REPOSTING this because of this from shadowkid


I know in the past that I have agreed with many here who have said our souls have been murdered or stolen by the abuse done to us. I have even wrote about it when we where lobbying at the State capital for changes in the statutes of limitation a few years ago.

However after a long discussion this last week with Ray my T in KY I don’t know for sure what to think. He say that no matter at what age it started, how bad it was or how long it lasted our souls where untouched by the abuse. Our souls are so deep within us that the abuse did not affect that part of our being.

What do you guys think????? Tom

Hi Muldoon,

I don’t have any sense of a soul in the spiritual sense, but I do and always have had a sense that my essential self, the genetic givens or whatever we are born with remains somehow intact. I have an image of my real self as covered up by the ugly crust of abuse. The recovery from this stuff is for me about revealing the real self that gets smothered by what happened. When I have felt how deep this goes it does feel like a wound in the heart, that it ruined me in some essential way and yet I feel that somehow the real me is still there. My abuse started very young so I can’t compare a before and after. I once believed that my depression was an ingrained personality trait that I always had and always would have, but I am out of most of that and other feelings and behaviours that I thought were me, have changed too.

Maybe I won’t allow myself to feel that victimised, but I do feel that the essential real me was covered up and split off but untouched by the abuse.

Rustam.

You're right. Maybe we should call it attempted-murder of the soul. Or maybe it's what we choose to do with our lives afterwards. It does take a toll like no other. Like our power sources were depleted, and it takes a long time to get that power back. Even now the lights dim occasionally, and I have to go stand in the sun (figuratively) to recharge. Come to think of it, I have a lizard like that, too.

Muldoon,
Thank you for starting this thread. Unlike your T, I do believe our souls have been touched by the abuse. I don't believe our souls are static things that remain unchanged from experience and circumstance. I think murdered and stolen might be strong words, but at the very least the abuse may have cowered our souls, made them stronger, uncaring, sympathetic, certainly different than what they were, although not necessarily better or worse. Peace, Andrew

I am not sure about souls and all of that spiritual stuff. Yes I believe in the spirit, but proof is hard to come by. But I can feel very strongly a part of my being that remained untouched by the abuse. It has been that part of myself that has gotten me thru many of the more difficult trials in this life. I think that some people call it the “inner child.” I don’t really know if it actually goes untouched. In some people it may be seriously damaged and in others it may be strengthened by the same type of traumas.

Recent scientific studies have indicated that there may actually be a gene for spirituality. This might explain why we react so differently to the same stimuli.

Wish I could give a conclusive answer to this question but far wiser men than I have spent their whole lives studying this subject and failed to come up with concrete solutions.

Aden

Tom.

Wonderful thread.

As my T said last week, "I have a good soul. They have violated my body, but they couldn't touch my soul."

That they can't do. It may be buried a little, but it remains there untouched. We may need a little digging to uncover it, but it is there untouched.

Take care,
Bill

Well I don't know about "souls" but I do thing that my tag line sums up what I feel regarding this subject.

From Switchfoot "Meant to Live"
"We were meant to live for so much more, but we lost ourselves. Somewhere we live inside"

i equate the soul with innocence and reverential awe. i that sense, the abuse did impact the soul, for it was an attempt to destroy that innocence and awe. however, i have found that even though my soul was impacted, i still have it. they did not destroy me, but they did put my development in temporary stasis. now, it is alive again, and it will thrive, as we all will.

Man what words have come forward from you, Too moved right how to reply. Have to print this out and read it away from the computer. Later TOM

I think it did mess with my 'soul' even though I'm not 100% sure of the meaning. It is a part of me and I will never be able to get rid of it. I can learn to deal with it, but it will always be there. I can learn to funcion more normally but it will still be there. I don't know why she chose me, why she did it, why I didn't do something about it even though I was young. But that will haunt me for a long time.

Jon