Abuse

TW: Suicide, Sexual Abuse, Religious Trauma

Shortly after my first suicide attempt, a well meaning Christian dismissed my struggles as an “attitude problem.” The interaction left me feeling despondent to the point that one of my roommates was concerned that I was going to attempt suicide again. He wanted to talk to our boss about my situation. I thought that was a terrible idea, as I did not trust the boss. However, I had gone inside myself, retreating from people because human interaction is harmful when I am depressed. I wasn’t in any kind of shape to advocate for myself. I don’t know why my roommate decided against talking to the boss. I’m glad he didn’t; it would have made the situation worse. After a few hours, I had stabilized enough to function as well as I ever functioned during this period.

Recently, a well meaning Christian suggested that my trauma, my history of depressive psychosis, and my suicide attempts were simply the products of an “attitude problem.” This mischaracterization of my issues stirred some memories, new and old. Among the new memories, I recall a meme by Lane Moore that hit me like a freight train when I first read it: “Surviving your abuser didn’t make you a ‘better person,’ going through trauma didn’t ‘make you grow.’ It took away your joy, and your trust, it almost killed you, and it shouldn’t have happened. If you grew or blossomed after, it was despite them.” I have always had problems with the notion that “what doesn’t kill you makes you stronger.” I was never able to articulate my issues with it, but her take made me feel that someone understood me. It also made me consider how much of our suffering is the result of choices people make, such as the decision to bully someone. Should we encourage bullies because they provide opportunities for people to “grow?”

Thinking about this led me to recall an episode of Criminal Minds featuring the character Derek Morgan. While Morgan investigated the disappearances of several women, he met a priest, and could not hide the discomfort and disdain he felt in the priest’s company. When Morgan was a child, he was sexually abused by the director of a youth center. While the abuse was going on, Morgan would pray that it would stop. It did not stop. The priest replied that God does not give us more than we can handle. Morgan said that God asks too much of a thirteen year old kid.

This isn’t far from suggesting, as I have seen some Christians do, that Morgan should be grateful that he was molested, that I should be grateful for the abuse and the trauma that made me suicidal, that we should be grateful in general for the bad stuff that happens to us. I cannot reconcile the idea of a loving God with a God who would put a child in harm’s way to “teach him a lesson.”

I have always been fascinated by the numerous occasions when scientific progress was impeded by the religious beliefs of scientists. Isaac Newton was a man of deep faith who saw, in the laws he discovered, God’s perfect plan for the ordering of the universe. Yet he knew his discoveries did not perfectly describe the orbits of the planets, for example. He attributed this to some human frailty of his and not something God did wrong. It was indeed his belief that time was constant everywhere that caused the problem. The obstacle was resolved when Albert Einstein, also a man of faith, asked, what if God did it differently? This led to his discovery that time isn’t constant, but relative to the observer’s frame of reference, hence the theory of relativity.

In a similar vein, it seems that Christians became confused about what is important in shoring up those who are struggling. I can only imagine that a loving God would recoil in horror at the suggestion that the sexual abuse of a child is something that He intended. Why would a loving God want his followers to justify evil by claiming it was His will? That stance wasn’t helpful to Derek Morgan. His healing began when he confided in his colleagues and they responded without judgement, but with patience, a willingness to listen, and love.

I am not grateful for the trauma I have endured. Rather, I am grateful to my Emotional Support Canadian, who listened without judgement as I described my relationship with an abusive narcissist. It was her willingness to understand and genuinely engage in a dialogue about what I had experienced that helped me heal. The Christians who dismissed the pain of nineteen year old me as an “attitude problem” tore my wounds open and left them bleeding as they departed to pass judgement on someone else’s failings. I didn’t have the words back then to express how hurtful that was and how much such experiences have alienated me from religion generally.

The therapist I worked with the longest was a man of faith. However, he was more interested in religion’s capacity to help people live, rather than its concern with what happens when we die. His outlook was similar to Leo Tolstoy’s, who once said that he felt better about his life when he believed that there was a God who expected things from him. But a religion cannot help people live if it is steeped in mysteries that are beyond our understanding. Before we part ways, I leave you this question: Is it more likely that a loving God would want his followers stumbling in confusion as they contemplate the mystery of why He allowed one child to be raped while sparing another? Or is it more likely that a loving God doesn’t harm anyone, and expects his followers to help people who are suffering, without condemnation, but with compassion and a genuine willingness to understand?

#Suicide #Depression #Trauma #PTSD #MentalHealth #Disability

My birthday is coming up. As I brainstorm how to treat myself to celebrate my day of birth, I wonder how does one raise a glass to a life lived in trauma? Read that again. Lived. In. Trauma. The whole of my life has been battling against physical abuse, emotional abuse, emotional neglect, invisible triggers, emotional dysregulation, suicidal tendencies, disbelonging, loneliness--all that is Complex PTSD (CPTSD).

This is a life to celebrate?

I reject this life. I want to design a new one. I want to experience a rebirth. How do I celebrate the next one?

Any ideas? #CPTSD

The Lifelong Echo of Healing: On the Non-Linear Grief of Abuse Recovery

"We delight in the beauty of the butterfly, but rarely admit the changes it has gone through to achieve that beauty." — Maya Angelou

"Healing isn’t linear," we’re often told, usually in the context of conventional grief—the kind with a clear beginning, middle, and eventual end. But the grief that follows abuse is different. It’s not about losing a person; it’s about losing yourself. It’s multifaceted, repetitive, and layered, a constant echo tied inextricably to your identity, not finality.

Surviving abuse means navigating multiple losses simultaneously. You’re not just grieving a relationship; you’re mourning the collapse of your worldview, the death of the person you were before you knew the darkness, and the shattering of the future you thought you were building.

"Trauma is not just an event that took place in the past; it is also the imprint left by that experience on the mind, body, and brain." — Bessel van der Kolk

This is where cognitive dissonance takes hold—a disorienting fog where you struggle to untangle genuine love from calculated manipulation, attempting to rebuild your fundamental beliefs about safety, relationships, and self-worth.

"Trauma is a fact of life. It does not, however, have to be a life sentence." — Peter Levine

It’s a cycle of rebuilding, failing, and repeating old patterns. The painful recognition of finding yourself in yet another familiar dynamic brings shame, but it is not a personal failure. It’s your nervous system, still patterned for survival rather than safety, picking the familiar pain until you consciously outgrow it.

The Stacking Stones of Loss

The challenge intensifies because the world doesn't pause for your recovery. Other losses—deaths, breakups, setbacks—stack atop existing wounds, each new grief pulling the unresolved layers of old trauma to the surface. Every setback reactivates memories that never fully settled.

Yet, within this difficult cycle lies a strange beauty: every resurfacing wound is a new chance. Another chance to see deeper, understand what was previously incomprehensible, and, crucially, to respond rather than collapse. This is how you begin to rewire the places that once trapped you.

"Not everything that is faced can be changed, but nothing can be changed until it is faced." — James Baldwin

Each time, the fall isn't as far. The stay isn't as long. You rise quicker, see the pattern clearer.

This is the real meaning of "healing isn't linear." Not a neat spiral or an infographic, but a long, messy, repeating cycle until your identity and soul evolve into something steadier. Maybe the endpoint isn't a final, self-actualized state, but the sovereign self: the version of you who can hold the grief without losing herself within it.

The journey doesn’t end. It just changes shape, becoming easier to carry. And you become a person who no longer fears the next round, because you have finally committed to not abandoning yourself when it comes. Keep building that beautiful life.

"We must be willing to let go of the life we planned so as to have the life that is waiting for us." — Joseph Campbell

Action Step: Pattern Recognition With Compassion

"Until you make the unconscious conscious, it will direct your life and you will call it fate." — Carl Jung

Healing demands awareness, not shame. When you notice you’ve repeated a relationship pattern or found yourself in the same emotional cycle, approach it with curiosity rather than criticism.

Ask yourself these questions, using the moment as feedback:

Did I see it sooner this time?

Did I leave sooner?

Did it destroy me as much—or did I recover faster?

Did I understand the pattern more clearly?

What did this round teach me about myself, my needs, and my wounds?

What part of me grew because of this experience?

What still needs strengthening, softening, or healing in me?

This is not an exercise in shame. It’s an exercise in awareness, evolution, and nervous system tracking.

"I am not what happened to me, I am what I choose to become." — Carl Jung

Every repeated pattern is not failure—it’s feedback. And each time it happens, you’re given another opportunity to grow deeper roots, sharpen your discernment, and expand your self-trust. If you need professional support in navigating these patterns, confidential and trained trauma specialists are available via the National Domestic Violence Hotline or the RAINN National Sexual Assault Hotline.

Hi, my name is Lena225. I am here because I would like to share my story .. I've been diagnosed with PTSD some time ago. Long 8 years living with it .. in therapy for over 2 years and finally I am able to breathe! I survived sexual abuse/rape that caused really bad PTSD. I am here cause I am finally able to speak about it ..

#MightyTogether

I'VE BEEN having very lows, finances are low, I'm still caregiving, I have trauma n I'm trying to be ready for American Thanksgiving if family drop by but I can hardly afford additional groceries needed for that, I'm always busy n thoroughly exhausted, 3 Huskies, a teen daughter and her boyfriend, a family member who up to this week yells at me profusely, sadness, Thanksgiving care for others and lotsa sadness, huge yard work, housework n serving people all day from early morning and into the night, did I mention exhaustion, Anon moral support for 3.0.0.5 years, SI, bus travel, motherhood, enduring abuse at times, walking with a cane exhausted n crying or over that every day, abuse by authorities in the past and I'm always working I don't get it, sometimes lives are taken, my mother's was, I have Faith but it's hard to get there to celebrate, I'm clean, control it with a glass of wine, I don't wanna be left out always this weekend, I might not make it, am scared but ok, give of yourself to others til you can't.

Hi, I had a moment at the weekend where I realised there was no relief in my life because I'm always either overstretched or pushing people away (or as I put it 'chasing the golden mask' and 'feeding the f*ck off dragon'...). At that point I realised with horror that I am going to just have to do what I want. Since then I have been committed to doing what I want and maintaining open connections with people close to me. It's scary but I think it has to be better than just doing things I don't necessarily want to do because I think it's the only way to get people to respect me and running away when they try to get close... Has anyone else had this experience? Would help to know if I'm on the right track...[yes I'm aware of the irony... 🤨]

#Depression #Anxiety #Abuse