Where Is God In Trauma?

[Tinyflame]

As a child, I desperately needed God. I needed someone to pray to. I remember a lot of looking out my window at the stars, thinking they were looking out for me. I wished a lot on them. I remember praying aloud and in my head, and praying so hard, over and over, but no one ever came to save me. I carried on praying, for years, but the guilt, the shame, the pain, what was happening, it all remained the same, until my friend was killed .. God had always looked after those I cared about, those were always the prayers that were answered, even if no one had ever rescued me. It is one thing not to save me, but it is another not to look after the people that I care about.

I have my own view on the afterlife that I have created, and that is all I need. If someone asks me what religion I am now, I say "I believe in God, but I believe in the theory of evolution as well". This got me into an argument a while ago that resulted in someone telling me my "relationship with God is wrong", which led me to conclude that anyone who judges me for my beliefs is somewhat missing the points that most religions are teaching.

I think any kind of trauma can shake you to your very core. It can make you question everything.

Doesn't everyone who believes something at one point begin to question their faith? If it is important to you, your spirituality won't go anywhere. My spirituality never really left me, but I needed to adapt it in order for it to make sense to me..

Dear rainy_daze, I totally relate, especially to your first paragraph you quoted, especially the last 2 sentences of it, and unless I'm wrong that (*might*) be what Jac meant, the trauma of the loss of the anchor, as she said. I (re)-experienced that in 2005/ 2006- many years after the initial events that started ptsd in motion. It was different the second time for me, not met with any rage, it was met with solely devastation, though not a change in beliefs.

I agree that trauma, or ptsd effects all relationships. And those being individual to each of us, that impact though the same might be experienced differently. I see no real difference between fighting the effects of negative thinking or fear, in one's relationship to God or any Higher Power, as combatting the effects of ptsd impacting on relationships with spouses, family or friends. Trauma really complicates things. :( Really blows up one's world to bits, sometimes.

Think the difficulty is putting pieces back that are left together, some things get let go, others we are thankful we retained, some things get put back in new ways. For example, I don't blame my dad or God, I understand (even did at the moment) the realities of life, but shaking the mistrust or fear, that's a lot more difficult and requires a lot more work on my part. Though am sure the trauma came from the unexpectedness and watching someone else 'knock him off'earlier and me doing nothing or saying nothing to stop it, and hiding that secret. Plus the trauma that preceded it, for many years. Plus neglect, sexual assaults.

Anyway, all I mean is, if, or whenever, I hear 'God' explained as tyrannical or heavy handed, I must get away. Not because my personal beliefs are threatened, but because it makes me feel depressed, trauma-related depression. Or like hearing a friend run-down. For me, my Higher Power was there, is there, hopefully will choose to remain with me. But that took 30 years of trauma-related work. I don't need anyone to reinforce my fears of why God would choose and want to give up on me or abandon me for good.

Hey, for what it's worth rainy_daze, I still wish or look up to the stars and moon. I feel comforted by them. :)

 

[Deleted member 1860]

Did anyone else have a "lightning-bolt" sort of moment when their spiritual beliefs solidified? I mean instead of struggling with it and coming into religion over time, you have a moment that completely just blows you away, and in an instant you just know...

From reading these posts I can't help but get the feeling that some perhaps have been lead astray as to what God is/does by others who claim to know all about him when really they don't, or have been given a false impression of what god is. I think it's important to come into spirituality on your own. It's when we believe everything we're told that things go awry.

Even the bible...yes, it's supposed to be the word of god, but WHO wrote the bible? Man. Is man perfect? No. So how can we expect the bible to be perfect in the sense that everything is true? The same goes with any person who preaches/teaches about religion. These people aren't perfect so their preaching/teaching is subject to flaw. Seeing all this has made me realize that spirituality is one of those things that comes from within. You find it on your own. It's when we start believing everything that we're told that things go haywire.

 

[Tinyflame]

Yes SoL.

I just came back to add for Jac (by the way sorry piratelady, probably good thing I didn't write more :( :rolleyes: ), I think I had to try to learn not how to stop myself from asking God, or decrease my expectation, but rather how to start asking God again instead. I think part of that was (mis)trust, fear, lack of hope, and fear to hope (for me).

 

[daretodream]

I have just recently joined and this conversation caught my eye on faith. I grew up in a home where faith was not shown and even cursed upon. Going through many forms of abuse and trauma for 44 yrs of my life I struggled with faith, even angry as my parents had been at times. In hindsight I learnt even though I had not found my faith, God kept reaching out to me and, yes even protecting me. As a child I remember a prescense when the sexual abuse began and throughout where I would be taken to observe or even to expereince a more wonderous and beautiful place. At 3 yrs old abuse is traumatic and I believe God protected me and kept me safe in my mind when he could not in my body.

The few times I entered a church I learnt from man and woman that God detested females like me whom had endured, incest, rape and abduction but that is not what God was or believed this is what man taught me to believe in the sermons I heard being spoken in.

Through AA I heard of God and saw others grasping desperately to their faith in great pain and healing coming through and I again questioned faith. I was blessed to get a second glimpse into faith but trauma followed that I could not comprehend nor mentally accept with in and my emotions grew to very dysfunctional state. I floundered and struggled in and out of faith always letting man push me away, never seeking out the answers myself.

When I was finally coming into my faith where no man could discourage me from in their teaching of, because I was reading, I was learning for me no one else. My world appeared to collapse . My marraige of 19 yrs suddenly ended and I screamed to the skies why have you forsaken me!.

I had not been forsaken but been blessed beyond words. The marraige ending was the beginning of my life free of abuse free to heal and free to love and free to find love.

I have no question in my mind about God or the blood of Jesus. I have seen miracles and when I finally began to open the veil of pain from the PTSD I was able to feel the love from God . I would never push my faith upon another but neither would I wish someone to disreguard mine.

I am so grateful for my faith and the healing it has brought into my life. With out my faith the other 3 S's of the four do not work:

FOUR S's
self care
self esteem
socialization
spirituality

One without the other does not work no matter how hard I tried, only with all four working in favour with the other does my healing take place and the weight and load I have carried so long begin to lighten and I am not only able to walk with a lighter load but walk with a smile upon my face and embrace life with joy , hope and even excitement. To learn, to share, to love, to feel, to enjoy, these are the gifts that my faith has given me.

 

[The Albatross]

OOOhhh! I love your 4 S's and have never heard of them before. I have the 5 P's but here make the 5th "P" optional: Patiience, practice, persistence, perseverance and prayer.

 

[daretodream]

The 4 S's was developed by a PTSd specialist whom works in the four stages of healing. I was only finacially able to do the first stage but took enough away to do the rest solo and was grateful for the gift in his teachings prior to me.

 

[Muzikluvr]

I was hurting and isolated. Mum and Dad were not available for me, and I could not find God – he was absent.

But the implication of this is that I felt that I was not important enough for God to love or care for me!

Funnily enough, so many years on, I am still a believer and my spirituality is very important to me...... But if I go deep I wonder if God is really there.

I turned to Jesus when my parents didn't believe me. My dad was so mad at me for "lying to him." I was abandoned and trapped all at once. No where to go, no one to turn to, no one to trust... suddenly I realized what my pastor must have been talking about in church. I could turn to Jesus at any time, He would support me, help me... answer my prayers. I was 7.

When I was 32, I pretty much did the same exact thing again. Falling to my knees under the weight of my fear that so many people believed my dad's misguided hopes that his daughter lied instead of his family being capable of rape. I'd been having flashbacks of MANY people in my church, family... even teachers, who knew enough to step in and help me; but instead, they'd been taken in by my dad's own persuasive victim story... the victim of a child gone bad. :(

So, at 32 when I'm freaking out about how no one will believe that I could have forgotten such audacities, my mind suddenly conjured the one person who knew the truth and didn't care at all what other people chose to believe. That was the first time I thought to myself, "It doesn't matter what they believe. The truth doesn't change just because people don't believe it." I found myself feeling more confident that I could stand up for my own perspective despite what circumstantial evidence people may point to that could make me look manipulative instead of manipulated, as I was... gaslighted, lied to, lied about, gossiped about, confused and WAY too young to understand how society could spin stuff until they were willing to believe it.

After having such a melt down, I returned to my fanatical Christian views and several years later realized that Satan was going to hurt me by hurting my children and the cycle would continue because of Satan. Yep. I had come full circle to my childhood beliefs, many of which were completely magical... but based in Christianity and difficult to refute since there are so many churches, including the Catholic church that practice exorcism and other such other worldly, mystical, magical, frightening Satanic rituals... or anti-satanic rituals? Whatever they are, I couldn't separate God's existence from Satan's. If one existed, the other must as well.

I decided to abandon them both all together, believing the same about God as I did about my family... that once I understood what happened, I would be able to reconcile my relationship with them and put evil in it's place. God would forgive me.

Instantly, I felt SO Much relief! I realized that the same guilt trips that were toxically influencing me to cling to my family, were also forcing me to cling to God. I had been terrified not to. I didn't really believe, I'd never really given myself a chance to decide. I had been proud to choose blind faith. I reveled in my new freedom. I just wanted some space from feeling guilty about not being sure if there was a God, and how I was supposed to behave... and all the various ways that I was failing Him.

Now, I've found that my world makes sense! There is no magic. Everything happens for a reason. I don't always know what that reason is, but it's not always about me. People make choices because it is what they choose to do given their backgrounds, their perspectives, their hopes, their dreams, their personalities, etc...

I have choices! I feel so much better. I feel like religion manipulates people the same way my family manipulated me to trust them over my own instincts. For me, life is better with logic.

I didn't read the rest of the posts here, just the first one. Jacnic, I wish you the best as you sort through your beliefs. It's not an easy journey, but whatever you decide to believe, may it bring you comfort and peace.

 

[Pencil]

spirituality is one of those things that comes from within. You find it on your own.

SoL, I would really like to challenge this - but don't have the time right now to do justice to the issue. From a Christian point of view - you can't. Not according to the Bible. And THAT makes the responsibility of people that much greater. But I'll come back to this in a while, okay?

But yes, that moment when things 'solidified'? I relate to that.

 

[Deleted member 1860]

Well, we'll have to agree to disagree. I won't debate it. I am not part of a Christian church which takes the bible literally. (To add to my previous post as to why, you'd also have to say that the translations of the bible are perfect---they aren't. Hence why I don't take things in the bible literally. It's a guide.)

 

[rainy_daze]

They are all just stories humans have made up to try and make themselves feel better.

I tell my kids that people pick which religion to follow based on which moral code they kind of like the most...... Your belief should only be about you.

I agree with you, rightkindofme. I like stories that people make up that make them feel better; that's pretty much my childhood in a nutshell there. Maybe that is why I was so enamoured. I was fascinated when people told stories, and I loved fables and things like that. I won't bang on about it, but it's not like I'm a strict religious person. I don't go to services and I rarely tell anyone my beliefs because I am surrounded by scientists (not literal scientists, but people who like to have a good bit of banter about mocking God, which is fine by me, they are very witty).

I also don't take the bible as fact. That is why I am responding with that to you, rightkindofme, because I took the moral bits of code I liked from religion, and shed the rest. Some of it was too contradictory and cruel... and not in keeping with my idea of the modern day or what it means to try and be as open minded about the world as possible. My belief is always only about me and how I see the world; I would never use my beliefs to cast judgement on others intentionally to hurt them, if that makes sense.

We all get judgmental about other people, especially if they don't fit with our moral code. For example, I can't stand people who cheat on their partners; I completely do understand there are so many reasons to, but I still judge because it's wrong to me. It conflicts with my moral code. However, I know there are some who use religion as an excuse for hate, and that isn't on. I think that's great your kids are learning cool stories, all religions have amazing stories, it'll help build an amazing belief system for them, in my opinion.

Dear rainy_daze, I totally relate, especially to your first paragraph you quoted, especially the last 2 sentences of it, and unless I'm wrong that (*might*) be what Jac meant, the trauma of the loss of the anchor, as she said....

Trauma really complicates things. :( Really blows up one's world to bits, sometimes.

Think the difficulty is putting pieces back that are left together, some things get let go, others we are thankful we retained, some things get put back in new ways.....

Hey, for what it's worth rainy_daze, I still wish or look up to the stars and moon. I feel comforted by them. :)

I think that is possibly what Jac meant. I can't remember where I read it, but I am sure there is a study about PTSD and how it can change your world view. If religion is part of it, no wonder it can get damaged, and you have to make sense of it in relation to who you are or how you are feeling in the moment.

I am thankful that I still believe there is somewere we go when we die. That is all that is really important to me. I like the idea of there being a friendly person in the sky to greet you as well. Even if I'm wrong, I don't care, I need the story to make me feel better. I think I would lose hope again without that belief.

Pretty tired, hope that makes sense. Thank you for responding Junebug, the last sentence especially.

 

[rainy_daze]

I think it's important to come into spirituality on your own.

I think so too. The idea of religion being forced upon people upsets me. God, god, gods, whoever you believe in or don't believe in, there's so many religions and stories you can make up if you want, as long as it's your choice.

I think everyone believes in something. I have a sibling who thinks all the religion is made up and when we die that's the end. There's no soul. I said how sad I found that, until it was explained more to me and then I really could understand it. It isn't an ideology I like, but I understand it, and it's a belief he came to on his own. Whatever gets you through life. Even if it is looking at some stars and trying to feel hopeful.

 

[Tinyflame]

I have to say though, only the moments of comfort are lightning bolts, the other just seemed to be 'there'. I mean my whole life the 'relationship' seemed to be there, can't recall it not being. Hard to explain.