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In Reply to: Re: reposting of Kristi's post - good for discussion posted by Kristi on April 22, 2002 at 11:34:27:
Leaving the Fam for a SGA is no doubt mind boggling for the reasons you've explained, but it's just as true for the the ist generationers cause I went through some of those things myself. You can also tell by some of the posts you'll bump into by those ist generationsers who are still in recovery or denial. I'm going to start in my own back yard here and see what's available, then move on to other states. etc... It'll be a start.
I was fortunate enough to be a handy man and was able start my own little business, so I've never really accessed much of anything for myself, but I am aware that the system is set up to help us succeed. That takes care of the physical. As for the emotional and the spiritual, well, there's lots of books and there's the boards, and there's therapists etc... All in all, total support can be available and 'failures' (people going back in) don't have to happen.
In regards to some of what you have been going through (with you sister) as a partner to a survivor of childhood sexual abuse, I can suggest a few things as I, myself, am a partner to a survivor of childhood sexual abuse. I didn't know that until the last couple of years when the shit hit the fan and all hell broke loose around here.
My wife had been grieviously abused, GRIEVIOUSLY; farmed out to childhood prostitution and pornagraphy at the tender age of ten. Her daddy walked her across the street and gave her to them and they tied her down and broke her in and did their business. Joining the Fam was an attempt at revovery from that abuse, and from the very near successful suicide attempt to end it all, just prior to joining the Fam. Her mother (whom I suspect had also been abused) was constantly ill and I think daddy prostituted his girls out to pay the medical bills. BAD DAD! Aside from that, he molested them himself, and what was so very difficult for my wife to acknowledge was the fact that her daddy was abusive, cause SHE LOVED HER DADDY. Kinda like what some of us went through with Berg. There were lots of folks that loved him and clung to his words as a part of their own recoveries from whatever and separating out the abuse was so very difficult. Chipping away at the denials and seeing it for what it really is does get one over the hump though, and the boards here are good for that - they chip away at people's denials, expose the lies.
My wife's long held secret began to be chipped away when her sister phoned one night several years ago and told my wife that she had been to therapy for childhood sexual abuse. I remember my wife breaking down in bitter grief on the phone, but it was several years later before she went in and did the real work of remembering for herself, and she didn't do that until I got over the Family for MYSELF. I know now that until then it just wasn't safe. There was another time she broke down in a gasping panic attack when she found a girly mag under one of our boy"s bed. I didn't and couldn't make the connections back then, cause like I said, her abuse was a long held (and carefully guarded) secret. But I see it now, that she was reacting to the abuses of the past and even in an indirect way, trying to communicate that to me.
She did finally go in and get it all out, but not without a tremendous battle. The change in the family dynamics with me having just healed from the Family, and now her having healed, and all the boundary readjustnments, litterally threatened to blow us apart and damn near killed her. The stress of it all brought on a very severe gall bladder-pancreas attack. Thankfully the doctors were able to catch her in time and save her life cause she was a goner for sure! (to be continued)
