{"id":1070,"date":"2009-06-13T10:36:46","date_gmt":"2009-06-13T15:36:46","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.switchingtime.com\/?p=1070"},"modified":"2009-06-13T10:37:29","modified_gmt":"2009-06-13T15:37:29","slug":"karen-answers-sue","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.switchingtime.com\/?p=1070","title":{"rendered":"Karen answers Sue"},"content":{"rendered":"
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Comment by Sue on 07 Jun 2009 at 4:19 pm<\/span><\/div>\n
Karen, I just finished \u2018Switching Time\u2019 and hope every day you gain even more strength and pride from the knowledge of the strength it took for you to survive the horrific events of your early life. The fact that you turned to alters and, later, Dr. Baer, for the strength and courage to live and not succomb to death, shows tremendous capacity to stare adversity in the face and come out on top. It must still be difficult for you but you truly are amazing. As someone who\u2019s been through various therapies and worked with many therapists, I know how truly amazing it is that you found Dr. Baer on, what appears to have been, your first attempt at counseling.
\nI have a few questions which may not be appropriate. I mean no offense and understand if you choose to not answer them.
\nI\u2019m curious as to whether your brothers were ever victimized by the many family members and community people who hurt you? I wonder, also, if you\u2019ve had concern about a genetic possibility of them, as males, abusing family members.
\nFinally, at what point did you tell your children about what you had been through and did it involve a meeting with Dr. Baer?
\nThank you for the courage it must have taken to share your story.
\nSue\u00a0<\/div>\n<\/blockquote>\n
Dear Sue,<\/div>\n
\u00a0<\/div>\n
Thank you so much for your kind thoughts and for understanding the difficulties I’ve had in overcoming my terrible past. \u00a0I am truly blessed to have found Dr. Baer on my first attempt to seek help. \u00a0Before Dr. Baer, immediately after giving birth to my daughter,\u00a0there was one therapist who tried to help me deal with the pain after my cesarean section went wrong. \u00a0I believe we only spoke twice.<\/div>\n
\u00a0<\/div>\n
A couple years after my daughters birth, I knew I was in trouble. \u00a0Large parts of my day were missing and unknown. \u00a0I felt sad all the time. \u00a0I tried to dismiss everything as just having a bad day, but I no longer could pretend. \u00a0I was not well and losing time. \u00a0I needed help. \u00a0It was pure fate that I found the right therapist, Dr. Baer. \u00a0God was surely present. \u00a0I was in such a fragile state, I didn’t care, and I thought dying was my best option. \u00a0I believe Dr. Baer knew this from the start and paid special attention to signs that may have gone unnoticed by someone else. \u00a0I was lucky in this.<\/div>\n
\u00a0<\/div>\n
Regarding your questions, there are no questions that I won’t try to handle. The few that cause me concern, Dr. Baer will help me with them.<\/div>\n
\u00a0<\/div>\n
\n
Yes, my brother’s were victimized, too, but not exactly in the same way, for they were boys and not sexually interesting to my abusers. \u00a0My brothers were beaten on a regular basis, degraded, humiliated, and never treated with the care and nurturing required for young boys to grow into fine men. \u00a0My brothers suspected things were happening to me, but I never shared the details.<\/div>\n
\u00a0<\/div>\n
Both of my brother’s are in their forties. One is married but never had children of his own. The other had two daughters who were never abused by him. \u00a0Neither of my brothers took on the traits of my father, and I am grateful for that. \u00a0I keep in touch with my nieces and they never once appeared as I did. \u00a0And believe me, I would know.\u00a0<\/div>\n
\u00a0<\/div>\n
During my therapeutic years, my children were aware that I was in therapy with Dr. Baer, but most of the time my sessions were during their school day. \u00a0As my children became old enough to comprehend small doses of the reality of my parents, I would share bits and pieces that I wasn’t treated nicely. \u00a0I never shared any of the traumatic memories with them.<\/div>\n
\u00a0<\/div>\n<\/div>\n
My daughter, at age 21, read\u00a0Switching Time, and she was amazed and proud of my survival. \u00a0She had told me that I was the best mom and thanked me for not dragging her into such horror. \u00a0My daughter came to a full understanding of my alters and could easily share stories of them that I had not known. \u00a0I don’t believe my son has read my story yet, but he knows of it and has read many news articles about it. \u00a0I believe some day he will, but it’s not necessary.<\/div>\n
\u00a0<\/div>\n
There was no need for my children to meet with Dr. Baer. \u00a0I believe my therapy was a success due to the fact that Dr. Baer treated me so that I in turn could be the best mom I could be. \u00a0I don’t believe dragging children into a parent’s therapy is always beneficial. \u00a0For me, it could’ve caused more harm than good. I spoke to my children on my own, sharing what they needed to know at the appropriate time. \u00a0Dr. Baer was always right there with me, in thought, and just a phone call away. \u00a0If I ran into some parental problem, he guided me.\u00a0<\/div>\n
Thank you for all your compliments and for caring enough to ask your questions.<\/div>\n
Karen<\/div>\n

\u00a0<\/p><\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Comment by Sue on 07 Jun 2009 at 4:19 pm Karen, I just finished \u2018Switching Time\u2019 and hope every day you gain even more strength and pride from the knowledge of the strength it took for you to survive the horrific events of your early life. The fact that you turned to alters and, later, […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1070","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-karens-answers"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.switchingtime.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1070","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.switchingtime.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.switchingtime.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.switchingtime.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.switchingtime.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=1070"}],"version-history":[{"count":5,"href":"https:\/\/www.switchingtime.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1070\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1075,"href":"https:\/\/www.switchingtime.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1070\/revisions\/1075"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.switchingtime.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=1070"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.switchingtime.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=1070"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.switchingtime.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=1070"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}