Abuse victims struggle with forgiveness . . . for good reason. The person they love most, and who was supposed to love them, has treated them worse than most people would treat their worst enemy. This is a betrayal of the worst order. How does one forgive that? Why even consider doing it? I believe there are many reasons, all for the benefit of the VICTIM. For more about that, check out my blog entitled “After the Abuse is Over, How Do You Deal With the Anger?”
Today I’d like to talk about a different type of forgiveness. The following is taken from my book, A Journey to Healing after Emotional Abuse.
When I work with abuse victims, some say forgiving themselves is harder than forgiving their abuser. Why harder? If someone else hurts you, you can ignore or get away from that person. But you can’t escape yourself. When you awake in the morning, you are still there. When you go to sleep at night, still there.
You are the victim. Why would you need to forgive yourself?
- For starting a relationship with your abuser
- For all the wasted time spent with him
- For the ways you allowed him to treat you
- For they way you acted and the things you did while you were with him
- For not protecting your child(ren)
- For getting a divorce/leaving him
- For not being “good enough” for him.
I can’t list every reason you might feel guilty, and might think you need to forgive yourself. Your reasons may not make logical sense, even to you, such as number 7, not being “good enough” for him. Possibly, you don’t feel you need to forgive yourself. If that’s the case, wonderful!
Why is forgiving yourself important for your healing?
Perhaps you aren’t sure going through the pain of forgiving yourself is worth the benefit. Why bother?
1. To improve your health
Holding onto self-condemnation elevates your stress. Long-term, chronic stress can cause depression and anxiety. In addition, it can cause a long list of physical ailments including*:
- Skin and hair problems, such as acne, psoriasis, and eczema, and permanent hair loss
- Menstrual problems, and an inability to conceive children
- Sexual dysfunction, such as impotence and premature ejaculation in men and loss of sexual desire in both men and women
- Eating disorders and obesity
- Gastrointestinal problems, such as heartburn, gastritis, ulcerative colitis, and irritable colon
- High blood pressure, abnormal heart rhythms, heart attacks, and stroke.
2. To bring you peace
Guilt and self-blame weigh you down. You may hear a constant negative voice in your head reminding you of all the supposedly unforgivable wrongs you’ve committed. Whether that voice is Satan’s, your abuser’s, a parent’s or your own, doesn’t really matter. You will never be at peace with those negative thoughts constantly circling through your head. Forgiving yourself will release you to be at peace.
3. To enable you to focus on others
When you are focused on your own guilt, you have little emotional energy to give to others around you. Forgiving yourself releases you to be able to love others as you’ve loved yourself, (Mark 12:29-31).
4. To repair your relationship with God
When you can’t forgive yourself, you may mistakenly believe God can’t forgive you. This may cause you to pull away from Him, or constantly beg His forgiveness, when He has already forgiven you completely, (Psalm 103:12, Hebrews 10:17, 1 John 1:9). Once you forgive yourself, your relationship with God can be fully repaired.
In my next blog, I will give you practical steps to learn to forgive yourself. Until then, please remember Jesus loves you with a boundless love. If you are His follower, He has already forgiven you. As it says in Romans 8:1:
Therefore, there is now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus . . .
May you realize today the love Jesus has for you.
Caroline
*http://www.webmd.com/balance/stress-management/stress-symptoms-effects_of-stress-on-the-body?page=2 accessed August 25, 2014.
I’m struggling with this right now. I apologized to my son for bringing my abuser in our life because he made promises to him and didn’t keep any of them. I have so many people including myself to forgive for this mess I got myself into. Most of all his family. They knew what their son was doing to me and has done and yet they still wanted us to be together. When I told his sister what he was doing she made the statement that I accepted a ring from him as if it was my fault that he was treating my like crap. I want to forgive all of them including myself and move forward but it haunts me on a daily basis.
This is so hard. I can only imagine the pain you must be feeling right now. Though it may be hard to imagine, over time, the sharpness of this pain may diminish. One of the steps I describe in forgiving others talks about having compassion for them. Sometimes, it is hard to even think about how to do this, so I will give you an example in the case of your ex’s family. Think about what it would be like to have an abuser as a son or brother. How embarrassing and painful that would be. Wouldn’t you always wish something would happen to “fix” him? Perhaps they thought if he was with a good woman, he would change his ways. Yes, it was unfair to you and your son. Perhaps they hoped that this time he would be healed, and he would be able to have a good relationship. This is only a guess, but it may help you to see things from their perspective, and may help you release some of your anger toward them over time. I hope this helps. May the Lord bless you as you go forward in your healing process. Caroline
Your example is what people have told me and I wish I really could have compassion for him and his family but I just don’t. I see them as enablers who try to cover up what he does and silence the people who he has wronged instead of allowing him to be accountable for his actions. Hopefully over time I will be able to see it from a compassionate perspective but right now I’m not there because I’m trying to combat the effects of being in a relationship with him.
Yes, I can see that you need to focus on your own healing right now. Please look for my next blog, about HOW to forgive yourself. Blessings to you. Caroline