Not sure i understand what you're saying right now.....But i do know when i talk to therapists is not the shocking events that affected me the most...Like people would think....I can tell those and peole would be shicked and feel oh so sorry for me....Its the very small details the things people take for granted that i lacked and were witheld from me..that most affeccted me...And noone understands.

The worse of the abuse was silent treatments and not being heard.

That was worse than being near death 5 days to be exact.

A lot of people will never understand that.

Arfie, I have to laugh at the excellent way you described that. I know some 'effete intellectuals' like that from presitigious academic circles, and also some politicians. It sounds a bit like the game of 'one-up-man-ship' too. And maybe I have to even admit to playing it myself once or twice in my life on different topics. I also know some people who have taken courses in philosophy in college and ended up with the same result of not believing in anything any more.

There is a saying that the best way to win at a game sometimes is to not play it. :P

ohhh, in fact, maybe you'll appreciate what happened today. I'm planning to go somewhere on Friday with a couple of other people. The person that is driving is rather dominant and she called about plans and kept asking about various details like, "What about lunch? I was thinking I could make lunch for three, ham and cheese sandwiches" , and I reminded her that I can't do dairy, and I didn't know if the other person would want pork, so ok, she is going to make two ham and cheese and I'll make mine, and we resolved that. Then we went back and forth about the time. She wants to be back early and it's about 100 miles away with one stop to pick hte other person up. So I suggested we leave at 8. She said she was going to do something else first, so I said that means you won't be here at 8 and she got all testy, and I finally said 'whatever', and she got upset at that. Then she asked how long I thought it would take to get to the town where we would pick up the other person and I said about 45 minutes, and she then disagreed saying it would be much quicker, and I said I was allowing time for slow traffic and delays, and she told me stop quibbling, so I said, 'whatever', and she got upset at that again. Then she asked me what route and I told her which one I use but she didn't like that and argued about another route so I said "whatever" and she got upset again. So I said, I don't argue with the driver.. you can do whatever you want. you keep asking me and then disagree with everything I say.

She wanted to come across as dominant leader by asserting her ideas and finding fault with mine, and I suppose if I felt like it I could have debated longer to make her victory sweeter, but I didn't play that game. I gave her permission to do whatever she wants, which makes me dominant in letting her take an inferior route and being late. :P but I've actually just learned to pick my battles, so I don't actually care if she takes this route or that route or is late. ~shrugs~

With issues of 'faith' also there are some things I've learned to let go of, and I try to find common ground and avoide debates as being very counterproductive. I have to say that I've learned that the hard way. :P

yup, xa1, that does, indeed sound like the stuff. There are always big, important reasons attached to every, little detail. Shrug-a-lug. Whatever calms your heart, sweets.

Seems to me that since I learned English in the sixties, certain words, like prejudice, faith, equality, free, etc., have acquired specialized and highly controversial meanings. When I first learned the word, "faith" it meant "to believe in." I could have faith in you. Way back then.

Now I call it the f-word. It feels risky to even use it. Ever. Not in English, anyway. I do not believe everybody who foams at the mouth over it has the same definition. Asking could get ya rabies...

that's a good name for it.

unfortunately, some people's faith IS drama, at the expense of all the freedoms and ideals most hold sacred and succinct.

And bad science, to boot, Mojo. Whatever you have concluded by whatever means, it is my mission to "prove" you wrong, by whatever means necessary.

Good argument to walk away from.

I preached at a church last Sunday. The topic was how to recover some kind of spiritual life, even if by spirit you mean being inspired by the arts, music, or literature with zero mysticism involved. How to recover if you've experienced cultish spiritual abuse growing up, like I did and others here have discussed here this week.

After the sermon, there were good responses. There were also those who took it upon themselves only to focus on the fact that the sermon mentioned spiritual abuse and not that it discussed the possibility of recovery after it. Just the mention of spiritual abuse was blood in the water for them.

They knew I have graduate degrees and teach at a college. On the other hand, the sermon mentioned my experience of spiritual abuse. So they knew I was smart enough to understand the issue, and I knew about spiritual abuse from experience.

But after the sermon this group of people took it upon themselves to lecture me on spiritual abuse from, as you put it, their soapboxes.

They didn't have to agree with me or do as I said--try to recover. But their argument didn't work for me in the sense that I don't want to approach my spiritual abuse any differently that I want to approach my sexual abuse. I don't want a person coming up to me to tell me that after my sexual abuse I can't have any kind of positive sex life forever after. Nor do I want to believe that I can't have any kind of spiritual life, even inspiration from secular literature, because I was spiritually abused as a child.

Maybe it's just me. I don't believe it will ever be as if it never happened, no. But I do believe in a degree of healing with therapy and support group work and in working for some measure of recovery. That's just me, though, I admit.

I suffered from what Muji calls 'spiritual abuse' also, as a child. My mother's father was a fundamentalist country protestant preacher in the kind of 'faith' of Jonathan Edwards "hellfire and brimstone" stuff that made my mother very afraid of God. One of the verses that was used as an excuse for parental license was the Commandment to 'Honor thy mother and father" , which was construed to mean to just accept anything they did or said without question and obey. (This makes me kind of feel like throwing up to explain it to you)
It was a great struggle for me to sort it all out as I reached adulthood and got out of there.
The 12 Step program, which is spiritual without being any specific 'faith' helped me alot to be open to change my understanding of God instead of just throwing the baby out with the bathwater.
I now have a strong relationship with God as I understand God, while having difficult relationships with both people who do subscribe to a specific creed. (Creed might be a better word for an organized denomination than "faith") , and people who are anti-religion, as both groups prejudge me when I say I am "a Christian". The label Christian is associated with certain stereotypes that are targetted by anti-Christs, and dissected and judged by each denomination in search of 'heresy'.

I really like what I saw in the news yesterday that Pope Francis said recently, "Men and women of the church who are careerists, social climbers, who use the people, the church, brothers and sisters those they should serve as a springboard for their own ambitions and personal interests do great damage to the church, he said"

A book I keep on my shelf for my Christian friends and family is, "12 Steps For Recovering Pharisees (Like Me)" by John Fischer. I get allot out of it, myself. The need to be Right is not an easy addiction to conquer.

Whatever the doctrine - or anti-doctrine - this week I am wondering if it is ALL soap-box hopping. I'll probably have another name for it next. It is a slippery phenom.

Hey, that sounds like a great book. I've got to get that one.

I should add I just had a book arrive in the mail. I heard it about here at DS PTSD from guayaba, I think. It is about separating from toxic family, something I had to do. Turned out to be a great book.

When this Pharisee one arfie's talking about comes, I'll let you know more about that, too.

Hey, x, that was a great quote from Pope Francis about not using the church for personal career gain. Right on.