{"id":569,"date":"2015-06-10T13:10:53","date_gmt":"2015-06-10T21:10:53","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/admin.patheos.com\/blogs\/shekhinahcalling\/?p=569"},"modified":"2015-06-10T13:10:53","modified_gmt":"2015-06-10T21:10:53","slug":"shame-and-your-beautiful-cooties","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/shekhinahcalling\/2015\/06\/10\/shame-and-your-beautiful-cooties\/","title":{"rendered":"Shame and Your Beautiful Cooties"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<\/head>

So a few weeks ago there was this article in the New York Times on how shame can be at the root of depression<\/a>:<\/p>\n

Several years ago a patient named Brian was referred to me. He had suffered for years from an intractable depression for which he had been hospitalized. He had been through cognitive behavioral therapy, psychoanalytic psychotherapy, supportive therapy and dialectical behavioral therapy. He had tried several medication \u201ccocktails,\u201d each with a litany of side effects that made them virtually intolerable. They had been ineffective anyway. The next step was electroshock therapy, which Brian did not want.<\/p>\n

\u2026<\/p>\n

He told me that his parents were both \u201cpreoccupied\u201d with the heavy burdens of a family that \u201ccould barely make ends meet.\u201d While his mother never called herself an alcoholic, she drank to excess, and his father was often emotionally checked out as well. Brian had few memories of being held, comforted, played with or asked how we was doing.<\/p>\n

One innate response to this type of environment is for the child to develop chronic shame. He interprets his distress, which is caused by his emotional aloneness, as a personal flaw. He blames himself for what he is feeling and concludes that there must be something wrong with him. This all happens unconsciously. For the child, shaming himself is less terrifying than accepting that his caregivers can\u2019t be counted on for comfort or connection.<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n

The author claims that shame and depression can be two separate things, and that, in Brian\u2019s case, what seemed like depression was actually shame. I don\u2019t know if I agree with the dichotomy she sets up\u2013maybe by depression she means depression-as-chemical-imbalance?\u2013but the idea of shame being a root cause of depression stuck with me.<\/p>\n

I can\u2019t count the number of times I\u2019ve been shamed by my family. The emotional neglect? Yup. My situation was virtually identical to Brian\u2019s, right down to the drinking problem and checked-out father. (My dad\u2019s been a Scientologist my whole life, so he\u2019s been encouraged, quite aggressively, to pretend he doesn\u2019t experience any bad emotions.) There\u2019s really not a whole lot to say about that type of shame, because on the surface it looks quite mundane.<\/p>\n

Rather, although it wasn\u2019t the focus of this particular article, I found myself more interested in the explicit shaming I\u2019ve experienced\u2013around my writing (\u201cWhy aren\u2019t you rich like Stephen King yet?\u201d), my career choice (\u201cWhy would anyone be a librarian?\u201d), the way I look (\u201cTweeze your eyebrows and wear the kind of clothes I wear, please\u201d), but especially around my witchcraft. When I started to get interested in Wicca in high school, I hid it from my mom as long as possible, and when she finally found out, she gave me a copy of the Bible for my birthday. A friend of mine pointed out that she couldn\u2019t have possibly thought that the gift would change my mind; after all, we already had both a regular and a children\u2019s bible in the house. I figured that she did it simply to demonstrate how unhappy she was with my \u201cdevil worship.\u201d<\/p>\n

If the reaction from those around me had been purely along the lines of \u201cthat\u2019s wicked,\u201d I don\u2019t know if I would have felt quite so shamed. After all, there\u2019s a certain mystique to wickedness; this was the 90s, and half my friends were dressing in black velvet and listening to Marilyn Manson. No, what really left me shaken was the idea that Wicca wasn\u2019t evil, but just silly. My sister once asked me what I believed, and as I told her, she giggled and averted her eyes. One of my classmates (a devout Christian) came up to me out of the blue one day and said, \u201cI just want you to know that I think your religion is stupid<\/em>.\u201d Complete with emphatic arm gestures.<\/p>\n

When someone makes a concerted effort\u00a0to shame you, they\u2019re often\u00a0driven by fear, anxiety, and insecurity. You\u2019re doing something they\u2019re unfamiliar with, or you hold a belief that contradicts\u00a0their beliefs, or they simply don\u2019t know how to relate to\u00a0the kind of person you are. That\u2019s threatening\u00a0to people who have been trained to believe that their way is the best\u00a0way. They feel contaminated by your very existence. They don\u2019t want your cooties, so they try to cleanse themselves by lashing out.<\/p>\n

But<\/em>, you might be wondering, what about shaming people when they do legitimately bad things? That\u2019s okay, right? That\u2019s necessary!<\/em>\u00a0Well, I\u2019d argue that even in situations where one\u2019s\u00a0behavior is harmful or misguided\u2013an anger problem, say, or a sexist remark\u2013shaming is often\u00a0a knee-jerk reaction instead of a thoughtful, strategic\u00a0response. People shame others because it feels good. It anesthetizes a wound. It almost never actually changes anything\u2013or, if it does, only in an excruciating, Rube Goldberg-like way.<\/p>\n

But knowing that doesn\u2019t make the sting go away, nor does it prevent shaming from getting under your skin. Even today I deal with a lot of internalized shame around witchcraft. When I see a Druid or Witch\u00a0in beautiful ritual regalia, a little part of me squirms. I hear the voices of my family, judging and laughing. Yet when I see a bishop or an Eastern Orthodox priest or a Hasidic Jew, I feel nothing. Because they\u2019re considered normal. Unlike us stupid, weird Pagans.<\/p>\n

I\u2019m guessing at least some of this story is familiar to you.<\/p>\n

As I mulled over shame, I\u00a0came across this delightful picture<\/a> in a parenting forum:<\/p>\n

\"Description:<\/a>
CC Tasha Sturm, Cabrillo College<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

It\u2019s a lab culture taken from the hand print of an 8-year-old after playing outside. Talk about cooties! You think you\u2019re getting your children\u2019s hands clean with mere soap and water? Ha ha ha. Our little darlings are walking germ vectors.<\/p>\n

And yet\u2013the vast majority of the bacteria on our skin is harmless, even beneficial. There are more bacteria in our bodies than our own cells. There\u2019s some evidence that bacteria actually influence our personalities.<\/p>\n

Isn\u2019t that something? The things\u00a0people\u00a0consider foreign, bad, and unclean are often\u00a0not only beautiful, but vital.<\/p>\n

Think about that the next time someone sneers at what makes you feel alive.<\/p>\n


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When someone makes a concerted effort to shame you, they’re often driven by fear, anxiety, and insecurity. You’re doing something they’re unfamiliar with, or you hold a belief that contradicts their beliefs, or they simply don’t know how to relate to the kind of person you are. 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