Imagine if you insisted to do business the same way as you did before the pandemic came around…by now your business would have died or is in the verge of collapse. Never stay the same. Be flexible, ready to embrace new ways of doing things, ready to learn. Isn’t the dinosaur, the most powerful terrifying beast extinct now…are companies such as Nokia dn Kodak no longer in the market?
Studies worldwide indicate that women are at the greatest risk of developing depressive disorders in their 40s. The vulnerable state, hormonal fluctuations, role-stress, victimization, sex specific socialization, internalized coping style and disadvantaged social status have been documented to increased vulnerability.
Whist the disorder is prevalent, spotting the symptoms are extremely challenging. Women manifest depression by talking about heightened emotions –they verbalize readily emotional distress, sharing about their guilt and shame; they try make themselves invisible so that people will ignore them.
Women with depression tend to conceal the condition because of shame, stigma, fear. Listening attentively to our women friends and noticing changes in their behaviors will help us catch depression at its earlier stages.
Working with Arianne through the years has been very very fulfilling. Through her company, CF Sharp, we have been able to enrich many many lives of the OFW spouses left in manila as their spouses work overseas. It is challenging to work with families that have been torn apart by necessity to make ends meet. There is much guilt, jealousy, loneliness, and resentment built up through the separation. The spouses left in Manila take up dual roles of father & mother to the kids; must be able to handle family finances, and must be able to manage in-laws who often judge them. indeed they are our unsung heroes.
Oftentimes, the problems of the broken hearted appear insurmountable. oftentimes, it feels like its useless to work on things. But, this group of ladies has an indefatigable spirit that keeps giving, giving, and giving. At this meeting, I had pitched a protocol for choosing the right girls to be beneficiaries of the centre. With a variety of disciplines and a heart brimming with love, a battery of tests were decided upon and a new batch of 10 girls were chosen for 2019. God bless these holy souls
Rape and Incest bring so much shame to the victim that they cannot even bring themselves to say the words. They stumble, hide behind their hair, eat the words, wring their hands…and talking to them about it brings so much pain and fear that they feel their oppressor right inside the room with them.
There are so much hatred and self-blame, so many questions that shroud their minds. For those who bear children from the crime, there is self-judgment for hating the child and hating being forced into being parents with its accompanying responsibilities when they did not make active decisions in this life-changing event.
The way out is through unconditional positive regard for them and the decisions, feelings, and beliefs they may have as they unload their stories and make sense of their new lives.
Most specially if the abuser is a parent or someone the victim trusts, abuse becomes more challenging to accept or come to terms with. It is the betrayal of trust and the disbelief that keeps the victim from healing. How does one come to understand that a person whom they have given their heart and trust to has taken advantage and used their power to hurt ? that after all the love and devotion given, they are treated with such hate and disrespect?
One of the ways victims of abuse survive the ordeal is by shutting down their feelings…numbing themselves to stave the pain away. The victims live emotionless days on end because perpetuators seesaw between kindness and hostility; treating them like objects and showering them with unwelcome attention. Their lives are a smorgasbord of physical, emotional, sexual, and spiritual abuse.
When they somehow make it out, they are so emotionally shut down it is difficult to reach them. No matter how sad, hurt, lonely they are, they would rather ball themselves within rather than feel the pain again. Only kindness and empathy break through the steel.
*Image borrowed from the Internet
Abuse works by diminishing someone till they feel so small, useless, powerless to defend themselves. When the victim is weakened by fear, hopelessness, lack of resolve, all out of solutions and fighting spirit —this is when the bully steps in and shows his might.
Sit and imagine the fear of the moment. The torment of thinking ‘what is going to happen next’; the second guessing whether she did something wrong; the feeling of powerlessness of being at someone’s whim; the wishing that ‘maybe this time I will get it right’; feeling of aloneness…no one can help.
The only way out for this broken soul is kindness. The love of kindness that someone extends to help someone out of that hole. Champion them, fight for them…not just stand by and look. Someone to help them dream again and give them a hand reaching their goals. Someone who reminds them of their skills and talents so that they may try again against all the fear.
An avenue that one who was abused can explore is to see the experience as ‘an event that has happened’ and it has come to pass. Understanding that one does not have to give up, only rest; that one can change life through action; that dreams can be accomplished slowly.
*Image borrowed from the Internet
Surviving abuse takes stamina. You have to be mentally and emotionally resilient, physically strong, and spiritually powerful. The abuser tortures his chosen victim day in and day out —taunting the victim to fight back, pulling the rug from under them, setting the victim up for failure, removing resources of coping so that they will become mute and inutile.
The ones who come to see me speak of keeping their head down to survive or at least keep afloat. They fight a difficult battle because they fight against themselves and the perpetrators and all those who judge them. And through the fight, they develop a different psyche —often filled with mistrust, hate, powerlessness, even self-loathing.
The armor of hate is pervasive as it colors all their lives. While the deep hate helps keep them alive to survive the ordeal, it keeps them stuck and eaten inside. Once freed from the situation, they try to release themselves from the stench and work through forgiveness but all they feel is self-recrimination for having ‘participated in the abuse.’ That protective armor now becomes a barrier against healthy sex, peaceful and deep relationships. Healing becomes a lifelong process.
May the strong become pliant again so they can live.
*Image borrowed from Psychology Today
For the few stout-hearted women, they find the courage to go against their perpetuators in the court of law. It is a challenging exercise for the victims as their body remembers and reacts to the fear they had lived with for many many years. Their stories, so embedded in their hearts, are spoken in haltingly as if unsure that it happened, the hurt and pain once more well up in their eyes. As they re-live the hell and once more feel the shame, the anger wells up within them and the venomous hate makes them speak viciously –the complexity of emotions shuts them down and depletes them of energy. The utter fear and pain they feel at having to face their perpetuator even from behind jail bars or from across the courtroom keeps them awake at night, zombie-like for the days leading up to the meet-up.
There is hardly anything one can say to help them walk through the pain. They are inconsolable, and no matter how many friends and supporters they have along they way, they walk alone.
For them, all we can do is listen. Receive their pain. Witness for them and remind them of their strengths. They cannot forget in the dark what they know in the light.
or send me a testimonial 😄