Hey Y'all

[ruby3110]

Sooo hi! I'm not very good at introducing myself and I'm super nervous around new groups but here I am! I'm a survivor, I guess, of emotional and spiritual abuse. I only really put the pieces together just under a year ago after talking with my siblings and I've spent the time since then slowly realizing more and more just how messed up my childhood was. My parents are loving but overprotective and controlling and their involvement with a fundamentalist Christian cult through about half of my childhood only made things worse.

Thankfully I'm moving out of their house to live with my oldest sister very very soon but I'm afraid getting to a safe place will just bring even more trauma crawling out of the woodwork. I'm not sure if I have CPTSD or not but...it seems highly likely. My older brother who went through the same wringer of abuse I did has CPTSD and I've been dealing with a ton of anxiety and panic attacks in the past several months.  I've been researching trauma and such more recently, stumbled across this forum, and just thought I'd reach out. Never hurts to have more community after all :>

[Roe Lee]

Hi Ruby!

Welcome to the forum! Happy to have you here

All my love,
Roe

[Deep Blue]

  Hi Ruby,
Welcome to the forum.  There are many of us that either realized their abuse later in life, or just assumed everyone else had childhoods like ours.  It was our normal so we didn't know any different.  I think you will find that the people here are understanding and many have walked similar paths as you.

[ruby3110]

Thanks for the welcome y'all!

[dur8516]

ruby,
Nice to meet you! I'm definately in the same boat as you! I have parents that are extremely caring but overprotective! I was not even allowed over anyone elses houses until I turned about 16, which can definately change someone's socialization skills. Moving out on your own will do wonders for you! It might be scary at first, I won't lie, but you develop so much as a person that you will feel refreshed even on your worst of days! Glad you have your siblings to talk to as well if you are having a bad day!

Welcome to the forum! Hope to hear from you some more!

[Erebor]

Hello Ruby, and welcome. 

My parents are loving but overprotective and controlling and their involvement with a fundamentalist Christian cult through about half of my childhood only made things worse.

I can relate. My family were involved in a Christian cult-like environment for almost as long as I could remember as a child, and the cult-like aspects in our lives continued even after we left that group.  I had one well-intentioned but somewhat controlling and overprotective parent, and one sadistic, controlling and overbearing parent (no good intentions at all).

The damage from spiritual abuse in particular seems to be a tricky beast to tackle at times.