Play & Book Excerpts
Light in Bandaged Places: Healing in the Wake of Young Betrayal
(She Writes Press)
© Liz Kinchen
Chapter Twenty-Five: Deep Therapy
I sought a therapist who could help me revisit my childhood and remember my years with Mark, in order to unlock their secrets more clearly. I was ready to do whatever it took to plumb these memories. I thought I needed a hypnotherapist but instead I found a kind, gentle woman named Patricia, who specialized in abuse and trauma recovery.
At the time, a trend in our popular culture was to identify events and people from our childhood as abusive, and at first, I resisted the notion for myself. I never considered my relationship with Mark, or my family of origin, as having induced trauma. So many people had much worse experiences. I did not starve, no one locked me in a closet or extinguished cigarettes on my legs, I was not homeless, and my parents never even yelled at me. Yet it was an undeniable fact I had serious problems with relationships, and they must have come from somewhere. My emotional inaccessibility, feelings of paralysis, and bafflement ran my life and strained my marriage. It took me a long time to understand that benign neglect in childhood and inattention to emotional needs are also traumatic for a child and have lasting effects.
Together, Patricia and I began a long, slow walk toward re-remembering and recovery. The process was laborious. During the early months and years of therapy, I began writing my story to help me recall childhood details and uncover emotions quashed so long ago. I discovered writing helped open memories long forgotten and shook loose some of the stuck places.
The therapy process is so intricate, like gentle neurosurgery of the psyche and soul... a rewiring of old neurological pathways and replacing them with new, healthier ones. Patricia likened the effects of trauma to living in a trance state—not fully aware and alive, living out of old protective habits. I often left Patricia’s office feeling oddly deconstructed and reconstructed internally.
An addict who feels the pull to fall, or who does fall, has a sponsor they can call who will understand them—not judge or reject them, but love them back onto the path. Like that sponsor, Patricia gently held a lamp of understanding, a broader and deeper vision than mine, and a belief in me that led me to my larger self.
Jason witnessed and supported my recovery, even as he held his own anger and disappointment. A note he wrote early on in my therapy reflects his struggle and his love:
My anger has come and gone and come again, but my love for you has always been steadfast and deep, even through my anger and your neglect. My love for you remains steadfast now. I still consider you the most beautiful and graceful woman in the world. Despite all that I have done to assure you and make you safe, I have failed to make you less afraid of me.
It was true I was afraid, and therefore avoidant. I neglected Jason’s needs, even though it was unintentional. I came to understand how my dynamic with Jason was fueled by a very young, hurt part of myself. The little girl living within me felt alone in the world. She didn’t trust anyone to love her honestly; she believed she wasn’t worthy of love and attention. This hidden little girl ran my life. She drove the doomed cycle with Jason of not feeling “good enough.” Longing for love, she believed she had to earn it by doing what a man wanted. This girl did not know what she wanted, or thought, or had the right to do; she could not advocate for herself. What she did best was to comply, shut down, or dissociate.
Each week, I sat in my usual place on Patricia’s couch, facing her as she sat in her chair across from me, surrounded by thriving plants, an airy room with light-filled windows. I sat with the familiar mix of apprehension of the unknown and comfort that I was in safe, loving hands.
“Close your eyes and take a few deep breaths. Can you see this little girl? Can you feel her in your body? How old is she?” Patricia gently coaxed me.
I saw a sad, bedraggled, little girl with a brown, pixie cut standing alone under a tree outside my childhood house.
“I see her,” I whispered.
“Tell me about her. What does this girl need right now? If the adult Liz could tell her anything, what would she most want to hear?”
Tears stung behind my closed eyes. “She just wants to be loved. She wants me to talk to her, pay attention to her, be with her.”
“What do you say to her?”
“Hey, little one. I’ll be your friend. I’ll look after you. I’ll take care of you.” To Patricia, I said, “I want to pull her onto my lap, wrap my arms around her, and hold her there forever.”
“Go ahead and do that. Hold her in your arms the way you would hold young Savannah or David or Max. You know how to love a child well. You’re doing great. You’re a wonderful mother. This girl needs a mother.”
I always left our sessions drained, elated, and sad. I had a ritual of leaving her office in the morning and stopping in the nearby Panera Bread to order a latte and peanut butter and banana sandwich to take with me to work. This small gesture of nurturing I gave myself was new for me. Now I knew the lack of attention I received from my parents was precisely how I treated myself. Pretending I had no needs and ignoring anything that hurt, I treated myself like I didn’t matter. I couldn’t change the past, but I could change how I treated myself moving forward. I began a slow crawl away from constantly betraying myself and toward loving, supporting, and nurturing myself into health and fullness of being...
I sought a therapist who could help me revisit my childhood and remember my years with Mark, in order to unlock their secrets more clearly. I was ready to do whatever it took to plumb these memories. I thought I needed a hypnotherapist but instead I found a kind, gentle woman named Patricia, who specialized in abuse and trauma recovery.
At the time, a trend in our popular culture was to identify events and people from our childhood as abusive, and at first, I resisted the notion for myself. I never considered my relationship with Mark, or my family of origin, as having induced trauma. So many people had much worse experiences. I did not starve, no one locked me in a closet or extinguished cigarettes on my legs, I was not homeless, and my parents never even yelled at me. Yet it was an undeniable fact I had serious problems with relationships, and they must have come from somewhere. My emotional inaccessibility, feelings of paralysis, and bafflement ran my life and strained my marriage. It took me a long time to understand that benign neglect in childhood and inattention to emotional needs are also traumatic for a child and have lasting effects.
Together, Patricia and I began a long, slow walk toward re-remembering and recovery. The process was laborious. During the early months and years of therapy, I began writing my story to help me recall childhood details and uncover emotions quashed so long ago. I discovered writing helped open memories long forgotten and shook loose some of the stuck places.
The therapy process is so intricate, like gentle neurosurgery of the psyche and soul... a rewiring of old neurological pathways and replacing them with new, healthier ones. Patricia likened the effects of trauma to living in a trance state—not fully aware and alive, living out of old protective habits. I often left Patricia’s office feeling oddly deconstructed and reconstructed internally.
An addict who feels the pull to fall, or who does fall, has a sponsor they can call who will understand them—not judge or reject them, but love them back onto the path. Like that sponsor, Patricia gently held a lamp of understanding, a broader and deeper vision than mine, and a belief in me that led me to my larger self.
Jason witnessed and supported my recovery, even as he held his own anger and disappointment. A note he wrote early on in my therapy reflects his struggle and his love:
My anger has come and gone and come again, but my love for you has always been steadfast and deep, even through my anger and your neglect. My love for you remains steadfast now. I still consider you the most beautiful and graceful woman in the world. Despite all that I have done to assure you and make you safe, I have failed to make you less afraid of me.
It was true I was afraid, and therefore avoidant. I neglected Jason’s needs, even though it was unintentional. I came to understand how my dynamic with Jason was fueled by a very young, hurt part of myself. The little girl living within me felt alone in the world. She didn’t trust anyone to love her honestly; she believed she wasn’t worthy of love and attention. This hidden little girl ran my life. She drove the doomed cycle with Jason of not feeling “good enough.” Longing for love, she believed she had to earn it by doing what a man wanted. This girl did not know what she wanted, or thought, or had the right to do; she could not advocate for herself. What she did best was to comply, shut down, or dissociate.
Each week, I sat in my usual place on Patricia’s couch, facing her as she sat in her chair across from me, surrounded by thriving plants, an airy room with light-filled windows. I sat with the familiar mix of apprehension of the unknown and comfort that I was in safe, loving hands.
“Close your eyes and take a few deep breaths. Can you see this little girl? Can you feel her in your body? How old is she?” Patricia gently coaxed me.
I saw a sad, bedraggled, little girl with a brown, pixie cut standing alone under a tree outside my childhood house.
“I see her,” I whispered.
“Tell me about her. What does this girl need right now? If the adult Liz could tell her anything, what would she most want to hear?”
Tears stung behind my closed eyes. “She just wants to be loved. She wants me to talk to her, pay attention to her, be with her.”
“What do you say to her?”
“Hey, little one. I’ll be your friend. I’ll look after you. I’ll take care of you.” To Patricia, I said, “I want to pull her onto my lap, wrap my arms around her, and hold her there forever.”
“Go ahead and do that. Hold her in your arms the way you would hold young Savannah or David or Max. You know how to love a child well. You’re doing great. You’re a wonderful mother. This girl needs a mother.”
I always left our sessions drained, elated, and sad. I had a ritual of leaving her office in the morning and stopping in the nearby Panera Bread to order a latte and peanut butter and banana sandwich to take with me to work. This small gesture of nurturing I gave myself was new for me. Now I knew the lack of attention I received from my parents was precisely how I treated myself. Pretending I had no needs and ignoring anything that hurt, I treated myself like I didn’t matter. I couldn’t change the past, but I could change how I treated myself moving forward. I began a slow crawl away from constantly betraying myself and toward loving, supporting, and nurturing myself into health and fullness of being...
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Liz Kinchen is the author of Light in Bandaged Places: Healing in the Wake of Young Betrayal. She is a writer, meditation teacher, and Buddhist practitioner.
With graduate degrees in computer science and counseling psychology, Liz worked in software development management for 21 years before moving into the nonprofit sector for seventeen years as the executive director of a small organization working with underserved children and families in Honduras. Her passions are her family, meditation, teaching mindfulness, spirituality, writing, talking with close friends, and walking in nature. She is a contributing author to the anthology Art in the Time of Unbearable Crisis, published by She Writes Press in 2022. She lives in the greater Boston area with her husband of over 30 years. |
Photo Courtesy: Liz Kinchen
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