IMPERFECT Lady

Unsayable is in the Art!

In the past few days, I have gotten to see the actions of abuse in the language of actions, even if the words were silent.  Now, I am reading another book by Annie G. Rogers, "The Unsayable- The hidden Language of Trauma".  

What is totally connecting to me is the way we as humans speak, either in action and words, and actually how actions are much clearer and more accurate than the spoken word.

To walk the talk isn't that easy, when our bodies and unconscious knowing are not that easily controlled...for our bodies and our unconsciousness want to be known.

Annie writes,

"This book reveals specific aspects of my work toward one end; to write history where silence reigned, where silence was broken by an undeciphered cry that went unheard.  When all the traces of history have been erased and the body itself is inscribed with an unknown language, how does a child begin to speak?  How is it possible to listen so that the child comes to know something vital, and speaking freely becomes possible, so that living inside one's own body is no longer a nightmare?  These are the questions that would guide my listening."

"This book carries stories of terrible anguish girls have lived. They are stories of how something real impinges on us and marks us in our bodies. This thing - I'll call it trauma - enters our speech as if by stealth, through the back door, in the night.  Then it sounds as though we are speaking in code to one another and to ourselves, and that code is both the mark of trauma and is, itself traumatizing." Annie

Her book, as well as the movie, "The Celebration" by Thomas Vinterberg, are clearly making me see that when you are not allowed to talk about abuse, when your mind has shoved it far away out of reach of memories, Your body and life's actions will still be screaming out your correct past.

Annie, also gave me an insight about abusers.  How their ACTIONS are showing what happened to them.  How they are speaking their trauma in actions.  It makes sense to me. 

So, what is so thrilling in a horrifying way is that we are all speaking, just that no one is listening, for we are concentrating on what is being said, and not what is being acted out.

What Annie came to know, is that in a group dynamic of the old therapy ways, where you all sit around and 'share' your story, the story wasn't being told. But, put them in a room doing art, without rules, just giving them the supplies and a few words, incredible things would show up.  The body and unconsciousness would be doing the art!

I know this to be true in my experience; my quilts were done without direction, plan or words.

Unsayable is in the Art!

Weekend Fun!

I started the weekend, making Salsa with my daughter...we made two batches, ending up with 14 quarts.

She picked up our ingredients from the Farmers Market in Green Bay.  

On Sunday, Ann and I dyed about 8 yards of fabric...7 hours flew by.  Two women totally immersed in dyeing, just like the fabric.

I turned my kitchen into a play area...with the counter's covered, we could just focus on dye and how we wanted to manipulate the fabric. Spills and drips didn't matter.

  

Here are our first two pieces in the dye water.  Immediately we loved the color.

Meanwhile outside is our soda ash treated fabric drying....

The before and after is striking.  How can you not love the process of dyeing?  Seeing the fresh colors is incredible, and of course my favorite part to see them hung on the line.

Loving the Orange!

It is always a surprise to see what comes out...how the way we twist and fold the fabric creates a wonderful design.

My favorite piece of the day is this one.  I love how it formed by twisting it around a dowel and then scrunching it down and tieing it with floss.  It will be water on a quilt soon.

Thanks girls...I will enjoying using what we made!

Talking Crazy!

I watched the movie, "The Celebration" twice…although once through would have been enough… it is brilliant in depicting the dynamics of how covering up abuse is impossible; only the eye of denial sees it as gone.  For in reality you can't cover up how you have been altered…your untreated wounds continue to rule your life. 

I saw denial at its truest form being played out within the family…its response is what clearly marks its insanity.

How the truth enters in and then the response.  A response clearly rehearsed from eons past…expected.  Demanded.  Needed.

The orchestration of denial has everyone playing their part, except one.

One is singing off key….

He is the problem.  

He isn't following the family plot.

He dares to stand up and say what everyone is trying so hard to not say, while screaming it.

He becomes the problem…a bigger problem than the one they are all working to keep hidden.

He becomes the source of their wrath and anger, physically or silently opposing…for their very lives depend upon silence, and denial.  Denial is who they are. They don't have another person to change into.  Who would they be without the pretty story that they overlaid upon the wretched truth?

To see the abusers mother singing a haunting religious melody...echoes the FALC.

To see the wife focusing on the 30 year marriage, that she has always gotten what she needed.  

To know that the weakest, or perhaps the strongest killed herself to exit out of the false reality.

To be the one called crazy for standing up and saying the truth. 

The truth wasn't challenged.

But, the person uttering it was...he had to be crazier than the truth.

At the end, the abuser apologized and knew he would be left alone outside of the family, the wife let him go, alone and she stayed with her children…. LIKE HE was the ONLY Problem….Not her.

Not her who witnessed her son being abused….and did nothing.  

The siblings did an about face in a couple of hours….and all was well with thee.  

What it doesn't show is how you then have to work like hell to eradicate the denial files in your head, your beliefs and your relationships.  How your denial self is all you have and you then have to walk and find your true self.

Who am I if I am not acting to cover up abuse in my childhood?  Who am I when I am not crippled by the affects of not being with my own truth?

It shows a family in complete agreement that "one man" is the problem, when in fact the wife is his equal and the children who hold the secret their army.  

All soldiers giving up their lives in order to preserve the father's innocence….and mother's.  To Honor, Love, and Obey thy parents…always and forever.  To never ever say the truth about what happened to you.  

In your silence you hold their honor. It isn't so much that you speak for them, but rather that you don't speak for me.  You don't not call me crazy.

Yet the silence of words does not matter when it comes to the picture of the family.

The movie shows the actions of the adult children of abuse, how it SCREAMS I am abused, confused and wounded.

No matter how we close our mouths, the abuse leaks out by what we have to do to cover it up.

What this movie left me with the most, is that no matter if you say it out loud or not, it is running your life, by how your denial has to be stronger than the abuse.

The sister who took her own life, couldn't find nothing strong enough to cover up her abuse.

It kept shining through.  In her dreams, it happened time and time again.

What I know, is that if you accept the truth, the truth will not haunt you.

What I would love all Huhta's to do is to watch this film and see who they resemble…see who matches your behavior?  And how do you feel our story ended, in comparison to how this movie ended.

It is not a realistic ending.  The years of denial have left deep ruts into the psyche of generations of a family, and it can't be undone over night.  It is years in the correcting.  Yet, if you are willing to start leaning towards the truth and away from abuse, the Universe will support you. 

The difference between this movie and my truth speaking, is that I was asked to leave, by the silence.  No one stood up and asked my father to leave.  Instead, they paid his defense fees, they drove his truck, provide him with a home to live in, they did everything for him.  I was the one who knew I would not see them again.

Not as long as I was talking crazy.

 

 

Files you Mislabeled.

"In any treatment situation, it is the therapist who is responsible for holding two stories, or two plays, together. The work of sustaining a therapeutic relationship demands a two-sided or perspective in order to understand both stories. And the deepening of this relationship over time demands honesty and intimacy and sometimes extraordinary courage. Knowing that we are human, and therefore limited in our understanding and courage, we can be overwhelmed by these responsibilities. We can then create a greater distance to protect ourselves, and even appear to be unmoved by our patients’ responses to that distance. But the effect on our patients is deadening whenever we show them that they do not affect us. Or, alternatively, we can create an illusion of intimacy by making false promises, unwittingly seducing patients to reveal their deepest and oldest wishes, as if we could somehow mete out the right responses and withhold what would be harmful, as if we really knew that difference. But neither of these strategies really protects us from the terrible responsibility of holding another’s heart in our hands, at least for a time, while not forsaking ourselves.
As I write this sketch of my observations about clinical practice, I see that, rather obviously, they carry the story of the book as a whole. I hope that others—parents, teachers, patients of every age, but clinicians especially—will read this story as if standing outside a house at a window at night, peering into a room at once familiar and unfamiliar, and watching an unfolding drama that adumbrates their own knowledge of relationships in psychotherapy."

From Annie G Rogers, "A Shining Affliction - A Story of Harm and Healing in Psychotherapy"

To me, it isn't just in the world of therapy, but in life in general. We are both responsible for holding the story and play of our lives together.  Being engaged with another human is to be fully present, to be the witness of their truths...to have the courage to be true.

What is so amazing about Annie, is that she was a victim, she healed her wounds and can now be extremely affective as a therapist, for she can know what is helpful, what is needed...and that she must show up completely.

The key is always...I see you.  And in my experience, until I saw myself completely, there was no way I could see others.  We see only as far as we see ourself.

There are victims out there who are trying to help others, who have not dealt with their whole lives, especially perpetrators who focused only on their victim days and did not address their abusive ways.  If you can't see how your past is playing out in your present, you are not aware...and are repeating the past in the present.

This is how the legacy continues.  The lack of seeing the past, the past shows up in the present to be seen. You don't see it, and the pattern goes on and on.

The only way to stop the past from repeating is to see it.

See what actually happened there, not what your mind would like you to believe.  To see reality in the past, will stop the past from living in your present day.

I know this will be argued, but look around.  And see in families the dynamics being played out verbatium.

If you can find a therapist who will challenge your past in your present, you will be on the road to recovery. Recovering your past and correcting all the files you mislabeled.

Wearing the Label "Therapist".

I just finished Annie G Rogers book "A Shining Affliction - A story of Harm and Healing in Psychotherapy"...it is brilliant in the understanding of how the past arrives in the present, until the past is corrected, and it shows the delicate balance between therapist and client.  How the truth can be manipulated by either side...

Healing will take two people facing the truth.

"The psychotherapy relationship is two-sided, whether we acknowledge it is or not. Each person brings to that relationship whatever is unrecognized, unknown, and unapproachable in her or his life, and a wish for knowledge of truths and wholeness."  Annie

This alone is the key as to why some therapy works and others don't.  It isn't the total blame of the client, it is a relationship, where one person fails to show up fully, authentically...and I wonder what is the percentage of failures...Client or Therapist?

Blaming the client only will no longer be acceptable.  How many folks have a relationship with the 'crazy' one and who are not truthful?  How many times does the 'crazy' one get left standing alone, unsubstantiated?

What truly drives us crazy is not so much the actual facts of our history, but rather the lack of integrity of those who are 'helping' us....or our family and friends.  It is easier to put me into the category crazy, by my self.  But, it has more to do about their story than mine.

I love the title, HARM and Healing.  

For what most automatically believe is "If she would just get therapy, she would be healed"...and not take into the equation the other person in the therapy relationship...that there can be more harm being done in therapy, if the therapist doesn't see the client. 

It is amazing that you can continue on your path of being a victim....just being victimized by the therapy world.  Ugh. How can you know?

I instinctively have hung back from therapist, well actually from people...as someone I could rely on to tell me my truth.  I had followed folks for my first 46 years and they led me astray from reality.  Now, I was hell bent on going it alone.  Forcing myself to see that which I hadn't seen, feel what I had pushed away. Being aware instead of blindly following.

I love how Annie shows the nuances of the client and then the harmful behaviors of the therapist as well as what is healing.

It is my belief, that we are now on the cusp of recognizing that the crazy one isn't the only one who is misleading the healing, but that rather it is at the mercy of courage of the therapist.

In the past, the one with the most college credits or the one who sat behind the desk was seen as the wisest.  

That no longer will be the case.

I am thrilled that there are books like this one out there.

To show the way of not only how the past is repeated in our present, but how to get out of the cycle....and that it will take the right kind of person wearing the label "Therapist".

I am Humbled By Art.

This quilt came to mind while reading this section from Annie G. Roger's book, "A Shining Affiction."  

"Blue was the color of your mother?  Or comfort?" I nod.  He continues, "And then, the blue got poisoned, love got mixed with something nearly lethal to you." 

Annie's therapist was reading her Art.

When I see this quilt now, it will remind me of the recipe of abuse..."Love got mixed with something nearly lethal" to our soul.

My Art quilts have been my way of releasing the nearly lethal something, getting rid of the parts of me that were not authentic.

Below are my latest two quilts.  I love their energy, how alive, how intricately impossible they match.  The Art is unleashed and free to express...daring to be.

Art healing doesn't lie.  Art healing shows the inner wellness, always.  My nature and nature, colors and design all working together...with ease.

Beach House Memories....And, Beach House Memories Too!

What I am completely pushed back by is the way energy is sewed up in my quilts, how the unconscious small wounded part of me was still able to speak...in color and design.

I am humbled by Art.

A Field Of Truth.

"Then if you speak, you must not show your face, Or, if you show your face, you must not speak.  Shakespeare

 In Annie Rogers book, "A Shining Affliction" she writes,

"These words of Shakespeare's.  I make my own translation quickly; "Speak the truth and hide your feelings in response to her nonresponse; or make up what you think she wants to hear, but shut up about what you really feel."   

What is so mind blowing about this book, it is about therapists, but also therapist who are unhealed or who are blocked when it come to healing their patience, due to their own issues.  Incredible and astonishing and true. 

The weaving of this story is spellbinding...and tragic and enlightening, how the patients truly is in charge, how they bring in their truth, how they are so authentic and then how it is met.

Into what hands does their truth fall?

And how is it held and responded to.

I believe, if the folks in therapy knew how critical it is for us to find someone to hold our truths, that it is WAY more about how they hear us then, HOW we tell our truths.

It is my belief, that by the time an abused confused person happens to be sitting in a chair in any therapy type situation, they are desperately seeking someone to get them back to reality. 

And, if the therapist ISN'T in their own reality, HOW in the Hell, can they get us to ours???

This book is a Must read for anyone considering the line of truth work. That is what therapy is. We are looking to you to help us find our path in reality.  

I just know by my own experience, that when I wasn't in my truth, I couldn't see truth in others.  

Now that I am, I can be a witness to anothers truth.  I believe, to the depth of my being, that therapy will be changing in this direction. It will be a field of truth!

 

My Truth was Welcomed In.

As I sit back and ponder my Keynote at Dial Help's Gala, I recall telling Tom Rosemurgy, that I always felt safer when he was there.  It even struck me as odd, for I was mingling and thoroughly enjoying myself, so where did the "unsafe" feeling come from.

It occurred to me while taking my sheets off the line, that what he does is he upholds my truth with me.  He carries it, he believes me.  He, the Law Man.

I felt so safe with Tom and the Dial Help girls and even with the Audience.  Safe meaning my truth about my history was honored.

When I feel that with these kind folks, it makes me understand what "hostile" means.

It means NOT believing in me...

I know that some of my family reads this blog, and they would dispute my claims, that they don't believe me...or my story.  For they would say they do.

Yet the sole reason, I physically as well as emotionally have put distance between us IS their reaction to my truth.

While they were retaining a family, I was tearing it down exposing the abuse.

This is the parting of ways.

Their focus is and has been on keeping the family unit.  Which then leaves me standing there with my abuse showing and them paying more attention to keeping a family, than looking at how it affected me.

What I felt on August 9th, as I moved around the atrium with My Lady quilts fully displayed, were folks who seen me.

Their first agenda or words to me were not why I wasn't with my parents etc.

They were extremely attentive to the journey an abused person travels in order to regain their power.

My speech will not win ribbons, but what I love, Love, LOVE is that I did it.

I stood up and gave it my best first shot.

Against the family grain, I did what they don't want me to do.  Focus on Abuse and speak of estrangement.

I am not even certain, they realize that I am estranged...due to their lack of being with my truth and not with the family.  I have felt that they hold me entirely responsible for my poor choice of keeping away from family members, functions and exiting relationships.

How many folks would stay with someone who required you to keep your truth away.

I just read today in a book titled, "A Shining Affliction- A story of Harm and Healing in Psychotherapy" by Annie Rogers....

"I feel we're not talking about me - as I know myself."  She does not respond.  I go on. "When I say something really important to me, it doesn't seem to matter to you."  As I speak, her face is closed.  My words go out into the air and dissolve, as if I've said nothing - or worse, they hang in the room as if I've said the wrong thing.  I keep trying, as if I can find something that will interest Melanie and compel a response.  Then I give up, and we sit in silence again."  

 This is fairly close to the reaction my family has given me...What a great paragraph to depict why we feel the hostility.  There is no welcoming of our truths.

Here is a picture of Tom...that I love.  He never, not ever, closed his face and let my truth hang in the room as if I had said something wrong. He is a gift to all victims who find the courage to speak up.  And he passed me on to An-Gel, who also accepted me completely.  The ease we have with each other is priceless.  They help carry my truth.  

And here is one of my new friend Barbara Rose. We felt an immediate connection.  I feel humble by her hearing me.  Sitting with my buddy Kirsten Menigoz, who when we met felt a strong immediate comfortableness...old souls reunited.   

Imagine what a fine reception for my truth!  A beautiful venue...and even Live music of Melissa Davis.

Thanks Melissa...it added a wonderful lively touch.

Here I am in my speech talking about loving my lady, even without hair and standing like this.

I love my open stance, strong and sure.

And I love this one of the three of us. These two ladies are working hard to help victims...and I have now joined their team.  

It certainly was a night to remember...a place that honored my truth....stood in reverence of my quilts...I was completely at home there, for my truth was welcomed in.

Thanks to all the Dial Help Team, Tom and the community!  I am humbled by it all. 

Universe called Me.

I know what it feels like to live on both ends of the spectrum of having to be brave and strong and have courage, while inside of you is nothing....and then stepping out fully charged.  The two are lifetimes apart...or seven years in the making.

I recall having to walk around our local town after the headlines in the paper and feeling so incredibly small, weak, vulnerable..."Like a scared rabbit" my husband remarked.

And I was.

I didn't know my own strength then...I was fully under the control and power of the outside sources, other's opinions and living from the outside in....and my outside crashed. So, I was left powerless.

I had to use my own auxilliary power...my own definitions and choices.  My individual and personal resources, which added up to about 1%.

I didn't realize how much I was powered by the church, family and society, until it suffered a complete shut down.

My auxilliary power of 1% had to take over.  

This was my sense of self, of who I am and how I fit in.  1% of my self worth was all that was left when you took away the religion and family legacy that I followed religiously as a good girl.  

I had about 1% rebel, and that was what I began to live from.

My inner dwelling place was small, a dot...a weak bleeping signal and that was what had to believe in.  My faith now switched from the outside to the inside.

Living from the inside out...

Incredibly I trusted this small tiny blip...this small sense of me.  I put 110% of my choices and confidence in this tiny dot called me.  For what I knew for sure is that the outside I had been following was completely not matching reality.  It was wrong...but my body had always been right.  It feared my father.  I had to now find out who I was inside.  My me muscle.

This muscle of me was so damn small and weak and unused, it was shriveled up and stiff and with each decision I made and each time I trusted its choice, it grew.

It flourished, unbended, stretched, grew limber and powerful and began filling up my insides, one section at a time.

When I stood before the public at the Gala I had 7 years worth of self growth inside of me.  I felt strong and powerful being me.

I know me.

I trust me.

I love me.

The juxtaposition between the two are hard to articulate, but are clearly depicted in my quilts.  

What I knew was that my self worth was growing, what I didn't focus on was that it is really our own self power.  That it isn't an auxilliary power, but our main power source.  Self worth is self power.

I previously used the outside...people's ideas of me and the churches rules to power me.  I rarely made a choice based upon my own power, which back then was my auxilliary power.

I love that my main power source is inside of me...plugged straight into the universe.

Speaking my truth and never waivering from what it required me to do, has continued to recharge and expand my power base inside of me.  

I agree it takes courage to stand up and tell your story, BUT it takes vastly more power to face your abuse, see your family as dysfunctional, make steps to separate all while operating under about 1% power.

Yet, what I have come to know.  The authentic power doesn't need as much as the outside power.  It must multiply exponentially when it comes from your heart and soul...oh yeah, the Universe supports truth only.

1% power from the inside can completely begin to turn your whole life around.

It's a power that is completely reliable and unpluggable.  You will never be without power...for it lies within you.

My Lady powered by the Universe called me.

My Lady and I are on a Crusade!

Well it is official, I am a public speaker...I am no longer a first-timer.  I trusted in my natural ability to share and speak from my inner self, and it worked. 

Some were a bit taken aback, when my plan as to just speak.  To carry no notes, to not prepare, but arrive and let it come...to just allow what comes to mind spill forth. 

I knew anything less would be unnatural for me and would have me being one step removed from the event, like playing me being me.

So I skipped right to me.

I felt good.

I felt strong, and it flowed out unrestrained, nothing was off limits, I was open.

A few times I did leave the audience with concern for a few tears being shed by my daughter and my friend...but I hopped back into the speech and reconnected to the audience.

The woman who gave my introductions did a brilliant job, a perfect segue into me.

She quoted my blog.

"I wonder what the Guest Speaker will say tomorrow evening at the Dial Help Gala?  I wonder what parts of her 7 1/2 year journey out of dysfunction will come to mind? What would the donors who support Dial Help most want to know?  How often does an event such as this have the opportunity to hear a victim share their story...and what parts would be the most helpful to the community at large?  

I have begun many speeches in my head and when I recognize the lack of an audience, it fizzles out....Well your audience is here now, Beth.

And so I got up feeling very surreal.  Me, a public speaker??? Really???

But, there sat the public, so I guess so. 

I can't really say what I said, for I was saying it not listening...which I know will sound strange, but that is how it went.  I know I hit the spots I wanted them to know...

How it is that an abused child loses a family when they set out to heal...how the old detective didn't want my sexual abuse to come between my relationshipw with my father and how I wanted him to find one, just one, common denominator....but he didn't.  How, the community would help the victims by staying in reality and not budging.  How Silence is for the Perpetrator and Speaking out is for the Victim/Survivor.  

My one moment of emotional wobbliness came when I read Rythea's quote.

"The people who have lost their parents and families due to abuse deserve the utmost respect and support. These people have risked it all to heal and stand up for the truth. These people are heroes and angels who hold a horrific reality for everyone else. They have suffered and escaped, and for that, I bow my head in reverence."

When I was done, Dial Help gave me a vase of fresh flowers in appreciation for my work.  I was in shock and awe, for I have only been there but a few months.  

As the Gala ended...many people sought me out, asking to purchase a quilt, my book, offered eye to eye contact saying to me... "You are brave"  "Strong" "Courage"  "Powerful"

I accepted their words...I felt them into each of my cells, they rang true.

Oh, and I found a new friend.  An instant comfortable strong familiar knowing, a tug, a draw, a magnetic pull and our personalities meshed, connected.  Something neither of us could have stopped if we tried.  I invited her to come to the WIND...she accepted.  She does visions...of course, since our first creative project is a Vision Collage.

I was told I was a crusador, before this event...and had to look up the meaning.

"A vigorous concerted movement for a cause or against abuse."  Yep, that is me.

My Lady and I are on a Crusade!

Below is the link to our local paper.  Check out where I am! 

Daily Mining Gazette

My daughter took many photographs. When she completes her work on them, I will pass them on!