Is This Love? How to Recognise Psychological Abuse

[Edel O'Mahony]

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

I woke up in tears, as I forced myself out of the dream and the pain…

When I was 9 years old I was made to sing at my father’s work’s Christmas ‘do’. I was an incredibly shy child and this event did nothing for my confidence, which my mother was well aware of and was part of the psychological control she used in forcing me. A few pictures were captured, one of which I was actually singing! The significance of this memory and picture was that years later, it became another tool my mother could use to abuse me.

After my father died when I was 14 years old, my mother had already become a manic depressive and as the rest of the large brood of children escaped her attention by leaving home at the first opportunity, her focus for venting landed squarely on me. I had no idea at the time the extent of her manipulations, it was to be my own journey of evolvement that allowed me to look back and observe the severe control and abuse she had exerted.

I looked after her for ten long years, escaping briefly only to land myself in a relationship with a manic, obsessive, depressive who eventually fraudulently signed over my parents house to cover his debts, leaving me to find accommodation for my mother, my year old daughter and I, along with the burden of guilt weighing heavy in my heart.

Guilt was my mother’s life force and she spent every waking moment in either hand ringing, in manipulative silences or all out verbal abuse. Eventually she created enough false information to feed to my elder siblings, that they came to collect her to go live with them. Ironically, all the accusations and finger pointing at me ended abruptly, when within 6 months they had to have my mother transferred into a nursing home, unable to cope with her.

It was just after she left living with me, that I found it. Clearing away the last remnants of her presence and prison I had been emotionally held in, I came across ‘that’ picture. Seeing myself singing all those years ago made me smile, remembering how painful a process it had been and yet I had managed it. I turned the picture over and that’s when I saw it, just one sentence written by my mother ‘Edel aged 9, what a beautiful child she was, what a disappointment she turned out to be’. A sentence that was to become my sentence, still trapped within her psychological abuse.

I of course recycled the same conditions and landed myself in a destructive, dangerous, 10 year marriage, extricating myself on the brink of suicide with 4 small children to support on my own. Even then I was not free of her tentacles. I remember receiving a phone call from her shortly after my marriage ended, while I was still reeling for my shattered life. She had only 7 words to say to me ‘You are a disgrace as a mother’.

I woke up in tears, as I forced myself out of the dream and the pain….

In the dream I relieved finding ‘that’ picture again and hearing her voice in ‘that’ phone call. What shocked me most was the deep pain I felt as I came to consciousness in the cold morning light. As my mind cleared and reality focused, I realised it had been some 15 years since my mother had died, she was gone! She couldn’t hurt me any more, so why was I reacting to these images?!

As I mentioned I had begun the lengthy journey of healing and evolving, which brought about creating a very powerful meditation programme that assisted the release of the negative charge within cellular memories. I had been sure my deepest negative charges had been around the physical, sexual and emotional abuse I had suffered at the hands of my ex husband, yet in the process of months of releasing , I had reached one of my core negative emotional memories right here.

As I realised this, the pain of the dream subsided and hope filled my heart…soon I would be finally free.

I share these experiences as a means for others to recognise the same pattern of behaviours they may well be immersed in at this moment in time. Until you can take charge of what you hold imprinted at cellular level and release the negative charges, you are holding your beliefs to recycle the fear based conditioning, which is creating the exact mirror in your external experiences.

Psychological abuse can show in various forms:

• Verbal aggression (e.g., saying something that upsets or annoys someone else)
• Dominant behaviours (e.g., preventing someone to have contact with their family, in my case it was to have me spy on my siblings and so become ostracised from them)
• Jealous behaviours (e.g., accusing a partner of maintaining other parallel relations, constant need for verbal confirmation that you are faithful or love that person above all others). 

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Having spent years working consistently on my internal development, it has allowed me to understand the science of what goes on at cellular level and the field of epigenetics is now verifying what I had personally experienced in my own evolvement. 

No matter how dark or seemingly never ending the current challenges are that you are experiencing in any form of abuse, there is the road to freedom. You can only step on it, when you are prepared to have the strength and courage to turn your focus within yourself and face what generations have imprinted through societal fear based conditioning. It is society that provides the biggest form of gaslighting, through creating false illusions through the power of words. Blame and guilt are two of the most powerful forms of psychological abuse. Let me tell you right now – there is no blame – there is no guilt – there is only experience.

When you can change your perception to view all your abuse as experiences, you change your beliefs, you reclaim your life and take back the self power to create your freedom.