Healing Childhood Abuse and NeglectHealing Childhood Abuse and Neglect

I'm in the process of re-designing the whole of Mental Health Today. It is quite a process. I'm doing more than just putting the old material in a new template. I'm reading most of the material again so that I can improve the meta tags, alt tags for the search engines as well as putting in a special "Related Books" section on most pages.

Thus, at this time a lot of technical information as well as opinions and other's experiences are flooding my mind. I am noticing that I am having an emotional reaction occasionally. I just had one and I wanted to share it because it is something that most of us consumers are dealing with and that is abandonment. That's what I want to talk about.

In an article on the site is one entitled "Healing the Abandonment Wounds." Just one sentence made me stop typing and sit in my computer chair staring at the ceiling.

The article says:

"I have counseled individuals, couples, families and business partners for the past 35 years and authored eight published books. Every individual I've worked with has had some abandonment wound to heal, and most relationship problems stem from abandonment wounds.

It is not possible to grow up in our society without some abandonment wounds. The following are some of the ways it can occur:

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Being torn away from mother at birth and put into a nursery.
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Being left to cry in a crib or playpen.
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Being given up for adoption or being left in foster care.
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Being physically and/or sexually abused.
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Being emotionally abused - ignored, yelled at, shamed.
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Being pushed aside at the birth of a new sibling.
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Having a parent or caregiver who is emotionally unavailable.
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Being unseen or misunderstood by parents or other caregivers.
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Being lied to.
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Being unprotected by a parent or caregiver.
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Being left alone in a hospital during an illness.
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Losing a beloved parent or grandparent at a very young age.
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Divorce.
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Being teased or left out with siblings or peers.
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Being ridiculed by a teacher.
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Being forgotten - not being picked up from school or other places.
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Being left at a young age to care for oneself, a parent, or other siblings."

And the article continues on.

The sentence "Being left to cry in a crib or playpen" was the sentence that stopped me in my tracks.

My aunt, in the past has shared with me that her mother, my grandmother babysat me from birth to age 3 as both of my parents worked. I did have this information confirmed by my grandmother but I did it slyly so as not to cause shame or blame. My brother was a difficult child to raise and needed constant attention. I was a quiet child and entertained myself.

It is important to know that my family lived in an apartment at the time in the same complex as my grandparents. My grandmother told me I really preferred to be in my own place, in my crib so I was there in my crib alone in the apartment 95% of the time from birth to age3. My grandmother would come and check on me from time to time.
Experiencing Memories of Feelings of Abuse or Neglect as an Adult

When I found this out I was both saddened and relieved. All my life I would not call it a memory, but a memory of my feelings. I don't actually remember seeing myself in the crib alone. However I do recall EXTREME feelings that, "I'm alone and no one will ever comes. I wait and wait to the point where the emotional pain of no one coming for a long, long, long, long time, is so strong it is as if my mind twists I can't stand it. The feeling of waiting and no one coming is so strong it's as if I go into another dimension of pure and total hell." I cannot tell you how bad it is. I don't have the words. It is a memory of feelings. I did not get that statement from any books. It is something that simply explains my experience as an adult.

There were actually two times in my adult life where I waited for my boyfriend - different ones as it was years apart - to come and I waited and waited and I went once again into that never never land and both times I laid on the floor in fetal position.

Religious Coping Plays a Role in Recovery From Depression

Depressed seniors who believe their life is guided by a larger spiritual force have significantly fewer symptoms of depression than those who do not use religious coping strategies. Moreover, this relationship is independent of the amount of social support those individuals receive, according to results of a prospective study presented at the 2002 annual meeting of the American Psychiatric Association.

"This is a pretty remarkable study–and when you see these kind of data coming out from both medical and psychiatric populations, it’s hard to continue ignoring religion as a variable in the recovery from depression," said Harold G. Koenig, MD, associate professor of psychiatry and of medicine at Duke University Medical Center, Durham, N.C.

According to study author Hayden Bosworth, PhD, attempts in the literature to distinguish the effects of religion from the effects of social support on depression have led to mixed success (Husaini BA et al. Int J Aging Hum Dev 1999;48:63-72). Dr. Bosworth, associate director, health services research and development, Durham Veterans Affairs Medical Center, and his colleagues attempted to address the issue by examining the effects of religious practices, coping mechanisms and social support on recovery among individuals diagnosed with major depression.

The research team assessed all patients (n=114; average age, 67.5 years) using the Montgomery Asberg Depression Rating Scale (MADRS) at baseline and at the end of six months. They also asked each patient about the extent of their religious practices and religious coping (Table).

The results indicated that higher patient-reported levels of religious practice correlated with significantly lower MADRS scores at baseline (P <0.02), after adjusting for covariates such as social support. However, the analysis of 90 patients at the six-month follow-up showed that religious practice did not significantly predict lower MADRS scores after adjusting for other factors (P <0.08).

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The analysis also revealed higher levels of positive religious coping were related to lower MADRS scores at baseline (P=0.03). Moreover, positive religious coping significantly predicted lower MADRS scores at six months (P <0.03).

The investigators reported that higher levels of negative religious coping were associated with higher MADRS scores at baseline (P=0.02), although similar findings did not appear at six months.

"These results indicate that clinicians should encourage reconnection with religion as a way of coping in patients whose spirituality has been important to them," concluded Dr. Bosworth.

"Physicians need to pay attention to their patients’ religious beliefs and practices," added Dr. Koenig. "Rather than continuing to see it as a liability or unhealthy crutch, they should see it as a potential strength in overcoming depression."

–Daniel Ko
Table. Questions Asked About Religious Practices and Positive and Negative Religious Coping

Religious Practices

Frequency and nature of:

* attendance at religious services and other religious activities at places of worship

* prayer outside of a church or synagogue

* watching or listening to religious programming

* reading the Bible or other religious or inspirational literature

Positive Religious Coping

Agreement with the following statements:

* "I think about how my life is part of a larger spiritual force."

* "God and I work together as partners."

* "I look to God for strength, support and guidance."

Negative Religious Coping

Agreement with the following statements:

* "I feel God is punishing me for my sins or lack of spirituality."

* "I wonder whether God has abandoned me."

* "I try to make sense of the situation and decide what to do without relying on God."