Innocence Revisited Read online

  The reprieve didn’t last long. Within weeks a new tranche of feelings rocked me to the core. Raw and lacking a context, the feelings floored me. Kate and I have reflected on this period since; they were devastating times and Kate’s observations have validated just how diabolical they were. Apart from describing how dreadful I would look at the end of each session of new memories, Kate also commented on how ‘my chair’ looked; ‘beaten’, ‘pummelled’, ‘pounded’ were the words she used.

  I would start to dissociate on the drive to see Kate. My dissociative state would deepen as I waited and by the time she called me in, I would be seriously spaced out. More often than not Kate would be obliged to lead me into her office by the hand as I couldn’t walk unaided. She’d sit me down in my chair and once in position, I’d curl up cowering in one corner of the chair, hands over my head, anxiously anticipating my fate. Within minutes, previously unknown horrors would commandeer my mind and my body would writhe, flail and shudder as I relived unspeakable acts.

  During that period a new phenomenon crept into my interactions with Kate, as I treated her with suspicion and a near paranoia, triggered by my terror and other forces I was yet to uncover. I would repeatedly question her motives and accuse her of betraying me. The nature of what I was recalling was so dastardly that it threatened to undermine the life-preserving trust which Kate had vested years of attentive patient care to establish.

  The sensible-sounding older child, whose voice Kate and I heard in that particular session, often spoke in the sessions that followed. I called the child ‘Sensible’ because that’s what she called herself. Sensible was my lifeline to my inner self during the innumerable sessions which followed.

  When Sensible’s voice first emerged from my mouth I was terrified; I had no idea what was happening. Fortunately it didn’t take long for Kate to work it out. Over time she explained that children, when faced with overwhelming trauma can form separate parts inside their heads. She stressed that such psychic splitting is an ingenious defence mechanism, which should be admired rather than feared. At that point in time her words did little to relieve my anxiety; I was convinced that I was going crazy.

  Through the mechanism of splitting, she explained, the trauma is compartmentalised; any single part of the child’s mind experiences less trauma than the child as a whole. This mechanism prevents the child’s psyche from being as overwhelmed as it might be otherwise, protecting the child’s sanity and that of the adult, into which the child grows. As a consequence neither the adult nor any separate part of the adult’s mind carries a complete set of trauma memories. Only through remembering and a process of integration can a full narrative of the child’s trauma be re-created and understood.

  I’d typically start off my sessions dissociated as in previous years, but then feel myself slipping into a more distant space. Instead of recovering a new memory straight away, I would begin to speak, but I wouldn’t be speaking in my usual voice. My voice would be that of a child. It would differ in tenor and lilt and utilise language more akin to that of a child than an adult. Often other parts would speak too, not just Sensible, and they’d each use their own voice. Sometimes the voices would have a conversation and I’d find myself listening to them chat like an observer. Yet each one of the voices would emanate from my mouth.

  While all except my usual adult voice were those of children, some of the voices sounded very young while others seemed older and others, older still. My mouth would switch between the different voices without my anticipating it and I would never know what they were going to say until the words were out. Sensible spoke more often than the others; she was an older child and seemed steady and more knowledgeable than the others. Before long, it became obvious that her role was to act as an intermediary between me and the parts, between the parts and each other and between all of us with Kate.

  Sometimes I’d feel as though I had a marketplace inside my head, even when no-one was talking on the outside. I’d have different voices speaking inside, and sometimes several would talk at once. The phenomenon was very disconcerting, especially at first. As the parts found their voices externally, it seemed that they wanted to be heard internally too. Whereas previously, I hadn’t been specifically aware of the parts in my head, for a while they dominated my existence. My head would frequently buzz with the frenetic activity of animated discussions and the internal ructions that activity caused!

  At first, the parts expressed a diversity of views which each one was intent on having heard. Some of the views were contentious and it was hard to accept them or indeed relate to the parts which voiced them. Kate told me that I should work on embracing each of the parts and accepting them and their views. At first I resisted, as they seemed at odds with my outlook on life, but eventually I appreciated the reasons behind her advice. Without accepting the parts I could not accept myself and without integrating them, or at least coming to terms with what they were saying, I could not become whole. Knowing and understanding the reasoning behind Kate’s advice didn’t make the process any easier. The whole thing terrified me and that fear was multi-dimensional. To deal with it I needed to understand where it came from and before I could understand that, I needed to understand how the parts came about.

  Kate explained that when I was little, and in mortal danger, my mind had split into parts which locked their own trauma memories away. This process had protected the other parts and ‘Little Me’ as a whole. Only now that I was an adult and supported in therapy, did the parts feel safe enough to re-experience their trauma and face the feelings it had caused.

  Sometimes one of my parts would pipe up when I was out and about. That happened a few times with different friends and it was downright embarrassing when it did. I’d do my best to cover it up by making a joke of it, or by pretending that I was doing it intentionally. Of course that excuse sounded strange anyway. The parts spoke up reasonably often, with my own kids, because they felt comfortable around them. When that happened, I’d pretend that I was playing baby games. Sometimes I actually was, but a lot of the time I’d regressed in age, and was younger than my biological children!

  Dan got to meet some of my parts too, but that was usually intentional. I encouraged my internal parts to speak to him so he could understand what I was dealing with. He didn’t meet as many parts as Kate did, but enough to give him some idea of the challenges I was facing.

  I resented having so little control over the various activities inside my own head. Not only did my mouth often speak without my permission, but it spoke on behalf of others, many I didn’t know existed until I heard them speak. I wondered how Kate would accept parts of herself which she didn’t know or couldn’t control. I grappled to accept my new predicament, but eventually realised that there might always be parts that I didn’t fully understand. My mind had been fragmented for a long time; it was imperative to achieve a cooperative headspace in which the parts worked together, but that was not always possible.

  chapter 26

  My name is Sensible.

  I didn’t plan on speaking that first time in Kate’s room, but the words just popped out. I was sick of sitting back and saying nothing. And Kate was getting worried; someone had to say something and besides Grownup-Cathy had been dealing with a lot for a long time; it was high time I introduced myself and helped her out.

  Grownup-Cathy is the name that me and the other parts call the grown up person that Cathy has become on the outside. There are lots of us; I don’t know all of us parts by name; no-one does, but I have met more of the parts than anyone else.

  Kate and Grownup-Cathy didn’t know about me until I started speaking. One minute Kate was asking Grownup-Cathy a question and the next it was me answering. They both freaked out when they heard my voice; I know because I saw them do it. My voice isn’t as deep as Grownup-Cathy’s and I don’t know as many big words. I’m younger, but I’m not as young as some of the others, like The-Little-Ones for example. They’re really young.

  I was a bit sc
ared the first time I spoke out loud. That’s why I didn’t say much. I’d never spoken to Kate before, even though I had listened lots to her and Grownup-Cathy speaking. I feel like I know Kate but not really. I don’t know her myself.

  Grownup-Cathy’s mind has lots of parts. Kate says that everyone’s mind has lots of parts but Cathy’s parts are split apart more than other people’s parts. Some of us are full parts and we have our own names.

  The full parts had lots of bad things happen to them and they have lots of things to remember and tell the others about. Others are bits of parts; they only had one or two bad things happen to them.

  All of us parts came about when Cathy was little; we call her ‘Little-Cathy’, which is funny because Kate does too. When Little-Cathy was really little, lots of really bad things happened to her and they’re the things which Grownup-Cathy has been remembering. Well some of them anyway; Grownup-Cathy still doesn’t know everything that happened to Little-Cathy. That’s why I’m speaking now; I have to help Grownup-Cathy find out about the other bad things and help her understand them all.

  The things I’m going to tell you about are really bad. Little-Cathy got hurt lots. And it wasn’t just Little-Cathy who got hurt, but other children and animals and babies too. Little-Cathy called the people who did the bad things ‘baddies’. The baddies did lots of bad things.

  They did bad things to Little-Cathy and they made Little-Cathy do bad things too. And the baddies made Little-Cathy watch them doing bad things. And the baddies did really bad things to children and animals and babies. I know because I was a part of Little-Cathy then. Little-Cathy was really scared and I was too.

  Kate tells Grownup-Cathy that all of the baddies have gone. She says that they’ve been gone a long time. Kate explains that Grownup-Cathy is all grown up and that she has a family of her own. Kate tells Grownup-Cathy that the baddies can’t hurt her ever again. Grownup-Cathy tries to believe Kate and she does most of the time. But when the young parts take over and remember what happened to them, Grownup-Cathy feels little and the feelings she had when she was little come back and she gets really scared.

  I know more about the other parts than anyone because it’s my job to help all of the parts. Not all of them can understand; some are too small and scared and others are too hurt and angry. Some of the parts only know about the baddies and how the baddies hurt them. And some of the parts are mean, parts like Growly; Growly is mean and scary and no-one likes Growly. It’s lucky that Growly sleeps most of the time; we never want Growly to wake up, not ever.

  I have lots to do. Sometimes, some of the parts don’t want to do what the rest of us want to do, but I have to try and get them to do it even when they don’t want to. It’s not always hard to get the parts to do something together. Sometimes none of us are out, even on the inside and Grown-up Cathy decides what she wants to do by herself. On most other days only a few parts are out on the inside and most of the time we do what Grownup-Cathy wants to do anyway. It’s only when the parts don’t want to do the same thing that I have trouble.

  Kate invites each of us parts to speak to her. She says that she needs to get to know us so she can help us understand each other. I help Kate by introducing the parts that I know. Not everyone is happy with me for doing that, because not everyone wants to meet Kate at first; some parts don’t trust her yet. They’re little and hurt; it takes them a long time to trust anybody. Kate’s great; she treats each one of us as if we’re the ones coming to see her and never makes us think that we’re not important because we’re only a part and not a whole person. And when a young part speaks to her, she talks to them like you do when you speak to a little child and that makes them feel good.

  Some parts don’t come out at all; they hide because they’re scared. Different ones of us are scared of different things because different bad things happened to us, but we’re all scared of the baddies. Some of us are scared of each other; we’re especially scared of mean parts like Growly. Kate doesn’t like us calling any parts mean. She says that all of the parts are important and that we need to get to know every one of us, even the ones we don’t like. She says that when we were little, each of us had a job to do and that doing those jobs saved Cathy. Kate tells us that the parts that the rest of us call mean were the parts which had to do the really bad things. She says that we should embrace the mean parts. I don’t want to do that, even though Kate says we should.

  We weren’t born when Little-Cathy was born; we were born after the bad things started to happen, because that’s when Little-Cathy needed us. Little-Cathy made us on the inside when she needed us to help her keep safe.

  Kate speaks with as many of us as she can; she even remembers some of our names. Sometimes she doesn’t know who someone is, but she says that she doesn’t always need to. She understands us and that’s the main thing. Kate’s really nice and most of us like her a lot.

  Sometimes when new parts speak, they’re new to me too. I introduce myself to them and try to make them feel welcome. Sometimes that’s hard to do because sometimes I don’t like them. Lots of people don’t like Growly. Kate says it’s because we’re scared of him. I’m scared of him when he does mean things and when he looks mean. But sometimes when Growly looks mean, he isn’t being mean; it’s just the way he looks. I’m still scared though.

  Grownup-Cathy keeps trying to work out who all the parts are, but it’s not easy. Kate tells Grownup-Cathy to be patient. Kate says that Grownup-Cathy doesn’t need to know who everyone is because sometimes you can’t know. I don’t like her saying that and nor does Grownup-Cathy, but we’re starting to understand what she means by it. It’s because some of the parts don’t know what happened to them; they’re scared and sore without knowing why. Some parts can’t remember what bad things happened to them; they just know that there were things and they were bad.

  I don’t like when parts fight on the inside because you can’t get away from the fighting. I try to understand what’s going on and sort it out without taking sides. The other parts think that I should be able to sort the fights out because I’m Sensible but I can’t always do everything myself. Long-Suffering helps me when she can - when The-Little-Ones are asleep and she’s finished all of her work. Long-Suffering is great like that, but even when she helps we can’t always make everyone make up.

  Growly makes this hard because he likes to start fights and when he doesn’t start them himself other parts fight because he’s around. Growly’s yucky and mean and he makes the other parts feel bad. Kate says that Growly does mean things because he’s scared and because he has no friends. She says that Growly had to do yucky things when we were little and that if he hadn’t done them we wouldn’t have survived. She says that we should be nice to Growly because he saved us. But all of us had to do yucky things, not just Growly and I tell Kate that. All of us had to do yucky things!

  Sometimes Distrustful says mean things about Kate, and she gets Pissed-Off going. I do my best to stop them saying mean things about Kate; I tell them that Kate is trying to help us all, but it’s not easy being me all the time. And I don’t like everything that Kate does either - like when Kate tells me to cuddle Growly! I’m never going to cuddle Growly! Not ever!

  chapter 27

  Most Sundays from the time I was around five, my father would drive me to my grandmother’s house. My father’s mother was the only grandparent I ever got to meet and I didn’t like her one bit. I hated going to her place and always objected, but my father took me anyway. I don’t think he had a choice.

  My grandmother was an ardent Presbyterian, whose rigid interpretation of her religion’s doctrine dictated a puritanical lifestyle. As a little girl I thought being Presbyterian meant not being allowed to use bad words, or drink any alcohol, even at Christmas when everyone drank a little sherry, even those who didn’t drink at any other time. My grandmother went to church regularly, not just on Sundays, but whenever there was any church activity. She was the treasurer on the church auxiliary and wore her
role as a badge of pride.

  As treasurer it was my grandmother’s job to count the money collected during Sunday morning services, the takings from fetes and stalls and tally it all up. The job took up a lot of her time, but she loved it and she loved the status it gave her. Her involvement with the church didn’t stop with the treasurer role. My grandmother always seemed to be knitting and crocheting - booties and babies’ outfits, doilies, and ‘kerchiefs to sell at stalls and fetes. And when she wasn’t knitting, she was baking. She baked sponges by the dozen with cream and jam in the middle and icing sugar on top. And tubs of lemon butter as well as jars of jams and marmalade by the legion. She’d use home grown oranges and lemons, and cumquats from the neighbours’ garden, and grapes from her vines out the front.

  My grandmother loved baking. She also loved eating and it showed. My mother assimilated my grandmother’s corpulence with ‘a wardrobe’. As a little girl I couldn’t grasp the comparison; my grandmother didn’t have any doors. I did agree that my grandmother was fat though, and I still remember how gigantic her bloomers were. To me they looked like sails ballooning when the wind got behind them on the washing line. Her breasts were large too. My mother used to say that you could serve morning tea on grandmother’s bosoms. And my grandmother wore dresses which looked like tents, except her tents had flowers on them and they went right down to the ground. They fell so low that you could barely see her ankles at all. I remember feeling sorry for my grandmother’s ankles because of the mammoth task they faced in holding her and her tent up straight.