Once Upon a Time in My Oceania

  From childhood, I was afraid of being stuck. I always cringed and felt nauseous watching Alice in Wonderland where Alice shrank and then grew tall inside that house until it exploded. I felt that my emotions and fears could be similar. There were actual instances that contributed to this fear and ones that I’m not yet ready to share with others outside of my close family and therapist. However, some instances include being locked in a room with abusive people or being tied up by those same abusers just for their entertainment. My wrists still sting as I remember the struggle and my chest burns at the memory of the panic. Just writing this, I broke out in a sweat. (PTSD is fun. Sarcasm, obviously.) The point is, being stuck has been a terrifying trigger for me created by traumatic events that caused it. It’s difficult to have complex trauma that contributed to my chronic Post Traumatic Stress Disorder. As my therapist told me a few months into our sessions over a year ago, not m...

  Christmas used to be banned while I was just a child growing up in the IFB world. With the often complexity that can sometimes be in homes and in churches in that environment, some members would celebrate, and others would not. Some embraced Christmas trees and Santa to a degree, while others swore such things were complete evil and would shun them. In my experience, the first IFB church to influence my family had shunned everything to do with the holiday, including gift giving. My family celebrated gift giving on a day that emphasized thanks and gratefulness more, and that was on Thanksgiving. This tradition brings back a lot of fond memories for me and as child I would be so excited to get my gifts a whole month earlier than most kids. However, when I reached a certain age and realized that others, especially the outside world, celebrated Christmas in a more acceptable way, I longed to experience that Christmas spirit in the same way. My first Christmas was when I reached the...

  Confronting a past that has harmed you without any say from you is difficult. Trying to process the decisions and actions made by others against you is a new level of confusing. I remember when I was a young adult, and my one imprisoned abuser started the process to seek an early release after a few years into his sentence. I started to search for anything I could use to speak up on my behalf if the process ever made it farther. What happened was that I stumbled upon notes and information taken by social workers and the detective on my childhood abuse case. It was very difficult reading those notes, seeing the sadistic mindset of my abuser. I remember that when asked why he molested me as a child that his response was that I was “annoying.” In his abusive and twisted mind, he molested a child for being a child and to him who was annoying child at that. I remember the turmoil reading that unwarranted explanation caused in me. I was always told that I was annoying growing up and ...

  There are many things wrong with fundamentalism, in my opinion. I couldn’t get into all of them in a single post without exhausting myself in the process. But I think the teaching of separation, this command in many ways, is definitely one of the most problematic ones. I could point to the way fundamentalism uses this teaching to separate its members from outside resources in cases of abuse, the different ways separation can impact the next generation mentally, physically, and educationally, or even the fact that fundamentalism instills in its followers not to rely on others to a point that is unrealistic and entire families suffer because of it. There really are many aspects that I could share about where this teaching causes future damage to fundamentalists. I never needed to be separate. I didn’t need to remove myself from a world that could harm me. I did not need to pull myself away from the joy that human connection offers. I didn’t need to be saved, sanctified, and separ...

  My journey post cult has been an uphill battle on most days. The trauma of surviving abuse and a cultic experience translated into struggles I still face today. Back in Autumn of 2014, when I left the abusive group I was a part of for 21 years, I didn’t have tools or support really. I shut down emotionally and mentally. I lost myself and fell into a dark depression that lasted 3 years without any relief. I started seeing improvement after connecting with other survivors. Then, I started to join the rest of the world. I started advocating, researching, and offering help to those that I could. In 2019, when I called out my past church for harboring an alleged abuser, I decided to step away in many ways and focus on myself after that negative response. Experiencing betrayal after betrayal by friends and family was my cue I needed to focus on my recovery. Within a year, I started building for my future. I sought out joy, took care of myself, created my support system, and sociali...

  By Ida McGrail Women are taught in many Christian circles that their worth comes from the mere fact that they are a virgin. It becomes a part of their identity. Stay pure, they say. True love waits. In youth group we wore the promise rings and signed the purity pledges. We read books like “I Kissed Dating Goodbye.”  We were admonished not to kiss our significant other; some of us could not even hold their hands. From a very young age, girls were taught that their virginity was what defined them, and without it, we were just “damaged goods” or “a rose that had all its petals plucked.” These dangerous lies filled my head for years, culminating when I was sexually assaulted at the age of 12. It warped my view of myself, sending me down a road of depression and self harm for the next 13 years, until I was able to create and maintain a healthy view of myself, as I learned, finally, that it was not my fault. Coming to that conclusion, however, was a long road and a difficult one, ...

  A lot of people ask me often if my faith is intact after everything I’ve gone through. This is a question that I’ve received countless times as a survivor of church abuse and religious trauma. I suppose it’s a relevant question after growing up where religion was a prominent fixture in my life. My spiritual journey isn’t one I often talk about. Granted, I do share what I feel were problematic teachings that leant to the abuse I and others have experienced. But truly have I broken down my thoughts, feelings, and opinions on religion? No, I haven’t. I’m unlikely to completely start doing that now either. This is partly because like everything else, I’m still learning about it. In the beginning days on my journey, especially after leaving the IFB, I was extremely close to God. I found such healing and the ability to break away more freely with recognizing that an all-powerful being was one of love. I would say at that time I was very progressive in Christianity if I was searching ...

  By Noelle Myers One thing many survivors of cults have in common is a sense of a lost childhood. Of course, big things like Halloween and prom were absolutely forbidden. Allocated as “of the devil” and “sinful” these childhood rites of passage were looked at with longing, watched from the outside like the proverbial kid in a candy store window. More than that, for me, it was also not doing many things children get to do. I could never ride the quarter machines, because all our money went to the church. Dance class was out – as being worldly and sinful – moving your body was a no-no, and let’s not even think about a leotard or the (gasp) music. Skiing, swimming, and most sports were out because of violations of the church-imposed dress code.   Even going to the gym was frowned upon (for women at least) due to the large number of men present and the lack of a “moral” dress code.   I can’t speak to what it is or was like for men, although I personally noticed quite the d...

  I knew it was possible that the new people in my life may stumble upon what I write on religious abuse, trauma, and cults. I also knew that they could possibly learn more about me than I was ready to share just yet. When I first started writing a blog, my articles, or social media posts on the abuse I survived, specifically in the Independent Fundamental Baptist movement, I didn’t worry too much about that particular aspect of being vulnerable about my experiences, on the internet, no less. I had a goal in mind, and I followed it. I started writing, raising my voice when I could about the things I cared about in the moment. I was all about “giving the damn” for once. It was with my first real connections post-cult, especially those of the romantic and friendship variety that really brought my writing to the forefront. At first, I struggled to know how to share about my passions surrounding abuse advocacy, mental health, and especially cult awareness as they are paramount to me....

  Becoming nostalgic for the life I once had in a cult happens very seldomly in my experience. But when I do, and I travel down memory’s lane, remembering the moments that were not as painful, I feel a connection to a part of myself that I lost. When you leave an environment that is hurtful, you know down deep it was always the right call to walk out the door. That does not change when you experience nostalgia for a time that you knew all the answers, had a role to play and in a community of your own. Last night this was me. I suddenly found myself diving deep into waters I rarely traverse. I found myself laughing about some funny moments and then crying over the things I missed. For example, I recently watched the movie RESPECT in a theater (gasp!) about Aretha Franklin. Aretha was a very religious person and throughout the movie, I found myself quietly singing along with the songs she had sung, songs that I hadn’t heard in nearly a decade. I sang a lot of those songs. In a co...

  By Anonymous When Lydia asked me if I’d like to write, I was torn. I have a lot of people in my life who are wonderful, and they don’t fit the into box of abusive or cult-like at all. But I did run into some people who were critical, condescending, and plain mean. I did try to do everything “right.” I thought if I did everything right, people would see that and be nice. I was wrong. It took me a few years to realize that some people would automatically oppose whatever my family and I offered the church. For example: activities. If they came to activities my husband had planned and was in charge of, they’d do their part with food or whatever but then they’d hang out in the other room and wouldn’t participate or see how well he was doing things. Of course some people were great. I am not talking about these people. Long story short, I went through a terrible depression. I don’t mean I was sad.  I mean I couldn’t function.  I couldn’t focus ...