KINDS OF ABUSE RECOVERED DURING RMT

• memories of sexual abuse and/or incest during childhood. The father is often remembered as the perpetrator. The abuse is often recalled as being facilitated, permitted or ignored by the other parent. In about 20% of cases, recollections of ritual abuse are later uncovered, typically involving Satanic cults or a men's fraternal organization.
• memories of kidnapping by aliens and being forcibly subjected to intrusive, often horrendous medical experiments on UFO's (0).
• memories of physical or sexual abuse during a former lifetime. The client is age regressed back to childhood, to their birth and finally to an earlier lifetime where they often recall abuse.

Childhood sexual abuse memories are by far the most damaging, because the alleged perpetrators are often members of the client's family or origin. The client is often urged to terminate all contact with the family. The splitting or destruction of the family frequently follows. Abuse by little green men on UFO's or by unknown perpetrators in a prior life has less potential for damage. The latter cannot lead to accusations against parents and other people with the resultant court battles, damaged reputations, overwhelming stress and immense legal costs.

Therapists who are committed to the widespread incidence of childhood sexual abuse recover such memories in most of their clients (some claim all of their clients). Therapists who believe in UFO's and in little green men under every rock recover such memories in most of their clients. So too do therapists who believe in past lives.

Possible conclusions:

1. If most recovered memories are accurate recollections, then the vast majority of adults who have emotional problems were sexually abused as children, and abused on board UFO's, and abused in former lifetimes. That is, many or most people have been abused in multiple ways by multiple groups of perpetrators, perhaps over many centuries.

2. If most recovered memories are false recollections of events that never happened, then such memories are a form of iatrogenic disorder: false beliefs inadvertently triggered and facilitated in clients by their therapists. Other people could have created false memories from:
   • using suggestive techniques described in self-therapy books
   • fellow members of incest support groups.

There are indicators that the second explanation is receiving increasing support by memory researchers, the mental health community and the general public. If this is true, then questionable therapy techniques, by loving, concerned but terribly misguided therapists are creating many victims:

• their clients who are partly or completely disabled by the experience.
• the innocent persons accused of performing the abuse
• siblings of the client who have been forced to choose sides.

Fortunately, recovered memories which are false are usually very different from the reality of the client's life. If they are not continually reinforced, they tend to become less believable with time. This causes many "survivors" to eventually become "recanters" and finally reject the memories as false. Unfortunately, too many clients commit suicide and too many parents die before this point is reached. Other recanters find that they are unable to reunite with their families; the devastation has been too great.

Return to the RMT page