Religious Trauma

I grew up in outer space.

Where “god” was referred to in orgasmic tones.

Something other and out there. Never the Center of Gravity, where in fact or in mystery the gods are found

I grew up in outer space. Homeschooled. They attempted to groom me to be a wife and mother, but I was afraid of kitchen knives, and anyway, who was I going to marry? I could count my friends on one hand.

Dad was a preacher. Fire and brimstone preacher, yes. Whose words to me in 2nd grade (when I brought home a smiley face sticker that said “Smile! Jesus Loves You”) were that the sticker was cliché and cringe. And while he may have been right in what he said, the whole event was formative in my thinking of who God is.

I don’t know, I’ve been told I play the victim a lot. But I still feel bitterness about my past and the malevolence of my parents towards me. For example, I was spanked repeatedly for simply not even eating dinner fast enough. This is what eating disorders are made of!

I’m 46 now. Such shame at a young age is tough to grow out of.

It is argued that such religious indoctrination and grooming is child abuse.

It certainly has been traumatic.

Dad mocked my BFF in high school for using a mirror. He shamed her and consequently, me (she was my best friend after all). He said it was narcissistic. She was simply being a teenager. Checking her teeth or her eyes for boogers, what does it matter? Projection much?

Later, as an adult, I actually explored getting my eyebrows waxed. Fancy that. Not really. Basic hygiene for many people.

The beautician said I had a unibrow and should (ready for this?) 

USE A FUCKING MIRROR!

The point is Dad’s words and finger-pointing as a child. The scapegoating. They were all projections, and I carried that shame into adulthood

Also, growing up, women were to be subservient and “homemakers.” After college, I had no role models for women working outside the home, so I was thrown to the wolves. I hit rock bottom, and the bottom cracked open.

I was an adult working full-time but still living at home, paying rent. I had a suicide attempt (I would have been probably 28 at the time). The parents just went away for a previously scheduled engagement for the week.

Yes, I was an adult, but I was following all their rules, living at home. Still PAYING THEM RENT.

And they just effectively flipped me the bird and left me in the hospital for a week alone.

I have unintentionally been the martyr in relationships, but I haven’t known what my options were

But I need to grow.

In the end, I left Evangelical churches because my association with said churches was causing harm. I had a bumper sticker that a voice told me to remove: “Truth Not Tolerance,” it read. 

Is that really the way to live? Truth at all costs?

My 30+ years in my father’s very cult-like church (and subsequently others similar) made me, a cis-woman at the time, still very patriarchal and egotistical. I had been kicked out of Dad’s church membership for dating a woman, but was still attending as a big “EFF YOU! You may kick me out,  but you can’t take away my faith!”

But is that faith?

“The body keeps the score,” they say. The insidiousness of narcissistic parental mental and physical abuse and co-dependence doesn’t just disappear by moving out of the house, but manifests later in life. 

I am not a psychologist, but it took months of commitment in a mental hospital and later jail to finally (at ages over 35) begin to separate my identity from the parents. This involves no contact with them at this point. One day at a time.

At this point in life, I have been sober for a couple of months, but the last time I went for a long period of sobriety was before being locked up for family drama. I haven't really gone for any length of time since then, 10ish years ago.

So I’m raw-dogging life now. At least I don't have to work. I do receive disability income, and I'm medicated. That helps. But I ask friends for prayers and good vibes cuz that's been true for about 9 years, and I still used alcohol as a crutch.

Do I think I'm an alcoholic? Not necessarily, but I'm trying to be healthier.

I'm just afraid of going backwards. My serious mental breakdown happened WHILE SOBER FOR A COUPLE YEARS.

So.

I’ve been called more times than I can count:

 a martyr or victim or a passive-aggressive.

These are my default mentalities, and I am trying to break free from them. The danger for me has been to go too far the other way and subsequently being labelled a narcissist and abuser.

Yup. Quiet little Corrie, as a child, is this aggressive adult bully STILL trying to find her voice.

Writing is the safest thing to do. So, after years of journaling, then a period of not privately writing anything but publicly plastering life details on social media, I am now returning to the quiet solitude of journaling.

So yes, to hell with that and to hell with Religion. To hell with the Patriarchy. To hell with Dad for driving away the only friends I ever had.

And to hell with me for allowing it to happen for so long. To hell with the Narcissist and to hell with the Victim.

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