Last week I posted two articles related to the Vienna Presbyterian Church in Vienna, Virginia. Between 2001 and 2005, as many as a dozen teenage girls may have suffered sexual, emotional and spiritual abuse from a church youth director. This year, the youth director was long gone, but church leaders felt that the wounds had not be properly addressed and healed. So a few months ago, the pastor and church issued a public apology.
Lawyers for the church’s insurance company warned the church not to accept responsibility for the failings of the youth director. Doing so, the insurance company said, would jeopardize the church’s coverage in case a lawsuit was filed.
The Vienna Presbyterian Church ignored the demands of its insurance company. On March 27, Pastor Peter James preached a sermon that acknowledged the church’s failings.
“Let me speak for a moment to our survivors,” he said. “We, as church leaders, were part of the harm in failing to extend the compassion and mercy that you needed. Some of you felt uncared for, neglected and even blamed in this church. I am truly sorry ”¦ I regret the harm this neglect has caused you.”
Guess what—so far, none of the young women has filed a lawsuit.
Why not? The case would be a slam-dunk. The youth director pleaded guilty to contributing to the delinquency of a minor. The church accepted responsibility. Several of the now young women have trouble in relationships, because they are still seeking the fantasy that the youth director promised. If they filed suit, they’d win.
My guess is that the women don’t want money. They want to be heard. They want to be validated. And they want to be healed.
Invisible damage
The problem with sociopathic entanglements is that so much of the damage is invisible. Even in cases where we lose money, jobs, homes, and are subject to physical violence, the big wounds are not readily apparent. Before all those obvious injuries occurred, the sociopaths softened us up with emotional manipulation, psychological control and spiritual abuse. These internal wounds not only eat at us, but they make it difficult for us to respond to, and recover from, the obvious physical damage.
After the sociopath, we need to purge our emotional and mental pain. We need internal stability. But when we reach out for help on this level, many of the people around us simply don’t get it.
They don’t understand why we need to talk so much about what happened. They don’t understand how, when we suspected that we were being used, we allowed it to continue. They don’t understand why we are still confused in our thoughts and emotions about the sociopath.
Get over it, they tell us.
These are the people, of course, who are lucky enough to have avoided a direct assault from a sociopath in their own lives. We often understand why they don’t really understand what happened—after all, we were once as clueless as they are. Still, their ignorance of the depth of our pain seems to increase our pain. We feel like we are not being heard, and our suffering is being invalidated.
Debriefing
Karin Huffer, in her book, the Legal Abuse Syndrome, describes this situation in detail in her chapter on “Debriefing.”
Debriefing, she says, is the first step in recovery. In the debriefing process, we tell someone exactly what happened to us, in all the painful detail. Unfortunately, it’s hard to find what Huffer describes as “quality listeners.” These are people who have the ability to hear what we have to say, overriding their own protective filters. She writes:
Protective filters are always at work. If an individual begins to share with another and the data threatens the listener’s feelings of safety, they may try to divert the data or simply not hear it at all ”¦
The function of this protective filter is to maintain the equilibrium of the listener. Victims’ stories shake the foundations that we lean upon in order to feel safe. When it is impossible for friends or family to hear, due to their protective psychological filters shielding them from vicarious pain, the victim feels rejected and alone.
Huffer goes on to describe a formal debriefing process. It’s best done with a quality listener or support group, but an individual can do it alone if necessary.
Support at Lovefraud
I believe that we have many, many quality listeners on Lovefraud. I am always amazed at the thoughtful, comforting and patient comments posted in response to readers who are spilling their traumatized guts.
The reason Lovefraud readers can do this, of course, is because we’ve all been there. We know what it’s like to be deceived, betrayed and assaulted. We know what it’s like to sit amidst the wreckage of what was once our lives. We’re all on the path to recovery, and those of us who are further along help those of us who are just beginning.
Healing, in the end, is an individual journey. To fully recover, we must consciously excavate and examine our pain, and find a way to let it go. But the process is helped immensely when we are heard and validated. I am so glad that Lovefraud offers this to so many people.
one/joy_step_at_a_time
LL_ mad as a hen and all’s well over here!
skylar
Ox, well yes, that video of the spathinator does look ALOT LIKE ME (and Charlize Theron) because I’m 6 feet tall, blonde and built like an amazon woman / super model from south Africa, but Oxy, it’s not me. She only LOOKS like me.
🙂
Louise
LL:
Thanks for your explanation; I appreciate that. Yes, I remember the Jim Jones thing. I like how you spelled out the five things that the posters (and spaths!) do that makes you believe they are spaths.
I need to say…my X spath did the pity play thing big time. I have to say he probably did that more than anything else…more than the lies or manipulation. The very first time we ever sat down and talked, the very first thing out of his mouth was….”so you heard I got in trouble?” I had not. He was talking about the DUI he had gotten five months prior. I guess he thought because he held a high position in my area that I would have heard about it, but I did not. Then came the well, I am not able to drive only to and from work because of the DUI and then he started telling me some convoluted story about his mom back in England. Anyway, as you can see, he started from the very first heartbeat with his pity play. And I wanted to fix him. Never wanted to fix anyone else in my entire life. He really messed me up.
Near
I haven’t seen one new troll yet. Maybe I’m not on enough or paying attention. :/ I have seen some old troll comments, though. This site seems to draw SOME sociopaths here, but it also seems that after they sign up they are usually gone after giving their narcissistic rants and comments. They just have to have attention and want to seem like experts. Although I have a feeling some are lurking and reading these comments. *waves*
This site is great for healing and is actually the best forum for venting and sharing stories without being labled or judged. My mom would actually do well to sign up, I think. 😛 Ox Drover made me feel welcome ON MY FIRST DAY. Many others also welcomed me, which I did not expect based off other online experiences.
Well, nighty night everybody. I’ve stayed up too late again. It’s this site’s fault! You’re all bad. 😛
Louise
skylar:
Yeah, I know…hahahaha!! She did start mirroring everyone, didn’t she?? It was so strange. That woman has some major issues. OK, so maybe we all do, but geez!!! And when she started questioning about emailing offline…sounded like she was jealous. It was all just too bizarre. Oh and the mentioning of suing by AR…crazy!!
Anyway, thanks for your info about all that. It helps me figure out what’s going on around here…
Eden
I should have stopped myself sooner, and for not doing so, I am terribly sorry. I have been reflecting on how I could have handled myself, and my reaction(s) to her reaction, differenetly. I should have thought more of others here, outside of myself, and what I was so stupidly trying to get through to her. I knew better than to engage, but I did, anyway. I know that Life is one big learning process. My parents have always reminded my sisters and I of this. Makes our mistakes a bit easier to process, handle and repair, I guess. Move forward and do things better, differently, the next time.
I am fortunate to have this place to come to, and to have you as my friends, and the hugest support system a person could ever ask for.
Much Peace… Eden
Eva
I’m still traumatized. Such an interesting conversation for a pragmatic linguistic analysis. I should have kept it as fast as possible.
Ana
Skylar,
Good morning.
Ana
Hey, I’m back in! Last night none of my comments were getting thru and now I’m back on. Goood.
Ox Drover
Ah, Eva, just wait around there will be another troll come through with a few snarky comments and you can study the linguistics of it! LOL This isn’t the last person who will come here and be inappropriate. LOL
Eden, there was a long time when I wanted to ENGAGE with every inappropriate poster here….they pushed my buttons. I realize now that the fact that they COULD push my buttons meant that I HAD WORK ON ME THAT I NEEDED TO DO. Now, very very very seldom does anyone actually push my buttons or pith me off.
I also used to get frustrated when people who were regulars here would continually break NC or do other counter productive things, but now it doesn’t bother me like it did….I am not feeling this need to rescue them, so I AM MAKING PROGRESS WITH ****MY**** healing. I am recognizing when I start to feel the “rescue urge” and I back off….I am starting to feel when a button is pushed and BACK OFF…and, when I “preach” to someone else about something, I am mostly PREACHING TO MYSELF, reinforcing my own healing behaviors and attitudes.
Sure, it feels good to be able to support and help others, but bottom line is that we must put our own healing first, and helping others in a NON enabling way is good for us, and feels good to us. The more we help ourselves the more we can help others. Plus, the better our own lives will be and the RICHER we become in peace and calm and wisdom and contentment and happiness.