Religious Trauma Counseling
While many who develop religious trauma may relate to a variety of shared experiences from commonalities in their religious background, your healing journey is your own. I will collaborate with you to develop a plan that will address your individual and unique concerns about the traumatic events you've experienced. Together, we can pinpoint your root causes of trauma, process your feelings, problem-solve for symptom relief, and empower you to move through life better equipped to show up as your authentic self.
You might benefit from religious trauma counseling if you are in and/or have left a high-controlling religious group. Religious trauma can present through numerous symptoms, some include: confusion, difficulty with critical thinking + making decisions, anxiety, depression, anger, grief, difficulty sleeping, sexual dysfunction, somatization, and the rupture of your family + social community.
While everyone's healing journey is their own, below I have outlined several focuses of religious trauma counseling I typically guide my clients through during the counseling process. Remember, healing is not a linear process. The purpose of the outline below is to highlight aspects of the counseling process we can work through together.
Focuses in Religious Trauma Counseling
Coping Skills
When we start to work together to help you find relief from religious trauma, I will help you build your personalized coping skills kit so that you will be better able to reduce the intensity of your symptoms in your daily life.
Boundaries
As you develop self-awareness, you will learn when and how to implement boundaries in your day-to-day life. Part of this work is learning to tolerate the discomfort of others' reactions to your boundaries.
Feel Your Feelings
It may be difficult for you to feel your feelings after high-control religion. You may feel disconnected or at odds with the practice of feeling your feelings as it's common for emotions to be dismissed or even vilified in fundamentalist religions. You will have the time and space to learn to feel and honor your feelings.
Vulnerability
You will learn how to show up as your authentic self, take healthy risks, and let yourself be seen in your life. Your thoughts and actions will begin to reflect your sense of worthiness instead of shame and fear.
Self-Awareness
It's common for high control religions to foster group think environments where it's difficult to think, act, and relate in ways that differentiate from the perceived group consensus of what's expected. As you develop self-awareness, you will learn to integrate your mind, body, emotions, and spirit.
Connection
You will learn to allow yourself to be deeply seen and known by the people who are most important in your life. You will learn to cultivate love, connection, and belonging with yourself, family, and friends.
Religious Trauma Counseling
Religion and spirituality can be positive and significant aspects of people's lives. Some people find profound meaning, comfort, community, and guidance in their chosen religion. For some people, religious and spiritual experiences play an important role in their mental health and holistic well-being.
For others, religion and spirituality has caused great harm. People's individual experiences with religion and spirituality can lead to a wide range of outcomes. For those who have experienced harm from religious teachings, beliefs, or systems, it can be healing to take the time to process your personal experiences with a trusted mental health professional.
It is an honor to work with clients bravely seeking help navigating the deep, internal work of healing from religious trauma. It can be a scary process to question the framework of your religious upbringing as it may be largely influential of your worldview.
Fundamentalist religions in particular, often strongly influence decision-making structures for your life, your relationship to self and others, your sense of community and belonging, and in general the way in which you move through the world and make sense of the beauty and pain we experience in life.
When we work together to help you recover from religious trauma, you will find a process that is sensitive to your individual needs and we will go at your pace. Religion often tells us how to think, what to feel (or not feel), and what to do. In our work together, you will learn to trust yourself and recover the parts of you that didn't have space or nurturance to thrive in the religious system you have been a part of. Whether you want to walk away from religion completely, want someone to sit with you in the discomfort of the unknown, or want someone to journey alongside of you as you piece together a new belief system and spiritual practice that allows you to live in your authenticity, we can partner together to reach your goals and help you experience the relief and personal growth you are looking for.