Abuse Shapes A Child’s Development and view of the world

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As I look back over my life at all the things that shaped my world view, my self-view, and my view of others, I have come to realize that although I have had several events I call big traumas that it was the little ones that really shaped my development as I grew up.

The year I turned seven was indeed full of big traumas it was the little traumas that happened between the big traumas that not only set the tone for the big traumas to become traumatic but it also set me to walk into other violent and abusive situations.

As a child is growing up the child is developing who they are and a big part of that is their worldview and their self-view. They are learning how to interact with other humans.

Abuse is sometimes violent and sometimes worse

Over the next few years as little Tina grew into a teenager there were things going on in the home. The family was telling little Tina that her accomplishments were bad. They told her things like “you think you are special because you got 100 percent on all your tests. You must have cheated.”

The sexual abuse continued to happen and continued to be denied. Robin tried to fight back when he came to her room. She would scream or run into mom and tell her. Mommy didn’t hit or silence or deny Robin but she did Tina when Tina tried to tell her. She hit Tina in the mouth so hard her mouth bled. Mommy silenced Tina and made her helpless.

When puberty kicked in and all the emotions went haywire, Tina was told how bad of a person she was because she “wore her feelings on her sleeves” as her mother would tell her. She was too sensitive she was told.

When Tina turned 12 she witnessed two men in hazmat suits dumping a barrel of green liquid along the train tracks behind the house on 204th street in Torrance, California. It’s now a superfund area.

She tried to tell her mother but she didn’t know what hazmat suits were called so she told her mother they were wearing space suit looking things. They weren’t space suits but they looked kinda like that. Mom dismissed her. the family went on being poisoned for the next few years until they finally moved to Downey, a higher class neighborhood. Or at least it was back in 1984.

Life went on for Tina as usual with the usual abuse that took place. After the time she saw the dumping, her doctor put her on a diet. She has started gaining weight. The doctor put her on a calorie diet. After all, a 12-year-old shouldn’t weigh 133 lbs. A lot of focus was put on her weight.

After Tina’s infant niece passed away, her sister moved back in. Brenda tried to help Tina with her weight problem by guiding her on a journey using anorexia as a weight loss plan.

Tina tried it for a while and it worked. She lost weight and the doctor and everyone gave their approval but Tina wasn’t anorexic and she couldn’t maintain the not eating for too long. She was eating here and there but with more caution. Tina spent most of her adult life trying one diet after the next to control her weight until one day as an adult she was diagnosed with Hypothyroidism, the autoimmune kind.

She went to church and attended a Christian School and although we were a very poor family, no one knew of the insidious craziness that was taking place in the home. It’s craziness because what was happening in the home didn’t make sense. It was so nonsensical that when Tina tried to tell what was going on, people didn’t believe her because it was just too crazy to believe.

Taking a look into the Abuse

Part of the abuse was Narcissistic abuse. With all the gaslighting, manipulations, blame-shifting, Love bombing, devaluation, and more. Mary was put on a pedestal and Tina was made the scapegoat.  

This is just a glimpse of what daily life was like. Watching siblings get abused. I witnessed the verbal, emotional, and physical abuse of my siblings as well as what I experienced too. It’s amazing how my siblings ganged up on me with my mother’s lead to help her abuse me and keep me in my place as the scapegoat. 

It wasn’t until I went into therapy after I went No Contact with my family that I started getting help to not only identify the abuse and to label it but in doing that very thing started my healing process. Healing from all of the insidious abuse that took place every day in little Tina’s life.

Little Tina was growing into a teenager and all the abuse prior such as the sexual abuse and all the crazymaking that took place in the home, she couldn’t identify when danger was present. After all, Danger was present even in her home. The threats of danger looked the same as her everyday life. So, she walked into traps without recognizing the danger signs.

What my family taught me about me, the world around me, and people, in general, shaped my views so much that I can’t even take a compliment at face value. I can’t help but think it’s just flattery and they want to manipulate me for some reason. I have to fact-check compliments which delays any positive response. I give a fake response then I go back and fact check it to see if I’m willing to accept it as a compliment or if it’s just flattery. 

Because I was told nothing but bad things about myself growing up, I find it difficult to believe that anyone would think something nice about me. And when I fact check it and it turns out to be something true about me, I cry because someone recognized something good. I’m not sure if it’s real or if I’m just reaching and wanting to hear that. Are they telling me those things because they know I want to hear them so badly? I want and need to hear good things about myself but I really just can’t believe that anyone means them.

The abuse directly affected my self-view in a negative way and I developed very low self-esteem. All of that Narcissistic abuse affected me worse than any of the violence that I’ve witnessed and endured in my entire lifetime and I’ve experienced quite a few.

Picture of Tina Houston

Tina Houston

Tina Houston is a survivor of several forms of abuse that began in her infancy as a one-year-old baby. In order to heal, she had to leave her family behind. It took a lot of work to be able to forgive herself and her attackers. It’s in this space that she writes about her stories.

My Story
Picture of Tina Houston

Tina Houston

Tina Houston is a survivor of several forms of abuse that began in her infancy as a one-year-old baby. In order to heal, she had to leave her family behind. It took a lot of work to be able to forgive herself and her attackers. It’s in this space that she writes about her stories.

My Story