Religious Trauma Syndrome...?

~ Posted 24th January 2017 ~
 
So, at church, I was asked to do a talk in Sacrament on a subject that deeply disturbs my psyche, because it brings back many traumatic memories of what my therapist did to me with her fanatical religious pushing... wanting to force me out of my (as she believed it to be), "evil church" to avoid the "Eternal burning hell fires", by joining her "perfect" church!!!!
 
It all resulted in such terrible emotional agony with me becoming very suicidal… and to avoid suicide, I started to self-injure, and this went on for a good few months before I was able to take control of this negative outcome and the added abuse, against myself!!! 
 
Memories I could do without... so I wish “they” would leave me alone! 
 
They may regret asking me to do this talk, because I cannot share such an acutely sensitive subject without the hurt and anger surfacing and without being authentic and true to my own emotions and struggles! 
 
I specifically asked the church I attend now, to leave me alone, and not to have any expectations of me. I’d come and go as I am comfortable to do and all I expect of any of them is to feel their unconditional love… “the ultimate healer.”
 
By pushing me to do what they feel I should be doing… to become “like them” … they will eventually push me away altogether! 
 
My religious values have arrived at a point where my personal relationship with my “Maker”, is between me and my Father in Heaven and not one based on what church I attend and how good or obedient a member I am in the eyes of the other members and leaders there. 
 
I am who I am… “they” cannot FIX me or CHANGE me.  My life is in my God’s Hands… I TRUST in Him and Him alone.
 
If I cannot be unconditionally loved and unconditionally accepted for “who I am on my own” as I choose to attend the church I do, then it is not a place I want to be… (All or nothing when it comes to “true and unconditional love and true and unconditional acceptance”!  I will settle for no less anymore… I’ve settled for less for far too long already!)
 
I have developed as a result of my therapist’s abuse and the horrible abuses I’ve witnessed happening in this world as a result of fanatical religiosity, what is known I believe as "Religious Trauma Syndrome"... and mostly, because nobody believed my side of the story when I was going through that trauma which was inflicted on me by my therapist… nobody would listen to me...
 
I was silenced, because the "therapist is always right"... she could lie her way out of anything, because I was the client with the problems!
 
I had no voice as an abused child, and I had no voice again when that happened!
 
As a result, I do NOT discuss my religious values with anyone, because I now treasure more than ever, what has become very personal and sacred between my Maker and me…
 
This letter is a rare exception… I need a voice today and I need to believe that someone can hear me today and someone out there understands…
 
Recently in one of our Logotherapy meetings, my trainer, completely surprised me by asking me to speak to the group about what happened in therapy with the transference and counter-transference which all but destroyed me at the time.
 
It was the first time I had been given a true voice and listening ears… I broke down and became very choked up trying to tell the group what happened and how drastically it has affected my religious worldview and further destroyed my trust in the world… especially the “WORLD” of religion… and changed my life due to the added trauma of it all.
 
4 hours sleep last night as a result!!!  I will not be able to deliver a talk at all, if I cannot find a way to sleep this week with my mind once again inflamed by those awful memories of that time in therapy, and other times where religion has deeply insulted and hurt myself and my family due to “their” judgements against us at times when what we really needed was “their unconditional LOVE”…
 
I wonder how much further I would be judged for even writing this…
 
I am sick to death to see what religions have done and are still doing to their own people (especially their own wounded) and this world (especially “the world” that is not “the same as they are”)...
 
My heart cries out… “Where is the LOVE - Where is the LOVE?”
 
Thank you for sharing with me…
 
~ Pana