boiling frogs

boiling frog syndrome is sometimes used to explain why a person in an abusive relationship finds it hard to get out. at one time they thought that a frog when put in boiling water would jump out, but if it was put in cold water and  very gradually boiled it would, be unable to sense the change,  stay in and eventually die. 

few weeks ago i woke with the words 'we were all like frogs being boiled slowly'. in a sleepy dreamlike state  i pulled out my journal to write it down. and then  i wrote, 'no, not all of us, probably just those of us who were X's clients.'

that time many years ago is shrouded in dense fogs. i don't remember the sequence of things happening. the years, the events, the experiences are jumbled up. we were in analysis, we were studying to be therapists but something went wrong, the analyst got sucked into his own shadow. and we were boiled. the analysis ended but lives and relationships were disrupted for many years after. the years between 1995 and 2000 i think or even further down.

its hard to write about it, for its hard to pick one clear thought and begin. but something pushes me to remember to try to string together the events and put one word after another. emotional abuse in therapy is probably more rampant than is reported. they say that a person who has suffered therapeutic abuse is like a person who has been abused as a child and needs as much sensitivity. they say that emotional abuse in therapy is life threatening.

often abuse goes underground.

is suppressed.

a part of a person is splintered off.

a part disassociates. 

to survive. 

perhaps years later something triggers the memory and it starts tumbling and jumbling and confusing the very life of the person.

they say a person who has suffered therapeutic abuse needs to go into therapy to sort out the mess. the loss of belief in ones own perceptions. the damage to the psyche and soul. but who in their right minds would go willingly into another pot of cold water which might just be on a very slow boil?

does a person who is suffering therapeutic abuse even know enough of the symptoms to recognise it? i remember my mind being like a tv screen with the image lost, filled instead with buzzy interference. constantly moving grey dots on a screen. 

high intensity broken electrical impulses. 

damaged nerves.

the inner mind like splinters of shattered glass suspended forever, forever ready to crash down and pierce the body, the mind, the soul.

red blood. pools of it. splinters of sharpness. energy sucked into darkness.

something urges me to piece together the story. to break the silence. so others can become aware. so that i can find those parts that were lost in those mists of forgetting. who was i before? and after?

its so hard. unsure of what might emerge. unsure of who will accompany me on this journey. and why go on it in the first place after so many years. is it really necessary? can it really be useful to me? to another? 

i talked to a friend about this. she told me that she had read that when a person is in analysis she is like a patient lying unconscious and cut open on a surgeons operating table. how do you know what they might put inside you she wondered? what happens if the surgeon gets ill before he can sew you back again i asked?

are some of us walking around with junk inside us? with open wounds?

lots of questions. few answers. raw. 

my mind is mostly on karate, the gasshuku in ko samui in a week. and coming back right into moving apartments. but a parallel thought process is trying to happen around these questions and perhaps some deeper and more sustained exploration will help me de-clutter a hidden room in my inner castle.