Sally Brampton In Yesterday's Sunday Times Wrote a Most Powerful Article Which Should Be Widely Promoted.
The fearful inheritance derived from a parent's abuse and the longterm damage it causes is there to see in the starkest of terms. More to the point, it describes so powerfully the toxic effect of such abuse in cognitive terms. It is not just that the abuse impacts on a child and causes it to establish emotional defences against further hurt. Nor is it that those defenses have longterm behavioural implications for the sufferer. It is that the defences and resultant behaviour themselves become so wrapped in the toxin, that one's very ability to break free is damaged and disabled.
That acts like a computer worm and bores its way deep into our sense of self worth and self-esteem, neutering our will to combat it. It seems to set up justifications to do nothing, to accept the damage inflicted on us as our lot and even attach a sense of disloyalty to it all were we to try to shrug it off.
All I feel I can add to it is a health warning: don't think this only happens in severe cases of abuse. The milder forms of of abuse can have seemingly reduced impact, but it can be just as insidious. Without us knowing, it can reside within us simply to knock out our resolve and self-worth to take on something new when we would wish to.
As Sally Brampton alludes, more of this is known now. Mercifully professional help is available meaning we do not have to slave under these toxic effects of many forms of abuse.
Gerry Neale
Author of "Squaring Circles" - a cognitive novel www.squaringcircles.co uk
Additional Information available from http://squaringcirclesbygerry neale.blogspot.com
The book can be obtained from Amazon www.amazon.co.uk
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