Cutting Her Out

Since the mother is the first,

the basic caretaker,

losing her -in a physical or emotional way-

starts a nightmare of deprivation

for a child.

In a way, it never ends.
Missing Mother Syndrome

Can't help wondering... what you're wondering about?

Some subjects are so broad they defy tackling in a blog post. Child Abuse is certainly on that list. So is child abandonment.

The purpose of most of my posts is simply to raise awareness, trigger interest in learning more, and provide some sources to begin a process.

Nothing more...the rest is up to you.

This is a picture of me and my Mom.

As a child in pain, I cut her out of it.

Still in pain, I taped us back together.

The story that follows was told so many times that occasionally I think I remember bits of it. Mostly I doubt that... unless perhaps on some deep level where emotions linger like silent watch dogs who never make a sound before attacking. In any case, the story goes like this.

Dad was enlisted in the Army Air Corp, stationed in Mississippi, training and waiting to go to war. His young wife, far from her home and family in New Jersey, waited with him. They lived in a rented, furnished room with bath down the hall. They survived on Corn Flakes and Beer.

I was born during that time. They brought me home to that room to spend my first few months in a dresser drawer used as a bassinet. Before I learned to walk, Mom was pregnant again. By the time I was walking, running, learning to climb, she couldn't stand the stress of waiting for Dad to be deployed, being pregnant in the heat and humidity of Mississippi, dealing with an active toddler confined in one room.

Mom wasn't willing to be separated from Dad, so for the good of all, they said, they brought me to New Jersey by train and left me there with family.

His family!

Total strangers!

Abandoned me in an unknown world!

Or so it might have felt to me. The story goes I was inconsolable. I cried so much that Dad claims the extended family felt sorry for me. He always said they did everything possible to turn me into a spoiled brat forever.

Mom and Dad returned to New Jersey a couple months later…just a few weeks before my brother was born. They moved into a room in the big house I'd learned to call home. By then I'd bonded deeply with Dad's Mom, my Grandmother, and with my Aunt and Uncle who lived there. When I wouldn't come to Mom and Dad, Mom said Dad's family had turned me against them.

I was seventeen months when my brother was born. That was the day World War II "ended." Our family war had only just begun.

Related Information:

What is Abandonment?

Specific Problems in Traumatized Children with Attachment Disorders

(at Imaginif...)

Emotional Abuse of Children: A Study of the Narratives in Protective Assessment and Intervention

What is Attachment Disorder?

Neglect in Childhood

The Anatomy of a Trauma

Isolated Pattern

A Child is Waiting,
Take care...be aware,
Nancy Lee

Survivors Can Thrive!: I've Created a "Survivor Needs" Meme

Marj from "Survivors Can Thrive" threw
the ball to Megan Bayless from "Imaginif..."

Asked her to play in the "Survivor's Needs" meme.

Then Megan threw the ball to me.
Now I'm throwing it to you!

Catch it if you can!

Can't help wondering...what you're wondering about? When Megan made me "it" I didn't even know what a Meme was! I also wasn't sure I wanted to play! Well, play I did, and learned what others already know...playing a Meme is a bit like playing Chess. You can learn the moves and play it light for fun...or play it as though your life depends on it... As a survivor I know two things about playing hard ball with my past. One is that sometimes it hurts to play. The other is that it always leaves me feeling lighter and stronger.

The Way to Play Marj’s Meme.


1. Please link back to Marj's post so people can see the origins of the meme, get ideas for their own self-care list, see who’s already been tagged, and maybe we can track how far this meme goes.

2. List 25 needs. and five wants. Try to restrict your needs list to things that have to do with being a survivor of some sort of abuse, assault, etc.

3. List 5 wants. Your wants list can be anything you want!

4. Use this list to remind yourself to get your needs met in this New Year.

5. Pass on the meme and tag five people to play the meme with you.


So, Here's my Survivor's Needs Meme...


My 25 Needs. As a Survivor of Child Sexual Assault and a Survivor of Other Physical, Emotional, Psychological Abuse and Neglect Throughout my Childhood and Beyond, and also as a Survivor of Perpetrating Abuse and Neglect on My Children:

1. I need release from having fear as my constant companion, day and night, as it's been since my very early childhood.
2. I need to be free to do whatever necessary to feel safe in my home, in my mind, and around people who are not threatening to me.
3. I need to be free to do whatever necessary to minimize stress in my life, in order to maximize the conditions conducive to maintaining the level of mental health I have achieved.
4. I need to be free to stop participating in my own use, abuse and neglect.
5. I need to learn saying NO is healthy and appropriate, and act accordingly.
6. I need release from the lingering sense of guilt and shame that as a child I somehow caused adults to abuse and neglect me.
7. I need to be free to feel what I know to be true…no child causes the bad behaviors of adults; no child deserves the terrible things some adults, including me, do to innocent children.
8. I need release from the lingering guilt and shame over failing my own children as a parent in so many ways, and in failing to break the cycle of abuse and neglect of generations that came before us.
9. I need to be free to feel pride about the many good things I did for my children that continue on as good things in the lives of some of my grandchildren.
10. I need to be free to feel the forgiveness my children have given me for lacking the necessary awareness, skills, knowledge, and strength to fully protect them from myself.
11. I need to feel responsible for my failures as a parent, but not accept blame for other's failures and inappropriate behaviors towards my children.
12. I need to be free to feel good about the many ways I did protect my children from others and myself who would have harmed them.
13. I need release from guilt and shame that I'm not doing enough to protect other children from abuse and neglect.
14. I need to be free to feel pride over what I have done for other children.
15. I need to be free from guilt and shame that I don't try harder to accomplish a goal I believe may help some children.
16. I need to feel so safe in ways I can't even imagine that I feel free to develop trusting relationships.
17. I need to be free to do whatever necessary to feel safe without feeling I'm being selfish.
18. I need to feel loved in spite of my negative experiences and imperfections as a child and an adult, not feel that no one could love me or even like me if he or she knew all about me.
19. I need continued personal acceptance of my own responsibility for doing the best I can with what each day contains.
20. I need to be free to continue doing everything possible to open the discussion of child abuse and neglect to the children who are abused and neglected, and to the adults who abuse and neglect children. Professionals need to listen to both voices. Truth, like a diamond, has many faces.
21. I need to believe that although I was injured and remain scarred as a result, I am not "less than" or "damaged goods."
22. I need my acceptance of myself as developmentally challenged in early life through no fault of my own. Although I can never be whatever I might have been in other circumstances, I have many gifts and talents to use to accomplish my goals as I am.
23. I need others to understand that I am not all black or all white, not all good, nor all evil. That does not mean I think being human is an excuse for child abuse and neglect. There are no excuses, in my opinion. But there are reasons that can and must be addressed.
24. I need someone to believe that I would do or give anything to have lived a different life. I didn't grow up dreaming of abusing and neglecting my children as a goal, watching as the cycle continued on to my grandchildren. I don't believe anyone does.
25. I need you to know after a lifetime of change, I am what I am, was what I was, and will be what I will, with or without your judgment, with or without your sincere acceptance, with or without your empathic understand. It is the children who are abused and neglected and their perpetrators who need your support for change, now.

Wants:
1. I want to use my education and passion to increase awareness of child abuse and neglect issues to spur others to fight for changes I believe are possible. I want millions of people to unite for children's rights as some have for other oppressed peoples.
2. I want more people to do whatever necessary to become better educated so they understand that child abuse and neglect will not ever be stopped by locking up perpetrators. Yes, those who abuse and neglect children should be identified, held responsible, treated, educated, punished, and monitored, as needed, and in some cases even locked up for a lifetime. But we need to replace failing systems with new and creative solutions to this global problem if children will ever have the childhoods they deserve and need in which to thrive and become healthy adults who would never, even accidentally or out of ignorance, abuse or neglect a child.
3. I want to pursue my lifelong dream for which I prepared by investing many years of my time, and many thousands of your tax dollars in student loans that may never get repaid, (but I assure you, aren't in default!) All of that together hasn't been enough to overcome such low self-esteem that in spite of excellent training, writing and illustrating picture books for abused and neglected children seems still beyond my abilities.
4. I want to wake up feeling glad to be alive and eager to live each new day, not wake up feeling soul weary, not wishing I was dead, not dreading whatever the day might bring.
5. I want my mental health medications and support systems to continue working as well as, or better than, they have for fifteen years now, so that I can continue to be "high functioning" on behalf of children everywhere. for

Blogs I Tagged:

Cerebral Mum http://cerebralmum.com/
The OTHER Mother http://theothermother.typepad.com/
Reflections of a Foster Youth http://prairieguy.wordpress.com/
Sunshine Girl on a Rainy Day – Lisa http://sunshinegirlonarainyday.blogspot.com/
Child Care Gone Wrong http://childcaregonewrong.blogspot.com/
http://lifespacings.blogspot.com/ Jumping in Puddles at Life Spacing

...and one for good measure...
She Knows Message Board

A Child is Waiting,
Take care...be aware,
Nancy Lee

The best place to thrive?

Home life as we understand it

is no more natural to us

than a cage is natural to a cockatoo.

George Bernard Shaw

Can't help wondering...what you're wondering about?

While I was out visiting around the net, I stopped to chat a bit at Imaginif...Child Protection was Serious Business. Nothing surprising about that as it remains a favorite site, frequently visited. I found myself getting carried away about child abuse and neglect...nothing surprising about that either?!...this time in terms of foster care, residential care, etc. and what environment is in the best interest of a child. I realized I'd gone far beyond Charmayne's focus, and even my usual comment lengths, so decided to return "home" to finish my wondering for now.



You might want to see Charmayne Paul's post, Residential and Specialized Care Models: Outcomes for Children in Out-of-Home Care, to put the following in the context that set my mind to wondering...

...............................................................................................................
Hi Charmayne, Yes to young people participating in debates on foster care, residential facilities and such! I hope we "get it" soon, that children's perspectives are valid and more informed about many things we may never learn through artificially constructed research and longitudinal studies.

As I was reading your post and thinking about my personal opinion that high quality, residential facilities (fully staffed and supported with the best people for each position, of course!) could be the most viable solution, at this time, world-wide, for many of the ever increasing child abuse and neglect cases, as well as for the serious behavioral cases, a pop-up alerted me to the following e-mail that coincidentally is related to this discussion:
Orphaned Children Show Higher Intelligence And Fare Better In Foster Care Than In Institutions

However as interesting as I found it, I remain convinced that the residential alternative needs to be explored as an option since foster care is so abysmal in most cases, and privatized home visitation care (here in the USA) is proving to be another way for some to make money with a minimum of actual delivery of services.
Being an optimist in some cases...one case being a hope for the children of tomorrow, if not today...I can't help thinking about possibilities that combine some of the failings of society in order to promote other alternatives. For example, quality residential facilities that provide for the safety, health, education and general welfare of children, augmented by programs of some degree of stipend for "foster grandparents," or "foster families" committed to the development of long term relationships with a child or siblings, to provide the nuturance and stability that extended families can. I see them providing that element of time intensive "specialness" that can be lost in residential care, writing, phone calls, visits, taking child for holidays, etc. There are so many children needing loving relationships and so many able adults who do as well, but programs that try to fill that need here, like Big Brothers/Big Sisters, Foster Grandparents, etc. leave too much to be desired. And too much risk to the children because of insufficient oversight. Given a residential facility interactions between adult and child can be observed randomly...

Sorry! It occurs to me that I am getting carried away here as a comment so I'm returning to my blog where anyone interested can pick up any additional ramblings...
....................................................................................................................

Seems like I have more passion for this idea than I realized and therefore need to do some research on the subject rather than rambling on in an apparently manic phase!

For starters, about the need for the debates globally, today's news contained the usual assortment of children abused, neglected, even murdered at home, in foster care, under DYFS supervision, and so forth:

Weld County probed in deaths of 7 year olds

More Florida children die from abuse

Charge dismissed in child death case

The Jakarta Post: Child abuse on the rise in RI: Commission

And the news also contained a variety of articles addressing failing systems, and alternative options such as:
Foster care numbers move upward in 'Lake of the Ozarks
Plans Goal: Less Foster Care
Missouri needs to bolster services to poor children


Obviously the idea of residential care as an alterantive for abused and neglected children, of all ages and circumstances covers more territory than I realized, and deserves some serious attention. At it's base, the concepts of home and family must be explored. Are the best of both what we have declared them to be, or like any other social constructs are they subject to change...perhaps for the better? Can the ideal home and family considered so important as a determinant of the environment in the best interests of a child be something yet unknown, yet to be constructed? So, as I gather more information, I'll be adding to this idea in the days to come. Please jump in with any of your thoughts or sources of information!

A Child is Waiting,
Take care...be aware,
Nancy Lee

Words left unspoken may hurt, too...

Great opportunities to help others seldom come,

but small ones surround us every day.
- Sally Koch

Can't help wondering...what you're wondering about, today? A request from Megan at Imaginif... to post a comment I left at Cerebral Mum , so she, Megan, can share it with others, left me wondering about how we never know what words or actions we drop somewhere in passing may be noticed...may even make a positive difference for someone?

How many times have you wanted to say something, then thought it silly to say, so left words unspoken that someone might have wanted to hear? I can't count the times I've done that. As, unfortunately, I can't count the times I've said something that would have been better left unsaid. So here are the words I left in passing, yesterday.


..............................................................................................................

What can I add to the comments already posted, when they say so many of the things I’d say? You are so beautiful in your honesty and determination to give so openly and freely. All of you.
This blogging community, and that includes you, Cerebral Mom… has given me something I never found in nearly 65 years of searching.

When I was a child I identified with the ugly duckling… but somehow every time I thought I’d found the swans with whom I belonged, there was still no happy ending.

I read voraciously as a child and adult, seeking a map or at least some direction to follow to lead me to that community where I’d be accepted as myself. Nothing more. That would be more than enough! And yet when I found this blogging community the result was so much more than I ever imagined that could be.

After a life time of wondering, crying, even screaming, Why don’t I fit in? Why doesn’t anyone understand me? What’s wrong with me that I can’t be like them, and belong?the answer comes at last.

The group of beautiful swans to which I’ve always belonged had no voice, no presence. We who were abused and neglected as children were invisible, individually and as a community, because the world of ducks convinced us we were too ugly to be seen.

Now they can’t keep us hidden. We see each other and say… WOW! Perhaps the ducks were blinded by so much beauty! Or maybe the ducks knew in their hearts, if they have any, that once we saw each other’s beauty, we would see our own, and once our own beauty was seen, we would also see how pathetic and ugly the ducks always were.

Now, through the honesty and determination to let others see us as we are…we’ve become so beautiful in our honesty and determination that we shine as beacons to the others still feeling lost and seeking their place to belong, to become, to be aware and to take care.
.........................................................................................................................

As an afterword...
I think ducks are beautiful, too!

And thank you for asking, Megan, although this is as good a time to say this as any... contrary to US Copywrite Laws, unless otherwise noted, my words are free for the taking...

A Child is Waiting,
Take care...be aware,
Nancy Lee

CASA's - Crazy About Kids

It can now be your choice to stop participating in

the oppressive nature of child abuse and to

reclaim your life, how YOU want it to be.

It can be your choice to take back the power

from the perpetrators and to

use your experience to help others.

Megan Bayless

Can't help wondering...what you're wondering about during this season of giving? We'll "Imaginif...Child Protection Became Serious Business" is having their Carnival Against Child Abuse Christmas 2007 Edition . I enjoy Megan's "stuff" so much that I decided to indulge myself today and just poke along through all the exciting blog postings there.

We'll, then I discovered Kate at Baby Lune is sponsoring a writing contest on a "favorite charity that acts against child abuse," so, of course I took time to write one while I was taking this "busman's day off" from reading and writing about child abuse! No hope for some of us, is there?


CASA's - Crazy About Kids

CASA's are volunteer Court Appointed Special Advocates for abused and neglected children. There aren't enough of them for many reasons, but here are a few:

CASA's have to care enough about children to be strong in the presence of the effects of abuse and neglect, and not give in to the luxury of venting their own anger and grief over the abominations committed against children, so often inflicted by their so-called caretakers.

CASA's have to care enough to enter homes where they aren't welcome, and sometimes would rather not be, ask personal questions that are resented, seek information about the home that people would rather never have known, sometimes risk physical danger, and all the while remain polite and attempt to establish a trust relationship with children and adults who often have no reason to trust anyone.

CASA's have to care enough to spend hours waiting around courtrooms to be there with and for the children for whom they advocate, only to have the case postponed so they can do it again. They have to make innumerable calls to attorneys and others who won't return calls, and are uncooperative when reached.

CASA's have to care enough to spend hours pouring over ill-kept records in unfriendly agencies, seeking information that can help a judge decide in the best interest of a child, rather than follow recommendations that may be carelessly suggested by over-worked child welfare staffers, or worse, may be profit or politically motivated.

CASA's have to show up at odd times and odd places to serve as advocates. They attend conferences at schools, joint-conferences at agencies, discussions in hospital rooms, clandestine meetings in dark cars on side streets, and anywhere else that might contribute an essential piece of information. Sometimes they even act as squatters for long hours, refusing to leave situations where danger to a child could be imminent without their continued presence.

CASA's have to do many things, like these and more not mentioned, to fulfill their legal commitment to serve the court. They do many more things to fulfill their heart-commitment to the children they serve. Many of those things you will never learn about because most CASA's do for children, not for recognition. Some things CASA's do take time, some money, some energy. CASA's volunteers donate it all, because they want to, not ever because they have to.

One other thing CASA's don't have to do, but the one thing all CASA's do, is care so much about abused and neglected children being protected from the worst sides of mankind that no matter what else they may have to do CASA's remain committed to finding and bringing out the best side of mankind in every one connected to the children for whom they advocate.

Courts can appoint many people from various professions to advocate for abused and neglected children. However, what can't be appointed is the part of every CASA volunteer that makes them truly a CASA. When all is said and done CASA'S are indeed Special.

So!…friends and family who read this will demand! So!… if CASA's are so special, if they are so needed, if they make such an important difference for abused and neglected children, and if, as you claim, you choose to devote yourself to children's welfare, WHY did you resign as a CASA?

The answer is simple. One reason I resigned is something everyone can do something about to keep other CASA's from resigning for the same reason. I am disabled and live on a below-poverty income. Gas and automobile expenses have skyrocketed in the past year. CASA's are on the go a lot. As is so often the case for organizations that depend on volunteers as workers, the CASA I belonged to cannot afford to reimburse volunteers for gas…or anything else besides some phone calls. In my experience, there isn't enough money in the world to hire someone to do what CASA's do…but there might be enough to at least keep them able to do it.

The other reason I resigned you may, or may not, be able to do anything about, but I will share the reason anyway. CASA's, as I've said and believe, are Special people. Perhaps I simply was not special enough. Perhaps the cause is otherwise. In any case, I wasn't special enough inside myself to stand strong against the continual onslaught of public and professional opinions proffered on every possible occasion that CASA's cause trouble for other agencies involved in children's welfare (they surely try!), that CASA's act like nothing else is as important as the best interests of the children (they surely do!), and that CASA's act like they know more about the children they represent than anyone else working for them does (that's true, too!) and that CASA's act like being a volunteer is as important a job as being paid to do whatever they do, and more valuable from the individual child's perspective. (Maybe?) Actually, I think CASA's ARE usually better on both counts.

PS: For Anyone interested in the pleasantly surprising results for the CASA article see:

Because Holidays are About Families over at Baby Lune.

And be sure to check out Gwendolyn Gross's book The Other Mother!

A Child is Waiting,
Take care...be aware,
Nancy Lee

SMILE! You could be the one to stop child abuse...

The sight of human affairs

deserves admiration and pity.

And he is not insensible who pays them

the undemonstrative tribute of

a sigh which is not a sob,

and of a smile which is not a grin.

Joseph Conrad

A Personal Record, Preface

Can't help wondering...
what you're wondering about?

I'm wondering, as I always do, what we can do...
each and every one of us...
no matter where, when or to whom, that might make a difference in protecting a child from abuse.

Asking a lot? I guess.

But today I came across one possible answer!
The funny thing for me about this is that I use this tip in my own life, but just never thought about sharing it.

Duh!

When I lived in Okinawa, Japan I was impressed by how friendly the people always were. I was told Okinawa was actually called "The Isle of Smiles."

A small island nation with its share of enemies, the Okinawans had decided early on to live by a simple philosophy as a means to increase their safety. Based on the premise that people might see you without a smile, assume that meant you were angry at them and might then attack you before you might attack them, they reasoned that the best defense then would be a good offense. SMILE! That way there wouldn't be any room for misunderstanding, they decided, and so they did.

And so I do when I encounter angry situations among adults and children. I also try to say something light and friendly to the child or children, just for good measure. usually it works for the moment to defuse the situation. That's a start...maybe one step closer to protecting the child at least for the time being.

So, Smile!

Now for the origin of today's musings. I've mentioned the site "Imaginif... Child Protection Became Serious Business" several times before. It's one of my favorite sites dealing with child abuse issues. It has posted a great piece by Megan Bayliss, Child Safety, entitled
"Who is Responsible for Child Protection. Smile, in case it is you!"

If that isn't a bumper sticker it should be! And even better as a bumper sticker is part of the closing lines in the article:
"Spread a random smile for child protection upon your dial today. Be careful and responsible though, its contagious and may cause great relief to a troubled person."

So, whether bumper sticker, or philosophy for living in a safer world,

"Smile!" is good advice.

On the other hand, in order to give you a full picture, and remind you that there are no simple answers, I'll tell you the rest of the story about Okinawa's smiles. The story is that some people from other lands talking about the Isle of Smiles decided that the smiles must be the result of some great secret. Perhaps a secret stash of gold? No the island wasn't big enough or wealthy enough to consider that as a reason for the gold. They decided the only logical explanation had to be that the Okinawans had discovered the Fountain of Youth! That lead to attempts to discover from the hapless Okinawans where the fountain could be found. With no answers, and only bigger smiles from the Okinawans, the foreigners frequently flew into rages and beheaded the Okinawans. So, as with all things...moderation is recommended!
And while I'm reminding you about Imaginif...'s site, let me recommend another recent post with a story that's sure to bring you a smile... see how we really can make a difference for the kids! Safe Kids: It's a Community Responsibility.

A Child is Waiting,
Take care...be aware,
Nancy Lee