On Meanings, Tyrannies, Women & Monsters

Posted on 09/12/2008 by Jane Devin

Then, in my childhood in the dawn
Of a most stormy life was drawn
From every depth of good and ill
The mystery which binds me still . . .
–Edgar Allan Poe, Alone

1. The Meaning of Things

I’ve never lost my childhood sense of mystification – my ability to be amazed by the intricate puzzles and foggy mazes surrounding the reality of a situation. And, over the years, my need to know the meaning of things, and to have those meanings make sense, has only grown stronger.

I suspect that if the world were as simple as wheat and chaff, the chaff would be far more plentiful. So many of us seem to be in a constant search for something outside our own realm. In reaching for that something, we superimpose the unnatural upon even the most common realities. A shadow becomes a ghost, a falling leaf becomes a message, and the human mind becomes a god, capable of performing miracles. . .if only one believes.

Platitudes and abstractionist philosophies abound, and many would argue that they are harmless. I strongly disagree. What becomes popular in our society becomes pervasive, affecting everything from our cultural mores to our social opinions.

2. The Tyranny of Positive Thinking

I remember when the gun of positive thinking was turned against cancer patients in the 80′s. Scores of books and literature were written that either laid sideways blame on victims for having the disease of “repressed emotions” or “negativity”, or that effusively promoted positive thinking as the cure. Those who died were not positive enough – they didn’t believe enough in the power of their own mind. Twenty years later, it’s what Dr. Jimmie C. Holland, in her book The Human Side of Cancer, refers to as “the tyranny of positive thinking.”

Unfortunately, despite major long-term studies showing that while having a positive attitude may help patients handle their disease better, it does not directly affect survival rates, the tyranny persists. The latest psuedo-science headline screams “A Positive Outlook on Life May Protect Against Breast Cancer”. Sadly, some breast cancer victims will read or remember only the explosive headline, and wonder if they brought the disease on themselves by not being cheerful or optimistic enough.

Outside of the realm of cancer, the tyranny of positive thinking has led to the massively held belief that unhappiness of any sort is some sort of disease – one caused by a mind that refuses to see the glass as half-full – that does not find beauty in pain, or redemption in tragedy.

And once again, platitudes abound.

Gratitude. . . turns what we have into enough, and more . . . -Melody Beattie
You can have everything you want in the world if you love yourself first!! -
Louise Hay
I am the perpetrator of my suffering – but only all of it. – Byron Katie

I had a revealing conversation once with a therapist who mindlessly repeated the oft-stated belief that “no one can make you feel hurt without your permission.” I asked her what would happen if at that moment a madman stormed into her office and shot her. Would she be hurt? Could she will the bullet to miss her? What if it wasn’t a bullet, but a fist or a flying stapler – would the weapon make a difference? Would she, bruised and bloodied afterwards, refuse to carry the affect of such an assault, maintaining the same unlocked doors and sense of security? What if it was not her, but her daughter?

Of course people can make you feel hurt without your permission. They can do so with a weapon, with words, with broken promises, bullying, or diminishment. Others can rob you of a livelihood, a sense of safety, or even a person you loved. They can steal the money you needed to retire or pay the rent. The bad actions of another can have a profound, and even lifelong affect.

Ah, but. . . “We can’t control the actions of other people, we can only control how we feel about it.” Enter the foggy maze, where a bullet becomes inspiration and an unwarranted fist becomes a lesson. Where those who die young were wanted in Heaven by God himself, and where pain, and struggle, and even the worst circumstances can be willed away . . . if only you believe.

3. Women, Unhappiness & the Chemical Solution

If only you believe in gratitude, says Beattie, whatever you have will be more than enough. And if it isn’t? Maybe it’s because you didn’t love yourself enough or think the right thoughts, according to Hay. In the end, Katie tells us, all suffering is self-inflicted. The robbery, the assault, the disease, the death. . .we must have wanted it on some level – or maybe God and the fates decided we needed it – or maybe it’s some karmic lesson left over from life #46 that we need to learn for life #47. After all, there are no accidents.

It doesn’t surprise me that women make up the majority of those who most strongly espouse this fantastical kind of thinking. We make up 50-51% of the population, yet hold only a scant percentage of the political and social power. Lacking equal affirmation, and standing outside the doors of power, we seek change where we can – within the boundless territory of self.

It’s also not surprising that much of this magical thinking is, at its core, overly forgiving and tolerant of outside sources, and heavy on self-blame. Women have been molded, domineered, and duped into ready forgiveness and self-blame for centuries.

We learned that we bring forth children in pain to pay for Eve’s want of knowledge. Our monthly cycle was not a sign of health, but a curse. We were taught that as long as the weapon used against us was no thicker than a man’s thumb, assaults against us were sanctioned by God. When even the most senseless wars of men killed our children, we were told it would be ignoble not to feel proud of our sacrifice. Our emotions have been, at various times, labeled as madness or hysteria. We have been romanticized as pleasing helpmates, cheerful housewives, and doting mothers. Scorned as ball breakers, brash women, hags, and bitches when we didn’t tow the patriarchal line. Even now we are often blamed for rape, the divorce rate, and the destruction of the nuclear family.

The unhappiness of women seems to be viewed through a different lens than the unhappiness of men. It’s likely that the same unbalanced social mores that rate assertiveness differently for the sexes does the same when it comes to emotion. In other words, when men express unhappiness, it may be considered reasonable given circumstances, whereas a woman’s unhappiness is suspect – caused solely by her own actions, raging hormones, or negative, complaining female mind. If we can’t find our happy place in imaginative mental revisionism, then there’s always a chemical solution. According to a 2003 study from the University of Michigan, the ratio of women to men on anti-depressants in 2:1-3:1. Even after accounting for gender-based differences, such as postpartum depression, the ratio is high.

While clinical depression is caused by a biological imbalance, I have to wonder if at least some of those prescriptions aren’t being written for women who feel guilty for not being the reality shifting revisionists and perfectly cheerful workers-daughters-wives and mothers society tells them they should be.

4. The Blinding Aftermath

Unhappiness is not a disease, and outside of true medical conditions, it is also not a symptom. It seems disingenuous to promote positive emotion as a natural, healthy response while blacklisting unhappiness as unnatural, unhealthy, and solely a matter of choice.

In a society where most circumstances, and the emotions surrounding those circumstances, are thought to be a matter of choice,

- social injustices are minimized or negated,
- complaints, no matter how valid, are derided,
- reality becomes “what you make it” rather than what it actually is,
- the pressure on changing external forces is lessened,
- and compassion and empathy are spared.

It is easier to wear blinders in a world where human unhappiness is considered a self-fulfilling prophecy or disease. Rather than going through the hard work of correcting injustices, we can blame the victims. We can refuse to see victims, and see instead only people who failed to make good choices. We can more easily turn a blind eye to the suffering of others, and turn a deaf ear towards their complaints, when we believe that whatever they are suffering is self-perpetrated.

We can harm each other in a myriad of ways, and then claim we are not responsible for the aftermath. We can be less compassionate, less generous, and less empathetic when we believe that the problem with other people is their attitude rather than their circumstance.

Certainly, happiness is preferable to the lack of it –- that is not the question. The question is one of genuineness, and realism, and rationality. In promoting positive, magical thinking not just as a self-help tool, but as the ultimate cure for nearly every human condition from cancer to social marginalization, what have we accomplished? What have we lost? What does the future hold for a society that makes bestsellers of books like The Secret, in which the author claims, “Everything that’s coming into your life you are attracting into your life.” Writer Tim Watkin, of the Washington Post, points out that “Hard work, talent, education, even luck go unmentioned. As The Secret puts it, all you have to do is ‘put in your order with the universe.’ Ask. Believe. Receive. That’s the mantra.”

It’s a mantra that has been played like a lulling serenade, particularly during the reign of Republican congressional then Presidential rule, in which big business and war took precedence over people, and invisible bootstraps were the only things offered to those reeling from high unemployment rates, skyrocketing inflation, and a record number of home foreclosures. The years from 1999-2004 (the last year studied) saw a nearly 20% increase in the suicide rate among 45-54 year-olds. For women, the rate leapt 31 percent. Coincidence? Or a matter of circumstance? Researchers believe that the prime suspect is a high rate of prescription drug use and abuse, particularly of anti-depressants.

5. The Monster in the Closet

On May 30, 2008 an elderly man in Hartford, Connecticut was run over by a car on a busy street. The driver did not stop, and no one, not even a single person, stopped to help him, or tried to divert traffic away from his body. Torres, 78, was left paralyzed from the neck down. “At the end of the day we’ve got to look at ourselves and understand that our moral values have now changed,” Police Chief Daryl Roberts was quoted as saying. “We have no regard for each other.”

What regard can we have for ourselves and others when magical, positive thinking is the order of the day? When we believe that someone, somewhere else, is in charge of helping those who need it – or worse, when we believe that almost every human need is a self-contained matter, and that experiences and tragedies, no matter how harsh or unjust, are somehow chosen?

To what end is the self-flagellation guised as positivity? If we cannot truly “think it and be it” – if the outside world does not turn on our most focused and heartfelt wishes – and the future we so studiously and lovingly envisioned does not pan out, is it because we did not Ask, Believe, and Receive correctly? Were our thoughts not happy enough, positive enough?

Realism in the age of magical thinking has become the monster in the closet. The scary thing that we avoid for fear of being swallowed or overtaken, or swept up in a battle when all we really want to do is relax –- let go and let God. Find inner peace. Fill up on a feast of gratitude, platitudes, and self-love when sustenance is short, believing that eventually we’ll discover the secret to life-long happiness and contentment.

If realism is viewed as a monster, it is not an imaginary one, nor will it go away if ignored or abandoned in favor of magical thoughts. It needs our action, awareness, involvement, and yes – our continued struggle for a world that is better in reality, and not just in hope. Our shared reality, in particular, needs us, front and center and standing at attention, willing to bravely face the unpleasant truths and do battle with harmful forces, if it is ever to arrive at a place of true social justice, lasting peace, and fully realized potential. We need bravery, not bromides, to create the changes we seek.

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She Jumps, and Has Her Reasons

Posted on 06/29/2008 by Jane Devin

Every night for several years, you’ve hopped onto a trampoline. You’ve jumped and jumped until your heart raced, your body felt weak, and you were exhausted. It’s this ritual, you believe, that allows you to sleep, and you have slept so brilliantly during these years that closing your eyes has become, in itself, a thing of beauty. You feel healed by sleep, both released and energized by the time morning comes.

Now, though, you’ve developed small fractures in both feet. Your knees are unsteady. Your legs shake in waking hours, as overly strained muscles begin to separate from bone. Still you jump, only more slowly, and more aware of the damage being done. You begin to question your methods, and momentarily consider other alternatives, but nothing feels as perfect or reliable as the thing you are most familiar with. Ultimately, you jump so that you can get there – to the place you love – the place that makes you feel wholly alive and beautifully human.

One evening, your trampoline disappears. It is gone, and you cannot afford to replace it. Your body, despite its accumulation of damages, aches for nothing more than the nightly ritual of jump-bounce-twist-turn. Your legs feel as if they’ve taken on a restless, unhappy life of their own. They moan and twitch and rebel beneath you. Your heart, used to taking a nightly pounding, feels eerily still.

You do not sleep.
You begin to dream of horrible things while you are painfully awake.
Your body, you feel, has betrayed you.
You fear you will never sleep again.

You pace the floors, and so much comes to the surface in the dark of night. Bitterness, sadness, fear, anger, apathy. Your mind, overly-full and anxious, turns dark and despairing. In losing the trampoline, everything else you once loved also feels lost to you. You begin to associate your jumping with all the wonderful things you fear are lost forever, creating a black and white list of reasons you must, absolutely must, have your trampoline back. Without it;

you will never sleep again.
You will never again feel right, or whole, or rested.
Unrested, you will never be happy.
Unhappy, there is no reason to live.

The thought of getting back on your trampoline begins to consume you. It’s only the thought of jumping again that brings you close to feeling any sort of happiness. Small fractures and torn ligaments become, in your mind, a smaller and smaller price to pay, and even somewhat meaningless in your list of self-justified consequences.

You need the trampoline.
Your body demands it.
You, or some very important, alive, or sacred part of you, will die without it.
You’re are in more pain when you don’t jump than when you do.

The trampoline becomes everything, and until you have it again, little else seems to matter. You need to tie off the vein, light the pipe, snort the coke, take another pill, binge until you puke, starve yourself into a silhouette, gamble until it’s all gone, sleep with another stranger, drink yourself into oblivion — because nothing else, you are convinced — will ever make you feel as good or as much like your truest self.

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A Failed Intervention

Posted on 04/27/2008 by Jane Devin

I see her through the clouded lens of decades past, the tiny girl with the weary smile, and the sure, square hands darkened with charcoal and chalk. At nine, she built her world of art on sidewalks and cement walls, springing dark-eyed figures out of marigold fields, and white rabbits out of wishing wells.

She had a quiet grace and sensitive hearing. I remember her brother standing next to her in the empty schoolyard one summer day and screaming loudly in her ear. She collapsed to the ground crying, covering her head as if the sirens had gone off and the world was coming to an end. Her brother scoffed and walked away satisfied. I stood with my back against a wall, watching her world crumble, my eyes darting left and right, for what seemed like hours.

“It’s okay,” I finally whispered, gathering up her chalk and charcoal and putting them in my bike basket. “It will be okay.” I repeated myself dozens of times, not knowing what else to say, and finally she lifted her braided head and nodded at me with a tear stained face.

She wanted to hold hands on the way home, so we did, my left hand in her right, my other hand pushing my bike. We walked in silence, with another secret between us, one of several, and our shared knowledge bonded us together more tightly than any game of double-Dutch rope or cats-in-the-cradle ever could.

Ms. Mary Mack Mack Mack and hands wrapped in brightly colored strings were only covers, dusty book jackets under which all the real stories stirred and collided. We were, underneath the false sing-song rhythm of childhood, The Girls Who Knew Things (no one else knew). We were The Girls Who Felt Things (that no one else could guess). We were The Girls With Secrets (that couldn’t be trusted to the world). We were best friends.

On the day she was to move thousands of miles away, I rode my bike all the way to Idlewild Park, a leg-numbing journey of ten to twelve miles. I rode the kiddie train around the park and glared at anyone who looked in my direction. I wanted a fight. A knock-down, drag-out, fists flying fight. I wanted to beat the whole world up. I wanted others to know my pain, and I wanted pain enough to cry.

I did cry, eventually. Under the cover of pine trees and dusk, when I knew for certain that the moving truck would be gone. When I no longer had to see the sad brown eyes staring back at me, or hear the promises of daily letters and one-day-we-will visits.

She was gone. And she took with her all the art and color and trust that had filled me. I felt drained of everything except defeat. I screamed into the Truckee river, the scream of a wild, abandoned child, and I bitterly harbored half a hope that she would hear me.

I hear you screaming now, my friend. And I know, I really do, how hard this is for you. It came as a shock, although in my mind this last scene has played over and over again until it finally wore down to the inevitable.

I can’t, I won’t, compete with your darkly romantic visions of a slow suicide by neglect and Jack Daniels. I won’t be the one to keep your secrets anymore, because they are killing you, cell by cell, moment by moment, day by dreary day.

You climbed the ladder with drunken energy, only to let go effortlessly once you were near the top. There, crumpled into yourself, nothing mattered. Not those who felt obliged to nurture you back to health, or those who acted as both catalyst and crutch. Not those who paid your bills when you forgot, or remembered your children’s birthdays.

I was there when you bought your house. It was a beautiful house, once, and just what you always dreamed of – water, mountains, privacy, room for dogs and cats and horses. Now I walk inside and everything has turned into garbage. There are puddles on the floor, mountains of filthy clothes, rotting food on the counters. There are no animals in sight except the dark-eyed one that sits among the melted candles and artistic ruins, drinking herself into oblivion.

It turns my stomach to think that you live like this. That you, who are capable of so much beauty, and who worked so hard to produce and attain it, could let everything turn to a pile of shit in a matter of a few years.

I’ve wanted to scream, but I held back, not wanting to hurt you. I’ve wanted to grab you by the shoulders and shake you back to life. I have felt anger so primal that it took all my willpower not to add the mark of my hand to where yours had been, and punch holes in the walls. I thought, wrongly, that gentleness would sway you. I thought, maybe, if I washed the clothes and mopped up the puddles, and held your hand, and whispered in your ear, and showed you how deeply you were loved, that something would click.

Instead, it was all a huge disconnect. You. Me. The World. But mostly you. Growing so numb that I have to wonder how much of you is really left. Your eyes are void. Your dry skin hangs from fragile looking bones. Even your tears are dry. Pathetic, heaving sobs begin and end in wanting, needing, insisting on more of something, but it’s always vague and never named. You wallow in the dirt of self-pity, and tell me you are stuck, but your nearly lifeless hands reach for nothing except another grimy glass.

And there’s him. The leech that has sucked you down into some lover’s abyss I’ll never understand. He loves you, you tell me, but from here it looks like greed and a matter of ease. You, not for the first time, are so willing to let everything go for that one man who will finally take you into the less-than-zero zone. If you both have your way, and I’m now convinced you will, you’ll be worth less than zero when he is through living off your lifeblood and scavenging through your possessions. Then again, you might be dead and it won’t matter anymore. He’ll stay and pick through the bones like the vulture he is, and the rest of us – those who have truly loved you and tried to protect you – will have to sieve through our anger to find our grief.

It’s one thing to fight you. We have fought before, and fairly. Two against one, though, is one too many.

I am saying goodbye, my once-precious friend, and there will be no promises of letters or one-day anything. I am done, because you are done. Because I still have a life left, and I can’t live it fully while I’m trying to manage the one you and your two deadly habits are intent on destroying. There’s no damage control I can do that will ever rise above your need to experience some kind of death daily.

Do not dare tell me that I have not loved you well enough, or strong enough, or deep enough. I have loved you far too long, and way too much. I’ve kept your secrets and indulged your disease, and drained myself of time, money, and energy in order to give you whatever temporary relief would get you through another day. My love for you long ago exceeded any expectation of mutuality, and I have loved alone. Alone. Like a wild child, desperate to hang onto my one true companion – The Girl Who Once Was.

I will miss her. I will miss you not nearly as much.

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Poison not Just in the Neglect, but in the Cliches

Posted on 03/10/2008 by Jane Devin

Poverty is Poison was the headline of a February 18th editorial in the New York Times. Every time I read something like this – old news passed off as a new discovery – I want to scream a little bit. Massive amounts of research, some of it quite famously cruel and spectacular, has been done on child development. That “children growing up in poor families. . . .experience unhealthy levels of stress hormones which impair their neural development” is not a new finding, nor is it surprising. These same stress hormones are found in children from abusive or neglectful homes, and it has been far beyond proven that children who are not nurtured in infancy, if they survive at all, will experience a host of problems, from social attachment disorder to learning disabilities.

What is surprising is that we, as a society, continue to expect and demand a cure through self-determination. That we negate the factual science of neural development in favor of blaming, shaming, or shunning the affected, believing that moral weakness or poor character, rather than any significant physical or cognitive deficit, is responsible for those who fail to rise to the social challenges of our competitive society.

I’d like to find your inner child and kick its little ass.

“Get over it,” pop star Don Henley once sang. “Complain about the present and blame it on the past, I’d like to find your inner child and kick its little ass”. Henley’s popular song, which seemed to show equal disdain for real victims as well as those faking it in exchange for a car crash payday, reflected the attitudes of many Americans at the 1990′s height of child abuse stories. Unfortunately, there was a window of time when it became somewhat hip to come out as an abused child – and celebrities, whether jumping on the popular bandwagon, or sincerely trying to help, only caused a serious issue to be taken less seriously. People started to recoil, not from the horrors of child abuse, but from yet another sad tale of alcoholism, rape, or rage – especially those told by people living a privileged existence far removed from the hardscrabble lives of the working and middle classes.

The backlash against abuse victims was swift, hard, and long lasting. English professors across America added “child abuse” to their list of cliched topics. More and more writers were steered away from the topic by threats of non-publication. When books were published, such as “A Child Called It” or “The Glass Castle”, the endings were happily-ever-after.

The old but persuasive bromides of positivity were shined up for a new generation who were spoon fed the concept of self-esteem without the struggles and accomplishments that naturally lead to a sense of self-worth. I remember arguing with my daughter’s second grade teacher about this when Elisabeth came home one day and told me spelling didn’t matter. I was sure she misunderstood the teacher, but no. Mrs Greene informed me that correcting a child’s spelling could “stunt” their creativity and lead to lowered self-esteem. My argument that self-esteem would be a natural byproduct of mastering the task of spelling fell on stubbornly deaf ears – as did my argument that creativity isn’t so fragile that it’s destroyed under structure.

That new generation is now grown up, and they seem all too willing to carry the torch for the crumbling and blind school of self-determination, regardless of scientific discoveries, old or new. Poverty is character, and character is destiny. Trauma is gotten over by self-help books and positive self-talk. Neural pathways, receptors and hormones are nothing that an hour with Joel Osteen or Dr. Phil can’t fix. Think it and be it. Get real. Or, as Oprah – who was once of the foremost advocates for the misunderstood underclass before taking the Cosmo girl road of peddling everything from diets to beauty secrets – might suggest, discover your spirit. Live your best life.

There is absolutely nothing wrong with feel-good philosophies, positive thinking, or living one’s life with passion. The wrong enters when these things are held out by the dominant society as a cure to problems that are far deeper, more serious, and more poisonous than everyday problems.

Not feeling great about the way one looks in a bathing suit is in no way equivalent to actually being (as opposed to merely feeling like) a social outcast.

I feel like a fraud. I’ve never fit in anywhere…

“I feel like a fraud,” says *Kari, who spent her first six years of life with a neglectful mother before being sent to live with her elderly grandmother. “I’ve never fit in anywhere … and my thoughts just don’t seem to work the way other people’s do.” Kari, now 46, spent most of her adult years trying to climb the ladder as a graphic artist in the corporate world.

“No one ever told me I didn’t have talent,” she says, “I did, and was probably even above-average in that area, but I just wasn’t well liked. I wasn’t liked when I was myself, and I wasn’t liked any better when I followed the advice of all those self-help, how-to-heal, or how to make friends books. I knew there was something different about me – something that made other people uncomfortable – but I never found what it was. I kept trying out all sorts of different approaches, but it was like I had some invisible mark of a social pariah. My work was valued, but I couldn’t get promoted. There were convenient acquaintances, but no real friendships.

“I went to therapists. I meditated. I read every book I could find on healing and being social, and I trained myself to carefully consider every response and every action. . .

“The weirdest thing has always been the way people respond to me. For some reason, my words were always taken far more personally than if they came from someone else. For instance, if one of my colleagues casually complained, it was no big deal. If I did the same thing, even using almost the same exact words, it was an Oh my God event – people would be shocked, or instantly label me a chronic complainer.

“It’s that kind of over-sensitivity. . .to me as a person, and to my words. . . that made me afraid to speak out at all. I was labeled weird, no matter how normal I thought I was, or how like them I tried to act. I became quieter over the years, and my own sensitivity around other people became so heightened it was almost paralyzing.”

After seven jobs in 19 years, Kari quit. She subsisted on unemployment and savings for two years, while struggling with intense depression and thoughts of suicide. One therapist suggested Kari might have a mild form of Asperger’s Syndrome, a diagnosis that left her with little comfort. “Even if I agreed with that, which I really don’t seeing that I don’t have many of the symptoms, it really doesn’t change anything,” she says.

Eventually, Kari went to work as an $8/hr. checker in a small grocery store, which pays her extra on the side to create signage. It wasn’t the life Kari planned, but she’s not alone.

There are profound and visible differences between a “wild child” like +Genie, who was discovered at age 13, after having been isolated from infancy in a dark room in her parents’ home, and David Pelzer, whose childhood abuse and isolation was chronicled in the book “A Child Called It.” Genie never recovered, while Pelzer went on to become a successful journalist and author. Their experiences, the extent of abuse suffered, their brains, and exposures to other people, were quite different even though there are several parallels that can be drawn.

What is less obvious, and almost invisible in society, are those who were significantly poisoned in childhood – those who were permanently affected by the crossed wires, mixed-up hormones, and neural changes caused by poverty, neglect, and abuse. Most often, those affected are physically indistinguishable from those who were reared in relatively normal and healthy homes.

The emotional and social differences, not seen by the naked eye, may range from mild to severe, with Kari’s case being somewhere in the moderate middle.

There’s no “get over it” cure, and no amount of shame or blame placed on victims can reorganize or “fix” the brain that was damaged in infancy or childhood. The best that survivors can do is to be aware of the differences and develop the patience, personal strength, and comprehensive understanding necessary to deal with being something of an outcast – with being, perhaps, “of this world, but not necessarily in it.”

For society, the question should not be about a cure that doesn’t exist, but a two-fold one of awareness and prevention. Rather than throwing the science (and its subjects) away in favor of the quick, convenient, and empirical “bootstrap” approach – which seeks to make everything from financial achievement to social success mere matters of character and effort – society might instead seek to understand the deeper, more realistic reasons why some former victims of poverty and abuse fail to thrive.

Understanding that, we might put more stock in prevention and make the end of poverty and child abuse in America a real and urgent priority, rather than shuffling both off to the easy-to-forget realm of stale news and tired cliches.

*Real name not disclosed.
+Genie was the psuedonym given to Susan Wiley by researchers. She now lives in an undisclosed group home in Southern California.

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When None of the Power is Yours

Posted on 01/28/2008 by Jane Devin

I didn’t know my Nana Hlatky very well. She lived in Conneticut, on the other side of the coast, and only came to visit every few years. Still, I felt a connection with her, far more than my sisters did. They couldn’t decipher her accent as well as I could, and none of them had either my curiosity or my rock solid determination.

I knew she had stories to tell, and I wanted to hear them. What was the hole in her chest? What happened to the farm in the Ukraine? Was she really on a train for 40 days before being sent to a work camp? How did she escape, where were her parents, how did she get to America?

Nana wasn’t big on talking, and I don’t know if that was her nature, or the circumstance of being in a different kitchen. Nana hardly ever left the kitchen when she visited – she was usually cooking or baking something, and when she wasn’t, she seemed to feel most at home at the kitchen table, sipping coffee.

I’m sure, too, that she thought I was the weirdest granddaughter ever, and a real shkidnyk – a total pest. But I adored her – all 4’11″ of her, with her serious green eyes, work-weary hands, knee high nylons, and soft red lipstick. I loved to watch those hands as they folded pierogies into perfect half-moon shapes, or mounds of fluffy dough into loaves of sweet bread.

Years later, when she came to live with us, those same hands would hold a butter knife in preparation for the danger that was coming through the door or sleeping on the couch. I would watch those hands wring as Nana begged to speak to the manager of this hotel. Those serious green eyes turned anxious and afraid, and were often filled with tears of confusion and frustration. My parents did not help. They harmed in ways that are still too painful to talk about. It was a terrible, brutal, heart-scathing thing to watch. My Nana. 4’11″. Some things are just not forgivable, and I will never forgive them.

I did the best I could at 15 years old, but what’s the best when none of the power is yours? I put in urgent, confidential calls to social services from payphones, and waited. In the interim, I bathed Nana, I talked to her, I tried to show her love, but as soon as she remembered my name, she forgot it. As soon as trust was established, it was broken. I was a stranger, I was a girl on the train, I was the maid who stole her purse.

Eventually, Nana was put in a long-term treatment facility, an “old folks home”, where she all but ceased to exist as a human being. She became a tiny, curled up shell, voiceless, with no spark of life left behind her clouded eyes. Her physical death took several years, but I prefer to imagine that her soul went first – to her brightest and kindest version of Heaven, where tragedies would be forgotten and love would be resurrected.

I thought of my Nana today when I read an article about a promising new experimental treatment for Alzheimer’s Disease. Bathing the brain in infrared light is thought to spur the growth of new brain cells and may, researchers hope, actually reverse memory loss, which would make it a groundbreaking discovery for hundreds of thousands of Alzheimer’s sufferers worldwide. The experiments worked on mice, but the first human trials will begin this summer.

After seeing the horrific powerlessness of Alzheimer’s firsthand, I have lived with the fear that my mind might go before my body. It’s a dreadful fear, particularly for me, since I already have a mind that’s prone to wandering off, or taking long daydream journeys. I wonder, really, how far of a leap it would be to go from merely wandering to getting irretrievably lost. I’d guess not far, and that’s frightening. So, like millions of others who share my concerns, I watch for new treatments, get excited by every advance made, and anxiously wait for the day a cure is found.

“Nana, do you think I’m pretty?”
“Vhat’s perrty to do in life? You tink perrty is important? Pffft. Be good, be schmart. Tat’s da perrty tat matters.”

She was, of course, very beautiful.

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America: Dumbed Down, Fattened Up, Porned Out & Pissed Off

Posted on 01/01/2008 by Jane Devin

Sure, it could be blamed on television or movies. It could also be about fast food, preservatives, and hormone-laden chickens. Maybe it’s violent rap music or video games. Overworked, stressed out adults. Over-scheduled or latchkey kids. The end of stickball and street hockey. Not enough vegetables and too many cans of Coca-Cola.It could be any of those things, or. . .it could that my theory is true, and America is suffering from a collective, nearly all-inclusive depression. Of course, one of the hallmarks of depression is that people who suffer it don’t believe they have it – they invent other reasons for feeling lousy, or are so used to feeling lousy that it almost feels good.

However, an analysis of clinical depression symptoms with the current state of America looks something like this.

Symptoms:

1. Changes in weight. An increased or decreased appetite. Weight gain or weight loss.
2. Impaired thinking and/or concentration. Trouble making decisions.
3. Sleep disturbances. Problems falling asleep or problems waking.
4. Heightened feelings of agitation. Easily annoyed. Irritability, restlessness.
5. Fatigue or sluggishness. Weariness. A lack of physical energy.
6. Depressed mood, with feelings of apathy, helplessness, and hopelessness.
7. Loss of interest in sex, changes in sexual functioning.

America:

1. Growing steadily obese. 64.5% of us are overweight. 1-5% are anorexic or bulimic.
2. America now ranks 20th in the world for education. We are becoming dumber.
3. Sales of sleep-aids like Ambien have skyrocketed. Starbucks has heavily expanded.
4. Road rage. School shootings. We have become more temperamental.
5. Despite a plethora of health clubs, we’re exercising less and eating more fast food.
6. A high voter turnout in America is 54%. 66% of us call in sick when we’re not.
7. Since 1998, Viagra has been one of the most popular drugs in America.

I think a scientific case might be made for my theory of a collective American meltdown in the last decade, but the empirical evidence by itself is overwhelming.

Stolen Childhoods

In 2001, I was at a grocery store when I saw a sweet grandmotherly woman bend over a stroller to coo at an infant and congratulate the mother. The mother quickly jerked the stroller away and said, “I am teaching him NOT to talk to strangers!”. The child was about six months old. Teaching kids the danger of strangers is appropriate, but making them paranoid, fearful, and anxious is not.

The protection of society’s children is warped. Those who most need protection do not get it, and the public is left with harrowing stories of child abuse and murder. Meanwhile, there are far too many over-coddled children whose parents forgo discipline in favor of a “my child can do no wrong” attitude. When their children act out at school, parents are quick to blame the teachers. While teachers aren’t infallible, it does not help that classroom time is often dominated by children with behavior problems. Teachers cite defensive parents and discipline as two of their major struggles.

At the same time, many public schools have eliminated recess, and any chance for children to expend excess energy, in order to fit more learning into the schedule. Children are being saddled with more and more homework, further cutting into a child’s play time. The average backpack of an elementary school child weighs 13.8 pounds. A 2004 study found that over 64% of middle school children report pain from carrying heavy backpacks.

There has been a 500% increase in the number of ADD/ADHD drugs prescribed to children since 1991. An article published by Education World states, “According to the Congressional Testimony of Terrance Woodworth, a deputy director of the Drug Enforcement Administration, the number of prescriptions written for methylphenidate has increased by a factor of five since 1991. About 80 percent of the 11 million prescriptions doctors write for that medication each year treat childhood ADHD, he said. In addition, production of Adderall and Dexedrine, also used to treat ADHD, has risen 2,000 percent in nine years.”

Is it really any wonder that America’s children are becoming overweight couch potatoes who are less interested in learning and more interested in the latest video game release? We have stolen childhood away from them at every turn. We need to give it back to them, complete with free time, family time, the outdoors, and discipline.

All the Rage . . . and the Apathy

Rape is the fastest growing crime in the world, with America still in the lead. The statistics are simply staggering, but perhaps none more so than this — only 2% of perpetrators are convicted. Pedophilia is a rising crime that has actually gained proponents in the academic sector.

While people should be enraged by that, and the often light sentences handed out to rapists and child molesters when they are convicted, many choose to expend their energies elsewhere — like on the highway. In 1999, a prominent Twin Cities anesthesiologist beat up a 68 year old female driver for going too slowly. The case was shocking at the time, but road rage has since become more common. Violence and deaths caused by road rage have risen steadily.

According to Wikipedia, in the 90′s, “gangsta rap” hit the mainstream, and by the early 2000′s, rap music became one of the bestselling music genres in America. Bustin’ caps, shooting your ass, bitches, pimps and ho’s were introduced into the American lexicon, and embraced by a newly ghettoized culture of youth and young adults. A 1996-1997 study found that illicit drugs were mentioned in 63% of rap songs, compared to 10% in other genres. Defenders of rap music claim that the lyrics are fueled by reality — if the reality did not exist, then neither would the violent, misogynistic lyrics. While that may have some grain of truth, the vast popularity of rap music does not match up with the reality of most American lives, black or white, which are not dominated by shootings, crack cocaine, pimps and whores.

That such things became popularized, and that psuedo-gangs have hit the suburbs, might be attributed less to the reality of American lives than to the feelings of hopelessness, frustration, and rage many Americans, particularly young people, seem to feel. Of course, there are plenty of people who also feel apathetic — they are either numb to the world outside of themselves, or disbelieve that anything they might do would have an impact. They keep to themselves, away from the polls, and apathetically go along with the dumbing down they get from corporate-sponsored television and newspapers, while they read fewer and fewer books.

Sex: Just Not That Sexy Anymore

Pornography continues to sell, and is becoming more mainstream. Estimates of porn sales in America range from a conservative estimate of $4 billion dollars up to $15 billion. In any event, the porn business has boomed since 1970, when revenue was estimated at a relatively paltry $5-10 million.

We can now order porn into our living rooms with a subscription to cable or an internet connection. Americans no longer have to sneak out to dark theaters to get their fill of naked, copulating others. There’s freedom in that — and some socio-cultural changes that don’t seem to be going away any time soon.

American women, taking their cue from porn stars, have started shaving or waxing their nether regions to baldness or near baldness. The trend has taken personal grooming into spas and salons, where for $30-$100 women can get themselves trimmed to bikini perfection, shape their pubic hair into a thin stripe, or go all-out and get the front to back, totally bald Brazilian.

“I wouldn’t date a woman who didn’t shave down there,” said one blog commenter, “too gross.” Preferable, it seems, is a woman’s return to labial prepubescence.

While all cosmetic surgery is on the rise, labiaplasty — a particularly painful operation which involves the cutting and restructuring of labial tissues to form a “youthful” appearance — has gone from being a secret of porn stars into the mainstream of female consciousness. Vaginal rejuvenation, a procedure that actually may have some medical merit for women who have prolapsed vaginas, has become a a fashion trend, with many women seeking the surgery only to appease the fantasies of their porn-fed boyfriends and husbands. From Women’s e-News:

Ileana Vasquez is a 29 year-old Southern California housewife with four children. She read about vaginal rejuvenation after she saw an ad in a magazine. Her marriage was in trouble and she noted that her husband wasn’t happy with her sexually.

“One time he had a few beers and told me that because I had all our kids and was looser now he didn’t want me as a woman anymore,” Vasquez said. “He did say he was sorry later on but I knew he was telling the truth.”

Vasquez had the surgery and she noted her marriage is back on track and her sex life is good again. “He’s become my sweetheart again,” she said. “He bought me a house and he wants me all the time.”

Anal sex, which was once reported by Kinsey to be engaged in by 9% of the heterosexual population, is now a growing trend. The CDC has reported that 38.2% of straight men and 32.6% of women now engage in backdoor play. The sales of anal “toys” have increased dramatically in the last decade.

So have porn, waxed parts, and Greek-style lovemaking made America any sexier? Not really. An estimated 25% of American adults, a third of women and a fifth of men, have no interest in sex. Up to 33% of our adult population has gone one year or longer without a sexual partner. Viagra sales have continued to rise since Pfizer introduced the drug in 1998.

Fewer people, it seems, feel adequate anymore. Their bodies and parts don’t match the sexualized images porn has brought them, and they turn towards surgery and drugs to “save” them. Where the Kama Sutra of decades past brought eroticism and imagination to millions of bedrooms, today’s porn is selling Americans on picture-perfect vaginas, silicone enhanced breasts, enormous phalluses, and taking it up the ass.

For millions of Americans, sex just isn’t that sexy anymore.

(to be continued).

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