Tears and Healing The Journey to the Light after an Abusive Relationship by Richard Skerritt

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What the experts say / readers say about Tears and Healing. More on detaching , healing , overcoming love , obligation .

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Where is the Light when you're in an abusive relationship? 

Life with an abusive partner can be a dark place. We become isolated from friends and family; battered by a continuous stream of verbal abuse (and sometimes worse), and most of all we suffer enormous pressure to agree to and support our partners reality - a reality in which they have no flaws, and we are the cause of all problems.

Although at some level we know this is wrong, and we know that we are not at fault, the isolation, pressure and demands can make us think that we are, indeed, crazy. And in this situation it is really difficult to think in a balanced way about what is happening and what we should be doing. All the forces around us push us to remain, and remain compliant. This is the nature of abuse.

You're not Crazy

Tears and Healing can open the door of this isolated place and begin to let the light shine in. It was written in the midst of a powerful (and growing) abusive situation. It looks at the experience from within, and so it offers a unique and powerful view on the situation.

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Abusive marriages put us in a powerful double-bind. Our responsibilities and sense of obligation are often powerful. At the same time, our own - and our children's' - need for safety, and our exhaustion from continuous abuse are strong motivators to change. Sorting this out isn't easy, even if our friends or family glibly say, "Just get out." It isn't so simple.

Tears and Healing looks at the many aspects of an abusive situation. It challenges with questions; challenges preconceptions, and explains what is happening psychologically. It's written for real people in real painful situations; it's not a book by clinicians about some disorder they see in their clinics.

Tears and Healing begins by telling the story of my abusive experience. It then talks about how we can overcome the powerful persuasion and reconnect with a balanced reality by working with people and groups; explains the nature of abusive disorders and how we interact with them; explores detaching to find emotional safety and how we can find ourselves and realize what we need; explores love and being in-love and who we can deal with and change these feelings; challenges our - sometimes concrete - feelings and values of obligation and how abuse affects these; explains the harm from abuse, and how we can heal after suffering it; looks at the prospects for moving beyond being locked in an abusive relationship, again with a look at obligation; and then shares a small view of my emergence into the light of emotional safety and freedom.

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What causes abuse?

Abuse is a behavior, not a disease. But abuse is caused by an underlying disease. Healthy people might occasionally lose their temper, leading to an outburst, but a consistent pattern of hurtful abuse can only be the result of a deeper problem. These problems - personality disorders - also lead to irrational thoughts and distortions of reality that are perplexing until you understand their origin. Abusive behavior is most often caused by borderline personality disorder, narcissistic personality disorder, or sociopathy - technically called antisocial personality disorder. Understanding what is going on in an abusive situation requires understanding these disorders. This connection leads to what we sometimes call the "light bulb effect", where long-standing confusion and hurt suddenly opens up to an insight - and the first steps to protecting ourselves and to healing.

 I've written two books on these abusive disorders; to start I suggest my simple, direct explanation in Meaning from Madness. It simple terms it explains the psychological drivers that motivate abuse. It explains how the mind of a disordered person uses psychological defense mechanisms that shield the person from fear by reordering their reality. I talks about the  delusion of being without fault, and how this makes it almost impossible for abusers to accept and benefit from treatment. And it explores the concurrent abuse of alcohol and drugs and how this aggravates an already difficult situation.

Why Does He/She Abuse Me? Meaning from Madness - Understanding the Hidden Patterns that Motivate Abusers: Narcissists, Borderlines, and Sociopaths explains the simple psychological driving force that defines these diseases; what motivates them to abuse their families yet behave well in public; explains their irrational actions, their treatment prospects, and the impact of alcohol abuse combined with these disorders. It explains the overlap/relationship of narcissism, borderline personality disorder and sociopathy. More about this book. Multiple books are available together in packages  at a savings.

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Emotions: Glue of Attraction or Distant Memory?

Still Pulling: If feelings of love, longing, and attraction still pull you toward the person who is abusive to you, it can feel hopeless. It's true, the situation is a tough one. Once again, understanding is the key that can unlock this door. Attraction is a powerful feeling that arises from experiences in the past. To escape from them, we have to create new experiences - essentially a new past - so that feelings can follow that lead to healthier people and better experiences.

This is where my third book can help. In Love and Loving It - or Not! explains how feelings of attraction arise; how a disordered partner uses this to lock us in. It explains how emotions derive from past experiences, and how we can choose new experiences that open us for new and better emotions. And it talks about the difference between being in-love vs. loving. Put these three pieces together in the Light Bulb Pack, which gives you all three books at a discount.

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Emotions are Gone: Many of you reading this are well past the point of feeling pulled to your partner. Years of abuse have not only dampened your feelings; your partner has become increasingly distant and unaccepting. These are typical patterns in relationships with abusers; they start out high, but decline over the years. Eventually, it's common for you to begin finding the abuse intolerable; or your partner increasingly finds it impossible to be around you.

In this case, Surviving the Storm is the third book to help you. It explains how relationships with abusers decline over time. Based on the psychological drivers you'll read about in Meaning from Madness, it explains why abusers need to get away from you to protect their distorted reality. When the relationship ends, it explains why abusers act so irrationally, demanding things they never cared about, for example. Based on this, it offers both strategies and situational tactics that can reduce how much your abusive partner acts out when the relationship is ending. It guides you in making your own choices after the relationship to minimize involvement and upset coming from your then ex-partner. And it talks about the meaning of ending a long relationship, and what it takes to heal and start anew.

To add Surviving the Storm, get the Small Storm Pack and get a discount from the 3 separate books:

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Editorial Reviews of Tears and Healing

Reviewer: J. Paul Shirley, MSW - Co-Author: Stop Walking on Eggshells Workbook 

I highly recommend Richard's book, Tears and Healing. His writing is clear, and although his words are written with gentleness, he pulls absolutely no punches about dealing with the hard facts about BPD and its effects on everyone. Some people say there is a reason for the pain we go through having a partner with BPD, and in Richard's case I agree. He has a gift for lending a helping hand for others trying to walk that painful path. I don't generally get excited about new books on BPD, but Richard's left me feeling good & that's a rare gift for a writer to have.

Reviewer: Sam Vaknin - Author: Malignant Self Love - Narcissism Revisited

There are bookshelves upon bookshelves of professional, scholarly, and utterly inaccessible literature about abusive relationships. Those who need it the most - the traumatized victims - are locked out by the jargon and the lack of practical advice. Recently, survivors and victims have taken matters into their own hands and have published their own books, replete with first hand experiences and tips. Tears and Healing is a fine specimen of such writing: sensitive, attuned to the emotional and pragmatic needs of the survivors, both deep and accessible, a helpful guide to the traumatic aftermath of abuse.

Reviewer: Randi Kreger - Coauthor: Stop Walking on Eggshells and the Stop Walking on Eggshells Workbook; Owner: http://BPDCentral.com .

In Tears and Healing, Richard Skerritt takes us along on his personal journey from his "lightbulb experience" to making painful decisions about his marriage to a woman with borderline personality disorder. It takes courage for non-BP partners to understand and take responsibility for their own role in the "borderline dance," and even more courage to write about it. Richard has done both.

Reviewer: Darla Boughton, Manager of Narcissistic Abuse Recovery/Psychopath forum (4000+ members)

Tears and Healing is a must read for anyone involved in a devastating relationship with a personality disordered partner. It is a must-have, top-notch, first-aid kit to understanding the emotional devastation such a relationship causes. The author reveals his first-hand experience and knowledge. Let Richard's words reveal how to reclaim your sanity in an insane interaction with a disordered partner.

Back Cover

Contents

Look inside for more on Detaching Look inside for more on Healing from Abuse Look inside for more on Overcoming Love Look inside for more on Feeling like you have to stay

For anyone living with a borderline, narcissist, psychopath, sociopath, alcoholic or just plain abusive partner.

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Reader Reviews of Tears & Healing

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Author's Comments 

Abuse is when someone else hurts us to serve their own needs and uses the situation to lock us in and maintain control. Abuse can be physical, emotional, verbal or sexual. My own experience was being verbally and emotionally abused. I consider my experience to be particularly brutal because my abuser sought not just control, but to emotionally destroy me.

But no matter the type or intensity of experience, I believe anyone currently in or having escaped from an abusive situation can benefit from my approaches. I worked hard to understand why I felt trapped and how I could escape. I read and studied many books on psychology and relationships. I pieced together the best ideas from these and added insight and models of my own. I've shared my experience and approaches as a mentor in online support communities since 2000. Hundreds of people in these groups have shared with me how unique and helpful my insights are. And thousands more have read and benefited from my online writings.

Getting yourself out of an abusive situation and healing the damage it has done are not small tasks. It takes time and energy. But you also need guidance in what to work on, because abusive partners deliberately distort our reality to serve their sick needs. My books, combined with continued dialog in support communities, can provide that critical compass to navigate the dark passages until the light breaks through.

I wish you good luck and Godspeed.

Richard Skerritt

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My Six Books on Abuse and Abusive Relationships

 Books on Abusive Relationships by Richard Skerritt 
Click a cover for more info...              Get three or more books together in a package  and save.

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