Can't faith in God be the Major factor in healing

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Can't faith in God be the Major factor in healing
T

tbar

Registrant
I got a e-mail from the only T in my state recommended on this site. He could not recommeded any one down here , but wishes I was up there (About 200 miles away) so he could see me. I am off tomorrow so will make some more calls looking for a group type thing.

I am learning to trust God more in all my circumstances. I know that all the time I was in denial with my Emotional abusive behavior in my marriage I was seperated from God's direction. I pushed my will and refused to acknowledge my abusive/neglected childhood and the fact that it was having an effect on me. I was very self-rightoues. I knew my relationship with God was not right but rationalized my marraige problems were mostly her fault. I find reading the Bible, learning scripture, listening to various preachers on the radio, tapes and reading books has helped a lot. It helps me handle the resentment I had deep inside me and the shame/insecurties I always had. I just don't see much talk about that on here. I know it's common for those abused to feel that either there is no God or why the hell did he let this happen to me.
I told my 12 year old son yesterday about me being sexually abused when I was a young boy. I want to put a testimony type thing on a website he is helping me create. He would see it on there so I figured I would tell him in advance. My wife was opposed to me telling him. I feel she just wants it to be kept a secert( we are seperated). Was I right or wrong?
Sometimes I feel this funk I'm in is mostly because of our seperation if we just reconciled or when we divorce I will be able to move on. Just knowing and honoring the fact of my childhood and not being in denile about it will be 90% of my recovery. I know it's not that easy but you know what I mean? I was pretty bad. Once I spat in her face. Broke things, Basically told/treated her like shit. Thanx for letting me vent. Got a new computer yesterday :)
Tom
 
Tom,

I told my 12 year old son yesterday about me being sexually abused when I was a young boy. I want to put a testimony type thing on a website he is helping me create. He would see it on there so I figured I would tell him in advance. My wife was opposed to me telling him. I feel she just wants it to be kept a secert( we are seperated). Was I right or wrong?
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I think it's difficult to second-guess someone else on something like this when you don't know their full story or anything about their family context. But since you ask I can just comment on how I would have handled this.

I would not have told a 12-year-old boy that I was sexually abused as a child. I don't think there's any way a kid that young could appreciate why you are telling him or understand what he is meant to do with this information. I would be especially concerned that he might hear this and have questions or worries that he is afraid to ask about. For example, he might wonder if HE is likely to be hurt because you were, or he might work through other danger scenarios that also feature himself being at risk. Or he may wonder, for example, is something wrong with my Dad now?

Apart from these considerations, his age is right at the time when boys are becoming anxious about sex and sexuality anyway. A boy already has a lot to worry and be confused about without bearing the additional burden of figuring out what it means to have a father who was abused as a boy.

The decision is yours of course, but in deciding what further information to tell him in the future I would consider how this will impact on him, what he can be expected to understand, what he can be expected to gain, and how the inevitable anxieties and confusion will be addressed.

It seems to me that this is especially relevant since you plan on placing a testimony on a public website where (I suppose) he can see what is said by you and by visitors.

Much love,
Larry
 
first, you'll find more talk of God on the spirituality board. i dont tend to say too much here on it out of respect for everyone's beliefs. yes, for me God and my faith are at the center of my healing.

as far as telling your son, that is a very individual choice. if it was right for you then it was right. i havent told my eldest. i have come out to my wife, parents, family, but i guess i saw no reason to burden my sons with this, especially now that i am a healthy, functioning part of thier lives. anyway, that is a very personal choice as i said.

i hope you find happiness and fulfillment whereever your life takes you.
 
Tough question all around. If I've been seriously injured physically, like my leg was smashed or something, that is a medical problem that I would treat by seeing a doctor. If I have a low level of faith in God, I would see a 'spiritual doctor' on that one--get somebody to help me study the Bible or something. The two are separate issues that I've found can only be treated separately. All the faith in the world does not keep a survivor of abuse from becoming depressed any more than faith in a resurrection keeps people from being sad when someone they love dies. It provides hope, and hope is important. It can help us maintain a more positive outlook dispite our emotional trauma. But it's not a cure.

As to telling a 12-year-old, I made what I would call a mistake in letting too much emotional baggage weigh on my wife's young sister. As she grew up and started finding boyfriends and eventually a husband, she tended to find men who needed fixing, emotional basketcases. Was that my fault? I'll never know. But I often wonder if I didn't set her up for a more difficult life by making her feel she had to help me instead of being a strong shoulder on which she could lean during her most unstable years. In other words, I don't know the answer. If I had it to do over again, I would err on the side of not talking too much about my trauma to kids who need to look up to someone.
 
My comment on telling a child is based on my experience in telling my 18-year-old daughter. She is very mature for her age, but she was terribly shocked and confused when I disclosed to her. She had a million questions, but being older and very confident she felt able to ask them. And being older she was able to understand what I was telling her and why. That is, she was able to ask for the help she needed to understood what the information meant and what she could do with it. I doubt that a 12-year-old has what it takes to slog through all this confusion and anxiety.

Much love,
Larry
 
On faith being the major factor in healing, I imagine that depends on the emotional and spiritual moorings of the individual. At the end of the day, Tbar, this is something only you can answer. Part of the answer is another question: What do you need?

In my own case I am sure faith would not have worked as a basis for my recovery. Not because of any lack of religious conviction, but because the problems involved in cases of abuse are, as ForeverFighting points out, not spiritual in nature.

There is also another consideration, again speaking personally. I am a person with strong religious beliefs and I was raised in a strong Christian household. But when I was abused the trauma of what was happening attacked the foundations of my faith just as they attacked everything else. I felt like I had been abandoned by God, just as I felt I had been abandoned by all the people in my life who could not SEE what was happening to me. I was too young to do otherwise. That is, my faith was not something that remained solid and unaffected as everything else collapsed. It was not a "rock" I could depend on, and that was for reasons that had nothing to do with me personally, but rather reflected what was being done to me.

My experience is also similar to those who find that the religious establishment can be distinctly unhelpful when it smells a threat of any kind. When I wrote to the church where I went (and where I was abused several times, including in the pastor's study) and told them my story, I did so just to warn them against complacency and the attitude of "it can't happen here". I specifically said I had no ulterior plans in mind. But do you think I got even the courtesy of a reply? Nope! My guess is that my letter went to the Session, the church took legal advice, and they decided to say nothing in case I tried later to use it against them.

Much love,
Larry
 
Thanks guys,
Before I told him I kind of figured he would say "oh" and that would be it. And that is what happened. No questions a minute or two of silence before I started talking about something else. We were eating at a fast food place. That is the same thing that happened a few months before when I told him I used to have a problem with alcohol.
He has been diagnosed with Aspergers Syndrome which is a high functioning form of autism. He does not have much emotional feelings. He is very intelligent All A's in school but does not connect facial expressions and that sort. He seems to be improving as he gets older which sometime happens. I think he has a mild form of it. I sometimes think that is some way the emotional abuse between my wife and myself has something to do with it. I remember sitting on the couch after one of our classic yelling matches, seeing him as a baby sitting on the floor thinking there is no way this can not be effecting him. Sort of an emotional shut down self preservation thing like a child of abuse. I actually was abusing him cause now I understand when ever you abuse a parent in front of the child, you abuse the child too. He is such a good kid and really a blessing.
Hope is key and something that I receive from my faith. I think a case could be made that abuse is spiritual in nature. A spiritual deficiency in the abuser. Lack of love & self-discipline, deception, gratify the desire of the sinful nature etc... That's what makes clergy abuse so horrfic, it goes against the very foundation of what they represent. This is a fallen world, as we clearly know.
Tom
 
Tom,

Hope is key and something that I receive from my faith. I think a case could be made that abuse is spiritual in nature. A spiritual deficiency in the abuser. Lack of love & self-discipline, deception, gratify the desire of the sinful nature etc... That's what makes clergy abuse so horrfic, it goes against the very foundation of what they represent. This is a fallen world, as we clearly know.
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This is your perspective and you will have to somehow be true to it in order to achieve your own recovery. I don't have any problem with acknowledging the spiritual dimension you describe here, and if you need this to be the mainstay in your healing that's how it should be. I don't know much about them, but I have heard that there are Christian therapists active in the field who would probably be able to guide you and focus your efforts. I wish you all the very best.

Much love,
Larry
 
TBar,

I hate to plug my book but what you have described in your post sounds a lot like my life.

If you are having trouble finding a T then my book may bring you comfort.

What Ever It Takes, God; The Most Difficult Things For Men To Survive by John Oarc.

Amazon etc.

Nice to have you here,
 
John,
Thanks, I just ordered your book and look forward to receiving it. I was at the book store early this evening before going to an AA meeting at the Jail. Forget title and author but he said some things that I took note of. Some times I minimize the effect of my abuse (he didn't penetrate me). But some things that can deepen the effect did pertain to me. My age at the time, the length of time it happened, His closeness to the family unit and perhaps most important what happen after (Or didn't happen) the abuse was discovered and ceased.
Larry,
I was seeing a Christian T for the emotional abuse issue (helped a lot)but he said he could not help with SA. I feel like he was afraid to go there or had some other reason. Which is really better then trying to bluff his way and giving me bad advice. I not sure exactly what I want or how to recover. Like I said in another post"give me a list of things to do"
Compounding the shame of the abuse is the shame of my mothers alcoholism. She brought that alcoholic into my life and then was drinking or drunk when see left me alone with him. The neglect continued all while growing up even through there was no more SA. Only God's healing Grace can cover that. I want to thank every one on here, but especially you Larry. Words can't express your selflessness and love
Love Tom
 
Tom I was abused at the age of 11 by my parish priest. All my life scence the abuse I have faith that there is a god but I can't get into the church thing. I have been alse open to anyone's faith but just can't get into the bible and all that.

About telling your son I think it is a good thing you told him. You may want to revisit the topic with him to see if he has any new??? It is a hard subject to talk about but kids need to understand that SEXUAL ABUSE is something that happens to some kids.

Tom
 
Tom and Tom :) ,

It is a hard subject to talk about but kids need to understand that SEXUAL ABUSE is something that happens to some kids.
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I absolutely agree, and there is a wide range of excellent materials aimed specifically at giving kids the information they need to stay safe. But I think educators would agree that kids need information that is not specifically threatening or confusing on the level of their own little world. There's a big difference between telling a child "There's a such a thing as bad touching", and telling him "Daddy was sexually abused".

Much love,
Larry
 
I was sexually abused by a vicar and, as a European, do not understand the God-obsession of many Americans.

To answer your question, I would say: ABSOLUTELY NOT. Your healing is in your own hands.

Religion, drugs and alcohol may help dull the pain but they are no solution.
 
Well said David. Also Welcome. I live in Japan but am originally from Lincoln, so welcome to a fellow Brit.
 
Tbar (Tom),

If it weren't for my faith in God and finding Him in a relational way and not from a "religious," distant approach, I don't think I would be in the game at all. One thing that I've come to appreciate is not just surviving the trauma but bringing it all to a place of resolution and for me that has been the cross. No longer denial, or saying "I forgive them" - yet keeping all the anger and bitterness in my heart and pretending to be a good "Christian." It has been a process for a long time and years of allowing God to take me back to face everything and then restoring my emotions, life, marriage, children, identity manhood, and my faith.
Take it one day at a time and open your heart to a true loving Father who desires to restore you completely, and make you whole - then the songs that you sing won't be some mystical, in the sweet by and by, but something you can live now and experience daily.

Tim
 
Originally posted by david(UK):
I was sexually abused by a vicar and, as a European, do not understand the God-obsession of many Americans.
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Please refrain from making inflammatory comments. This statement adds nothing to this discussion and serves only to alienate the American members here.

To answer your question, I would say: ABSOLUTELY NOT. Your healing is in your own hands.

Religion, drugs and alcohol may help dull the pain but they are no solution.
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While I agree that a lot of people use religion as an opiate, I don't think that is what TBAR is getting at in his original post. Personally, I think that as long as you are careful to keep a proper balance with other aspects of your life, religion can play a strong role in your recovery.

The trick is to not get lazy and just assume that God (or whoever) will do all the work just because you are "faithful." Recovery involves a lot of hard, dirty work, and religion will not remove this requirement. I think the value of religion is that it helps provide an overarching focus for recovery, I.E., it helps survivors place their recovery into the greater context of life direction and goals. Religion can give your recovery meaning, but God is sure not going to go to therapy sessions for you.

Nobby
 
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