It took me a long time to confront my own prejudices and to realise that it takes the role of both men and women to keep a patriarchal society alive. Both genders get locked in the revolving door of destructive values and behaviours, each profoundly affected by the intricacy of their hatred. My journey to health involves the unravelling of these intricate and complex feelings in myself.

In the first part of this pathway, I needed my victimisation feelings witnessed by an empathetic non-judgmental healer. The second part, which is presently in process, is to face the bully inside of me that lies underneath my victim. I resist facing the bully and bringing it to consciousness as I can easily get attached to the soothing comfort I get in support of the victim. This resistance prevents me from growing any further with my actions and leadership in the world because as long as I keep the bully hidden from myself, I am unable to problem-solve and dialogue with others when there are misunderstandings or discrepancies.

When this happens, rather than talking with others, I can get silently furious and hold on to feelings of rage. I see now that throughout my life I have harboured feelings of hate, bitterness, jealousy, resentment and coldness. As a child, I was full of rage by the lack of love around me and I acted out these feelings in different ways: for example, I would rip up my toys, dolls would be decapitated, body parts pulled. I did not know that this would hurt my parents.

Growing up as a pre-pubescent and young teenage girl, I had no intellectual or creative stimulation. I felt it was unfair for my middle brother to be allowed to roam free, while I had to look after my youngest sibling, and do all the household chores. I would get into such a murderous rage because my middle brother would not submit to my demands and pleads for help with the chores and I would verbally insult and physically strike him. I had no concept then that I was hurting my brother and that he carries this wound in his heart to this day. We continue to struggle for closeness. I was also cold and unloving to my baby brother. I will never have an opportunity to mend this with him physically, as he is no longer living.

If I felt my relatives/neighbours had criticised or judged me in any way, I would get very upset. My response would be very nasty and would be followed by the silent treatment. I learned these skilled responses from the women that surrounded me: my mother, grandmother, aunts, cousins and female neighbours. These women grew up unloved, lonely and submissive to the male role in the patriarchy. In turn, our feelings were of hate toward the men and children, as we felt suppressed by them, and we hated other women as well because they were the enemy. As females we can despise other women because they represent the competition for the available males who will look after us forever. The vicious circle continues and even though intelligent and healthy, we fall for it again and again. What a betrayal to those around us!

When I face my bully and I see how I hurt those around me, my conscience feels more expanded. When I feel like a victim, I have no awareness of others. Now, my challenge is to learn how to communicate my reactions and feelings through healthy two-way dialogue. I give my friends full permission to tell me when I withdraw from them in silent rage; and, to my delight, my reward is extra space for learning, creating and developing sound connections with others.