Father Wounds: Can A Man Feel Helpless If He Had An Abusive Father?

​What a man may find is that he has the tendency to feel helpless and as though he has no control over his life. By being this way, his life is likely to be far harder than it needs to be and it is unlikely to be very enjoyable.

However, although simply being aware of this is not going to change his life, it will give him the chance to do something about it. Before he had reached this point, how he experienced life would just have been normal and he wouldn’t have felt the need to do anything about it.

A Bleak Existence

What he may find is that when he feels helpless, he doesn’t just feel this way and have negative thoughts. No, he could find that it is as though he is helpless and his whole body could feel very heavy.

He is then not going to have anything on top of him weighing him down but this is how it will feel. One way of looking at this would be to say that it will be as if his body has been drained of just about all of its energy.

Immobilised

Consequently, it will be a challenge for him to do just about anything and it might take a while until he returns to how he was before. Yet, when he does have this experience, his inner voice could end up criticising him for not taking action.

Thanks to this, he might end up forcing himself to get moving and to get something done. If this is what does take place, it could take a hell of a lot of willpower, and it might not be long until he returns to how he was before.

The Reason

He may find that there are certain things that play a part in why he feels this way or he might not. For example, he may find that he ends up having this experience when he is unable to meet certain needs.

Then again, he may find that he is unable to pinpoint why this takes place, with it appearing to be a random occurrence. If this is the case, he could come to the conclusion that this proves that there is nothing that he can do to change his circumstances.

A Desperate Place

Either way, his life is unlikely to be very fulfilling, with most if not all areas of his life being the opposite of how he would like them to be. So, he could have a job that is soul-destroying and his relationships might not be very nourishing.

In both of these areas, he could often be walked over and perhaps treated as though he has no value. But, instead of standing up for himself and making it clear that this is not acceptable, he could typically tolerate it.

Totally Disempowered

Now, if someone was to pay attention to how he behaves, they could say that he is a man who is not in touch with his power. They could even say that he has been emasculated.

And, if they were to find out about how he often feels, they could say that this proves that he has been stripped of his power. If he was to hear about what their thoughts are, he might find it hard to disagree with what has been said.

A Way Of life

If he was to think about how long he has experienced life in this way, he may find that his life has been this way for as long as he can remember. This could be seen as a sign that he was simply born this way and just has to accept how his life is.

Nonetheless, there is a strong chance that he wasn’t born this way and that it is the result of what took place during his early years. If it is but he is not aware of this, it will show that his brain has blocked out what took place in order to protect him from pain.

Back In Time

This may have been a stage of his life when his father physically harmed him, with this being something that took place on a regular basis for a number of years. Due to the power imbalance and how powerless and dependent he was, he wouldn’t have been able to do anything about what was going on; he was unable to fight back or to run away.

To handle the pain that this would have caused him, he would have ended up repressing how he felt and disconnecting from himself. Along with this, he would have often automatically gone into the freeze and fawn survival responses.

A Disconnection

Quite simply, not only was he was totally helpless at this stage of his life but he would have acted helpless to minimise the damage that was done to him. If he had resisted what was going on and fought back, this stage of his likely is likely to have been even more traumatic.

So, losing touch with his aggression/fight instinct would have automatically taken place to protect him. This would have served him but now that he is an adult and this stage of his life is over, he will need this part of his being to transform his life and to be in his power.

Two Parts

To reconnect to his part of his being and to embrace his power, he will most likely have a lot of pain to work through. As this pain is worked through, he will gradually be able to get out of the collapsed state that he is in and to become a more integrated human being in the process.

His parasympathetic nervous system will often be activated and this is partly why he will spend so much time feeling flat and heavy and feels powerless and lifeless. Being this way will also be what feels safe and working on his emotional wounds will allow him to slowly know that he can also feel safe when his sympathetic nervous system is activated, which will allow him to feel powerful and alive.

Awareness

If a man can relate to this and he is ready to change his life, he may need to reach out for external support. This is something that can be provided with the assistance of a therapist or healer. 

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Oliver JR Cooper
http://www.oliverjrcooper.co.uk