Irritability - bipolar or something else?

[Darkside]

I had already thought about this some and I described this same little boy to the therapist I saw Thursday. She asked me if I felt compassion for him and I really do. This meditation made that compassion stronger.

Sometimes I wonder if our inner child becomes injured not just by what happens to him/her but also because he doesn't know how to interpret events and the adults don't do a good job of explaining what is going on.

 

[David Baxter PhD]

Sometimes I wonder if our inner child becomes injured not just by what happens to him/her but also because he doesn't know how to interpret events and the adults don't do a good job of explaining what is going on.

And because for most children it happens at a time where their natural tendency and emotional-psychological development is somewhat egocentric, i.e., "if good things happen to me it's because I am a good person and if bad things happen to me it's because I am a bad person".

 

[MHealthJo]

Absolutely. One thing that has been so fortunate for me is that for some parts of my experience, I DID have older people who knew some of the right things to say.

My heart goes out to anyone who firstly experienced pains that no child deserves, but even more so when there is no healthy, truthful explanation given, or intervention or support available to the child at the time.

The more good and healthy stuff you know now, Darkside, the more you can explain it in a childlike way to that child. You have done a ton of excellent things that I'm sure have already helped you make these connections you've made so far and have those explanations that will help you.

I can't tell you how many times I have seen it make a difference to a child, when they simply get told some sort of healthy "childlike" explanation that an adult is behaving wrongly, and it is nothing to do with the child - the child is so special and important. That grown-ups can have sicknesses in their brains sometimes and do really weird things they shouldn't do. But someone else is there, and is going to help you.

The grown-ups shouldn't be acting this way, but sometimes when grown-ups were little they didn't have the right things that they should have got, and it can make people's brains get very silly and mixed up. Or other things can mix up people's brains too.

But that is still not your fault and nothing to do with you, and they still should figure out how to learn to not act that way. But someone is here to help you out and make sure it is okay for you, because you SHOULD get everything good and nice that you need, as much as possible.

...end quotation marks!

 

[Darkside]

And because for most children it happens at a time where their natural tendency and emotional-psychological development is somewhat egocentric, i.e., "if good things happen to me it's because I am a good person and if bad things happen to me it's because I am a bad person".

The worst sin is when the parent makes the child responsible for how they feel. If the parent is needy and uses the child to satisfy their emotional needs (incest) the child can grow to believe they have the power, and the responsibility, to save (emotional rescue) people. If the child is unsuccessful or refuses to make the parent feel better they come to believe they are inadequate - or worse, that they are bad.

 

[MHealthJo]

It's so terrible. :'(

I have often pondered the concept of evil - what it is exactly, where 'sickness' ends and 'evil' begins. I absolutely believe in evil acts and choices. But I often wonder about evil "people"... what it means to be evil, rather than sick, and where that line is. I wonder whether evil people know they are evil, or whether in their utterly twisted mind, they actually believe they are "right" or justified somehow, like Hitler, etc.

David, if you ever come across an article about brainscans etc of narcissists, please post.

 

[Darkside]

It's so terrible. :'(

I have often pondered the concept of evil - what it is exactly, where 'sickness' ends and 'evil' begins. I absolutely believe in evil acts and choices. But I often wonder about evil "people"... what it means to be evil, rather than sick, and where that line is. I wonder whether evil people know they are evil, or whether in their utterly twisted mind, they actually believe they are "right" or justified somehow, like Hitler, etc.

David, if you ever come across an article about brainscans etc of narcissists, please post.

I've often thought about the same thing. That might be the difference. An evil person is so perverted they never doubt or question themselves or their actions. They never have dark moments in which they say, "Oh my God, I caused that" and then feel guilty and contrite - genuinely. Scott Peck wrote about this in his book, "People of the Lie."

We all do bad things ... horrible things ... but we have a sense of shame and guilt when we realize what we've done and how we have hurt someone. An evil person has no internal mechanism whereby they even debate the consequences of their actions much less accept responsibility for what they've done to hurt someone. I suppose that is the definition of sociopathy.

 

[W00BY]

I think the less reality a child has the more chance there is of abuse not being discovered until they are older.

I think the lack of a cohesive and stable adult in my childhood not only helped stew the abuse that was going on but also robbed me of my ability to speak up.

The confusion and uncertainty that an unstable family life/family members exhibit when your a child is certainly one of the lasting sensations for me as an adult and was the hardest part to unravel in my head as I came to terms with what I had experienced.

Some people call it the psychological abuse, I think that phrase doesn't even begin to describe what it is like.

The realization that people that should have cared and protected you, did not, the battle for the truth and to extricate your mind from the lies, fantasies and cover ups and falsities that went on and the actual experiences themselves.

Keeping a sense of what is right and wrong in such circumstances for most adults would be near impossible for a child still learning to fit into the jigsaw of society it is an mountainous task.

 

[Darkside]

Very well said W00BY!