03 Mar Healing Scars of a Broken Heart
This is an anonymous testimony and Foster Coalition has permission to share this story. TW: mentions of child abuse, neglect, sexual assault. Reader discretion advised.
As a child, you are supposed to trust and feel unconditionally loved by your parents and family, right? But what happens to a child when that trust is broken? What happens when they are trained to believe that love is conditional? Well, let me tell you…
Early Life
I was not aware of how impacted my brain was from what I endured as a child. Being told, “you are not good enough,” or being punished every time I failed to exceed the expectations I was given…really stuck with me. Whenever my parents would be angry, drunk, or both, all the things I had ever done wrong in their eyes would be thrown in my face. It was a reminder that I was flawed and had to earn their love. When I would do everything right, I would be rewarded. If I made a mistake – if I was human – it was not pretty.
I would often get abused by my parents emotionally, verbally, sexually, and even physically. When I would defend myself or beg for the abuse to stop, I was reminded of all the wonderful things my parents had done for me. This was to tell me that whenever I made mistakes, I deserved the treatment I received…because after all they had done for me, how dare I rebuke any maltreatment when I did not fall in line.
If I wanted “good treatment,” then I had to perform perfectly and show how grateful I was to them. My worth and the amount of love I received was based on my performance. What was confusing was that even when I performed perfectly, somehow, there was still always something I had done wrong.
This is how I was trained to accept conditional love. As long as I fought for approval, bought affection through my acts of service, and proved my worth through good behavior, maybe then I would be worthy of being loved and cared for. Fun fact – conditional love is not real love, and little did my young self know that this would only be a never-ending cycle of being trained to accept abuse. All that young girl wanted was her mommy and daddy to love her no matter what. She’d fight for it until she finally got it because that is what mommy and daddy were supposed to do…right?
Teenage Years
Once I was removed from my home and into a foster home where I had time and space to heal, I saw the ways that conditioning showed up in my everyday life. I became a people pleaser. I was hyper aware of any energy-shift in the room. Someone’s change of tone would set off my alarm bells to tell me something was wrong and it was my job to fix it.
I would often find myself in scenarios daily where I would think, Oh, If I bring my teacher something that might make her happy and like me a little extra that day, she will be nice which means we would all have a good day. If I said no to someone, then I would hurt their feelings and they would love me less. I had to do whatever it took to make them happy so my worthiness of their love would not falter.
No one should ever be made to feel this way, especially a child.
In addition to people-pleasing, I also tried to excel in everything I did. If I didn’t, everyone would be disappointed in me and my worth would diminish which would lead to them loving me less. In relationships, so long as I gave a guy everything he wanted, I was worthy of being loved. No matter how they treated me, if I could just do better, then they would be happy and I would continue to be worthy of loving.
If my foster parents told me I messed up or forgot to do something, even if they were doing it in a loving, healthy way, I took it as imminent failure. I felt like I had failed at being perfect and my worth was diminished. I was terrified they would see that I was not good enough and no longer worthy of loving. I wanted so badly for them to see that I was. That was the lie I believed, that they did not already love me no matter what. But I could not see it that way, not yet anyway.
Adult Years
As I have gotten older, I saw it in later relationships, in my work, and in the way I treated myself. I often put my feelings aside for others. I felt like it was my job to fix everyone’s mood and problems. I did not know how to set boundaries, nor did I think I was allowed to. I entered a toxic relationship where I was forced to endure more abuse and was conditioned further to believe that I deserved the treatment I was getting.
I had to realize that I did not deserve that. That love does not have to be transactional. Even if I messed up or failed, I was still worthy of loving. I had to stop searching for validation in others, and instead, validate myself. It took time to learn what real love was, but with my faith in God and support from my family, friends, and therapist, it was possible.
I also had to learn to trust again. I had to understand that not everyone was trying to take everything from me, that I was not going to be unloved because I did not do something perfectly or say yes to everything. I slowly began to learn that there are people out there willing to care for my heart and not abuse it.
An example of this was whenever someone would do something nice for me, my immediate response would be, “Oh, now I have to pay them back somehow or they are going to think I am not grateful. Now, if I ever put myself first at any given moment, they will think I took their gift or gesture for granted and I will no longer deserve it or any gesture of love moving forward.” It sounds crazy, but this is how I was trained to be. I believed love was transactional, and what I thought was real devotion to someone was actually supply and demand.
Of course it takes time to unlearn this, and still am every day, but it is possible to accept unconditional love as it should be. It is possible to learn how to set boundaries and not feel like you are being selfish, to trust someone with your heart and know they are going to handle it with care.
Having a guard up is not always a bad thing, either, though. Pain and suffering teach you what to watch out for, because there are bad people out there who will hurt and take advantage of you. Healing is learning how to balance the two: being careful and also being able to find someone who is safe to let your guard down with and let them in. You deserve to be loved. Don’t keep yourself from experiencing what is out there. It can be messy, but it also can be beautiful.
I also had to learn that parents were just unhappy with themselves and took it out on me, but the abuse still alters your brain chemistry. I see it in my everyday life to this day. People do not often talk about that. You can take the kid out of the abuse, but you cannot take the abuse out of the kid.
MORAL OF THE STORY:
You are not defined by your experiences, and healing is possible. Do not let people burdened by their own misery trick you into thinking you deserve to accept false forms of love. Do not let them trick you into thinking you deserve abuse and maltreatment, because you do not. I did not. Believe me when I say, YOU ARE WORTHY OF LOVING. Believe me when I say, HEALING IS POSSIBLE.
Resources to contact in the event you are in need of help:
In an emergency, call 911.
Visit our resource page to find mental health resources available in your county.
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