fair/ unfair punishments and trauma

 I read the following statement on fetlife a few days ago, and it gave me a lot of food for thought:

I realise it's not for everyone, but sometimes I like receiving punishments which are not "fair" - perhaps dished out on a whim, or because the disciplinarian is a bad mood, or just because they can. I find it appealing that I can be interrupted from a perfectly innocent activity: spanked at any moment; if I'm watching TV, I might suddenly be blindfolded; if I'm chatting with other littles, I might suddenly have a dummy shoved in my mouth so I then have to stay silent. If punishment is only the result of being "naughty", this gives me too much control as the little.

I pondered these words a lot. And I realized how closely linked it is to what I am doing constantly in my life.

I understand now: I am constantly afraid to be punished unfairly. I am constantly on edge. I am constantly trying to please the people in my life, in order to prevent them from unfairly scolding me/yelling at me/ criticising me and punishing me.

I have been exposed to unfair / unpredictable treatment and adult behavior from a very early age on.

And now I am always trying to guess or learn or feel what another person is doing/feeling/intending to do, in order to keep myself out of harms way. 

I am scared shitless of doing the 'wrong " thing. I am scared of making a mistake. I am scared of causing problems or -God help me-, even causing troubles.

The older I get, the more I understand how much I have been traumatized when I was young. I always knew that there is a lot going on in my family of origin, and I always understood that I was a parentified child, taking care of the needs of the adults, but it took me years to grasp how deeply I was effected by the drama around me.

When I entered my first sexual relationship, I had this constant fear that I might do something that pisses the guy off. It felt like I was walking trough a field of landmines. I was never sure when he would explode. And it was completely unpredictable. I never knew what could trigger him. And this feeling never left me. 

And still today I am constantly in fear. My german shrink has asked me often: "what are you afraid of?" but I could not give her a satisfactory reply. I know my husband loves me. I think basically I am afraid NOT to please my partner, and that as a consequence he might punish me emotionally. 

The more I look into it and into myself, the more I understand how much I am hurting. I stumbled accross a great blog by Dr Arielle Schwartz, a psychologist, in which she writes about the "fawn response". 

And when I read her words , it felt like she is expressing exactly what I am feeling but what I wasnt able to put into words so far. After reading what she wrote, I wanted to shout from the top of my lungs: yes, exactly, that is it! Finally somebody understands what I am going through. Finally somebody puts the unspeakable into words

She says:

 When a child learns to cope by taking care of the parent’s emotional needs, that child is relying on a defense structure, termed the “fawn” response which has been widely discussed by Pete Walker in his book on Complex PTSD. The fawn response involves trying to appease or please a person who is both a care provider and a source of threat. Examples of fawning include:

“I hoped that by caring for them they might care for me.”

“I never showed my true feelings for fear of retaliation.”

“I was always walking on eggshells; I never knew when they would explode”

“I had to shapeshift myself depending upon their mood.”

When engaging a fawn response, an individual bypasses their own needs and in some cases, sense of identity, for the sake of attending to the needs of others. In adulthood, an unresolved fawn response might lead to patterns of people pleasing or co-dependence, in which one continues to sacrifice their own needs for the sake of maintaining relationships.

Physiologically, a fawn response involves reading the social and emotional cues of others to attend to and care for their needs. Fawning also involves disconnecting from body sensations, going “numb” and becoming “cut off” from your own needs. 

 Here on this blog, I wrote often how difficult it is for me to feel connected with my own needs and to get my own needs met. And even when I opened the blog, and when I chose the name:" the strong woman", it only shows that already back then I felt like I HAD to be strong. 

In a way I am very relieved now, because I finally know what is going on inside me.