Got ACEs? CPTSD? Is a toxic abusive relationship (TAR) part of your past or now? Here’s free help!

Carey Sipp 7/2/257:17 AM

(Activation warning. This is a first-person opinion piece sharing my thoughts on toxic abusive relationships [TAR] and a relatively new 12-step program, TAR Anon, which offers free, solution-oriented, acceptance-based, and psychologically-safe Zoom meetings from 6-7 PM ET on Mondays and Wednesdays, and from 12 Noon-1 PM ET on Fridays. This is a warning regarding potentially activating language, so you can choose whether or not you wish to continue reading. Further, I extend the activation warning to the program’s TAR Tales, where TAR Anon members share their stories.)

(Illustration from the STAR Network Foundation Instagram site.)

If there are adverse childhood experiences (ACEs) in your past, chances are good that you’ve been in a relationship with what Dr. Jamie Huysman, creator of the rapidly-growing 12-step program TAR Anon (Toxic Abusive Relationships Anonymous), calls a toxic abuser.

Huysman, a licensed clinical social worker (LCSW) and psychologist, is the founder and executive director of STAR Network Foundation, Inc., a 501(c)(3) nonprofit organization which incudes TAR Anon® and several other programs.

The STAR Network™ is rising in myriad ways.

Hearing Huysman speak regularly in TAR Anon meetings since being introduced to him about six weeks ago, it’s clear to me that he lives the organization’s mission to educate, energize, and empower people by giving them access to programs such as TAR Anon.

Meeting Huysman’s team, attending the two-year-old STAR Network’s “Scars to STARs” global online conference in May, and seeing the impressive list of the organization’s allies provides further evidence of the energy and gravitas backing the campaign to raise worldwide awareness of and treatment for the millions of people “whose emotional reality has been distorted by TAR”.

Organizations listed as STAR Network allies include the CPTSD Foundation, the National Association of Social Workers, Caron, WeHealUs, WellMed Emotional Support Response Team, and the Polyvagal Institute. Organizations shown below were among those sponsoring or supporting via social media, the SCARs to STARs Day in May.

Also heavily involved is mental health advocate, author, and former U.S. Congressman Patrick Kennedy, who delivered the keynote address at Scars to STARs Day. During his speech, Kennedy – who grew up with the trauma and tragedy of losing to two high-profile uncles to assassinations, family addictions including his mother’s alcoholism, and the intensity of a father who advocated for mental health parity while at the same time self-medicating his grief with alcohol – writes and speaks passionately about his own struggles with bipolar disorder and substance abuse.

The Need for TAR Anon

With one-in-four children in America growing up in a home with at least one parent who has a substance abuse disorder, one-in-five Americans living with some type of mental illness each year, 63.9% of U.S. adults reporting at least one ACE, and 17.3% reporting four or more ACEs, it’s likely most of us have had some experience with traumatic abusive relationships.

This is NOT to say that all people with mental illness or substance abuse disorder are or become toxic abusers. Far from it. Though it has been my experience – and well documented in research and reporting – that when people are depressed, anxious, at the effect of a substance or addictive behaviors, or are experiencing the challenges of mental illness, harsh words, neglect, and addictive behaviors can be among the consequences faced by the troubled person with regard to their own self-talk, as well as proximate family members and friends.

What pushes irritability and lack of awareness of the impact of one’s negative behavior into a diagnosis such as narcissism, borderline personality disorder, or Cluster B personality, as defined in the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorder, 5th Edition (DSM-5) is a more consistent, pervasive, and intentional pattern of hurtful actions and personality traits that significantly impact relationships and the well-being of others.

TAR Anon is raising awareness of the prevalence of and solutions for these challenges.

Huysman shares in TAR Anon meetings that globally, approximately one-in-eight people have a personality disorder. Estimates in the U.S. are higher, with reports varying between being 10-15%. Regardless of the diagnosis assigned to the abuser, in the 12-Step TAR Anon meetings, the person in recovery from abuse is the most important person in the room.

As a person with an ACE score of nine, I can legitimately say there have been some toxic abusers in my life. I have been in therapy for Complex Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder (CPTSD) off and on for many years, and have the entire alphabet soup of different treatment methodologies in my recovery from early and ongoing relational trauma. My toolbox includes CBT (Cognitive Behavioral Therapy), DBT (Dialectical Behavior Therapy), EMDR (Eye Movement Desensitization and Reprocessing), IFS (Internal Family Systems Therapy), years of neurofeedback, two rounds of trans-cranial magnetic stimulation, countless hours of meditation, and a litany of different anonymous programs I will not share to protect my own anonymity, and the sanctity of the programs themselves.

With TAR Anon being a meeting ground for people from many different programs, or none, and toxic abusive relationships being evident in so many public places in our lives today, I am sharing information about this program and my involvement in it for the greater good.

Further, as TAR Anon is also a relapse prevention model that works well as a complement to all other 12-step programs, it can be used as a great primary or companion program.

Out of respect for the privacy of all people, and because dwelling on the past can be its own form of abuse, my toxic abusers will not be mentioned. It’s how I respond to myself and to them that is the most important aspect of this recovery.

Among the most important lessons learned from years of recovery and realizations that come with it, is that as an adult, I am not a victim and that my brain, and I, can change!

Looking back and realizing that even as a little kid I chose toxic friends, I see that the last 20 years have been way different and have given me great hope. Among the realizations that helped me change my thinking was learning that the brain has neuroplasticity — the ability to change throughout life.

This knowledge was and is incredibly freeing. I’ve seen the positive impact of changing my thought patterns, seeing clearly that I wasn’t stuck with the brain I was born with or had trained, as an infant and child by circumstance, to expect toxic inconsistency and unpredictability.

I learned to reparent myself and accept life-changing healing and support. Changing thought patterns is healing and life-changing, and many of the books, workbooks, and practices that have been so helpful to me over years of self-care are listed as resources in the thrice-weekly TAR Anon meetings, including The Body Keeps the Score by Bessel van der Kolk, MD, and Complex PTSD, From Surviving to Thriving by Pete Walker.

I’ve also learned through years of therapy, recovery, neurofeedback, meditation, journaling, being in community with sane people who love me, purposeful work I love, exercise, singing in choirs, spirituality, reparenting myself, parenting my children, and spending time in nature, that these resiliency boosters and the right dose of an antidepressant have helped me rewire my brain.

I am now much better at discerning and avoiding toxic people and relationships. The best part of this shift is developing a growth mindset, which has actually helped me attract the kind of people and opportunities that bring me joy and healthy relationships.

Had TAR Anon existed years ago, I might have learned much of this sooner, not had to do so much research, and could have saved many thousands of dollars in therapy.

The great news is that this 12-Step program now exists, and I believe it can be a tremendous accelerator, comfort, teacher, friend, and compassionate partner in recovery from all types of ACEs, from the original 10 in the 1998 Kaiser Permanente and CDC (Centers for Disease Control and Prevention) study, to the more expansive and inclusive ones shared in this brilliant illustration created by the North Carolina Partnership for Children.

It is also said that TAR Anon is the only 12-step program whose primary purpose is to help people recover from attachment disorders and CPTSD.

Other important messages I believe one can take from the TAR Anon meetings:

For most toxic abusers, it’s not their fault. They may have been born into homes where inconsistency, lack of nurturing, unpredictable care, domestic violence, mental illness, substance abuse, physical, verbal, or sexual abuse, neglect, or the death or loss of a parent – resulted in their own anxious, preoccupied, dismissive-avoidant, or fearful-avoidant (disorganized) attachment styles.

This toxic environment led them to adapt to survive. Adaptations could include, but are not limited to manipulation, dishonesty, abuse, cruelty, and/or addictions to substances or behaviors. They may have seen their parents and caregivers model changing roles as persecutors, rescuers, and victims. The childhood adaptations that helped them survive made it harder for them to attach in a healthy way. That attachment style followed them into adulthood, where it wreaked havoc on the abuser themselves as well as the people with whom they had relationships.

And guess what? The same could be said for most victims of toxic abusers.

Sadly, to feel safe, many of us who grew up in chaos subconsciously recreate the familiar, even if what we are recreating is toxic.

Many of us reared in toxic environments fell into the abuser-rescuer-victim cycle until we got some help recognizing the pattern. If help was not available, we might have become or married alcoholics, become gamblers, spenders, workaholics, hoarders, or the type of over-achiever who lands in the hospital from exhaustion, illness, or an epic burnout. I’ve been there.

In over 31 years of 12-step work, I learned early on to take an inventory of my resentments and fears, seeking for my part in any situation where I had a conflict, and looking for the pattern of my behavior so I could help disrupt it. I have also learned the value of accepting input from others to disrupt destructive behavior patterns.

Gratefully, I also learned this in Cognitive Behavioral Therapy (CBT) decades ago. In it, I was able to look at a situation and separate my thoughts, feelings, body sensations, and actions IN WRITING, so I didn’t collapse a story and miss the way I allowed my thoughts to create my emotions, the way I felt, and the way I reacted instead of responded. It’s true that if we knew how powerful our thoughts are, we would be very careful about what we choose to think about, or allow into our precious minds.

TAR Anon can help accelerate learning about complex or childhood post-traumatic stress disorder (CPTSD) in an anonymous and psychologically-safe online environment, with caring and TAR Anon-trained meeting facilitators. TAR Anon leaders and attendees are people who are there to listen and support each other.

TAR Anon meetings teach us that we repeat behavioral patterns from early, insecure attachments because it is what we know – and on some level, it feels safe. Even sleeping on broken glass can feel familiar and safe if that is what you knew as an infant and child. In meetings, though, we see how we need to form new behaviors to leave destructive behaviors behind. Learning and forming new behaviors may come through “aha” moments – feeling emotions, learning to love ourselves, and recognizing and avoiding toxic people. These are steps on the path to greater well-being.

Among the saddest facts I’ve learned from studying ACEs science, the science of positive childhood experiences (PCEs), and early relational health, is that children living in emotionally toxic environments (what I call toxic intensity) will often learn adaptive behaviors to survive. Some of the behaviors that can become “hardwired” in infants and children include:

disassociating or disappearing themselves to avoid attracting the attention of an abuser;
becoming a caretaker and/or protector of a perpetrator or perpetrators;
people-pleasing to avoid conflict or punishment;
overachieving and perfectionism designed to evoke positive attention and praise;
eating for comfort and gaining weight and/or developing anorexia or bulimia to have a sense of control and/or to avoid attracting – consciously or subconsciously – sexual advances; or
becoming controlling and manipulative to create a sense of safety or being in control.

With early childhood trauma (ages zero to three), and no experience of consistent nurture, the developing brain can be so harmed by the toxic stress hormones of cortisol and adrenaline that its function and structure are affected. Some infants and toddlers are actually wired to be fearful, distrustful, isolating, and chaos-seeking instead of being trusting, curious, and connection-seeking. This is why I advocate for, write, and speak so much about the need for early relational health as the basis of health and well-being across the lifespan, and share this seminal video of Bruce Perry, MD, with “What Happened to You: Conversations on Trauma, Resilience, and Healing” co-author Oprah Winfrey.

Though it is infinitely better to prevent toxic abuse by supporting pregnant women and new mothers and caregivers, their infants, and children to receive “neuro-nurturing” there is hope that people who have struggled with negative effects from a toxic childhood can find help and can change thought patterns. Factors are so variable though — severity of trauma, the environment, access to support and a sense of safety, exposure to positive childhood experiences, and on and on — one cannot make generalities about who can make such changes and to what degree. I only know what has worked for me and helped to lift me from multi-generational depression, abuse, and addiction, “one day at a time” dependent on my self and spiritual care.

The Hope of Recovery

I do believe there is hope for people who grew up in abuse as well as abusers who find their way into a 12-Step program, become willing to work a program, and who grow in the safety and acceptance of the program’s participants, because I have experienced and witnessed this over many years.

People can realize positive shifts in personality from programs including, but not limited to:

Alcoholics Anonymous (AA) and Narcotics Anonymous (NA) can help people who abuse substances see how their substance abuse affects their lives, families, and careers, and learn how to live “happy, joyous, and free” lives without the substance;
Adult Children of Alcoholics can help people who have grown up in relationships with addicted persons learn to reparent themselves by recognizing and practicing healthy behaviors (ACOA’s Yellow Workbook is terrific; working it with a friend from the program can be a game-changer.);
Al-Anon and Co-Dependents Anonymous (CoDA) can provide guidance and support for those in relationships with people who are addicted to substances or behaviors; or
Other anonymous groups addressing sex/love/romance addiction, over-spending, over-eating, and gambling can help abusers understand how these maladaptive behaviors may have started generations ago.

(Note: Addiction is often linked to likely epigenetic and genetic factors. In the interest of space and time, I am not addressing that topic here.)

As stated previously, I’ve been a member of multiple 12-Step programs; one for more than 30 years. Through the years the comfort, safety, security, friendships, and reparenting these programs have offered have helped me to rewire my brain. They have inspired and fueled me toward the designation I am most proud of in my life, that of Cycle Breaker.

I also believe the childbirth education (the Bradley Method) and early relational health support from the La Leche League I had, along with parenting classes, decades of therapy, journaling, 12-step meetings, and being blessed to have two precious children whom I swore would not grow up in the same toxic intensity as my brother and me, put me on the path to follow the steps I wrote about in my book, The TurnAround Mom: How an Abuse and Addiction Survivor Stopped the Toxic Cycle for Her Family – and How You Can, Too!

At the behest of one of the editors of this blog post, I am sharing a bit about my book. Its chapter titles offer a glimpse at some reparenting advice that worked for me, and incorporate so much of what I’ve learned over the years and attempted to crystalize and share in the book. I believe they also fit with what is being shared in TAR Anon. (Note: I don’t receive any income from the book and encourage you, if you wish to purchase it, to buy it used.)

Live a Life of Extreme Self-Care
Build a Strong Support Structure
Create a Sane and Strong Family Life
Establish and Keep Strong Boundaries
Make Better Decisions
Spend Your Precious Resources Wisely – Energy, Time, Money
Attract Healthy Relationships
Avoid Toxic Intensity
Practice Peace: Rushing is Abusive
Honor Your Family’s Future

All of this is to say: We don’t have to pass toxic behaviors on to our children. People can change. And I believe TAR Anon is a tool that can help anyone who has experienced ACEs begin a healing journey.

I believe that TAR Anon and the many programs the STAR Network is advancing can accelerate the change we want to see. And I believe this work will resonate with many here on PACEs Connection.

While I wish TAR Anon had been around earlier, I’m glad it’s here now and am thrilled to share it and reiterate that it meets online three times a week:

Mondays and Wednesdays from 6:00 – 7:00 PM Eastern Time and

Fridays from 12:00 Noon – 1:00 PM Eastern Time

While meetings are free, just as in any other 12-step meeting STAR Network Foundation accepts and gently encourages donations. The foundation is a 501 (c) (3) organization, so gifts are tax-deductible.

While attendees are required to register to join the virtual meetings, they do not have to share their real name or appear on video. Meetings are anonymous, and anonymity is practiced as an integral part of this program of recovery.

One final bonus to these meetings, and one that has been incredibly helpful to me.

Each meeting closes with breath work to help calm the central nervous system and help it go from the reactive, flight-fight-freeze-fawn state to a state of rest and digest, wherein we can access our thinking brain and not be run by our emotions. Instead, after just four rounds of breathing in for four seconds, holding the breath for seven seconds, and then blowing the breath out hard through the mouth for eight seconds — about 80 seconds in all — the nervous system and body shift to the “parasympathetic” or more relaxed state. The extended exhale helps slow the heart rate, lower blood pressure, and quiet the mind.

I know it has been a help to me. Since I started attending the meetings and practicing the 4-7-8 breath work, chronic painful stomach issues that have plagued me most of my life have lessened greatly.

Here’s a link to a recording of the practice.

For more information, please visit TAR Anon.

Additional resources below include TAR Anon’s 12 steps, promises, and several of the videos found on the STAR Network Foundation’s Instagram page. New animations are added frequently.