity, I didn't have that option.

The healing happened when I realized that what I really needed was not to ferret out his humanity, but to find out more about mine. I feel sad for him and his family. I feel sad for all the children harmed by his illness. And I feel sad for the 12-year-old boy who couldn't quite figure out what to do with all that shameful information.

The history will never go away. And the sadness? Even though it happened more than 40 years ago, the melancholy still visits periodically, probably to remind me of that 12-year-old boy who felt ashamed and alone.

I wish you peace.

Posted on Mon, Oct. 03, 2005
The long-lasting harm pedophiles do
By Dan Gottlieb

Child sexual abuse is almost always done in secret, and the victim is usually manipulated into keeping quiet. Pedophilia is shameful. And because it so often remains private, the victim can carry the shame for a lifetime while the perpetrator stays in denial.

The psychological impact depends on the victim's relationship with the perpetrator. If the pedophile is a family member or someone who was trusted, the child not only suffers the abuse and betrayal but becomes confused about who and what is trustworthy. Often these children no longer trust their own judgment in people.

A man I treated said that after his father abused him, he had two choices: to hate his family or to hate himself. He said it felt safer to hate himself.

The most scarring kind of abuse is when it gets repeated or ritualized. Sometimes other family members know about the behavior but cannot acknowledge it even to themselves. So they pretend it isn't happening. And we now know that institutions can do the same thing. Like families, institutions often attack the accusers when confronted with the truth. I have treated many people who were rejected when they summoned the courage to tell the truth to their families.

Despite the shame and secrecy, healing remains possible. In her book, The Violence of Men: New Techniques for Working With Abusive Families, psychologist Cloe Madanes says that, ideally, the perpetrator seeks treatment, consisting primarily of developing empathy for the abused child. The perpetrator would come to understand not only his own illness, but the terrible pain his behavior causes a child. Ideally, he would feel great regret and remorse.

Madanes even has the perpetrator make a public apology to the child. In that way, the perpetrator takes back the shame he deserves. The child, while far from healed, feels a semblance of understanding from the larger world.

This process is based on the philosophy behind the successful truth and reconciliation hearings, which began in South Africa after the end of apartheid. In these hearings, what was private became public and those who were injured were able to say publicly who injured them and how. And those who wanted amnesty could say publicly what they had done and express remorse.

In the real world, of course, most perpetrators do not seek treatment. And if they do, their heart is not in it. And if it is, the risk of repeating remains for as long as they live.

So what happens to all these aging victims whose suffering was never acknowledged?

I treated a 35-year-old man who was repeatedly molested by his baby-sitting uncle when he was 7 years old. He couldn't tell his mother because he feared he had done something terribly wrong. But he begged her to find another baby-sitter. His mother responded that her brother was wonderful and caring so the abuse continued for several years.

The boy grew up and tried all sorts of drugs to numb the shame. And when he eventually told his parents, they sided with his uncle and said he must be making up these stories. Despite the pain of that confrontation, he no longer felt ashamed of what had happened. He realized that the illness he carried his whole life didn't belong to him. It belonged to his uncle and his family.

To all the men and women abused by people you trusted in the church, you may never find the justice that so many of us desire. And you may never hear your perpetrator say: "I understand that my behavior caused you terrible suffering. I understand that I've violated your body and your spirit."

But thanks to a devoted grand jury and a tenacious media, your story is being told. And now the larger community knows what happened to you.

I am sure thousands out there will agree with me when I say I understand the suffering you have endured. I understand the rage you must have carried. And I am deeply sorry for what happened to you. And despite the injustice, I wish you peace.

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