Re:Repressed memory information

"your rhetorical style of repeatedly attempting to attack the source..." - exactly anon. poster how I've been reading your posts.

"I can only assume is due to a lack of substance on your part." - this is a below the belt attack on someone's integrity and way out of line.

As I've read your various anon. posts I've wondered if there was some you could be prevented from posting to this forum. However, upon reflection, I realize that you are actually doing more for EMDR than anything else.

Also, if you truly believe that clients should be informed then why didn't you provided more links to information on "repressed memory". Providing just one source, a one-sided source in my view, is not giving clients adequate information.

I also beleive that those who deny the concepts of "repression" and "dissociation" are doing a disservice to those of us who are struggling with the denial of our traumatic pasts and experiences. I've always remembered a number of incidents of witnessing horrible violence as a child. However, I have no feelings/emotions to go with one of those events and minimal feelings around the others.
I've actually oftened wondered if I had "left my body", the only way I know how to describe it, during those times and as a result have thought I must be crazy. It is an awful way to feel, something that is not exactly nice to carry around inside of oneself. It is because I thought I must be crazy that I was unable to tell anyone about what I had witnessed. Did those experiences happen? Yes, they did, others have confirmed them and I have discussed one event with the direct victim of the particular violent act.

Furthermore; I had very surprising, unexpected and completely unsolicited information shared with me, by an older family friend, which confirmed my experiences as a child. Experiences, thoughts, feelings which I continually denied by telling myself "that is just my imagination or it wasn't really like that or it wasn't that bad." Additionally, and again; completely surprising, unexpected and unsolicited, an older family member shared information on something she had witnessed as a child. This information described an experience I believe I had and which is still somewhat unclear. In this case the family member was describing something that happened to a 3rd family member and, yet, it confirmed to a degree an unclear memory of something I believe happened to me. If I grew up witnessing violence and if I now know that an unclear memory of something I think happened to me has actually happened to another family member, then, I think it is highly likely that I did have that actual experience. I haven't attempted to explore this further, I'm not into trying to uncover past memories. However, if at some point I become more clearly aware of something which I have suspected, and which was uncanningly similiar to what an older family member described, then, I will take it as a true experience.

I am grateful that there are people who know and understand that some experiences are of overwhelming that they must be pushed out of awareness in order for the person to cope and survive. I feel insulted (and doubt myself - I must be crazy) when others deny that we can forget traumatic events. It is difficult enough to overcome the impact of trauma and violence, being disbelieved does not help.

I apologize, to the moderator, for the length of this post. But, I am just so tired of blaming myself for the past, of feeling and thinking that I must be crazy, for questioning my own memories and attempting to deny them. And, I am even more tired of people, such as the anon. poster, who seem to have a gripe against EMDR; the idea that people can forget and push things out of awareness; and who attack researched techniques which offer hope to those of us struggling to regain our lifes.

Replies:

Re:Repressed memory information, by Cynthia A. Byrtus, 04/13/01

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