I am moving very slowly through the article I cited in yesterday’s post.  The realization that I am better off as a result of my mother’s beatings than I would have been without them is a tough fact to understand.  I’ve heard that before, that abuse is not as bad as neglect, but only right now do I begin to realize why that is so.  This article I am reading documents research about what brain and nervous system changes occur due to isolation of rats after they are weaned — and the effects being seen parallel schizophrenia and depression, consequences that would not have occurred to these rats if the isolation had not occurred.

Beatings at least stimulate the brain, I guess.  Isolation has an entirely different effect.  In actuality, I had both……  these are not things any therapist has ever explained to me –unfortunately, I have to figure this out for myself….

I have been able at times in the past to read research articles and process the information intellectually while remaining detached from my feelings, from my memories, from what particularly my body knows about what I have experienced.  We are not trained in our culture to be able to process the information we hold personally about ourselves in our lives.  How do I combine the two ways of knowing?  Right now I cannot dissociate the two….

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