Soul Mosaic

Status check: A tiny, subtle “shift”

I need to take a moment before I continue to reflect on some changes within me that I have noticed lately during my writing.

When I started, there was a lot I felt underneath but did not understand. All I had were broken pieces of a life story, rage reactions, destructive emotions such as self-hate, high anxiety, and depression. I knew that what was done to me was wrong. Severe. I knew I had been harmed. But without the clear vision of the entirety of it all….HOW it was done to me, and why, all I was left with was confusion and those roiling emotions.

Now, as I continue to dissect my past and learn about emotional dysfunction, mental health and control issues, and how trauma is caused and handed down from one generation to the next, I notice a “shift” within me.

I can’t quite describe it all yet. Things are “in motion.” Certainly I am still angry at him and all I’ve lost. But there is a blunting of the intensity and sharpness. It’s not gone, nor do I suspect it will be. But even as it is still a swirling cloud right now, it is changing. Transforming into something new. So I will just pay attention as I continue to write.

The things I can identify are a mix of fatigue, relief, the beginnings of a calmer place…and a growing sense of self and self-power. I think there is something about actually facing the monster that harmed me, and seeing it all in the light of day, that makes it…better? Better is not really the right word. I will simply say right now that I feel like it is changing ME for the better.

Maybe it’s just that sometimes to see your adversary fully, to see the WHOLE picture, gives a much bigger appreciation for just how mighty the battle was. It’s like that beginning scene from the 1970 movie Patton. The officers were walking at dawn through the wreckage-strewn remains of the military company that had spent an entire night in horrible combat. All around them were bodies. Parts of bodies. Destroyed weapons. Blown-up trucks still smoldering. In the light of the rising sun, there was the entire panorama before them – the full carnage. And it was only in that moment that anyone there could realize just how brutal that battle had been.

That is what this moment in the writing feels like. To start to see its entirety and really embrace it is to realize just how much I’ve been minimizing what I’ve been through. The weapons I faced may have been simple and unsophisticated, but he wielded them with such intensity, precision, and ruthlessness that their power was more like a thermonuclear device in its emotional and psychological destructiveness.

And what of the man who caused it all? Was he like that small man “behind the curtain” in The Wizard of Oz, using smoke, mirrors, loud noises, and illusion to pretend he was “the Great and Powerful Oz?”

Certainly, my father was a “small man.” He stood for nothing but destruction and self-absorption. But he was much more dangerous than the “pretend Wizard.” The Wizard of Oz never choked anyone or even threatened to. My father did. Repeatedly. And the research studies show that the next step beyond choking is murder. The Wizard of Oz just created an illusion. Dad used actual violence to create actual terror, control, and emotional carnage.

This writing is my “morning after” walk through the battlefield, taking in the magnitude of what was thrown against me. How powerful and how many the weapons. The depth of the destruction they left. And…unexpectedly, the potential, now, for a new future less crushed by immense rage, anxiety, and sorrow.

I only know that as hard as this work has been…I am actually glad for it. Not glad I had to do it. But glad I chose to do it. I have zero regrets.

So, for this moment, I will leave it at that and keep writing. We will see where I land by the end of this book.

Now, on to his tools.

How to apply the tools for maximum effectiveness

As the researchers found with the “brainwashing” of POWS in Korea, none of these domestic abuse tools are revolutionary secret weapons. But used well in the right hands, they are designed to bring anyone to their knees and submit.

Their immense power comes from how they are employed against someone:

• Use the entire mix of tools in combination with each other for a synergy – the combination is much more powerful than the sum of its individual parts
• Systematically, repeatedly, and constantly use them to reinforce power and fear
• Have the selection of the right tool(s) in any given moment be unpredictable and variable; The pattern of use depends on what the abuser feels will work best at the moment, and the abuser may not even know in advance what tool to choose. It may be premeditated, but it might also be just a random, volatile reaction
• Threaten or actually deliver violence
• Use the love, emotional openness, and vulnerability of the victim against them.
• Use the tools in such a way that the victim doesn’t realize what is happening, or only realizes it too late

Regarding those last two… if my father treated my mother with charm during their courtship…and he could be very fun, engaging, and charming…then I suspect my mother never saw any of this coming. By the time she did, she was trapped not only by her love of him, but by religion, culture, finances, the times, and the responsibilities of children. She had nowhere to go and no one to turn to.

And for me, well, I grew up in it, so I thought it was normal.

The list of “toolbox items”

Here is the complete list of things my father used in our household, alternated masterfully and delivered in constant and generous doses. To me, all of these are tools to get and maintain “coercive control.” Each, in one way or another, fits into at least one of the eight items on Biderman’s Chart of Coercion:

• Isolation
• Monopolization of Perception
• Humiliation and Degradation
• Exhaustion
• Threats
• Occasional Indulgences
• Demonstrating Omnipotence
• Enforcing Trivial Demands

Here are many of the things he did to us. I’ve listed them in no particular order because he used them all, some simultaneously, and often rotating the order unpredictably. A number of them overlap to create the same effects – psychological and emotional control:

1. Behavioral/operant conditioning and “training,” especially to induce “learned helplessness”
2. Isolation
3. Shame and demean, humiliate and degrade to invalidate a person’s worth, confidence, and self-esteem
4. Minimize and invalidate a person’s feelings and emotions
5. Use platitudes and toxic positivity
6. Slowly remove a person’s agency and independence through intimidation or punishments for attempts at independence. These punishments include things such as guilt trips, the silent treatment, and more
7. Slowly push the victim’s limits and boundaries until there are none
8. Prevent the normal forming of, or destroy one’s existing identity
9. Distort reality and perceptions by pretending all is well when things are not, or avoiding truthful discussions of the real issues – “avoiding the elephant in the room”
10. Making another responsible for his happiness
11. Intermittent reinforcement of punishment, rewards, and love
12. Charm offensive to initially gain control or to fool outsiders
13. Trauma bonding/Stockholm Syndrome
14. Instill fear and terror with the threat of violence – which is an unending stressor
15. If necessary, actually deliver violence; Since things will calm down after an outburst, this may need to be reapplied regularly and possibly unexpectedly
16. Exhaust the victim emotionally, psychologically, and physically from constant, unpredictable demands or outbursts.
17. Gaslight the victims by TELLING them what the truth is even if it doesn’t match reality or one’s actions
18. Minimize and normalize bad behavior
19. Pathological denial – him – of his behaviors or the truth
20. Pathological denial – her – of facing what was happening
21. Cognitive Dissonance
22. Spiritual Bypassing
23. Masking
24. Require secrecy about home life
25. Enforce trivial demands and total loyalty
26. Parentify kids
27. Victim blaming – “Look what you made me do”
28. Demonstrations of omnipotence to show that he is all-powerful, resistance is futile, and there is no escape

Up next

Concrete examples of Dad’s coercive control methods

Then…on to my mother and her “lot in life.”

Note:

I am seeking financial support to complete my memoir, work with an editor, and make a visit to my home state for fact-checking. Your help would mean the world to me as I take this step toward healing and giving voice to my journey.

Please like, comment, and share this post to help spread the word. The link for my fundraiser is on GoFundMe. Thank you for your support.

This entry was posted on September 20, 2026 at 8:00 am and is filed under Memoir - sexual abuse trauma recovery. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.