Boarding school survivors are characterized by many positive qualities. Often there is an individuality and a creativity, an ability to tough things out, and a capacity to endure privations with good humour. But there are costs too. The humour sometimes covers profound emotional and spiritual wounds. In order to survive our schooling we may have sought to amputate an important part of ourselves, a part that isn’t necessarily a “winner” or successful, but loving and vulnerable. Our partners may be aware of a certain subtle absence, a lack of trust or intimacy that has become second nature to us. It is as if we were taught only too well how to be private, self-reliant, coping individuals. Boarding school made us a master of disguises. When it comes to adult, intimate relationships, we need to recover spontaneity, self-expression, a willingness to risk all and be hurt – or be loved. Our caution and calculation are then a huge obstacle.
This is problematic for us to talk about because boarding school was sold to us as something that made us special and uniquely loved. We had the good fortune, we were given to understand, to have parents able and willing to make great sacrifices so that we would have a head start in life. Is it suprising then that we find it such a challenge to speak about the actual joylessness of much of school life, the emotional withdrawal, the sense of being trapped, the torment of isolation, secretiveness and shame that was in reality a large part of our daily existence? We were sent away to an institution that could feed us, educate us, teach us sports and social skills and how to be a confident manipulator, but one that could never give us a parent’s love.
We adapted, of course, to this abrupt, bewildering alteration in our young lives. We learned the rules, kept ourselves busy and, from sheer necessity, we hid our longing for our home and family. Pretty soon we cut ourselves off from our loving feelings, because to miss as much as we did would be too painful to bear. How did we survive and become sexual adults, in a cold, rule-bound place from which everything soft or tender was removed? How did we compensate and how do we live this out today?
The workshop is open to men and women of any age or background, with or without previous experience of such work. It generally appeals in particular to those want to express their feelings or memories, perhaps their distress, in a safe place, where they will be accepted and respected. Hearing from each other about our experiences of boarding school, using a range of methods drawn from psychosynthesis, bodywork and gestalt therapy, T.A. and other therapeutic approaches, we can gain understanding about how we have shaped ourselves so that we begin to form choices about how we shape our future lives.
