“Repeated trauma in childhood forms and deforms the personality. The
child trapped in an abusive environment is faced with formidable tasks
of adaptation. She must find a way to preserve a sense of trust in
people who are untrustworthy, safety in a situation that is unsafe,
control in a situation that is terrifyingly unpredictable, power in a
situation of helplessness. Unable to care for or protect herself, she
must compensate for the failures of adult care and protection with the
only means at her disposal, an immature system of psychological
defenses.”

―
Judith Lewis Herman

“Many abused children cling to the hope that growing up
will bring escape and freedom. But the personality formed in an
environment of coercive control is not well adapted to adult life. The
survivor is left with fundamental problems in basic trust, autonomy, and
initiative. She approaches the tasks of early adulthood–establishing
independence and intimacy–burdened by major impairments in self-care, in
cognition and memory, in identity, and in the capacity to form stable
relationships. She is still a prisoner of her childhood; attempting to
create a new life, she reencounters the trauma.”

— Judith Herman

“When I was about 20 years old, I met an old pastor’s
wife who told me that when she was young and had her first child, she
didn’t believe in striking children, although spanking kids with a
switch pulled from a tree was standard punishment at the time. But one
day, when her son was four or five, he did something that she felt
warranted a spanking–the first in his life. She told him that he would
have to go outside himself and find a switch for her to hit him with.
The boy was gone a long time. And when he came back in, he was crying.
He said to her, “Mama, I couldn’t find a switch, but here’s a rock that
you can throw at me.” All of a sudden the mother understood how the
situation felt from the child’s point of view: that if my mother wants
to hurt me, then it makes no difference what she does it with; she might
as well do it with a stone. And the mother took the boy into her lap
and they both cried. Then she laid the rock on a shelf in the kitchen to
remind herself forever: never violence. And that is something I think
everyone should keep in mind. Because if violence begins in the nursery
one can raise children into violence.”

— Astrid Lindgren, author of Pippi Longstocking, 1978 Peace Prize Acceptance Speech

“Often children who survive extremely adverse childhoods
have learned a particular survival strategy. I call it ‘strategic
detachment.’ This is not the withdrawal from reality that leads to
psychological disturbance, but an intuitively calibrated disengagement
from noxious aspects of their family life or other aspects of their
world. They some how know, This is not all there is. They hold the
belief that a better alternative exists somewhere and that someday they
will find their way to it. They persevere in that idea. They somehow
know Mother is not all women, Father is not all men, this family does
not exhaust the possibilities of human relationships-there is life
beyond this neighborhood. This does not spare them suffering in the
present, but it allows them not to be destroyed by it. Their strategic
detachment does not guarantee that they will never know feelings of
powerlessness, but it helps them not to be stuck there.”

— Nathaniel Branden, The Six Pillars of Self Esteem

26 Things Adults Do Who Have Experienced Childhood Emotional Abuse

1. They have commitment issues, probably because they had a hard time trusting anyone as a child.
2.
They sometimes go into auto-pilot mode and blank out entire
conversations or events. This is due to disassociation, a skill learned
in childhood, and it’s often unintentional.
3.
Mood swings which seem to come at random times are often the norm for
them. This is often because they had to deal with this as a kid, so the
only response they knew was to model the behavior.
4. They may commit acts of self-harm. This often follows from doing this in childhood.
5. They are angry underneath it all, and have outbursts of anger seemingly from nowhere.
6. They are nervous all the time. This may make them seem edgy or startle easily.
7. They don’t feel valid. No matter what they’re doing, they’re unsure if they can do it.
8. They have low self-esteem.
9. They don’t handle compliments well. They doubt their veracity.
10.
They are quiet. They don’t feel comfortable using their voice after
being worn down as small and wrong throughout their childhood.
11. They may have issues getting close to others, because they may not especially, in general, like people.
12. They may beat themselves up mentally and emotionally, since they were beaten emotionally for so many years.
13. Conflict gives them immense anxiety, so they often run from it instead of facing it.
14. Making eye contact is extremely difficult and speaking makes them anxious, making it even more difficult.
15. They fear others abandoning or leaving them. They have attachment issues.
16. They are often defensive, perceiving people as negative or offensive because of their previous abuse.
17. Often afraid of contact with people, they may be introverted and try to distance themselves as much as possible.
18. They may be sensitive to loud noises, as they were raised in an environment of raised voices and yelling.
19.
Many victims of emotional abuse overdo it because they want to please
everyone. They become perfectionistic, tidy, clean and organized.
20. Often they will have trouble making decisions, after hearing throughout childhood that they were not good enough.
21.
They are tough, but very sensitive. Because of experiencing a plethora
of emotions at a young age, you have considerable emotional sensitivity.
22. The world of emotional abuse leaves them second-guessing everything.
23. They constantly say that they’re sorry.
24. They will often ask questions to which they already know the answer, due to self-doubt.
25. They have addiction issues.
26.
They are actually remarkably humble. They sincerely appreciate the good
things in their life. They are a strong, grateful survivor of their
past.

What I remember most about emotional abuse is that it’s like being put in a box. How you end up in there is the biggest trick – I never managed to work that one out. Maybe you think it’s a treasure box at first: you’re in there because you’re special. Soon the box starts to shrink. Every time you touch the edges there is an “argument”. So you try to make yourself fit. You curl up, become smaller, quieter, remove the excessive, offensive parts of your personality – you begin to notice lots of these. You eliminate people and interests, change your behaviour. But still the box gets smaller. You think it’s your fault. The terrible, unforgivable too-muchness of you is to blame. You don’t realise that the box is shrinking, or who is making it smaller. You don’t yet understand that you will never, ever be tiny enough to fit, or silent enough to avoid a row

It’s time to make emotional abuse a crime, Lauren Laverne

All too often women believe it is a sign of commitment, an expression of love, to endure unkindness or cruelty, to forgive and forget. In actuality, when we love rightly we know that the healthy, loving response to cruelty and abuse is putting ourselves out of harm’s way.

Bell Hooks, All About Love

Hypervigilance makes sense as a survival strategy. After our brain has perceived a life-endangering situation and gone into fight or flight, then some people’s brains will be on the alert for more situations that could also be threatening. If the type of trauma you experienced was abuse or assault, then you were hurt by a person or people. That’s obviously different than being bitten by a snake or in a car accident. And when we know our abuser, there is a breach of trust and emotional harm inherent in the assault.

So now when we find we’re getting close to someone, we start getting anxious. We look for signs we’re about to be betrayed or hurt. We get paranoid about someone’s tone or interval in responding to our texts. We’re anticipating the worst and unconsciously looking for signs that we’re right.

from How to Trust People Again

It’s hard to believe that human beings
can be classed as “feral”, but there have been a few isolated incidences
where this was indeed the case.

One of the most famous, is the story of Genie, known affectionately as “Wild Child”.
This beautiful young girl was rescued by the authorities when she was
13 years old and they were astonished to find that she acted like a wild
animal. Genie was timid, walked on four legs, and couldn’t speak any
English. She wasn’t raised by animals, as seen in other cases, but was
the victim of horrendous abuse that spanned over a decade. When she was
around one year old, her father decided to keep her socially and
physically isolated.

During this time, he kept her permanently strapped to a child’s toilet
or bound her in a crib with her arms and legs completely immobilized.
Nobody was allowed to interact with her and she had no stimulation of
any kind. She was also severely malnourished and had numerous vitamin
deficiencies.

Her cruel, abusive father promised her mother that if Genie survived
past the age of 12, he would allow her to call authorities to rescue the
child. Genie was rescued after a violent row broke out between her
parents, and her mother took her out of the house. (This was the first
time she had ever been outside). She was almost blinded by the sunlight,
and struggled to walk upright. Eventually, psychologists and language
experts began to look after Genie. As she was only fed baby food, she
had great difficulty chewing and swallowing and became distressed
whenever she saw food. Although she was very shy, Genie was highly
antisocial, and proved
extremely difficult for others to control. Regardless of where she was,
she constantly salivated, spat and growled at others. She had no sense
of personal property, frequently pointing to or taking something she
wanted from someone else. In addition, she did had no situational
awareness. Doctors wrote that she acted on impulse irrespective of the
setting, especially noting that she frequently engaged in open
masturbation and would sometimes attempt to involve older men.

After living in several foster homes and specialised hospitals, Genie
made some improvements. She had minimal manners and social etiquette.
She could speak a few words and showed a wide array of human emotions.
Her case is key in understanding human behaviour and holds a great deal
of scientific value. Today, Genie is in her late 50s and is still being
cared for by professionals and psychologists. She has improved a great
deal, but will always remain “feral” according to experts.