The Aftermath of Abuse and Trauma – YES, The Body Does Keep Score!
The Aftermath of Abuse and Trauma – YES, The Body Does Keep Score!
Trauma: A deeply distressing or disturbing experience or physical injury
Abuse: to treat someone with cruelty or violence, especially regularly or repeatedly.
Trauma and abuse stimulate the body in a negative way, causing deep harm that cannot be seen by the naked eye.
How does the body cope with the intense stress placed upon it, during and after the trauma and abuse are long over? Our bodies are very sensitive creatures, lit up with nerve endings from top to bottom. The dysfunctional stimulation puts the brain on over load, which screams out to the body time to “abort the mission”.
Brain waves are shouting, “Get out now”, and it is time for fight or flight mode to jump into high gear. As all the bells and whistles are going off inside the mind and body, someone in trauma could present “well”.
What do I mean by that? Speaking from personal experience of abuse, I was in fight or flight mode for years, as I was abused for a very long period of time throughout my young life. I was abused on all levels, ranging from mental, emotional, physical and sexual abuse. Very sensory in my body was screaming for help, release, and freedom from this internal trap. Life became clouded as the days carried on with a bleak outlook.
The most interesting thing about it, was that on the outer shell, I presented very normal. How can that be, when so much trauma has occurred. For myself, I buried it deep, and held it in so very tightly; fighting every day not to let it show.
Here is the big question?
Did my body take a toll from all the years of abuse and silence. The answer to that is a very big YES.
As I grew into a woman, and moved on with my life, there was still this secret baggage that remained. That dark and heavy package was like a lead weight trying to bring me down at every twist and turn in my life. I couldn’t escape it, no matter how hard I tried.
Slowly my body started to give way, and the past was seeping through. No matter how hard I tried to keep it down and repress it, that stirring pot of lava continued to bubble waiting for the right moment to explode.
One day after all the years of holding it in, I exploded, and what an explosion it was. I hit rock bottom.
This very explosion happened after being married ten years, and three children later. I was living in two worlds for many years, and my body was screaming at me “enough is enough”.
Our bodies do keep score and absorb everything in life that we go through. My big moment came out of surprise.
I want to share this very personal experience with all of you. I would definitely call this “time sensitive”, as this is the moment I completely fell apart.
TRIGGER WARNING
At this time in my life, I was 30 years old working and raising my three young children. Life was busy that is for sure, and I worked diligently to be the best wife and mother that I could be. My past taught me about what type of spouse and parent I did NOT want to be, so I dug in deep taking pride in being amazing at both.
I was also dealing with my mother who was mentally ill, and her daily antics. She is part of my past and present with that connection of continued abuse. She abused me mentally, emotionally and physically for years upon years. It did weigh so heavy on my mind, body and spirit.
On a cold March morning I woke up sick. This was not the normal sick, and I felt with every part of my being that I was pregnant. My husband and I were not planning on having another child, and our youngest was just over a year old.
I decided to take a pregnancy test, and sure enough I was pregnant. I sat in the bathroom and cried all by myself, as I thought how can I handle any more children. As the tears streamed down my face, my internal anxiety turned into instant love for this child inside of me. I pulled myself together, and that night after dinner, I shared the news with my husband.
Internally, I was hopeful he would be happy, but that was far from the case. He stared at me in distress and anger. He did not want any more children, and the financial stresses were more than he could bare. As he absorbed it, I stared at him silently, waiting for a positive response. I did not get that, and that set the ball rolling to what was next to come. My internal baggage floated to the surface. I felt abandoned by him, not wanting our child, and I felt rage and anger.
As we moved forward from this news, we both had completely different thoughts, and feelings. It weighed heavy on our marriage that is for sure.
Well, I guess God has his own plan, because I started to miscarry the baby at 14 weeks of pregnancy. I was so sick, and went to see the doctor. I could not drive, so my father-in-law drove me. My husband was working. As I sat in the office, they did an ultrasound and the baby had no heartbeat. I was devastated. They left me alone to call my husband and process the news. As I shared the news with him, I heard relief in his voice and sadness at the same time. He tried to console me on the phone, as I sobbed uncontrollably.
I told him, that I needed to have a procedure to take out the baby as it would not come out naturally. That night, I went into a complete breakdown. I was laying in bed tearing at my own skin, and then all the flashback of the past came bursting out. I felt my skin crawling as I hit my stomach over and over again.
I didn’t want to be in my own body anymore, I needed to escape.
The next day we went, and I had that procedure. Well, there was the biggest trigger exploding in full motion!
In my past, when I was fourteen, I became pregnant after two years of touristic, sexual abuse. I could not speak of what happened to me because I was traumatized into silence, at that time in my life. My father took me to have an abortion, and my family shamed me for being such an awful, wild and out of control teen. I was abused for years, and by the time I was a teenager I was filled with rage and anger, but nobody saw that or took it all into account. I was deemed the BAD Child! So, I silently moved on with my life internalizing everything. It was like in the movie, “The Scarlett Letter” – That A was burned on my chest, as I carried such deep shame.
This procedure opened up the flood gates to every single thought and emotion connected to that time in my life, and I was on overload. The nightmares and flashback were horrific, as I watched myself being abused over and over again.
I was taking care of my family, working and driving, as these images would come out of nowhere and I would have to relive the nightmare every single day. The final straw was when I was out with my children, and as they were playing at our local play-ground. I started hearing voices. I felt my body go burning hot, and I was hearing my children’s laughter and my screams of painful abuse at the same time.
Everything went distorted, and I could not stop it. I felt so dizzy that I had to sit. Once it subsided enough, I gathered my children and drove home making sure they were safe. I did not realize I was dealing with Complex PTSD.
I was devastated by this experience, but it fueled me to seek out the help that I so desperately needed. I found an amazing therapist, who was so kind to me. He helped me sift through Pandora’s Box piece by piece allowing me to feel it, experience it and validate the reality of all that had happened to me.
My horrendous childhood of trauma and abuse was finally exposed. I said the words out loud for the first time, as I heard my own voice saying “YES, I was abused”. Powerful moment in my life.
That was just the beginning of a very long and painful road towards healing. I had to take things in stages, as the extensive amount of loss and abuse was too much to unpack at the same time. So, over the course of my healing journey, I did a lot of journal writing and three different stints in therapy.
I was grateful to find different therapists at each stage of my healing process, that understood what I had been through, and allowed me to take the lead as I hit many levels of healing. Again, this did not happen overnight, it took many years.
Now, looking back at it all, some of my stories still can take my breath away, and I will always have my triggers and pings of the past, but the difference is that now I have given them a place to be. I took back control of my life, because of all the work that I did. It was the hardest work that I ever had to do, but the most rewarding.
I needed to save myself, so I could save my family. My love for my husband and children is what gave me the courage and strength to do it all. I was not the woman back then, that I was truly meant to be. I was clouded by the past, as the body DID keep score.
I am proud to say I am the woman that I was born to be, and even more. I continue to work on myself, and now I am helping other people do the same. I am giving them a voice to step into the light, and be brave enough to take that journey.
I am a voice for the voiceless, and I will never be silenced again.
Do not let anyone ever tell you that the body does NOT keep score, because the are 100 percent wrong.
Embrace the Journey.
God Bless,
Lisa Zarcone
Author – Public Speaker – Child & Mental Health Advocate
Social Media Influencer – Blogger
Massachusetts National Ambassador Naasca (National Association of Adult Survivors of Child Abuse)
2023 Woman of Impact Business West Magazine
2021 Heroine Award Recipient – MA Commission on the Status of Women
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