Abuse ~ Violence

Archives: Abuse/Violence

Kids and Violence
Bruce Bibee

Now that we have another episode of teens killing each other, the fires of anguish are once again stoked with the questions: Why? What could have been done? How can we prevent this in the future? And so on. These questions need to be asked, re-asked and re-asked until we come up with some viable options. The answers that will provide us with true solutions, however, are going to be answers that society is not ready to hear – at least, society hasn’t been ready yet.
Society is ready to hear that something or someone is to blame (take your pick: guns, law enforcement for not enforcing the already draconian laws about guns, TV violence, the devil, abusive parents, uncaring teachers, bleeding heart liberals, the Internet, etc.). We’ve been to the blame-well and each time we go, we are finding that these blaming answers don’t provide us with long-term solutions.

It must be remembered that teenage boys have been doing crazy, violent stuff for a long time. Billy the Kid, for example, was about 12 when he killed his first man, and was dead by the time he was 21. Look into history and what you will see is teen boys finding a cause and using it as an excuse to slaughter one another and anybody who might happen to get in the way. Right now, there’s no World War to fight, no more killing Commies for Christ, and the Balkans are somewhere on the other side of Europe. So what is a testosterone-poisoned, emotionally unbalanced, shame-driven boy supposed to do?

When my boys hit their teen years, my wife asked me what does one do with teenage boys. My reply was, “Make them live in the woods until they’re 25 or so.” I was only half joking. Boys need challenge. They need to test themselves against the world. They need risk. They need to find their limits (physical, emotional, mental and spiritual) by going past those limits. They need the woods: survival training, subsistence living, tracking and killing their dinners, mentoring by elders – basically the whole tribal thing that we have systematically dropped from our civilization. If this process of empowering teen boys had evolved instead of disappearing, what might it look like today?

Following Maslow’s “Needs Hierarchy,” this apprenticeship for teens would start with survival needs. In my view, there are three elements in modern-day survival: 1) knowing how to survive in the wilderness; 2) knowing self-defense; and 3) knowing first aid, CPR, and so on. Since none of these are taught in schools (which teach the survival skills of competing successfully in our society, rather than living as a child of the Earth), we are already at a disadvantage.

I think we all ought to be able to “pop the hood” on our psyches and know what to do when we need tune-ups. We ought to be able to know why we think the way we do, feel the way we do, act the way we do, and be able to change all that for the better whenever we need to. Major overhauls may need “mind mechanics,” but the routine maintenance stuff ought to be our own responsibility.

What this means is that the prerequisites for violence would be conscious rather than unconscious processes within one’s psyche. We know that all criminal violence is a function of “shame.” If we were to teach kids how to deal with the information coming from their emotional selves (i.e., what the shame is saying) in ways that worked better, then passage through the teen years (as well as through life) would be much easier for all of us. As noted, this is not taught in the schools. Nor is it taught in most homes, or at church. The only place it is taught is within counseling settings or as a part of a program of recovery (for example, Alcoholics Anonymous).

The third thing that would probably be a part of a modern teen apprenticeship process is some kind of “vision quest.” According to spiritual theory, there is a spiritual opening at puberty. A number of existential questions emerge at that time – questions such as: Why am I here? What’s this world all about? Why do human beings do the crazy stuff they do? These questions need answers. The answers, since they cannot be found within the ego-self, require the aspirant to leap to his Higher Self.

Where, then, do we go with our frustration, our fear, and our need to answer these tough questions in ways that are finally meaningful? I think we are answering these questions in our search to synthesize the recovery process and deep healing process. For example, there are wilderness survival schools and other programs of apprenticeship, mentoring, and so on.

Malidoma Patrice Some, an African who was raised by Jesuits before returning to his tribe and undergoing the ritual initiation into manhood, explained this concept in his book, Of Water and The Spirit: “Each one of us possessed a center that he had grown away from after birth. To be born was to lose contact with our center, and to grow from childhood to adulthood was to walk away from it. The center is both within and without. It is everywhere. But we must realize it exists, find it, and be with it, for without the center we cannot tell who we are, where we come from, and where we are going.”

Initiations into manhood are opportunities to reconnect with our “center.” Without that, we end up drifting, attaching to something—anything—that will give us a sense of belonging. In all cases of criminal teen violence, we find the underlying shame that many psychologists have determined is there; we will also find, according to indigenous peoples, a lack of “center” in these teens.

These are “problems” that are easily solvable should society wish to do so. In order to solve these problems, however, schools, churches and parenting will have to be re-invented. It is my hope that we will find ways of creating a holistic system for giving our teens, both boys and girls, what they truly need.

Bruce Bibee is a Master of Kung-Fu San Soo. He also holds a Master of Transpersonal Psychology and works as an abuse recovery counselor.

The Many Faces of Child Abuse
by Jackie Garretson

We have the opportunity to look carefully at what
we experienced as children and decide whether
or not to pass it on to another generation.

In Imago Relationship theory, it is assumed that the foundation of the couple relationship is created in the childhood relationships and experiences of each partner. Like the "chicken vs. egg" debate, what you are doing as a couple with your children right now, forms the foundation of their future love relationships.

Imago theory also assumes that our choice of a love partner is greatly influenced by individual needs that were not adequately met in our childhood. During the first twenty years of life, every child has certain personal needs that must be met. The most basic of these needs are in the category of "attention hunger." These are time, attention, and affection, which equal affirmation. These needs must be met by adults, not other children, and require personal attention, because gifts, objects and technology won't substitute. It is important to understand the ways that parents inadvertently fail to meet these basic needs and ask yourself: "Did this happen to me?" and "Is this happening to my children?"

Just as with adults, the emotional abuse of children involves a violation of boundaries. In their book, Kids Who Carry Our Pain, Drs. Hemfelt and Warren suggest this definition of abuse: "When a child's boundaries are violated, or the child is prevented from completing a developmental task, abuse has occurred. When abuse occurs, attention hunger goes unsatisfied." It is my belief that attention hunger is a foundation need; therefore, later forms of development will be unsuccessful or less successful if this foundation is not firmly in place. It is like the old proverb that you can't build a house on quicksand.

The law recognizes some forms of abuse -- abandonment, sexual abuse and that which leaves marks on the child, for example. There are also passive forms of abuse, both emotional and physical. When does discipline cross the line and become physical abuse? When do busy parents trying to make ends meet cross the line and emotionally abandon their children? When does openness and honesty with a child become emotional incest? These are all questions that must be answered if you are to avoid inadvertent abuse in your family. Following are some areas to consider.

For a young child, home is a refuge and family members are a very significant relationship. To a child, Mom and Dad are the "gods" of everyday life. When Mom or Dad yell at you (it doesn't matter whether you deserve it or not), it feels like "God" is upset with you and you have nowhere to hide. A child has no way to process why Mom said, "You can't do anything right!" A child doesn't understand displaced anger or Mom's difficult day. The child swallows the message and then internalizes it. Years later, that message whispers in the grown child's ear, You can't do anything right! This programming of a negative message constitutes abuse.

Negative messages can be conveyed silently as well. If there are three children in the home and two get lots of attention and one is ignored, the message to that child is, "You are not important." Negative messages are also conveyed by what a child witnesses. If Dad says things to Mom at the dinner table every evening that "put down" her cooking, housekeeping or feelings, the child's bond with his mother and the marriage relationship are damaged. This child has received the message that women are objects of scorn and this will impact his adult relationships with women. Children soak up unspoken attitudes that influence the rest of their lives.

According to Hemfelt and Warren, healthy boundaries in a family include the following:

Structure Each person fills an appropriate role regarding marital fidelity, control in the family, and degree of authority. This means that children do not have more control than a parent does.
Stability Life is positive and comfortably predictable from day to day. Children who never know if they will come home to anger, affection, or indifference do not have stability.
Safety The family offers the child safety, protection, and, if needed, support when dealing with the outside world. A parent that allows one child to bully another, or expects a child to mediate other relationships in the family, is not providing safety.

Any time the nurturing role is reversed, requiring a child to act as counselor or confidante to the parent, emotional incest occurs. It is never the child's job to be there emotionally or physically for the parent! Children should be expected to do age appropriate chores, but when a child has to pitch in to cover for Mom on drugs or Dad who never gets home till bedtime, we are seeing abuse. If a child must nurture a parent, they are set up to feel guilty when the parent is not happy. Another way to abuse a child inadvertently is to withhold information that they will need in adulthood, such as information about healthy sexuality or the communication of emotions.

Finally, emotional abandonment, often in subtle forms, is abuse and prevents the attainment of basic needs to satisfy attention hunger. The very worst thing that can happen to children is to lose a parent or the parents' marriage. Children need to bond with Mom, Dad, and a healthy union between them. Whether avoidable or not, when these bonds fail a child will have trouble and will need special help in adjusting to the loss and working through the trouble. Abandonment can occur even when both parents and the marriage are present. Prescription drug addiction, severe depression, addiction to television, excessive computer use, even excessive exercise or hobby activities can create conditions that leave a child feeling unimportant and abandoned.

Life is full of challenges. Most parents mean well, including our own. The field of marriage and family therapy has come a long way in understanding what helps and what hurts healthy development. We have the opportunity to look carefully at what we experienced as children and decide whether or not to pass it on to another generation. We have the opportunity to help our children, right now, to become better future partners. This is a gift to all of our tomorrows.

Jackie Garretson, LMFT, is a certified Imago Relationship Therapist practicing in Anchorage, Alaska.