TAR Anon can help accelerate learning about complex or childhood post-traumatic stress disorder (CPTSD) in an anonymous and psychologically-safe online environment, with caring and TAR Anon-trained meeting facilitators. TAR Anon leaders and attendees are people who are there to listen and support each other.
TAR Anon meetings teach us that we repeat behavioral patterns from early, insecure attachments because it is what we know – and on some level, it feels safe. Even sleeping on broken glass can feel familiar and safe if that is what you knew as an infant and child. In meetings, though, we see how we need to form new behaviors to leave destructive behaviors behind. Learning and forming new behaviors may come through “aha” moments – feeling emotions, learning to love ourselves, and recognizing and avoiding toxic people. These are steps on the path to greater well-being.
Among the saddest facts I’ve learned from studying ACEs science, the science of positive childhood experiences (PCEs), and early relational health, is that children living in emotionally toxic environments (what I call toxic intensity) will often learn adaptive behaviors to survive. Some of the behaviors that can become hardwired in infants and children include:
- disassociating or disappearing themselves to avoid attracting the attention of an abuser;
- becoming a caretaker and/or protector of a perpetrator or perpetrators;
- people-pleasing to avoid conflict or punishment;
- overachieving and perfectionism designed to evoke positive attention and praise;
- eating for comfort and gaining weight and/or developing anorexia or bulimia to have a sense of control and/or to avoid attracting – consciously or subconsciously – sexual advances; or
- becoming controlling and manipulative to create a sense of safety or being in control.
With early childhood trauma (ages zero to three), and no experience of consistent nurture, the developing brain can be so harmed by the toxic stress hormones of cortisol and adrenaline that its function and structure are affected. Some infants and toddlers are actually wired to be fearful, distrustful, isolating, and chaos-seeking instead of being trusting, curious, and connection-seeking. This is why I advocate for, write, and speak so much about the need for early relational health as the basis of health and well-being across the lifespan, and share this seminal video of Bruce Perry, MD, with “What Happened to You: Conversations on Trauma, Resilience, and Healing” co-author Oprah Winfrey.
Though it is infinitely better to prevent toxic abuse by supporting pregnant women and new mothers and caregivers, their infants, and children to receive neuro-nurturing, there is hope that people who have struggled with negative effects from a toxic childhood can find help and can change thought patterns. Factors are so variable though – severity of trauma, the environment, access to support and a sense of safety, exposure to positive childhood experiences, and on and on – one cannot make generalities about who can make such changes and to what degree. I only know what has worked for me and helped to lift me from multi-generational depression, abuse, and addiction, was a “one day at a time” dependence on myself and spiritual care.
The Hope of Recovery
I do believe there is hope for people who grew up in abuse as well as abusers who find their way into a 12-step program, become willing to work a program, and who grow in the safety and acceptance of the program’s participants, because I have experienced and witnessed this over many years.
People can realize positive shifts in personality from programs including, but not limited to:
- Alcoholics Anonymous (AA) and Narcotics Anonymous (NA) can help people who abuse substances see how their substance abuse affects their lives, families, and careers, and learn how to live “happy, joyous, and free” lives without the substance;
- Adult Children of Alcoholics can help people who have grown up in relationships with addicted persons learn to reparent themselves by recognizing and practicing healthy behaviors (ACOA’s Yellow Workbook is terrific; working it with a friend from the program can be a game-changer.);
- Al-Anon and Co-Dependents Anonymous (CoDA) can provide guidance and support for those in relationships with people who are addicted to substances or behaviors; or
- Other anonymous groups addressing sex/love/romance addiction, over-spending, over-eating, and gambling can help abusers understand how these maladaptive behaviors may have started generations ago.
(Note: Addiction is often linked to likely epigenetic and genetic factors. In the interest of space and time, I am not addressing that topic here.)
As stated previously, I’ve been a member of multiple 12-step programs; one for more than 30 years. Through the years the comfort, safety, security, friendships, and reparenting these programs have offered have helped me to rewire my brain. They have inspired and fueled me toward the designation I am most proud of in my life, that of Cycle Breaker.
I also believe the childbirth education (the Bradley Method) and early relational health support from the La Leche League I had, along with parenting classes, decades of therapy, journaling, 12-step meetings, and being blessed to have two precious children whom I swore would not grow up in the same toxic intensity as my brother and me, put me on the path to follow the steps I wrote about in my book, The TurnAround Mom: How an Abuse and Addiction Survivor Stopped the Toxic Cycle for Her Family – and How You Can, Too!
At the behest of one of the editors of this blog post, I am sharing a bit about my book. Its chapter titles offer a glimpse at some reparenting advice that worked for me, and incorporate so much of what I’ve learned over the years and attempted to crystalize and share in the book. I believe they also fit with what is being shared in TAR Anon. (Note: I don’t receive any income from the book and encourage you, if you wish to purchase it, to buy it used.)
- Live a Life of Extreme Self-Care
- Build a Strong Support Structure
- Create a Sane and Strong Family Life
- Establish and Keep Strong Boundaries
- Make Better Decisions
- Spend Your Precious Resources Wisely – Energy, Time, Money
- Attract Healthy Relationships
- Avoid Toxic Intensity
- Practice Peace: Rushing is Abusive
- Honor Your Family’s Future
All of this is to say: We don’t have to pass toxic behaviors on to our children. People can change. And I believe TAR Anon is a tool that can help anyone who has experienced ACEs begin a healing journey.
I believe that TAR Anon and the many programs the STAR Network is advancing can accelerate the change we want to see. And I believe this work will resonate with many here on PACEs Connection.
While I wish TAR Anon had been around earlier, I’m glad it’s here now and am thrilled to share it and reiterate that it meets online, five times a week:
- Mondays and Wednesdays from 6:00 – 7:00 PM Eastern Time,
- Tuesdays and Thursdays from 2:30 – 3:30 PM Eastern Time, and
- Fridays from 12:00 Noon – 1:00 PM Eastern Time
While meetings are free, just as in any other 12-step meeting STAR Network Foundation accepts and gently encourages donations. The foundation is a 501(c)(3) organization, so contributions are tax-deductible.
Attendees are required to register to join the virtual meetings; however, they do not have to share their real name or appear on video. Meetings are anonymous, and anonymity is practiced as an integral part of this program of recovery.
One final bonus to these meetings, and one that has been incredibly helpful to me.
Each meeting closes with breath work to help calm the central nervous system and help it go from the reactive, flight-fight-freeze-fawn state to a state of rest and digest, wherein we can access our thinking brain and not be run by our emotions. Instead, after just four rounds of breathing in for four seconds, holding the breath for seven seconds, and then blowing the breath out hard through the mouth for eight seconds – about 80 seconds in all – the nervous system and body shift to the parasympathetic or more relaxed state. The extended exhale helps slow the heart rate, lower blood pressure, and quiet the mind.
I know it has been a help to me. Since I started attending the meetings and practicing the 4-7-8 breath work, chronic painful stomach issues that have plagued me most of my life have lessened greatly.
For more information, please visit TAR Anon.
Additional resources below include TAR Anon’s 12 steps, promises, and several of the videos found on the STAR Network Foundation’s Instagram page. New animations are added frequently.
New iterations of these fabulous and wise animations are shared frequently on the STAR Network Foundation Instagram site.
