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My Secret, My Disorder
Posted on Friday, September 15 @ 01:00:00 BST by Neomie |
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Sarge writes "written by: Linda A. Miller copyright May,09,2006
*a short summary of my life long battle,pain and suffering,recovery and survival*
Trichotillomania. A word I had never heard until I was in my late 30's.
My demon had a name. Finally, I knew what to call the thing that had tormented me for
almost my entire life.
One morning while getting ready for work,I was half heartily listening to the
Sally Jesse Raphael show on TV about self mutilation. Then they mentioned people
who pulled their hair out.
My heart stopped. I felt exposed and mortified, as if everyone in the entire world had just found out my horrible, shameful secret.
Did I hear that right? I stopped what I was doing and sat down on the couch and
listened to what she was saying. I couldn't believe what I was watching. A girl, someone else.
like me. Someone who pulled their hair out. Why had I not heard of this before? I don't
know why I felt I was the only one in the world who did this, but I soon found out that I was not. To pull ones hair out.A member of the compulsive disorders.I had a disorder? NO WAY! Yes...I did,I do. Shocked, but relieved at the same time, I felt a weight lifted off my shoulders. There were others. There was help and understanding, a name, that name.
The behavior isolates you from others. You are disgusted by it and ashamed.
A form of self punishment.
Fearful that someone will find out. On the other hand you are strangely comforted by it because it distracts you from your anxiety, but mostly I felt it was my cross to bare.For what ever it was I had done. Would I ever beat it? I hadn't yet.
Hearing it on TV gave me my first real feelings of hope. I sat there and cried.
I was adopted. I started the pulling somewhere around the age of three. I was
being sexually abused by my two older brothers. From what I understand, it is a
wayof distracting you from what is going on at the moment that is too overwhelming.
I believe my therapist called it "Post Traumatic Syndrome".
My mother didn't realize that I was pulling my own hair out. She found the hair on the floor and started noticing bald spots. She took me to a doctor. Had blood drawn, checked my Thyroid. They couldn't figure it out. I couldn't bare to tell her, the doctor, any of them. I would try harder to hide my secret. The doctor told her that I must be stressed for some reason. I'd grow out of it. I never did. When I was sixteen my brother ran away. My hair was really bad then.Again, my parents just thought I was severely upset and stressed by this incident.
I did not go to a therapist until I was in my mid twenty's. When I learned that
my mother had known about my brothers sexually abusing me but did nothing to help us. She didn't want my father finding out about it. I felt sacrificed and betrayed. I thought I might be able to get help from a therapist. There had been many issues that I had worked out on my own over the years, but was having trouble beating this one, the pulling. I went for a couple of weeks, but found myself even more depressed at the end of each session when my fifty minutes were up.
There I was with my soul exposed and she would put her pen down on the yellow
pad. I knew what that meant. My time was up. I would drag myself out of the office and back home, where I would cry. It was too painful this way. I stopped going.
I went through years of good periods and relapses. Experienced what it was like
to have nice hair, and endured the lowest of low points where my my scalp would be so
sore from pulling that it would sometimes bleed. I remember feeling something warm running down my scalp, and reaching up and finding blood on the end of my fingers. That would scare me.
I was broken inside. The suffering, the despair was sometimes overwhelming. I did not want to be put on medication.I wanted to feel normal. Even though nothing in my life seemed normal ever. I was tired of worrying that people might see the bald areas. I was constantly trying to hide the spots. I was sick of being humiliated by the comments of those who didn't know better or who were just out right rude. "What's that? You're going bald?"
The trip to the hair dresser was just as bad. "Oh, you're hair is really thin on the sides!"
DUH! God, did they have to say it so loud? Other customers would look over. Going swimming was horrifying too. I loved to go to the lake like anyone else, but would hesitate getting in the water for fear of people noticing the thin spots. It was affecting almost ever aspect of my life and I sick of it!
Here I was living my life, carrying my secret around, my disorder, and hardly anyone knew.
When I had turned forty years old, I was still battling this. I had met a woman
who I was dating at the time.I had not pulled for several months. It felt good. The woman I was seeing had her own compulsive disorder along with anorexia. It was too much for me. I started pulling again, more than ever. I finally broke down one last time and cried, and cried, and prayed. "Please, God! Please help me! I don't know what else to do. I can't do it anymore. I don't want to be bald. I don't want to do this anymore.I don't know what to do. PLEASE...." I got up off the floor and I don't know how or where it came from,but I decided at that moment, I could do something. I could stop. I didn't NEED to do it anymore.
No one was going to make me do it ANYMORE. Nothing in my life was going to make
me do it. I did NOT HAVE TO PULL. I was a good person. The sexual abuse in my life was not my fault, and I didn't have to be a victim anymore. The pulling kept me a victim and I was not going to let it anymore. I vowed that every day, every second, that I would be aware of what I was doing and that I would not let myself pull. NO. I was putting my foot down! I would be gentle with myself, forgive myself,and constantly remind myself that I was OK, that God loved me,and that I could love myself. It was a battle.I had to literally be aware of where my hands were at all times. When I would
start to go for my head,I would say out loud, "NO, you don't need to do that." and my hand would go down.
Eventually I would allow myself to touch my hair. I could touch it and not pull, that was alright. Eventually my hair grew, it felt good to feel healthy hair. How I longed for someone to want to put their hands in my hair and me not be afraid for them to do so.
Little by little, day by day,second by second, it got better. The compulsion
lessened. The days turned into months, months into years. I am now 4 years pull free. I have been through 3 break ups since, and have not resorted to hair pulling. No matter what happens to me, I do not need to express my feelings through hair pulling. I don't even feel tempted by it anymore. Don't get me wrong. I still think about it everyday, but that's good because I have not forgotten, and being aware is part of healing and recovery. I never want to forget.
Some things in life are not in our control. This I discovered,I can control and I thank God every day for giving me the inner strength to help myself.
Many of us our wounded in different ways. Many of us our victims, but we don't have to be anymore.
Me...I am a survivor.
"
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