The Netflix documentary, The Keepers, documents the 1969 unsolved murder of Sister Cathy Cesnick, a high school English teacher. Jean Wehner, who is featured in The Keepers, was one of Sister Cathy’s students. Jean reports sexual abuse by a number of priests at this school, including the Director of Religious Studies and the School Counselor/Chaplain. Jean Wehner has now authored a book...
The most painful thing in the world is to realize that your parent doesn’t love you.~Anonymous Survivor Victims of child abuse experience complex feelings for the parents, other family members, nannies, clergy, coaches, etc., who abused or neglected them or who enabled or were passive bystanders to their abuse. These feelings often include subjective experiences of “love” and attachment. Other...
To be able to help survivors who have been victimized by coerced perpetration, those of us who support victims – therapists, clergy, loved ones, fellow survivors, etc., first need to develop a deep understanding of how torture-coerced harm works, that torture can make anyone do anything, and the kinds of “breaks” in free agency that happen in the course of torture. We need to understand all...
Drawn Swords by Jeanne Adams: Book cover Download Book PDF 255MB From the author: Drawn Swords began as a storyboard that filled my entire dining room table. My childhood trauma memories had returned by level of emotional intensity, not in chronological order. I had literally hundreds of notes scattered on that table. First I wanted a timeline that would make sense of it all. Then I wanted to...
Note from Ellen Lacter: I am so happy that Anne Redelfs, MD, has contributed this article to my website. Dr. Redelfs is a ritual abuse survivor and retired psychiatrist. She has created a healing ministry where she helps people listen deeply to their hearts and minds as inner guides to health and wholeness. She calls herself a “gardener of the soul.” Her website, anneredelfs.com, offers...
Updated May 2, 2021, with Important Contributions by an Anonymous Survivor-Colleague. Originally published October 6, 2006. Important note: This article includes some very disturbing content. Survivors may want to have a therapist, clergy-person, or other support person review it first and then discuss when it might be the right time to read it and whether to read it together. Introduction Most...
BackgroundThis presentation will discuss the treatment of victims who have done harm to other victims driven by: a) abuser coercion andthreats, b) psychological manipulation by dissociation-savvy abusers, and, c) enactments of sexual and physical abuse in dissociated states. MethodThe author, a PhD qualified Clinical Psychologist, has worked with abuse survivors since 1982 and with victims of...
Our Hopes for Our Children We wish our childhoods were filled with love and happy memories. But for many people, maybe most, our childhoods were something less. Perhaps our parents were harsh and overly critical. Perhaps we were abused in unthinkable ways. Now we have our own children. Will we make our children feel the way we felt growing up? Or will we be able to give them more love and peace...
The safety of victims and their loved ones can be increased by creating evidence packets and distributing them to trusted parties. Crime evidence held by trusted parties may safeguard victims and loved ones against being killed, disappeared, permanently disabled, etc., in order to lose or destroy all evidence. Typical evidence included inside of the sealed packets: Identifying information...
I have worked primarily with child sexual abuse since 1984, treating both child victims and adult survivors, probably about 100 of each, if I had to hazard a guess. In this time, I have learned a startling, as well as somewhat obvious, effect of child sexual abuse: Perpetrators who sexually abuse children achieve whatever response they are seeking in the child. Perpetrators have the advantage of...