GT Where did it start?

[Phoebes]

I hear a lot about these abusive behaviors being due to "generational trauma, " and thinking how to "break the cycle." My questions are:

1. In which generation did this generational trauma start? What initiated the unconscious cycle that laid the foundation for generations to come to receive unconscious and egregious abuse at the hands of those who are supposed to love them?

2. Why has it not occurred to a single generation so far to do anything to change their behavior? Are we the first to have this original thought? Why do they want to stay in those behaviors over having good relationships and a happy life?

I'm very confused by this concept of generational trauma. Was Adam traumatized by a snake? Was a caveman traumatized by a tiger attack? Who started hitting their family and then immediately denying it? Why is THAT the behavior that gets passed down? Why do we learn in school to tell the truth but we learn in our family we must lie? What got in the subconscious? We know that our own abusers were "abused themselves" so just couldn't possibly take accountability or apologize or change..Why? Why now? I understand NPD on an intellectual level, but I do keep hitting a wall with "it's generational trauma."

[AphoticAtramentous]

For #2, I think the big reasons are lack of education + stigma. Not to say that our parents are all uneducated, just that they don't know the things about CPTSD and intergenerational trauma that we might do today. They parent the way they do because they don't know otherwise, and may not even know that there is a better way of parenting. Pretty sure my parents truly believe that they parented me well... But now we have the internet, we can talk about our own experiences more, and realise these things in our family aren't healthy.

I think also that mental health stigma has been improving over the years. Because you know, if you were mentally ill back then, you'd either get a lobotomy or get sent to an asylum. So I can understand why many would choose not to work on their trauma issues if those were some of the options on the table.

Those are just my opinions at least.

Regards,
Aphotic.

[Phoebes]

Thanks, Aphotic..I've listened to Mark Ettonsohn's channel which really breaks down where these specific behaviors come from, like narcissistic rage, projection, splitting. I've found it helpful, although he insists they don't know what they are doing.

I grew up older gen x and didn't have internet until really my 30's. But I always knew the behavior being given felt wrong and horrible, and when my mom would say in a rage "I'm just doing what was done to me!" I think she knew, and I always wondered "why?" I read a ton of books looking for answers, journaled, and didn't have kids because I got the message that how you were raised is how you were going to raise your kids from multiple sources. I knew I didn't want to but I didn't want to risk it. But I didn't blindly just birth kids and beat them.

I'm glad the information is on the internet for young peoples sake. I never found Bessel van der kolk's book or Gabor mate's..they weren't in my algorithm in the card catalogue. I was just grasping at anything that sounded helpful but wasn't, like "boundaries."

Anyway, I don't know...
 I still wonder where it started, and why.

[Armee]

I get frustrated by intergenerational trauma stuff too. I don't have it in me right now to say more.

[Chart]

"It Didn't Start with You", Mark Wolynn
PapaCoco recommended this book to me. I haven't finished it yet but find it superb. He goes into detail about generational trauma.

It all makes perfect senses to me. I have a great uncle killed working on the Manhattan project. I still carry his name through a series of "circumstances", all of it TOTALLY unconscious on the parts of family members. Abandon runs right through it all.

Why haven't we figured this out? Imo it's actually really complicated and it involves a great deal of unknown aspects of brain functioning. Just the modern science of genetics is only about 75-years-old. Epigenetics (the science of how genes influence behavior) is even more recent.

As well, and this is just my opinion, it kinda doesn't matter. As Bessel Van der Kolk points out, among many others, just knowing "why" we feel the way we do, doesn't change "how" we feel. Understanding the roots of dysfunction is one thing, healing from that traumatic dysfunction is another.

But I do find it all really fascinating.

[Phoebes]

Chart, it is complicated. So much about the brain we don't know, too. Yeah, I don't have to figure it all out, I mainly just wonder where this extreme behavior starts, and why some family trees don't have to deal with this as much, maybe on a spectrum.

While I'm dealing with this stuff, sometimes having SI, I have friends that have good self esteem, gladly and joyfully look forward to holidays with their family..enjoy lots of love and support from their parents. Have mutually respectful parental relationships...I may not know all the details, but I can see that they have an innate sense of self worth and lovability.

I just wonder why for some of us it's just gotten worse with every generation. Like no one could bring themselves to not be abusive. And no kid on their watch was going to have self-esteem and think too highly of themselves! I mean, there are traumatic events and then there is abuse.

That book sounds interesting. Yeah I already spent like 30 years of my life trying to figure my mom out so I could be compassionate and forgiving. It's on her to heal herself, and I know it'll never happen. Will it for me is still left to be determined.

[NarcKiddo]

Yes, it is frustrating.

I don't have kids (a big part of that was due to trauma and the subconscious fear of perpetuating it) but I sometimes find myself thinking about my mother's own trauma. And then I think that I would not have done to my dogs what she did to me. And yet I might have done some of it to my kids - because she would have interfered. At the age when I would have had kids I was still not really aware of the nature of the problems.

I probably have more to say so I may come back to this thread but I have to go now.

[Chart]

I just wonder why for some of us it's just gotten worse with every generation.

I'm not sure that's the case, Phoebes. If my family trauma is an accurate example (two grandfathers who suffered intense abandonment) then the trauma "should" end with me, that is to say my kids won't be very affected. I'm confident my three kids were healthily attached (according to my understanding of attachment theory). My narcissistic ex—wife was not so toxic as to scapegoat our kids. She just always put her interests first and pretty much avoided honest intimacy with the kids. But she did all the necessary work and cared for them. Me, I was intimate and much more loving, but my own trauma reduced my patience and I also had a lot of anger for many years, especially when they were younger. That softened over time as I came to understand myself better. And I honestly think it never passed into the abusive spectrum. Which is to say it was never violently chronique. Concretely, I would get very verbally angry once every 4-6 months. And my anger was over their behavior, and never their "being". So my kids today seem ok (apart the eldest but she's still doing ok even if she's pretty mad at me. She had birthing trauma as well...)

So all that's to say, if my kids have kids they'll almost certainly be good, decent,  loving parents. My generational trauma "should" end with me.

Bad luck for me maybe, but I think the Universe gives everybody their turn.

I'd like to say as well that being traumatized and suffering from Cptsd has led me to a level of understanding and awareness that most humans don't have. This is my opinion of course, or a perception, but I've noticed this on the forum as well... we're far more conscious and aware than others in "real" life. Cptsd is becoming part of my new "healthy" identity. After 50 years of searching and confusion, I've finally got a really good handle on the mechanics of what's going on. I was chatting with a friend yesterday and during the conversation it was like a humongous banner appeared before my eyes indicating exactly "how" this friend had been abandoned and subsequently turned about face and plunged into supporting extreme right-wing politics. I clearly saw and understood to what point his ideology was a direct expression of the absence of his father.

And the best part now is that not only do I understand so much more, I know what to do, and particularly what NOT to do in terms of reacting. (In this instance I didn't say a word.)

THAT is a plateau full of peace and fulfillment that pretty much escaped me my whole life.

Anything that we go through and come out of feeling more complete and at peace can't be so terrible. Might this not even be a good thing in the long term? One thing's for sure, if I can MAKE it positive, that's a major 'coup d'état' that can't be downplayed.

Cptsd can be "gotten through". Not easy. Not fair. Not to be wished for... but it can be beat, and I'm convinced I'll be that much closer to whatever enlightenment there might be out there waiting for me because of the work it's made me do.

I've decided, the days of peace are getting longer, and the days of pain are fewer between.

The toxic generations behind us are not, nor ever were the victors. Stay the course and let the past die. Our future holds something else in store for us.

Peace and love, no mean feat, but after Cptsd, a piece of cake.
 

[Kizzie]

One person who is a good example of intergenerational trauma is actually Martin Miller, son of the famous Alice Miller who wrote many well known and dare I say beloved books on trauma. 

We have an article by him in our blog about the abuse he suffered by his mother and father. See https://www.outofthestorm.website/guest-bloggers/2019/4/28/how-victims-become-perpetrators-passing-war-trauma-on-to-your-own-children. He also wrote a book "The True Story of the Gifted Child". He is clear that he believes his mother was traumatized during WWII, "war trauma" he calls it, in which forgetting was the only recourse she had.  But it wasn't dormant really, it impacted her behaviour perhaps unknowingly, perhaps not. Whatever the case she did not want to address her suffering. So even though she knew about trauma she still 'gifted' her children with her trauma because it was not something she acknowledged in herself and the times were such no-one spoke of these things.

Looking further back it's easy to to see how much generations before her were traumatized by unrest and hard times in general. For time immemorial no-one has really spoken about trauma which  for me is the key factor in why IGT of trauma kept occurring. Still, no-one really identified CPTSD until Dr. Judith Herman in the 1990s and now we know what it is and have more tools and understanding to break the cycle.

I was really afraid to have children too, but we had a son and I was determined not to treat him like my NM and alcoholic F treated me. Happily, he is a loving, caring young man who knows about my trauma and how it impacts meso he understands it is not him on the occasions when I am triggered or whatever.

So I do think it is possible to end the intergenerational transfer of trauma. More of this active cycle breaking will happen (IMO) as more people come to know about trauma and CPTSD which is one reason for OOTS - to pass knowledge and tools along.  Here's "A Love Letter to the Cycle Breakers"  you might enjoy. It always touches me deeply because I know so many of us are trying our best not to pass our trauma along. https://www.motherhoodandmore.com/a-love-letter-to-the-cycle-breakers/

[Phoebes]

Narckiddo- i have felt that back and forth of being understanding of my mom's trauma, as well as the thought about treating the dog better. The thing is my mom planted that feeling sorry for her into the whole mind-warping mix. She did also treat the dogs badly.

I am sad for my mom, but sometimes I have the thought that I hope so badly one day I will see the dogs again so I can apologize to them. Sometimes I have a flashback to the way I wronged a dog, or how our childhood dogs were treated and I didn't save them. I know I didn't know as a child to get your dogs their shots and not leave them out in the cold. But I know now and I'm mortified and would do anything to fix it. Why wouldn't my mom have that feeling about her CHILD. I know, NPD, mental illness, splitting, projection, inability to self reflect, yada yada...

I wasn't aware of the nature of my problems in my 20's either, narc. I was just running running running.

Chart, thank you for your story, and important reminder!  I am so happy to hear and proud of you that YOU have broken the cycle and did not become and unchangeable narcissists like some people do. The thing my mom doesn't get is I don't "expect her to be perfect," and that if she just apologized for anything, anything at all, giving me a sense that she wants to change and do differently, we would totally have a relationship. But she can't, and her parents couldn't.

I'm glad that you had kids and were able to work through this. It sounds like you have a lot of insight and empathy for your kids and for being good to them, and, it actually good for me to hear from a man who is conscious of all this..where are they? Haha. You're right, I cannot let my experience and other people by the arbiters of my fate. I have to keep moving forward and healing no matter what.

Thank you for the reminder about that article, Kizzie. I remember reading it when it came out. I read the letter as well. I wish I had had a kid. I know I would have tried to be different. I may have been way too lenient for fear of being way too harsh, but that may have turned out ok..lol. I'll never know. I guess being alone, and now becoming isolated and by far the most lonely I've ever been, I feel like "solving" the current issue, which is still more with my parents, and they are not having it.

Sometimes I think of my mom's mom. We were not close. She was damaged by the war and poverty. She was abusive, controlling, a hoarder, pretty mean to me (told me she'd disown me if I said anything else about my molesting grandpa). Definitely lots of trauma in her life.  She's gone now, but I also learned later in life she poured all of her creativity into her tiny little church in her town- she made tapestries and designed stained glass windows, and cooked for everyone every week. She volunteered. She was an amazing cook, but she didn't let my mom in the kitchen,and my mom didn't let me cook either. I feel sorry for her, and I kind of wish I had gotten to know her more when I was older. I wonder if I could feel that for my mom. It's hard to forget the abuse.

[Armee]

I feel sorry for her, and I kind of wish I had gotten to know her more when I was older. I wonder if I could feel that for my mom. It's hard to forget the abuse.

Phoebes, just a gentle reminder that the lack of relationship with both your grandma and mom is not your fault or doing. Even if you were in contact with her you would not have a relationship with your mom because people like her are unable to have a relationship. You would serve her needs and let her destroy yours. That is the only kind of relationship available.

This isn't an issue of your inability to forget past abuse. I have no doubt you're actually remarkably forgiving. This is about the present just as much and in that present your mom is still the same person she was then.

I say this because 1. You don't deserve that guilt. It's not yours. And 2. Because I never went no contact with my mom I was there till the end and it was awful and soul destroying till the end. In fact it got worse the closer she came to the end.

Things wouldn't be different between you and your mom if you could somehow mentally and physically forget the past because she has not changed. I'm sorry your grandmother did nothing about the molestation, took his side, and forbid you from talking about. I'm so sorry you were left unprotected and alone.

[Phoebes]

Thanks, Armee,

I know intellectually it's not my fault. Why does it still feel like it's on me. I can feel solid in that for long periods of time. Then I just start thinking well this is the only chance to know if anything could change. Once they are gone they are gone. I'll accept that for a while as well. Why does it never feel gone. It's just a heavy weight. Always.

[Armee]

I know. 

[Chart]

I know intellectually it's not my fault. Why does it still feel like it's on me. I can feel solid in that for long periods of time. Then I just start thinking well this is the only chance to know if anything could change. Once they are gone they are gone. I'll accept that for a while as well. Why does it never feel gone. It's just a heavy weight. Always.

I believe this is the Limbic level of the brain. It is the deepest level. This is the baby that not only needs to be held, but needs "connection" of the most human kind. And this continues. "Attachment" means so much more than just connecting with the mother. The parent is the filter through which all reality is understood. When that message is incessant "everything is wrong", the child can find but one solution: "I must be responsible, there must be something wrong with me..." At this point the child no longer "learns" about a loving reality around them, they must construct at system that can protect them from a reality that could very well destroy them... Whatever track the amygdala gets on, it stays on. Tearing up those rails and building new routes is a massive undertaking. By all accounts our intellects are of limited effectiveness for this change. Limbic change is the hardest thing in the universe. This is why others don't change. Even us, wanting nothing more than to effect internal change, struggle like mountain climbers in a blizzard. Hellish cold. Zero visibility. Hundred foot fall three feet in front and we don't see a thing. Our parents led us here and now we have to find our way out. The difference is they act like the weather's fine. We however know we're in the merde. Here's to seeing reality... 
Others, who see no reason to change... there's nothing we can do.