Fleeing From The Empty Shell of a Man, from The Journey

 The Journey is a Saga of freedom, discovery, and Trauma. 

The Journey

Prologue Excerpt

Thomas Niles knew I was a threat to core of his very existence, because he was an empty shell of a man, with a fractured ego, whose abusive dominance and violence was substituted in his mind for masculinity. Violent and abusive people exist within all genders, and every diverse alteration thereof, as well as across societal spectrums. Not every abuser is obsessive, possessive, and controlling to the point of becoming murderous, but Thomas Niles was. When I chose to break his control over me for good, I had to die. Thomas Niles announced it in advance and threatened to kill ‘every one of those kids,’ if I left with them, because I and his children were his property. There was no way out, or so he thought.

In 1987, I and my five children fled for our lives during an unseasonable February thunderstorm, with nothing, and no plan. There are multiple types of abusive people, those who destroy the soul with words that cut like daggers, and those who will do more than that-they will kill you, body, soul, and all. Thomas Niles had killed before, and I had no doubt he would do it again, this time, not as a soldier during wartime. Thomas Niles saved up wrongs and collected them, he was what the FBI calls an injustice collector. According to Thomas Niles, I had incurred his absolute wrath, and in such a way as to merit execution. When I took action by fleeing from Thomas to save our lives, Thomas Niles took the act as  a high crime committed against his ego, because in his schema of things, I stole his property. I slaughtered his pride, humiliating him in front of all who knew him, and for that I deserved an especially brutal and torturous execution. Thomas was homicidal when I fled so I knew in advance that escaping would invoke an all-out, obsessive attack in a fit of desperation, so I virtually disappeared without a trace.

After fleeing through three states, my children and I thought we had broken free, and were safe. The looking-over-our-shoulder was finally over, we were free to rebuild our lives, and create happy futures. Thomas Niles had been the problem, the dark shadow in all my children’s lives: he was the antithesis of what was right, the antithesis of all I stood for. Once Thomas Niles was out of our lives, I believed the trauma and tragedy would be over, but I was wrong. A family is a small government, a society, a system, a school, in which children are the students. In each day of every child’s life they are learning, silently watching, mimicking emotional behavior set by example, being conditioned. No child leaves a violent home without absorbing those horrific lessons and adopting vile and broken attitudes that form their foundational system for every decision they make, for as long as they live. The toxic and corrosive environment in which we lived, created an impact that would reverberate like a gong, for years to come. There would be many days in which I wondered who of us could survive.

The Journey is Nostalgic, reminiscent of happy childhoods and family memories; and it is dramatic, as it recounts the perilous navigation of a family that is often in crisis. The systematic progression of toxic dysfunction becomes a central theme of the story, as every family member alternates between times of stability and success, and tragedy.

The author is narrating in first person, as the author is an integral and vital part of the story. Societal Stigma is a factor in families keeping dysfunction secret, as something shameful, that should be hidden and denied. In The Journey, the Truth about Family Dysfunction, and its invasive and devastating impact upon each family member is revealed. The dynamic influences of siblings upon the family dynamic, in both positive and negative ways, is outlined through the actual life story of the Niles Family.

One of the strongest protectors of family abuse, and dysfunction, is the Secrecy and Denial that acts to insulate it from the truth. It is common for members of a family to come forward with revelations of abuse or mistreatment, only to be discounted, and invalidated by the family doused in narcissistic denial. It is also common for societies to blame ‘The Mother’ for all that goes wrong in a family; or even for the choices made by adult children, and to leave ‘The Father,’ blameless. The responsibility of mothers is far greater than that of fathers, according to the unspoken ‘code’ of Societies steeped in patriarchy. Children grow up in a world in which it really does ‘take a village,’ but there is no village standing by, waiting to help for the long haul, only the zealous members of society anxious to assign blame, then walk away in self-righteous vindication. The abuse of children requires blame to be placed on the right person, and responsibility taken by perpetrators who are held accountable. The balance of justice requires this, but it is lacking in families, and it is lacking in societies. Wounded Souls continue to spread toxic distress upon others because of apathy, the voice of Justice is rendered silent. In this unbalanced system, perpetrators are often, never held accountable, and the victims are left without resolution. The best justice is The Truth, honestly Told, and Honestly Felt, as the True Anathema to Dysfunction; and this Truth starts in the same place that the Lie itself was born -behind the closed doors, and the secret rooms, of The Families of Origin.

The Journey is about Telling that Naked Truth. The Truths that Dysfunctional Families choose to shamefully hide.

 

When Love Fails

 https://medium.com/@josephinethomp/when-love-fails-b3442284e17e

Love Never Fails,” is a relative statement, but it is not an absolute truth, because love fails some people. No matter how much you do for them or how long you endure their injurious behavior, forgiving and compromising, relentlessly absorbing their lack of love, in the hope they will change. One sunny day, that person you loved, whether they are a family member or a life partner, you envision the great awakening.

With a tired and broken heart, you long for the day they will realize the vastness of your love for them. You hold out eternal hope that One Day they will miraculously awaken to the realization that you have moved heaven and earth for them, you have suffered deprivation, endured long hard hours of toil and you have spent many sad and lonely nights crying for them. Your martyrdom with not be left unrewarded because they will wake up, and when they do, their hearts will melt with deep appreciation, and you will bask in their reciprocation of your love. They will ‘see’ you, and finally appreciate you. That is the hope of millions of people dealing with narcissistic interlopers who only pretend to have the potential for love.

A Narcissist will deliberately entertain your hopes, baiting you along with the breadcrumbs of affection, storms of love bombing, and future promises; thus, extending the ordeal of wistful hopefulness for years, even decades. All the while you pour out your affection and give your genuine love to a disingenuous Taker. A Love Thief who takes your heart and leaves you suffer the loneliness of despair.

Normal people love ‘normally,’ and the average normal person reciprocates love with gratitude and appreciation in their hearts. Love begets love between all parties involved from the children, parents, friends, neighbors, and whomever else enjoys basking in the rewards of goodness and kindness. There is always at least one narcissists living on the fringes of normalcy, the Taker and the Heart-Breaker, the eternal victim, whose life and circumstances were always sabotaged by circumstances, at least, according to them. The excuse maker, entitled, manipulative, covert, needy and seeking.

Every Normal family has at least one. Although Care is taken to ‘Raise children right’, through careful and deliberate parenting and guidance; despite the fact, the narcissist sneaks into families, faking and taking, under the radar. You may sense their defect, feeling they need more love and understanding, but no matter what you do for them, or how much they take from you, you will never get it back in the form of love, out of the bottomless chasm that they call a heart. Love does not live within them, they will never cherish you, and see your value as a person, they only see your value to them as supply. Once the supply dries up, they will discard you like spent garbage, and never mourn your loss. The worst of them will dispatch you post haste by actively forcing your early demise by despicable means, to serve a secret greedy agenda; an early payout of life insurance money, or worse, they eliminate you for their own pleasure.

Love Cannot Save Them because they do not want to be saved; therefore, your love will fail them, every single time.

The Torn Episodes Project Video

THE TORN EPISODES ONE-NINE 

Kickstarter Project Video

Sara Niles Project

TORN From the Inside Out & THE JOURNEY

 MEMOIRS

In 1973,  a young woman, barely sixteen years old, and a zealous member of a cultist religious group, married a twenty-three year-old man, also a member of a the same religious group:

Fifteen years of abuse and five children later, Sara Niles fled for her life, crossed three state lines, and finally landed in a Safe Port. The Journey is the story of the Niles Family, especially the Children who grew up in a violent and traumatic environment. 

TORN From the Inside Out tells the story of Sara Nile's abuse and eventual escape. The Journey is the rest of the story.

Links in Sidebar: Click Book Images

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Torn From the Inside Out

Born from Trauma: 'A Pain so Great as to Tear the Soul Inside Out'

On a sunny day in 1960, a white haired, eighty-year-old man, walked up a steep hill deep in the countryside of Southern Arkansas, and walked away with a three- and one-half year old, little dirty girl-child, riding high atop his shoulders, holding tightly onto the old man’s bald head. The little girl was scared, hungry, as always, and she had no idea of the home she was going to. The little girl had been given away by her biological mother to an elderly Great-uncle, the brother of her maternal grandmother. That little girl was Me, Sara Niles. I lived a fairytale life on 'the Flower Bed of Eden', at least, that is how it all began.

Fast Forward

February 13, 1987

"I am going to kill you DEAD!', screamed my husband and father of my five children, Thomas Niles, as I flew down the stairs of the townhouse, two steps at a time, running for my life. Domestic Violence homicide had taken the lives of two local acquaintances that I knew well, only a few years earlier, as both were murdered by their long-time husbands, each much like mine. I was about to suffer the same fate. I was going to die that night, I knew it, as the thunder storm raged outside, a worse storm raged inside.

It was the storms inside that night that I feared.

Every life carries a tale, a backstory of origins, choices, successes, and failures; for a life is no small thing to live, some lives are smooth like paved roads, while others are bumpy and fraught with danger. An unconventional life, one without the prerequisite cushions of predictability and stability, is especially fraught with dangers, as was mine. The dire straits created by unforeseeable events and circumstances, just as the biblical verse states: “Time and unforeseen occurrences befall them all”, befell me more times than I could count. I lived a dangerous life with a dangerous man.

From the Garden of Eden straight into 'Hell'

In 1973, Sara married Thomas Niles, which negatively altered the outcome of Sara Nile's life. Saved from trauma as a child, nurtured, and trained in sound moral principles by loving relatives, nothing prepared Sara for life with Thomas Niles.

The Fairy-tale wedding in a Jehovah's Witness Kingdom hall packed to the four walls, soon became a prolonged nightmare in which the hopes and dreams of a talented child, were singularly shelved in favor of survival. The Storm that ignited as an innocent marriage before man and God, would last awhile, because unbeknown to Sara, she had married a monster in disguise.

I am a different Sara Niles, than the young girl of my long-gone youth; I have the insight young Sara never had, and I am much wiser and stronger than the infatuated young girl that I once was. I will be your narrator as you journey with me across time and space, back to where it all began.

The JOURNEY (411 pages)

Forty Years in the 'Wilderness' of shame and denial that shrouds the The-headed Monster in secrecy; denying the truth of what you see with your own eyes, and the emotions you feel in your heart, is tantamount to self-murder. Most people who survive abuse and carry its wounds and scars, never speak of it openly, therefore, they carry wounds that never heal.

 

The life the Niles family lived after fleeing abuse began as a quest for freedom, but issues, and ingrained hurts incurred during the long nightmare living with Thomas Niles, continued to appear at dubious times, in  ways that could not be ignored.

It is estimated that up to seventy percent of people in the world have suffered some degree of family dysfunction, yet people rarely speak of it. Secrecy and denial aid in the perpetuation of dysfunction, The Journey tells the stark truth-sometimes leaving in only a new beginning.

How It All Began:

We left our whole world behind, and fled with nothing, yet the children never even once asked Why?"
When a Raging Fire strikes a home in the middle of the night, everyone flees the home, with no regard for possessions, no grabbing of personal belongings, because every second counts. In most cases, there are family and friends, co-workers, and others standing by to help.
In 1987, we fled from a different type of 'Fire', a would-be killer who promised to erase us from the earth. The Niles Family would embark on a lifelong Journey of Reparation and searches for Resolution.

Sample Torn From the Inside Out

 MEMOIR

Psychological Drama  

• INTENSE
• Insightful
• Malignant Narcissism
• Literary Narration
• Trauma

You Are ALONE: Relationship with Your Narcissist

 

Your Lonely Life with The Narcissist

In the egocentric world of Your Narcissist, YOU do not exist, at least not as a real person. You exist as a service provider, a status symbol, or simply a source of emotional ‘supply,’ that they gain through a toxic feed-back loop. The REAL you, the one they seem to laud when they are in a state of dysregulation and must recharge your batteries through that intense ‘thing’ that they do-LOVE Bombing. The minute your narcissistic son, daughter, partner, or friend, realizes you are becoming fed up with them-they flip the switch and turn on the charm. The charm is not a genuine recognition of your strengths, although they know you have them, the charm is a tool of manipulation. It is like petting the cow before you milk her, a veritable ‘Here Kitty-Kitty’ routine designed to set the stage from round two, or after years of abuse, round number one thousand, Welcoming you to Gold Star status in the Twilight Zone of Trauma-Bonding.

It is not like you never suspected something was wrong with your ‘person,’ or imagined they were defective in their social skills, to say the least. The truth is you had no idea they were Fake Entities, made up of pure deception and fraud. It is even more likely that you never knew there is a name for your person: Narcissist, and that that are descriptive and definite categories which your narcissist fits into like a glove. If your narcissist is covert, their ‘mask’ was so well developed that it may have taken you decades to identify them as The Problem and not you. Like a snake slithering in the grass, they camouflage themselves with superficial charm and intense emotional storms of ‘gratitude’ and pleas for forgiveness, leaving you only one noble response-to brush the erroneous behavior aside as a mistake.

Despite the gross manipulations, your inner warning signs set off alarms that you ignored or excused, chalking it up to some eccentric nuance uniquely theirs. You always suspected something was not right with Your Narcissist, but they were so good at covering their tracks that you discounted your concerns. People who exist in their own realm hiding behind deception and a false identity, are like ‘Actors’ in which the ‘Stage’ is real life; yet there is no reality. The Narcissist is a walking, talking, oxymoron, an ironic, enigmatic conceptualization of all the best parts of a normal personality, yet peppered with confusing behaviors that are far from normal. It is like an Actor entered your life at some point and never left the role. The REAL person that you thought was great, never existed.

The reason most narcissistic people develop a penchant for deception and role playing is simple: they know they are flawed, but refuse to accept it; instead, they create a false image composed of everything that YOU like, like a custom-made persona. The Narcissistic person is often a good worker, and very intelligent, so they are capable of understanding what is expected of them, and they can deliver. The Narcissist at work may perform exceptionally well in many types of settings, in the church system, they are saints, among friends, they are ‘the best,’ always willing to help, but at home? At Home is a different story because the average narcissist gets comfortable at home in their own environment and they feel entitled to be themselves, to kick off their shoes and remove the mask.

The problem with a narcissist being ‘themselves’ is which self will they be today? The Abusive Tyrant raging because they were frustrated or dissatisfied, or even bored? Or will they put the mask on and play a game of “Love Bombing’ to keep the targeted person in the relationship duped?

In all of the chaos of narcissistic games, unpredictable behaviors, and rollercoaster cycling up and down from happy to sad, the victim is fully alone in the room, wherever ‘the room’ may be. The Love Bombing stage makes it seem like the narcissists care about you and are willing to ‘see’ you and listen to you, but it is like a quick breeze on a hot day, it quickly passes. The 'love' of a narcissist is like the taste of honey that was not honey at all.

Loneliness gradually sets in, where you feel as though the narcissistic family member or partner is not aware of you as a person. This is apparent when you are excited over your good news, or a personal accomplishment, and you rush to immediately share with Your Narcissist, with your eyes wide and your heart full of cheer, only to have your news discounted in favor of a distraction. Right in the middle of your notice that you received a promotion in which your salary was doubled, they will nonchalantly ask if you remembered to buy milk on the way home. Flabbergasted, you answer “No,” because who is thinking of milk with such tidings to bear? The energy of the revelation is halted, cold water thrown on your lifetime accomplishment, so for a brief moment, you have a flash of anger; but not willing to further ruin your announcement, you ignore it. A huge Red Flag was just waved in your face, by years of conditioning has trained you to keep quiet and forget about it.

In another scenario, you just enjoyed a great movie and want to share, when they break the flow of happy cheer with mundane distractions:

‘Hey, let’s go to my mom’s,” or ‘I think I am going to run a quick errand-be right back;’ even worse, they pick a fight over something inconsequential right in the middle of your story. Your joy and happiness were once again interrupted. Years may pass before you feel the impact. You are alone in your own world, there is no room for you in the narcissist’s world. After endless pointless conversations in which you attempted to make your concerns known to your narcissist, you accept the fact they do not live on the same planet with you.

The sudden realization that your narcissist does not ‘hear’ you or ‘see’ you, is like an abandonment, even a death. The person you loved with all your heart, and whom you sacrificed much of your own happiness for their comfort, as Brett Butler said to Scarlet O’Hara, does not “Give a Damn.” It is over. The illusion is broken, and the ‘relationship’ you thought you had, never truly was a true ‘relationship’ between two present and participating adults. It was a ‘relationship’ of One.

 

The mind is an amazing tool that adapts to the circumstances it functions in; therefore, cognitive distortions put in place, begin to crumble. An earthquake takes place, and your world is turned into a shambles, as the brain and heart experiences a total reorganization-as everything that ‘was,’ is no more.

You are truly Alone.

Sara Niles