Self-esteem, recovery from sexual abuse

This week while reading Scientific American Mind I came across some interesting articles that relate to self-esteem. I will write about these articles in the coming weeks and would love you to comment with your thoughts.

The first article relates to survivors of childhood sexual abuse, an issue I have personal experience of both as a “survivor” and a therapist.

The article refers to a common lingering reaction of contamination where survivor feels negative feelings of “impurity”. They feel they are still contaminated by the abuser and spoiled goods. Not surprisingly this often leads to self-esteem, body image and relationship issues. In some cases there are behavioural issues such as obsessive body washing.

Scientific American Mind report on a study undertaken by psychologists at Goethe University, Frankfurt using Behaviour Modification methods that applied both logic and emotion. The study took the form of a brief intervention of one session with a “booster” follow up meeting.

The following steps were taken:

1. The participant was encouraged to discuss the detail of their thoughts of contamination including feelings, where they had these thoughts and the impact on their daily life.

2. The participant was given a research task to find out how often human skin cells are rebuilt and replaced. In particular to calculate how many times the cells in trauma related parts of their body had been replaced since last contact with the abuser. This was done via the internet during the session.

3. The therapist then facilitated a discussion where the participant explored what these facts meant. For example, none of the existing cells on the participants body had ever been in contact with the abuser so were free of contamination.

4. The final stage was a visualisation where the participant was encouraged to imagine shedding their contaminated skin.

The study author, Kerstin Jung reported results that were extremely positive and encouraging. There was a significant reduction in feelings of being contaminated and they also noted decreases in overall post-traumatic distress scores.

In Jung’s opinion the combination of factual information coupled with the mental imagery is key for emotional change. Knowing the facts alone provides information only without emotional change. To quote Jung “we introduce the imagery technique as a vehicle to transport the rational information from the head to the heart…… images are much more powerful to change emotions than verbal information”.

This research connects with the work Rick Gray has been doing in the USA working with war veterans suffering from PTSD. He has been using NLP techniques based on V-K dissociation (Visual-Kinesthetic) and measuring changes in brain structure at the molecular level using MRIs.

The veterans often experience more progress in one session of two hours than measured during two years of alternate therapies. MRIs show actual changes in brain structure at the molecular level after the intervention.

Many survivors of sexual abuse experience PTSD and imagery often seems to help people move on to a new place in their thinking and experience in life. This in turn boosts self-esteem.

I’d like to expand this out further by thinking about the impact of identity labelling. I have very deliberately used the label “survivor” in this blogg to label the participants in Jung’s study as this is the label they used however even this label needs to be questioned.

In my own journey there were some interesting changes in my labelling of self. In NLP, identity is one of the most profound levels when looking at self-belief and identity labels are often the most resistant to change.

Here is how my labelling progressed. Until the age of 29 years I was without a label for my experience of sexual abuse, I knew that a regular visitor to the house had sexually touched me and I had kept it secret. My experience was at an unconscious, childlike level as if I had stayed stuck at that age sexually. My memories were intact I just didn’t share them with anyone and didn’t really consider how the experience had negatively impacted on my self-esteem and adult relationships.

The identity level was so profound that it lacked a label and was just who I was. I then attended a personal development workshop where I had a revelation about many things and this in particular.

I became for a short while a “victim” of sexual abuse. This label of course is very disempowering and I was quickly helped to reframe this label to “survivor” however for quite a long time it was a word only and not who I felt I was. I still felt like a victim.

As the anger began to kick in I started to feel more comfortable and almost self-righteous with my proud label of survivor. I was confident and willing to share my experience with all who wanted to know and some who didn’t! It was still emotion laden.

As I continued along my personal development journey I realised that truly moving on from this traumatic experience from my childhood involved moving to a new state where this experience was just an experience.

I no longer use the term “survivor” in relation to myself. In my opinion this keeps us still locked into the experience at an identity level. Moving to a place where our past traumas can be recalled without the emotional load frees us to step into our full personal power.

Now I have labels that are far more positive “woman”, “wife”, “friend”, “teacher” and “leader”. I probably have more labels than that as I like to be flexible in my interaction with life however I am clear that the only labels I want to define myself with are those that focus on a positive and happy future unchained from past events.

To look at the original article in Scientific American Mind go to:

www.scientificAmerican.com/mind

For more information about Rick Gray’s work follow the link below:

http://archive.org/details/RichardM.Gray_Ph.D.NLPandPTSD_TheVisual-KinestheticDissociationProtocol.

Next week I will write about the second article and it’s links to self-esteem.