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<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n<\/p>\n <\/p>\n <\/span>In order to understand hyper-vigilance better, I would like to share part of the Prologue of my memoir, I Never Heard A Robin Sing, <\/em>available as a Kindle on amazon.com.<\/em><\/span><\/p>\n \u201cI didn\u2019t choose my life.\u00a0 It chose me.\u00a0 If I want to go back to the beginning, I have to pass this memory first. <\/span><\/p>\n In a tiny bedroom, a young girl lies, swirled in dreams of innocence.\u00a0 A shaft of moonlight beams through worn drapes, exposing yellowed wallpaper and stark metal bunk beds.\u00a0 Nestled asleep in the lower bunk, she draws thin, coltish legs closer to her chest as her breathing deepens and her eyelids flutter.\u00a0 Wispy brown hair scattered about her face, frames small bones, and delicate features.\u00a0 A rosary creeps from under the pillow, its beads still warm with prayer, the cross dangling above the hardwood floor.\u00a0 Under the bed, a multi-colored mutt named Rusty hiccups his way through his own nighttime visions as he twitches in time to a windup clock that sits in protective watch on the dresser. \u00a0A three-year old child sleeps in a crib nearby. A younger sister lies in the upper bunk unaware of the impact the trauma of the next few minutes will have on her life.<\/span><\/p>\n As slumber guards the scene, the handle on the door turns, creaking in protest.\u00a0 It opens slowly, shrouding the room in a hazy light.\u00a0 A tall man, gray slivering his temples, casts sharp shadows that spill into the corners. \u00a0He watches for a moment as she sleeps, then enters, closing the door in a surreptitious manner.<\/span><\/p>\n Her life will never be the same.<\/span><\/p>\n I buried the memory of what happened deep in my unconscious mind, to be lost for over thirty years, as my emotional growth became locked in time.\u00a0 At the age of thirteen, I didn\u2019t even know the meaning of the word rape, much less incest.\u201d<\/span><\/em><\/p>\n <\/span><\/em><\/p>\n <\/span>Think about the innocence of a thirteen-year old girl lying in a bottom bunk, having just prayed her rosary and fallen asleep with visions of all that is good, drifting through her dreams. <\/span><\/p>\n In a matter of seconds, her life is destroyed. In a matter of seconds, she will be hyper-vigilant for the rest of her life.<\/span><\/p>\n <\/span>Sometimes we don\u2019t understand ourselves that we are being hyper-vigilant. We only know that we are cautious about things that most people assume are not a problem. The Middle English Scots used it to refer to keeping watch or staying awake. Most of us have insomnia. If our abuse happened, like mine, while we were sleeping, then to fall asleep is a dangerous thing so something inside of us says, \u201cdon\u2019t do it.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n <\/span>I have a sister who was awakened by my screams and the noise of my father\u2019s rape. She won\u2019t buy a computer because she knows the government has tiny cameras installed on them to record everything you do. <\/span>She won\u2019t file a claim for an insurance policy her brother left her because she doesn\u2019t want them to know her social security number (which is required on the form). The insurance company said they already have all of the information on the claim form (including the social security number) but they just need her to fill one out. <\/span>She has a cell phone but won\u2019t turn it on for fear the government will record her conversations. She only uses it for emergencies.<\/span><\/p>\n <\/span>She\u2019s only the witness to a trauma, not the victim. But sometimes witnesses to crimes <\/span>become more traumatized than the actual victim. She is hyper-vigilant on a massive scale. Most survivors of child sexual abuse are afraid to trust, don\u2019t like people getting too close, startle easily and can never let their vigilance down. Who knows what might happen?<\/span><\/p>\n <\/span>As I said in my book Repair Your Life<\/em>, We become adept at finding ways to either detach from reality or look the other way by creating continuous distractions. <\/span>Hyper-vigilance, a condition that causes great and continuous stress, becomes a walking part of us. <\/span>It interferes with our sleep, our ability to make wise decisions, and most importantly, our capacity for spontaneity and joy. <\/span>It creates an environment where everyone and everything becomes suspect in the destruction of our own well-being. <\/span>Life, instead of blossoming into the vibrant and abundant promise we expected at birth, is now a desolate affair. <\/span><\/span><\/p>\n <\/span><\/span>The emptiness of a life filled with the baggage of untreated childhood trauma is one of the saddest things known to man. Sadder yet is the knowledge that we could have been helped. <\/span>We wait with anticipation for someone to rescue us. <\/span>No one had rescued us from the abuse, but somehow we think that as our lives go awry, it’s only a matter of time before a knight will ride up on his steed and either protect us from life or protect us from ourselves. <\/span>In our naivet\u00e9, unable to regain our own power, we fall easy prey to the abusers of the world, thereby prolonging our own agony.\u201d<\/span> <\/span><\/p>\n <\/span>How to overcome hyper-vigilance once we begin recovery is a huge challenge. <\/span>We have to go through many stages before we can trust. First, we have to Recognize, or admit, that the problems we are having in life are a result of being sexually abused as a child. That is the first and most important step on our journey across the Bridge of Recovery. As we move across that bridge, with the help of Repair, we learn many important things: the abuse was not our fault. We were just a pawn on a chessboard. We learn to make healthy choices in our friendships, in our mate, in the type of lifestyle we are living and in letting go of old behavior patterns.<\/span><\/p>\n <\/span>It isn\u2019t easy. Nothing worth having is. However, in time, we will gradually let go of our fears, our insecurities, and our inability to make wise choices. In time, the hyper-vigilance will be a faint shadow in our lives and the abuse nothing more than a scar that we notice now and then with the ability to place objectivity between our former trauma and our current lives. <\/span><\/p><\/p>\n