The first memory I have of my mother is her rocking me and saying, “What am I going to do when my baby grows up?” What a lovely memory, right? Fast forward to a dozen years later. My mother discovers my father is conducting middle of the night raids in my bedroom where I lay asleep in the bottom bunk. From that point on she spiraled into emotional instability that often left us children shaking. I remember driving in the mountains one time and my father parked near the edge of a cliff to get a photo of the scene below. My mother began screaming and sobbing, fearing the car would go over the cliff. Me and my siblings in the back seat exchanged nervous glances. Another time we were getting ready to go to church. When mom began to climb into the passenger seat she noticed a run in her nylons. Within seconds she was sobbing hysterically, her screams obvious to everyone in our neighborhood. My dad tried unsuccessfully to calm her down and finally led her back into the house before leaving for church without her. Again we looked at each other in confusion and embarrassment.
All my life my emotions have been just on the edge, waiting to spring at me at the slightest discomfort. When I was little I once said of something I didn’t like, “I hate that.” My mother scolded me and said never to say “hate”. I should say only “like” or “dislike”. Me, ever the rebel, wanted to know why they invented a word called “hate” if you could never use it. That may have been the beginning of getting my mouth washed out with soap. As I grew older, any traumas, any severe disappointments, any unfair punishments I had were always met with tears. Where did I learn that from?
I still have a tendency to meet periodic upsets with tears. They just start flowing. I still use the word “hate” when I’m riled. My emotions seem to just sky rocket. But since going through recovery they do it less and less and I get over it faster. Now, I’m more in control of my own emotions.
Some of us are more emotional than others. Some are stoic; others are blessed with unfathomable faces. Behind all of us lurk two sources for our emotional makeup, our childhood and the DNA we inherited from our lineage. I inherited some of mine from watching my mother unable to contain her own emotions at the most trivial of matters. The rest came from being wakened out of a sound sleep in the middle of the night to be used for someone else’s sexual gratification.
Today, if someone has explosive emotions they are labeled bi-polar and placed on medication. Does it help? It no doubt makes it easier for other people in their lives but I’m not sure it helps the one taking the medication. In the mind of someone diagnosed as bi-polar the feeling of being worthless has taken control. If they have learned that they can control their environment through bad behavior when they are in a low, they are more likely to repeat the performance. Attention is what they seek. With attention, even negative attention, they can begin to feel as if someone cares. After a while, sliding into that out of control emotional state becomes a way of life. There is no going back except to enter a program of recovery. I know because I was there.
I’m just a commoner (no initials after my name) but it seems to me that if a child has emotions that are uncontrollable and liable to do damage, a few honest sessions of what their home life is like, their relationship with parents and siblings, their environmental factors and so on might disclose a culprit. When we have been abused as a child we think it is caused by something we did or didn’t do. We take the blame; we wear it on our face; it is obvious in poor grades, in an inability to make friends, being argumentative and rebellious, violent emotions and other unhealthy behavior patterns. And no wonder. Inside of us is a dark and ugly secret, one we not only can’t comprehend but can’t even identify.
I’ve learned through the years that at times when I feel strong emotions bordering on tears I can connect the occurrence to something similar that happened previously. Sometimes I can trace it backwards in time to its source, the traumas of my teen years. Once I know that what is happening is not about the present, it is about something that happened years ago I can deal with it. Once I can establish that, I can grasp my emotions, place objectivity between me and the incident that set me off and I too can have an unfathomable face.
How many mass murderers had deeply troubled childhoods and unhealed childhood traumas. We all have emotions. It is not the emotions that are the problem; it is what we do with them that are a problem. Unfortunately this is often a double edged sword. Happiness that turns into exuberance is an emotion that’s good. It’s not the negative emotions that cause the problem. It’s how we direct and control them. Anger at someone who has attacked you is a good thing; you can fight back. Rage at the enemy in war time drives the battle forward to a victory. Tears at the funeral of a loved one can begin the healing process.
Remember, you were not born bi-polar. You were not born with out-of-control emotions. You may have been born with an inherited gene called “emotional”. That is not a bad thing. Somewhere in your childhood no one taught you how to control your emotions. Somewhere in your childhood a trauma lurks that caused the feeling of being worthless. You must go back to the source and begin a healing program.
Check out the REPAIR Your Life book page on our website. REPAIR is an acronym for a program for recovery from incest and child sexual abuse that works.
