Forefront Families

“I would never abuse my child or anyone else’s,” you might say. I believe you when you tell me that. Only a handful of people would knowingly and intentionally abuse a child. The parents who beat their children with whatever they find near them, inflicting cuts or bruises, would say that they were only trying to keep them on the ‘straight and narrow’. The father who molests his child or the kid next door is sick in the head. These forms of abuse are totally unacceptable and are the first to spring to people’s minds when, in a seminar, I ask the participants to list the abuses they know.

      Abuse is maltreatment of someone. Society puts serious sanctions on physical abuse such as mercilessly beating a child or committing sexual assault on them. One that, in my experience, can be just as damaging is verbal abuse. The law is not going to punish a person for emotional abuse, but it might lessen the sentence for a person who can prove that they murdered their spouse because of the constant emotional blackmail and verbal abuse their mate meted out. This happened in the case of a preacher’s wife in Tennessee who murdered her husband several years ago. She was released after a few months because she declared that her husband constantly put her down and emotionally abused her.

      What about the mother who in a fit of anger states, “You were a mistake. I wish you had never been born?” “You are fat and lazy and you’ll never amount to anything!” The recipients of such loose-mouthed abuse often suffer for the remainder of their lives from being cursed in this way. How many readers were told this, or similar phrases, by parents and suffer from a lack of self-respect, insecurity, or never have the opportunity to achieve their potential? As a counselor I have come across so many people whose lives have been screwed up by a flash of anger. It is only when emotional healing takes place and God breaks the power of these curses that the offended one can feel free to move on.

      Parents, it is so easy to let our anger take control so that we say words that cannot be taken back. If you have an anger problem you need to learn some skills to control it. If you let fly with a damning phrase you can change the whole course of your child’s life and prevent them from reaching their potential. It seems that such words are not forgotten. They may be temporarily dismissed, but they are lying under the surface waiting to dampen the next great thing in your child’s life. Your child is emotionally locked in at that point and does not have the freedom to dream and see things come to fruition.

      I counseled an Australian lady who was in her late 60’s. Tearfully she told me how her parent’s words kept her from getting married. She was over-anxious and had very little confidence. What a terrible indictment to place on anyone, especially a child who has a whole life ahead, but has been emotionally crippled.

      Occasionally I come across what I call a survivor. Somehow they had the strength to not allow the damning phrase to beat them. My oldest brother was told by his high school principal that he was a nice guy, but that he would never amount to anything academically. Well, I guess that was a challenge to him and he was going to prove that man wrong! My brother became a school principal and remained in that job probably longer than the man who tried to lay that curse on him.

      Survivor cases are rare. We need to guard our lips to avoid emotional trauma in our loved ones or anybody else we associate with. I learned and practiced a very important message that has constrained my speech for many years…”If it is not positive and doesn’t build the other person up, I need to shut my mouth!”