Old Wounds. Everyone has old wounds that need mending at some time in their lives. Some people learned while they were young to immediately communicate how they were feeling and were able to resolve their pain.
However, today there are a lot of people that have not been able to heal. Many of them have buried their negative feelings deep inside.
Some of them have turned off their feelings altogether, and have become numb or desensitized. Sometimes, the body and mind does this as as a defense.
Severe Emotional And Physical Trauma
Sometimes, people experience such severe emotional or physical trauma, that it is better to wait to deal with the situation until they can better cope with it.
This is often the case when it comes to abuse. Many children who are abused struggle with being able to express their true emotions.
Because this is the case, many of them lose touch with their inner self, their true self, and cut off emotion. In many cases, it feels too unsafe to have or express emotions because they are in an abusive, scary and harmful situation.
Triggers
Many of these children grow up without any counseling or any other form of support. Once they reach adulthood and are on their own, they can begin to be confronted with situations that will cause them to feel emotional triggers.
These triggers are signs that something is not resolved. To those around them, it may seem that they are very reactive to certain things, or become very fearful.
It is only when the adult who was abused as a child becomes aware of their own behavior, that they can begin to take steps to heal.
Healing
Healing is going to be different for everyone, but there are some things that can help most people.
First, it is important for the wounded individual to have compassion for themselves and what they went through. They need to give themselves permission to feel.
One of the hardest things to do is to cry. As memories come back, or triggers happen, it is important to ask "What am I feeling? Why do I feel this way about this?"
When someone asks themselves these questions, they may suddenly gain insight to why they feel the way that they do.
Trusted Confident
It is incredibly helpful to have someone to confide in that can be trusted. Most people who have been through abuse need to be able to rebuild trust.
And it is important to note, that just because trust is broken over and over again, does not mean that all people are going to be that way.
The Courage To Heal
Healing takes courage. Healing takes being vulnerable. But that vulnerability needs to be within the injured person. They need to allow themselves to be weak. Many of them are so exhausted because of the many years that they had to pretend to be strong.
Someone who has not been able to safely express themselves has not been able to speak their truth. And as they start to take steps to do this, it can be very terrifying.
They can be afraid that if they speak what is on their mind or express how they feel, that they will be hurt again. They can be afraid of other people confronting them, or disagreeing with them.
It is important to allow someone who has been abused to be able to feel that there is a safe place that they can express whatever it is that they need to. This makes all the difference. If they can find just one person to turn to, then the healing can be much more rapid.
Turning To God
Some people find that they really heal the most when they talk to God through prayer. They know that they can trust him, that he has never let them down.
This is especially true when they realize that the actions of others have nothing to do with God, and are not God's fault.
It is easy for people to blame everything on God, but once someone understands the basic laws of God, it makes trusting him all the easier.
Free Will
God has granted to mankind their agency or free will. They are able to choose for themselves. Each one of us has the ability to act for ourselves, and we are also acted upon by others and other natural forces (nature).
God cannot violate our free will because then he would not be God. God does provide both justice and mercy because of the the negative actions that others can take.
When people focus on the perpetrator of abuse as the one responsible for what happened, then they can let go of their anger against God.
Victims And Perpetrators
Abusers often were abused themselves. This does not excuse their behavior, but it does give insight.
It is important that the cycles and patterns of abuse are ended, and both the perpetrator and the abuse victim have the ability to keep the patterns from moving forward.
This does not mean that all those who are abused will become abusers. It just means that once they heal, it is better for the generations that follow after them.
