Infant Holocaust survivor, and other stuff...

Having noticed a couple of similar threads, I'd like to ask more specifically about my situation.

I am an infant Holocaust survivor from Eastern Europe. We lost almost everyone except for my immediate family: mother, father, brother who was six years older and a cousin who was orphaned after seeing his mother shot in front of him, and myh father's mother. Nuclear family emigrated to Austria when I was five, but left behind my grandmother and cousin. It was a traumatic journey through the just being constructed "iron curtain": I was drugged to keep me quiet and we were shot at while walking in cornfields by border guards with machine guns. I remember all this perfectly, like a movie.

My mother never bonded with me. I was (we were) undernourished and she had experiences that she won't talk about. I can't imagine (or I can) what she went through. She's 85 now.

We then emigrated to Canada and because we had no money and both my parents worked I was left alone from the age of six. Third (and fourth) languages, isolation, brother was sent away to boarding school (why?). Then grandmother came and died within the year. Cousin died of brain tumor.

I was sexually assaulted by a stranger at nine. Couldn't tell anyone - didn't have the words or the relationship to tell. I still get triggered by certain sexual situations. But have been married 35 years. Catholic school. Lots of guilt. Found out I was Jewish when I was 15. When I was sixteen she told me I would be more attractive if I had my nose "fixed" but in retrospect I think she just didn't want me to look Jewish.

My mother's response when I told her about my sexual assault last year was, "You were lucky it happened before you started your menses and you didn't get pregnant."

There's more, but I can't write it all here.

Now the point about EMDR. I was in therapy for about six months with a very nice therapist who suggested EMDR. We had about 5 sessions which became increasingly more intense and scary for me. At the last one I was following the lights on the light bar in a darkened room and I dissolved into blackness and fell down a black hole. I was curled up on the couch facing the wall and sobbing and she couldn't get me to come back for about, she says 15 minutes or so. Eventually she told me she was turning the lights back on and that I should go to my "safe place" but I had no idea of how to do that. I stayed there about a half hour settling down and then I left and drove home.

I never went back. She called to see how I was but I put her off saying I was busy.

Am I a poor candidate for EMDR or was she just not well trained?

I read your book and thought it made sense.

Do you have info about other people in my situation? Basically 1st gen Holocaust survivors, but feels like 2nd gen cause I was so young, a family of great silence, de-facto abandoment, sexual abuse trauma...

Shall I try again, or would you suggest different therapy?

Thanks for your patience in reading this long post.

Replies:

Re: Infant Holocaust survivor, and other stuff..., by Shapiro, 8/7/99

| Behavior OnLine Home Page | Disclaimer |

Copyright © 1996-2004 Behavior OnLine, Inc. All rights reserved.