Brenda - Detangling Faith

When faith has been tied to fear, performance, or control, even the word “God” can hit your nervous system like a threat.

In this deeply personal episode, I sit down with therapist and former church leader Brenda Cochran for a grounded, honest conversation about church hurt, spiritual abuse, and religious trauma—and why so many people feel anxious, ashamed, or like they’re never enough while trying to be “good” believers.

As a licensed clinical social worker, Brenda has spent more than two decades working in psychiatric care, private practice, and nearly twenty years leading a counseling ministry inside a church. Having walked alongside thousands of people navigating trauma, addiction, mental health, and faith, she brings a rare perspective to the intersection of psychology, spirituality, and whole-person healing.

Together, we unpack the continuum from painful church experiences to coercive spiritual manipulation. We explore the difference between believing something intellectually and actually feeling safe in your body. Brenda explains how early programming shapes the lens we wear, why “deconstruction” can be such a triggering word, and how deprogramming—or as I like to call it, detangling—can look like separating God from the ways people have misrepresented Him.

We also talk about spiritual bypassing, the damage caused when mental health struggles are met with platitudes instead of compassionate, trauma-informed care, and why accountability matters inside our faith communities. Along the way, I found myself unexpectedly grieving parts of my own story, making this one of the most vulnerable conversations I’ve shared on the podcast.

We go into the hard places too: what happens when spiritual authority is used inside marriage, why some people feel trapped by theology, and how curiosity, compassion, and good questions can open a door without starting a fight. We end where so much healing eventually leads—to grief. Mourning what should have been so we can embrace what still can be.

If you’re detangling your faith, questioning what you’ve been taught, or trying to separate God’s voice from the voices that wounded you, this conversation is for you.

If this episode resonates with you, subscribe to Defiance of Silence, share it with someone who needs language for what they’re carrying. 

Transcript

Safety, Breath, And Setting Intentions

Valerie 0:01

Hey everybody, welcome to Defiance of Silence, a Sacred Witness podcast. We are here today to talk about a topic that's important to me and has shaped a lot of the way that I navigate the world today. So before we begin this conversation, I do want to acknowledge something. If you have experienced church hurt, spiritual abuse, or religious trauma, there's a good chance that something in this episode will stir within you. So maybe you'll feel relief because somebody finally put words to what you've been carrying, or maybe you'll feel some grief, some anger, or just recognize that the questions that you've quietly carried for a while are valid. And what if asking questions means I'm doing something wrong? I know that fear. For years I thought that questioning what I'd been taught meant that I was questioning God. So instead of asking deeper questions, I tried harder. I prayed more, served more, memorized more. Yeah, underneath it all, I still felt really anxious and disconnected and somehow convinced that I was the problem. I know that resonates with a lot of people these days that I've been talking to. And so this conversation isn't about attacking a church or abandoning faith. It's about learning how to separate God from the way that people sometimes misrepresent him. It's about giving ourselves permission to untangle what we've inherited so we can discover what's actually true. So one thing that my guest Brenda said that stuck with me is that healing eventually leads us to grief, that all roads lead to grief. Not because grief is a destination, but because we have to mourn what should have been before we can embrace what still can be. And that was a powerful part of this conversation. So before we begin, I'd like to invite you to take one slow breath with me. Inhale deeply. And exhale really slowly. Let your shoulders soften a little bit, unclench your jaw, find your feet on the ground beneath you, and notice that in this moment you are safe. Whatever this conversation stirs within you, simply notice it with curiosity, not judgment. Take what you need and leave the rest. And now here's my conversation with Brenda.

Meeting Brenda And Starting The Talk

Valerie 2:26

Miss Brenda, welcome. Hi, how are you? Um, I'm so good. Thank you for asking. Thank you for being here. How are you? I know you just moved and you're getting used to Texas. How's that been?

SPEAKER_00 2:37

Uh, amazing. Um, I've been here for six months. I moved here a day after Christmas, threw a whole bunch of stuff in a rental SUV and drove across three states and uh landed. I've been here for six months, but I just moved into my house a week ago.

Valerie 2:56

Oh my goodness. So you're you're getting you're getting acclimated to the some first Texas summer. So welcome. Welcome to Hell. I'm sorry.

SPEAKER_00 3:03

Yeah. Well, hey, I I uh I left hell. We call it Satan's basement in Phoenix because it's 110. When I first moved to Phoenix in the early 90s, it was 123 degrees, and I had to tell my kids it's too hot to swim. Isn't that something?

Valerie 3:19

I know uh us being in Phoenix for I think I think it was a total of eight years, if I'm not mistaken, before we moved north. But we would have to go to the park really early in the morning or late, late, late, because it would the kids would be like, it's too hot. Like the slides would burn their little butts. So it just Oh yeah, it's dangerous. So coming to Texas is it's hot, but not not that. Like the dry heat thing is a total joke, and it's true. You're right. You're totally right. It's totally true. So I'm so glad that you're here to have this conversation. I've been I've been really waiting for somebody to engage in this topic in a way that is respectful and healthy. Um, and so I just really appreciate you being here. And so just to start before we dig in into the meat of this, what what drew you into this kind of work?

SPEAKER_00 4:07

Well, um, I've been around for a while. Um, so my work has evolved and changed. So I originally um became a psychotherapist in 2002. So I've been around for a while and um just my career has evolved from psychiatric social work in a psychiatric hospital to um landing in a church, also starting a private practice. So um, if I were to give you the short story, um, when I was a little kid, um I was sitting at the dinner dining room table with my godmother, and I think it must have been like 10, and I said, I just want to help people. And she goes, Well, you should be a social worker. And I was like, A social worker? What is that? And um, that's really how it all started. Um just wanted to contribute and help um disenfranchised populations, people that did not enter the world with um a full silver spoon and helping people get emancipated from poverty and different things in the environment that pull us down. So um that's pretty much how I started. I went to college um right out of high school, uh, moved to Phoenix in 1990, was a stay-at-home mom. Um, and then I went back to graduate school in the mid-90s, mid to late 90s, when my kids were a little bit older. Um, and then I launched into behavior health in 2002, working in a psychiatric hospital. So that's kind of the short story of how I got into it. And then I landed in the church, and we can we can get in that in a minute.

Valerie 5:44

Yeah. Yeah, and that's where we're going with this conversation today, in case, in case the listeners haven't figured that out yet. Um, there's a lot of terms surrounding, you know, you can call it church hurt, you can call it spiritual abuse, you can call it religious trauma. I think all of those things apply on different levels. And um so just to start, is there a difference between those things? And how do you how do you define, as a therapist, like how do you define spiritual abuse and religious trauma versus church hurt? Like, is there a difference and what does that look like?

SPEAKER_00 6:16

Oh boy, um, you just opened the Pandora's box right away, didn't you, Valerie? Sure did. Well, um I'm gonna say that spiritual abuse, religious hurt, church hurt, um, I would put it on a continuum, meaning there's different variants of hurt and abuse. And I look at a person, I'm pretty much what we call client-centered,

Why Brenda Became A Therapist

SPEAKER_00 6:40

meaning I don't I come in with an open notebook and experience, learn about that person's experience and where the misfiring occurred. Like where is it in their present, where their past has come into their present and is causing them some kind of distress in in the moment, in whatever they're doing day-to-day. Because we never know the impact. We can't just assume that because this happened with this person, that there's something wrong with them today. So we always have to be measuring and looking to make sure that there's really an impact and the severity of it. How, how, how has it disrupted their day-to-day life? So, church hurt. I work with a lot of pastors' wives and people in leadership because I've been in leadership for 19 years, seven of those years I was actually a pastor. Um, and even congregants that come into the church making assumptions about churches, um, positive, negative, and neutral. Um there's that church hurt, but then there's mistreatment and abuse by people in authority. And and oftentimes the the person walks into it vulnerable. There's some kind of vulnerability that um sets them up to not have a good radar or healthy defenses. Um, and then we move more into like cult like religious cults, like um the the biggest one, like the on the continuum, the one on the far one side cult like was that Netflix documentary with the new um the new polygamist that replaced the gentleman in jail.

Valerie 8:26

That was that was tragic to watch. It was very hard to watch.

SPEAKER_00 8:30

Very hard to watch. And and I've been following a couple of the women that have come out and they have podcasts now. And so just watching them heal and change, because there was some they grew up into this um community. And so there's been a lot of deprogramming that has to happen, which the word I use the word deprogramming a lot because we have to undo some very um in-depth beliefs that occur at a very vulnerable time in our lives, meaning zero to about 16. Our brains are not fully developed. They're not fully developed till we're like 26, uh, where we can use our own reasoning, abstract reasoning. So we learn a lot of these beliefs. Um, if we're in a spiritual environment that really get ingrained, and I use the term DNA. They get ingrained in our DNA. And it's like a lens that we wear when we look at the world. We look at ourselves in the world and relationships. So we have to work on the lens, if you will.

Valerie 9:33

Yeah. Yeah. And that I feel like for many, like for myself, I didn't realize that some of that uh religious trauma and spiritual abuse that I experienced was even that until recently, because it was just what was norm and just what was programmed, so much so that I know I even perpetuated that and repeated those things to other people. And that's been something that I've had to untangle um recently and really just look at like, what do I actually believe in? What really, how did this all come to be? Like, where did where did this happen in me and when? And um, you mentioned deprogramming, and that I think that's a great word. Do you consider that to be the same as like people saying I'm deconstructing? And I've I've had a lot of confusion personally around that word deconstructing. Like I I like to say I'm detangling, detangling all of the things because I I still am a believer. I still believe, but what I believe right now is still um being formed because I've had to strip it all away. And so I don't want to say I'm deconstructing or I'm not believing anymore. Um, so it's it gets sticky because when other people in that faith-based um sect or whatever you want to call it, you know, other Christians see that as dangerous. And and I've gotten a lot of just interesting conversations and lack of conversations, interesting ghosting and interesting, like, hey, I'm not talking to you anymore. This is, and I'm okay with it. It is, it is okay. But it's just been an interesting journey to me, which is what's prompted me to want to have this conversation, is you know, you still go through like the whole detangling in your mind of like, well, am I doing something wrong by questioning and asking these things and really stripping it down to the basics, like recently asking myself, if I never heard a church sermon in my life, if I never had anybody modeling anything for me and I only heard the gospels, if I only read Jesus' words, what would I think of him? And what would I think of all of these things? And that's taken me down a path that I can't even tell you. I can't even begin to start. That's a whole nother show, I think. But but that has really helped me to see that this detangling has needed to happen. And I wish it would have happened sooner, but it is what it is, and it's where I am now. So to circle back to the original question, is that the same as deprogramming? Is the is the deconstruction? Do you consider those the same, or am I talking about two different things?

SPEAKER_00 12:09

Uh, kind of. So I'll start with the word deconstruction. So that is a trigger word for people in leadership, like pastors and leaders. It's a trigger word because they're generally speaking, and this is my opinion, obviously, um they're they're viewing it as somebody who's turned their back on the faith. Like they're turning their back on God or something. And and so deconstruction is a big word that is actually can be a trigger word for people because they have assumptions

Church Hurt On A Continuum

SPEAKER_00 12:40

about what that is. But I've learned that the word deconstruction means different things to different people. Um I'll tell you my spin, um, I do think deconstruction is similar to deprogramming because we learn things, and you said it really well. We learn things outside of what the word of God really says. There's religious traditions, denominational traditions that go beyond what the as what the word of God says. And I have spent many hours with people that have been a Christian for many years remind them of what the salvation message is, believe it or not. And I'm not a theologian, but you know, why did Jesus come to this earth? Why did he come? Why did you need to be saved? Like some of these basic questions that we need to go back to score one. So I love how you said, what would I be like if I just read the gospels? And how would I know the Lord? Which is in essence, if you were in the jungle and somebody handed you a Bible and you had never been in a church setting, would God speak to you? Would He speak to you, or do you need all of these other people, like American Christianity is very different than Christianity in India. It's very different than Christianity in China, in in um South Africa, in you know, different parts of the world. Um, so when we say deconstruct, sometimes it's unlearning some of these things that we've learned as Christians in America. Just some of these things that even foreigners just don't understand um, you know, about the word of God and how to practice. So that's my kind of take on it.

Valerie 14:39

Yeah, I think that um it's interesting because I'll just use my own life and my husband as an example, and I'm sure he'd be fine with me sharing this. You know, I grew up in a quote unquote Christian home, right? Um, you know, all the things, purity culture, youth camps, I mean, all the things. And he did not. And so he did not start coming to church until well after we were married. And it's interesting now, because we have these conversations, and when I started having this kind of like untangling, it was kind of happening at the same time with both of us, and we were like, whoa, wait a second, what is going on? Why, why is all of this, you know, at the front of our brains now? Like, what are we trying to figure out here? And we had this conversation, and I had no idea how to allow God to show me that he loved me or to know that I was loved without some kind of performance of some sort. Like, I, even though I could say like intellectually, like, I know I don't have to perform, I know I don't have to do any of these of these things. And I'm not, please hear this the right way. I'm not blaming church necessarily, but the message is you know, the more you do, the more God blesses you, or you know, and if that's the way I chose to hear it, okay, fine. Like we can argue that all day. But the bottom line is that I had this inherent from being a little kid, like that you had to put, you know, others first, then Jesus or Jesus first, others then yourself. Like you had no say in that. And and I didn't know how to be loved or held. I knew God loved me, but I didn't know how to let him just love me without me having to do something in return. And we talk about grace and like I understand it all in my brain, like, but there was something inside that I just was like, I don't know how to just let that be. And I would go to uh counseling or retreats and all the things, and I would get that emotional fuzzies about it and be like, oh yes, okay, yeah, I'm feeling that that God loves me, but it wasn't like ingrained, like you said, that DNA, like that fixed way of being was just programmed that way that I ultimately had to perform in some kind of way. Where my husband doesn't have that, and he's like, he he's so free, and he's like, Yeah, no, I mean, he just loves me. Like, and he's so close to God, and he has he has these like straight up mystical experiences almost when he encounters God. And I'm like, Well, what the heck? I've taken the notes, I've read the book, I did the podcast, I, you know, like so that's where it left me, like, hmm, there's something to this because he wasn't all tangled up in that, he didn't have all that religious junk hanging on. He just got like, that's not what the Bible says, that's not what Jesus says. Like, hmm, maybe he doesn't say that. So it just really kind of came to a head, and I started asking friends, like, what do you think about this? And so it just tumbled out into this converse, bigger conversation of like, if you're deconstructing, are you sinning? Are you going against God? Like, I'm not turning my back on God at all. I'm actually turning towards him in this because I'm trying to weave through all of these things. So that was a lot of words just to say, but I think that when you grow up with a certain idea of how it's supposed to be, it's really hard to break away from that. So I I send love and encouragement to anybody who's trying to detangle or deprogram or deconstruct those things now because I think it's the blessed best place I can be in because I'm open and willing to hear and look differently at what's not working, because there's so much hurt that's happening. And now that I'm aware to it, it almost makes my stomach turn when I hear things that people say. And I'm like, ooh. And that's so sticky because I'm not making churches wrong or ministers wrong or pastors wrong. It's so individual. But how, if it's so prevalent, like how do we how do we deal with that? Like, what do you say to somebody who's like, okay, I want to be part of a church community, but every time I go in the doors of XYZ, it depends where you live too, I think, you know, living in the South or living, you know, it depends. But how do you make sense of church after church walking in and hearing these things and knowing that it's not right? Like what what does a Christian do with themselves when they can't find community?

SPEAKER_00 19:08

Well, um I'm gonna back up a little bit on the deconstruction and then we'll jump into that. Um, what you described very well, Valerie, is what we call a paradox, what I call a paradox, where we have two conflicting parts of ourself that oppose each other. So you use the word rational, like I know the rules, I know what's the truth, I know that this is wrong, I know this, that's your rational brain, that's your adult brain going using wisdom, right? But then there's this paradox where you use the word untangle. So we have to untangle these other, I do a internal family system. So we have these different parts of self that learned these spiritual teachings when our brain wasn't fully developed. And so that's the DNA, that's the imprint. So we go through life learning once we grab onto abstract reasoning, because you said it, you go, I just started questioning with my friends. So that's abstract reasoning, but you're challenging your own self,

Deconstruction Versus Deprogramming

SPEAKER_00 20:10

right? You're you're you're going, wait a minute. And it happens very can for some people very subtly where I don't know what I believe. And so if there's if we're gonna use psychology or developmental psychology, we are all to separate become individuals and be a different person than our family of origin, right? We have to separate, figure out who we are, and become different. We have to form our own belief system. But many of us don't know that we have to do that. We just keep chugging along on the train of what we've been taught, what we believe, until we hit a glitch or we hit something or something happens to us and we start thinking independently, like why do I always feel guilt? Why do I always feel shame? Why do I always feel like I'm not good enough? So we start having this paradox and this conflict with this other part of ourselves. So we can, and I'll segue into your question. So we can go into a church and attracted to that church because those other parts of ourselves feel very comfortable there. But then we start seeing things that wait a minute, wait a minute, this doesn't add up. Um, and then we start challenging what's happening, meaning abstract reasoning. And that can go wonky. Having worked in a church, I've seen both sides of the tracks. I've seen people come in and rage at pastors and leaders, me being one of them, where I would speak on stage and I would have congregants come up to me and point their finger and yell at me. That would be one side, like, how dare you say that because this, this, and this, and this. But then you have the the silent people that sit in the pews and not in the congregation and not. Say anything. So um there's a challenge we when when something starts happen when something happens to us in church, we start challenging what we believe. Like why are they saying it doesn't make sense? And then we start differentiating ourselves, meaning I don't know if I believe that anymore. I don't know if that's because I'm not, you know, from the first conversation, I'm not feeling that peace that the word of God promises, or there's a conflict in what we're seeing and what we know. So we have to start. I loved your word detangling. I might have to steal that. Because we have to start, I I use the pie chart, like we have to put a pie chart, detangle, we have to separate it. Like, okay, I know God loves the church, right? But how do I navigate conflict with what they're teaching with what I know? That makes sense. And still stay connected to God, your relationship with God, which is very personal and intimate.

Valerie 23:07

Yeah. And I think for myself, I shouldn't say I think, I know for myself, um, that the question started coming up when I was saying, okay, I'm anxious, I'm depressed, I'm, you know, whatever's going on with me. And I'm applying the word of God and I'm posting scriptures all over my house. And at one point I think I had a scripture on every cabinet door in my home. Anybody that knows me that been to my house saw them. Um, and I and I memorized and I did all the things, but I still felt that way. And I would express this. I felt I was being honest and true, and I would express this in a way like, you know, let's just use an example of like a women's group. Okay, this is what I'm experiencing. And it was always pointed somehow back to uh you have some bitterness somewhere you're not dealing with, or you have unforgiveness, or you have, you know, um some kind of root of some kind of spiritual attack against you. And what I came to realize was that it was all things that happened developmentally that was just my nervous system. I wasn't doing anything wrong. And so I spent so many years feeling like I, so I stopped saying like I'm anxious or I'm depressed or I'm these things, which I know now, like I've changed that language anyways. But at that time, that's what I was saying. Like now I can say, Oh, I'm experiencing some anxiety. But at the time it was like, I'm so anxious, you know, how about me? And and I remember meeting you for the first time, and you said, Do you know what codependency is? I'm like, no. And you gave me a book to read, and I was like, How did she know?

SPEAKER_01 24:48

We're all codependence in some way.

Valerie 24:50

Yeah. So that was like the very beginning of me realizing, like, oh, there's something here. And that was 20 years ago, you know? So that's how long I've been on this journey to figure out and untangle this stuff. But but I would go to these groups and these these women were well-meaning and saying, like, well, let we're gonna just pray this out or be anxious for nothing. Okay, so if I'm anxious for nothing, but yeah, I am still feeling anxious, then what am I doing wrong? And I would be, I would be confessing to God things that I didn't that I know now is not something I need to confess because I was it wasn't wrong. It was my God-given nervous system trying to get my attention that, hey, there's some things buried here that need to be brought to the light and be shared and and be um witnessed properly and also off the loop because we have a nervous system. But growing up where you didn't go to counselors and you didn't take antidepressants and you didn't do those things. Um, a lot of people that I have met have expressed that same um, like as Christians, like, well, and they had to justify to me, well, I'm gonna take this medication or I'm gonna, I'm gonna go to counseling. And I'm like, something feels so wrong with this. Like, this is it's okay for you to do that. And where did we pick up that we couldn't? And so that really started all of that. Um, and I just have found it to be so freeing to realize, like, okay, God created this nervous system, so I'm allowed to listen to it. And and let's let's use science and let's use psychology to figure out how to get these things moved through and live so we can live fully expressed and fully free with the gifts that he's given us.

SPEAKER_00 26:33

Um and that's so that's so blasphemous that you say that, Valerie. I say that tongue in cheek because

Anxiety, Shame, And Spiritual Platitudes

SPEAKER_00 26:40

no, true. And this this is not knocking the church, but oftentimes the church has well-intentioned people that have somebody sitting in front of them and the only resource that they have is to apply some type of spiritual principle because it's they don't know what else to do because there's a lack of understanding or lack of education. And and it's we can only look at things through a spiritual lens. And and even as you said, those things that the people would tell you, I would tell my clients, okay, that's a spiritual platitude that they don't know what to say. So they're saying this platitude because they've only got this toolbox with like five things and and they they mean well, but they don't understand the whole person. So you're talking about the rational brain, the emotional brain, and the somatic brain. I call them the three brains. So you're you're talking about felt sense. Your nervous system is a felt sense of safety. So if somebody's, you know, if we come in with this paradox of parts of self where we have this childlike knowledge, we automatically submit to somebody who's in leadership. And when there's God in the picture, it raises the bar. Right. So if somebody's representing God and they tell you the spiritual platitude, we we have this these child parts of us, these immature parts of us that automatically with vulnerability believe what they have to say is gospel truth because they're they're close to God. They are in leadership, therefore I must believe everything they say is truth. We walk out the door feeling shame, guilt, emptiness, uh, conflict, conflicted, you know, and and we don't use our adult brain to be able to have a filter inside of the church. Like uh slow the words down, keep them out here, and then you take it to the to God because scripture says the to the veil has been torn. We have direct access to the Holy Spirit and revelation through him. We don't need anybody else. I mean, the church is there to guide us, to, to have discipleship, to learn, to grow. But we take things back to the Father and we ask him. And we the more we connect with him, the more the revelation will be directed to us specifically for our unique self, because he knows us like the, he knows the numbers of hairs on our head. So he knows us better than we know ourselves. So there's a there's a disconnect that happens there where we automatically believe because God is in the church and they're in leadership, and we we we mustn't challenge, but the Bible is very clear about taking things to him. And sometimes the church doesn't like that. They get defensive because they and I'm speaking very general because there's a lot of churches that aren't like this. Sure, right. But there's they want you to stay in a very narrow lane, and that can be very difficult for people that have childhood trauma, addiction, um, you know, addiction being called a sin, um, you know, sexual abuse, just some of the archaic beliefs around it. But I will say there's many churches that are uh really coming on board and educating themselves about addiction, mental illness, and childhood trauma. Yeah. They're more sensitive to it, but there's a long ways to go. There's a lot of churches that are very closed to that whole person approach, which is what you talked about, you know?

Valerie 30:12

Yeah, and I would I would agree with that statement in my experience, my limited experience. I mean, I'm not a professional in that sense, but I have been in the church for a long time, and I've had to go through a healing journey inside and now outside of a church. And the amount of healing and it breaks my heart, almost makes me tear up to say it. Like the amount of healing that I've received outside of church has been much more profound than what I received inside. And that kills me to even say that out loud because I don't think it has to be that way. And unfortunately for me, I maybe just didn't find those communities that are doing that. Like you said, there is a long way to go. And I think there is hope for that, that that can happen with people like yourself that are willing to blend that area. I mean, you've spent a couple of decades leading and counseling within a church setting and outside of a church setting. And um, what did that experience teach you about people and faith and and were there tensions that you experienced in in having both of those worlds together?

SPEAKER_00 31:15

Well, um, when I first started working at the church uh way back in 2005, I don't remember, but I sat down the the head pastor, um, head pastor of the church left. And then this new pastor who was very young took over the church. And he was, I was his first hire. Um, I was still working in the psychiatric hospital part-time, and I was gonna start working at the church part-time. And I sat down with him and I said, I need to know your position on this. I need to know your position on this or this. And we were in complete alignment on these these specific, you know, abuse, divorce, addiction. And my pastor, um, he said if he wouldn't have been a pastor, he would have been a counselor. So he has um, he's able to think outside the box. He is an outside of the box thinker, and he has uh he has received tremendous pushback because he's open to healing from addiction from a whole person perspective. So I was fortunate that he let me fly. He let me do whatever I wanted to do to create a healing whole person center on the property of a church, which that's exactly what I did. Um, and we even had trauma conferences, and I mean, I could go, I could go on and on, but I the church that I went to was very rare because our one of our missions was to help other churches become educated on trauma, mental illness, and addiction. And many churches are very closed, but there are churches that are very open. So I was fortunate. I didn't get a lot of pushback from the head pastor. Um, pushback came from other pastors in the church and other parishioners or congregants that didn't understand um whole per I call it whole person healing, meaning, you know, the three brains, emotional brain, somatic brain, and rational brain, like health, nutrition, you know, healthy lifestyle, um, things outside, combining spiritual, spiritual principles with these other nervous system, as you say. Um, there's a lot of pushback. Um, five, five paragraph emails about stuff that I was doing. Um, okay, here all a vulnerable moment here. I kid you not. The first year that I was at the church, I was accused of practicing witchcraft.

Valerie 33:42

Oh my gosh.

SPEAKER_00 33:43

So I had a group of ladies in the corner of the church praying me, trying to pray me out of the church.

SPEAKER_01 33:52

My gosh.

SPEAKER_00 33:53

Because they believed that I was practicing witchcraft because I was a licensed therapist and you know, I was bringing, ushering the devil into the church. Um but but thank the Lord that my head, because it it really takes your head pastor to have your back and know that he has your back, and he had my back. And the woman that was spearheading that ended up leaving, was asked to leave the church, turn over her keys. She was in leadership, turn over her keys, and eventually had left. Um, but there's pushback for sure within the church. So that um, you know, I don't know if I answered your question, but having the head pastor have my back is was key. It really was.

Valerie 34:35

That's amazing. And I know you did a lot of amazing work there. And I was able, even after we moved away, I was still able to follow some of the things. And I know I benefited from that ministry that was started there. So I I certainly eternally grateful for that. Um, but the story that I'm telling is so common. A lot of people say, Well, I feel this way, X, Y, Z, and they you come back with the platitudes. I want to circle back to that because you did mention that. And it's these are all nice things to say. These are all beautiful things to say to someone until they're actually hurting. And then it's a mean thing to say, I've I've discovered. And and I have to own the fact that I've repeated those things too, because I don't know what to say. And so you just say what was said to you. And I'm sitting here saying, Well, you're not supposed to be anxious for anything, so-and-so, like, Miss Amanda, you're not supposed to, you know. And here I am doing the exact same thing that I felt was damaging to me. And so when I had that realization, it was like, oh my gosh, this like adds another layer to um kind of that

Whole Person Healing Inside Church Walls

Valerie 35:40

shame and guilt and all the things that you're feeling when you're trying to untangle this stuff. And what I found in that season, um, I don't know if it was a podcast or what, because I I had limited myself to only listening to Christian this, Christian that. I didn't listen to anything secular and I didn't read any, God forbid, I read a book that was outside of like a Christian author that lined up with, you know. And if I was reading something, it was questioned, like, why are you reading that? And I started to put together, like, well, now I'm questioning you. So you're going to say that this is not, you know, good for me. And I went through a really dark season of like, well, maybe, maybe I am not a Christian, then this is, but I could never reconcile that. Like I could, I could not say that. But I was getting so close to it and it was scaring me that, like, if this is how the people are going to treat somebody who's in pain, I I can't be part of that. You know, how do I sit around this? Yes, yes, 100%. And what I realized is that in listening to this particular podcast, I heard the word spiritual bypassing, and I was like, well, what is that? And I tell you what, figuring out what that was, it was like somebody just took a key and unlocked all of it because then I had language and understanding for why I felt like I was healing, but really it was just band-aids. And I'm like, if God really healed me deep down, why did it feel like it was just a band-aid? But it was because, you know, mind, body, spirit, it wasn't all connected. I didn't do it all in that way. And so over the past several years, as I've talked with people, just on the daily and just in my life and people around, um, I find that that spiritual bypassing part is really hard for me to wake up from. And I you couldn't have convinced me otherwise either, because there was something in me that would there was like this little bit of fear, and I know what it is now, a fear that would say, Well, what if you're wrong? What if there, what if all of this is wrong and you're doing something that's, you know, um, blaspheming God because you're getting into these things.

SPEAKER_00 37:49

Then what though? Then what? Yeah, then what? What if you blaspheme, then what? Because I mean, that's this narrow lane. So what you're talking about is is so real as far as how people turn their backs on God and even take their own lives because it's such a personal thing. And what you're talking about is um, if I don't stay in this narrow lane, I'm going to be banished to outer darkness and I'm going to lose my salvation. So we have to go back to our theology. If I read a book, if I shop at Albertsons because it's a non-Christian, like legalistic, like I can't shop there because of this, and I can't do this because of that, and I can't, because if I do, I will lose my salvation. So we have to go back to the basics. And I think that's what you that that fear. You are afraid that if I did anything outside of this narrow lane, that the worst thing that could ever, I'm going to blaspheme the Holy Spirit. So we have to go back to theology and unpack that. There's a lot of churches that have used that scripture to control and manipulate people instead of its intended uh interpretation. It's intent what that scripture was intended for. Does that make sense?

Valerie 39:08

Yeah, totally. And that's and that's something that was so hard to wrap my head around because I didn't have anyone at that time that was willing to have these conversations. But what I could find on the internet or wherever were people that were like, you talk about a continuum, they're way on this other side deconstructing like Christianity as BS and blah, blah, blah. And then I wasn't finding anybody down like that middle, like, let's just be real here, what is actually happening. And since then, I have seen a whole lot more come out, and it's it's been really beautiful to see. Um, but I feel like all of that was kind of coming around at the same time that I was trying to figure it out, and things were very, very dark. And like you said, I mean, unfortunately, people do get um in such a de desperate space where they're coming to the church or to a recovery program within a church. And God bless recovery programs within a church. I I attended one myself. Do I have a little bit of a racket with some of the things that went on in there? Yes. But overall, um, it was good for me. And it was it was good for me to start asking the questions. And um, I totally lost where I was going with that. I think I was trying to arrive to the point of um, it got so dark that people come to these things and they're they're suicidal, or they're or they're not gonna admit it like me. I was suicidal, but I was terrified to even tell anyone that. And or I would have never done it in my mind because that was an unpardonable sin. Like I wasn't gonna risk what could happen to me. So instead, I was just gonna be the walking dead. And that's that's the part that breaks my heart now, is is is the pain that a lot of people carry because they don't understand how they are loved and that they are love and you can't hear it or see it because of the guilt and shame, and the the church isn't helping in a lot of areas. It's not helping them. I felt more shame sitting inside the church than I ever have outside. And one could argue, well, that's because you're living in sin now. Like, I mean, I've heard it all, and and I'm like, actually, I feel sorry for you because I think you're the one that's bound up. Like, this is not, you know, and that can go down a bunch of different paths. We could take that talking about different things. But when somebody comes to you or someone in ministry, what does the church need to do differently to get it right for them? The church?

SPEAKER_00 41:41

Maybe I should rephrase that quite. You know, I think that um just how how I've had to learn to be a good therapist is I always have to evaluate myself after each session. Did I do the right thing? Am I making a difference? Is there something about me that I need to grow and change to be a better clinician? And I think that's what's generally speaking, um, there's a lot of old couches in churches where we've done the same thing for so many years. We can't get rid of that old couch. But if I think if people were more cute come curious about their own growth and changing the old couch, meaning start to look at things differently and look at people differently and their experiences differently, um, one pastor or one leader at a time to learn new things. Um I think it that's the first place to start, meaning stretching your tent stakes, as they say in the Old Testament, like widening, widening your your lane, um, looking at getting feedback. Um, and we could have a whole nother podcast on accountability in the church. There isn't a lot of accountability, so people get in these lanes and they aren't challenged and they're not called out for some of the abuses and things that they tell people when people are vulnerable. So, you know, I say that God has entrusted somebody else's soul with me. That's a somber thing.

Valerie 43:17

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 43:17

When when somebody's soul is presented before you and they are telling you some very vulnerable things, and you respond out of ignorance and you're not examining yourself like I if this is out of my scope, um, that's where the damage can occur.

SPEAKER_01 43:38

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 43:38

You know, where somebody's vulnerable and they've allowed themselves to come to you, come to a leader and say, Um, I need your help, and then they come back with you know, you just need more faith. You just need to stop doing that behavior. You just need more, if you have more faith, you'll be able to overcome this, and then they Walk away feeling less more distant from God, like there must be something wrong with me because I don't have enough faith. So it's it's widening that out and looking at when you say these spiritual principles to people, they may not have the capacity to understand what you mean.

Valerie 44:17

Yeah, that's a good point. That's a good point. So that could be internalized and interpreted any any kind of way along the spectrum of like, well, I'm just the biggest piece of crap ever, you know. That's why that's how I heard that. You know, there's many times that that's the case. Like for me, I was literally asking God, who, who else do I need to forgive? What I've forgiven, like, why is this happening? And I was in such a panic that like I was forgiving the neighbor for whatever. I mean, just anything I could think of because I was trying to unburden

Spiritual Bypassing And Fear Of Blasphemy

Valerie 44:50

myself of like the feelings that I was having and didn't realize that I needed to just embody those. And actually, I don't think I was feeling anything from the neck down because I was so disconnected and everything was over spiritualized. And I feel like spiritual pain, I didn't have language for it at the time, but that is probably the most agonizing pain you can be in, um, at least in my opinion, because there it makes so many questions, and you have more questions than answers. And maybe that's just the powers in the question. And I've heard that quote a million times, but when I started questioning those things, um I started seeing like, okay, if I'm really experiencing God and and peace, and he brought me that peace and that healing and that wholeness through people who I entrusted my soul with to help me. And I've made a good choice with that, and I was witnessed, and that's how this whole podcast came to be, because I learned that drama needs the right witness, first of all. And to be able to be witnessed and loved and cared for and not judged, and to be able to say the thing that's under the thing and be received with love and caring, like those were the hands and feet of Jesus that met me in that place. And I didn't find it inside of the four walls of of the church that I was attending at the time, and not making anybody wrong for anything, anything in in regards to that. I don't think there was intentional harm, but I know that in a lot of cases there have been. And I think it's really, really important for people to understand that if they're experiencing something that doesn't seem right, then it's probably not right. And it's okay to question those things. And what do you think happens? I know I'm shifting gears kind of quickly here, but I've been thinking about this. What do you think happens when someone's experience of God um becomes intertwined with the actions of the people who've harmed them, like leadership or or even like parents or spouses? Like, how does somebody untangle that part when you're I let's just let's just use like an abusive marriage as an example, just to be very clear. So you've got, say, a husband and this spiritual authority, I'm the man of the house, I'm the authority here, and that's in direct opposition to what we know as of God. So how does somebody recognize we're in their in a situation like that? I've seen time and time again where those things are happening and the spouse is going, Well, I'm gonna betray God, or I'm gonna, you know, it's gonna be wrong if I get a divorce, or um like those are some of the biggest areas when I talk with women that they get the most tangled up with as far as spiritual um abuse and questioning things.

SPEAKER_00 47:47

It's usually with the spouse, not necessarily church leadership always, but yeah, church leadership is easy, but spouse is a whole whole nother game. Like, cause you can set boundaries with church leadership and you know, because they're distant, they're over here. Um, but when it's in your own home, um I would say 30% of my caseload is women who have um spiritually manipulative, abusive marriages. And, you know, how you came into detangling much later in life, and you were probably married and had kids. The same thing happens with these women. They they're in these marriages and they start differentiating and figuring things out and learning to think for themselves, and they realize that they're in a home, that they're being mistreated. A lot of times people don't know it till they actually have something happen where wait a minute, this is getting worse. There's something not right. They listen to a podcast, they listen to uh your podcast. And like, wait a minute, yeah. Well, but what happens is there's a witness that happens in them that makes them curious and they're drawn to it. So they're like, okay, something's wrong. And it's it's difficult because every marriage is different, every situation is different. But I do work with a lot of women whose husbands use the spiritual authority card, and then they have to start coming against it. They have not coming against, but they have to start navigating how are they gonna, how are they gonna um respond and stay in the marriage? And it's there's a l I don't like to use the N-word, and I when I say the N-word, I mean narcissism because it's an overused word right now. Like anytime somebody doesn't like something that their husband do does, they call him a narcissist.

SPEAKER_01 49:36

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 49:37

Um, but there's some very self-centered, undifferentiated spouses who need to have control over their wife because they're not differentiated, meaning they're that person that's closest to them is an extension of their own insecurities. Yeah. And then let's just throw spirituality on the table. So we take these spiritual principles and twist them to control this person. So um, you know, Leslie Vernick is a phenomenal, well-known uh marriage uh expert with these kinds of marriages. Um I would, if anybody's in this that's listening, I would recommend going to her first. And then there's a lot of great resources on how to respond to your spouse because you you each situation is so different. Like the 30% of my client load, a lot of women have such a strong relationship with the Lord themselves that they have a barrier between him and them. And they're they're not physically abusive, they're spiritually abusive, which you can set barriers if they're not escalating in any way that's more damaging. They can still stay in the marriage, but be so grounded in their own relationship with the Lord that they're able to survive.

Valerie 51:00

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 51:00

But then there's other marriages where the it escalates, and the more the woman pushes back, the more the worse that person becomes, becomes more controlling. And then we move into more physical abuse, emotional, financial abuse, which I've had clients that they've had to leave in the middle of the night because it kept escalating. It started out as the spiritual head of the household, but then it escalated. So there's each situation is is different on how the woman wants to proceed in the relationship.

Valerie 51:33

Yeah, I think that that's that could be a whole nother podcast. I have a guest coming on, coming on later this this season that I'm looking forward to you all hearing. And she has written a book about this in her own journey and leaving a spiritually abusive marriage. And she's um, I'm excited and hope that that will help help some people who might be stuck with that too. But that's what made me ask that question is is hearing some of her story and just thinking, like, wow, um, I'm fortunate for fortunate for me, that's not something that I've had to walk through, but I do have many close to me that have, and it's it's just added to my detangling of like, man, so this is, you know, and you can't shake people awake, you can't make them see what's happening until they start questioning for themselves, like, you know, they they have to figure that out. And that that's something that um I think many times I've heard women say, Yeah, I went to my pastor and they told me we need to have sex more. Or I went to my pastor and they told me, you know, and you're shaking your head because yeah, people say that, and it to me it's like appalling

Spiritually Abusive Marriages And Control

Valerie 52:40

that that's the advice and that's the answer is, well, you need to be doing these, and it's always on that woman, like you need to be doing this and you need to be doing that, but what are you doing wrong? And and thankfully for me, I've not experienced those types of um, you know, leadership counselings or whatever, but I have heard it and read it and seen what it does firsthand, and it just makes me it just makes my heart hurt that women are suffering with that.

SPEAKER_00 53:09

And men, it's not just, you know, there's there's men that are females and female messages are they're they're pretty there too.

Valerie 53:17

So it's not um not something that is easily solved in one possible.

SPEAKER_00 53:23

Well, and women, you know, the women that come from the perfect Christian home, like you did, they um they get married, they go to Bible college, they get married, and they have children and they're uneducated. In 15, 20 years in the marriage, they find out they're being spiritually abused. They have no education, they have no support, they have no family, they have no way to get out. That is more of a real issue. Um, women that can't, they'd have no place to go because they did the, they did what they thought was the right thing to do by getting married young, having, and I'm I'm not saying this is wrong. Right. Um, but people change in marriages. Like they change and evolve, and 15 years down the road, here's this woman with four children, uneducated, no family. And how do you navigate that one? And we live in an economy that you can't live on minimum wage and pay for child care, and you know, it's just not possible without support or a place to live, like community house, some kind of, you know, sibling where they can move in with. And even then the the it's really hard for them to get out of it.

Valerie 54:35

Yeah. And I think for a lot of people that I have talked to, um, they just choose to stay because it's easier in that regard. But it's like you're just abandoning yourself over and over and over. And self-abandonment, that's also could be a whole nother conversation. But that self-abandonment really is um, it's a real thing. And every time I know for myself, when I abandon myself in whatever situation, it just adds even more guilt and shame onto, you know, because I can't get it together now, you know. And so as just a normal person walking around in life, how how do you how do you encounter somebody? I mean, like take your therapist hat off for a second and say, like, you encounter somebody in in the grocery store or maybe a new friend and you and you start having these conversations, and you're talking about untangling these things. Like, what's a practical way to explain that to somebody if they're maybe facing some opposition and being questioned on why they're not believing or whatever? Like, is there is there a common phrase or way to like handle those conversations without making yourself yourself feel like you're, you know, you're being gaslit in some kind of way that you walk away thinking, like, oh, am I doing something wrong?

SPEAKER_00 55:54

Like, is there a like how to be a friend to somebody that you see is in a destructive relationship? Like, how do you form the form that relationship? Or is that what you're saying?

Valerie 56:04

I guess I'm saying, like, how do you have that conversation with somebody, not even just about a relationship, about themselves? Like for me, I would handle a conversation with somebody differently now than I would have 10 years ago that was saying, like, hey, I'm questioning God and I'm questioning, I'm thinking of deconstructing like all of these things. What's like a normal response to that? Because I've received many different responses, and I never know how to respond to anyone either. I'm like, I'm a little too edgy to be your Christian friend, but I'm not quite, you know, like I don't know where that, where I fit in that. And I maybe I don't even know what I'm saying, but in a personality personality plays a lot to a lot with how you're gonna respond to somebody.

SPEAKER_00 56:42

Yes.

Valerie 56:42

Yes, but in a normal dialogue with somebody, just say a casual conversation and you're talking about maybe you're talking with another Christian who is not awake to these things and is not questioning these things, how how do you have that conversation without it turning into an argument?

SPEAKER_00 57:00

Well, if somebody's exposing something about their marriage that you keep key key in on, you pick up on, um, and they're just exposing it, meaning they're not just they're in a pick they're in a two-paragraph conversation with you, and then they they expose something about the relationship. Um, if we're coming at that person with compassion and uh not judgment, we're we're compassionate and we're not judgmental, we're curious. So we shouldn't come to people like that with an agenda, like, oh, I need to get them to see that they're in an abusive. I think curiosity and compassion and connection are the foundational principles. If a person's in a grocery store, if it's somebody you're just meeting, a stranger. Um, you know, you you want to get to know them and get to know their story before you come at them to point out something, because we would be doing the same thing that the, you know, the the religious abusers are. Well, here's what you need to do, and you need to leave, and you need to do that. And and and self-awareness is key in your own personal growth as far as how you come across to people. Um, if you're not cute, curious and compassionate and use of questions, um it's not gonna go anywhere because they need connection and compassion before they need correction or defining, you know, unless obviously if they're in a physically a dangerous, dangerous situation, you definitely, my opinion, you want to be direct, like you're in a physically abusive situation, and they probably already know it. Right. Um, but what can I do to support you? Um, what do we need to do? Here's my number. Um, let's make a plan, you know, something that's more physically abusive. But uh, I would say compassion, curiosity, and question just use of question, meaning get to know them, let them know their story more. Like, did you really? Um, you said not to put my therapist hat on, but if you go to just just research motivational interviewing. So it's really just use of question, like getting to know by asking questions, it brings can bring self-awareness to their situation. Like your mirror back some things that they're saying, um, to help them kind of have self-awareness on their own without you being direct, like, you know, do you know that your husband's a narcissist? Or something? You know, they're gonna shut down really quick.

Valerie 59:33

Yeah. Yeah. I think that's beautiful. And and I ask that a lot is how can I best support you? And you know what the answer I get most of the time is I have no idea. Most of the time they say I have no idea.

SPEAKER_00 59:44

Let's talk more. Let's talk more. It's like, let's sit down or talk more about that. Because that's an open invitation. When they say I have no idea. It's like, would you like to talk more about it? I'd love to, I'd love to figure something out or walk alongside you.

Valerie 59:58

Yeah. Yeah. And it's important if you're on the receiving end of that to obviously safe people. I mean, that's a whole different conversation. You know, you can't just walk around telling everybody all your things, but when you can find a safe person that genuinely is meeting you with curiosity and compassion and um wants to walk alongside you, it's okay to allow that. And it takes as long as it takes. Like you're nothing's going to be solved overnight, is something that, you know, I'm still detangling a lot of things. And the people that have walked alongside me during that process have asked nothing of me. And I've really appreciated that. And I'm hoping that in my own personal life I can do the same for others because I know there's times that I didn't. And there were people that went before me that were kind of detangling things, and I was like looking at them sideways, like, are you sure you should be doing that? And now I realized I was coming from that place too. So I totally get it.

How To Talk Without Turning It Into A Fight

Valerie 1:00:50

And I look back now and I go, Oh, they knew something I didn't. They definitely knew something I didn't. And now I can go back to those people and have conversations and say, So now that I'm on this path right behind you, can you give me some insights? Like, what have you found? You know, and so it's really important from a witnessing aspect to be able to for me to silence myself enough to witness and not judge and not try to fix. And that's where that whole codependency stuff comes in, and and really just realizing it's not my responsibility to fix or carry any of this for somebody else. But I can be compassionate and and truly feel for them and feel for their situation without having to fix it. And I think that's really important for people to understand too. So walking through as we get ready to wrap up here, I do have one more thing I wanted to ask your thoughts on, is you know, and part of healing and going through any kind of abuse and overcoming anything is is grief. Like how what do you feel the role of grief is? Um, how does that play in with religious trauma? Is that is that something that I mean, I just I haven't heard people talk much about finding grief there. And and through my own journey, I I think I've sidelined, kind of skipped past the grief of that, um, because I found so much other grief in other areas that I've needed to mourn. And so now really looking at, like I said in the beginning, I asked myself the question if I'd never heard a sermon in my life or was never told anything, what do I see in Jesus and what do I see in his words? And it does re I realize there's some grief there. Like, oof, I think there's some grief there because I missed out on developing the relationship with him that like I'm so jealous of that my husband has because he didn't have all of that stuff, you know. So that pure relationship, and and I would hear people say over and over, like, oh, I just fell in love with the Lord all over again, and I never could understand that. Um, so I feel like there's some grief there that I've touched of like what and it sounds silly to say, but like what I didn't get, but I still had Jesus. Like it's weird to even say that out loud. Like, yes, he's always been there, but things got so confusing and so muddy that I'm just wondering if that's grief that I'm finding, or is that even a thing? Like, is there grief associated with religious trauma?

SPEAKER_00 1:03:28

Well, yes. It so when we when we go on with a wider lens, you know, we've got religious trauma, but we just talk about trauma or things that happen to us that wasn't supposed to happen to us. So when things happen to us that aren't supposed to happen to us, we adapt and protect. We adapt and protect ourselves. These are natural mechanisms that are God made. We naturally adapt, we naturally protect. So we start protecting and adapting and morphing through life to survive, to navigate the world. Sometimes we emotionally shut down. Like I use the concept three brains. We have a rational brain, emotional brain, and somatic brain. So when we adapt and protect, sometimes we get very disconnected. We live in our rational brain, or we live only in our emotional brain, or we live in our somatic brain. But none of them are talking to each other, but they're supposed to talk to each other. So what you just tapped into, when we talk about grief, grief is the foundation, it's the pot at the end of the it's the pot of gold at the end of the rainbow. It's where we all roads lead to grief. All roads lead to loss. But the problem is we are so adapted and so protected that we can't get to the grief. We're angry, we're anxious, we're depressed, we're busy, we're we disassociate, we detach, we medicate, and just talk to somebody who's in recovery from an addiction, you know, or trauma. We have to get to those more complex emotions to heal. The the grief is grieving what should have been that never will be.

Valerie 1:05:18

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 1:05:19

Never will be. We lost that time that we should have been loved, we should have been protected, we should have been talked taught correctly. It's the should's. I should have had this happen to me, but I didn't. And feeling that emotion and allowing that emotion to come out because it's a very ugly emotion that is really hard for high functioning people, well protected, well defended people to get in touch with. So it is it is the cornerstone of healing for trauma survivors, for religious abuse, being mistreated, mistaught, um, walking around. This world for 30 years, women that have been in 30 year abusive marriages, grieving 30 years of their life. You know what I mean? And and the gr behind the grief is the healing. It's it's learning to let go. And you use the word integration before we were online. We have to integrate our past into our present and reconcile it. And grief is that one of those pathways that reconciles the past with the present, letting go and accepting. But we can't accept until we grieve.

Valerie 1:06:33

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 1:06:34

We have to grieve, and it comes in waves, it comes at random times, you know. Yep, we don't get to say.

Valerie 1:06:41

And that that's the part. I'm like, yeah, I thought I've I thought I've worked through all of this grief. And as you could see earlier, like it brought me to tears a little bit, like still finding some of that that I thought um, you know, I had worked through. And that that is literally what grief does. It comes in waves and pieces, and it's not always convenient. And so um, thank you for that. Uh that was a great answer. Um, and so when you think about the thousands of people that you've walked alongside, um, this is more of a personal question. Um, what what do you feel like that's taught you the most?

SPEAKER_00 1:07:21

Um what has it taught me? Um, I think that everybody is very unique and different. We each have our own thumbprint, but not one thumbprint is like yours or mine. So when somebody sits across from you, they're all different. And so I've learned to come with a blank slate and let them unravel their story instead of me coming with my bag of tricks and my knowledge and my experience. I meet them where they're at because everybody is unique and different and may not need what might be good for this person over here, might not work for this person, to really be present with that person and let them teach me on what's best for them. Um, empowering the client to run the session instead of me telling them, here's what you need to do. You need to do this and this and this, uh, but empowering them because everybody's so different. So I think that's what the past 25 years or so has taught me is that really being neutral when you meet with somebody because they're all different. Their stories are all different, their perceptions, everything is different.

Valerie 1:08:33

Yeah. Yeah, that's beautiful.

SPEAKER_00 1:08:35

What gives you hope these days? What gives me hope is my clients' uh courage to face and do hard things. Um the stories of faith that my clients have had, what they've had to endure and how they've overcome helps me have faith in humanity. It helps me have faith in God. But when I have when I get to witness somebody having this beautiful encounter with the Lord, and then they share it with me, that gives me hope to keep going. Because God is still on the throne, he's still in the business of talking to his people. Um, and we just need to listen. But I would say just hearing hearing stories of courage uh people facing and doing hard things and being able to walk alongside them.

Valerie 1:09:28

Yeah, that's beautiful. And before we completely wrap up, I do like to ask all of our guests, what is something that you do as a

Grief As The Cornerstone Of Healing

Valerie 1:09:40

personal practice? Um, because you're obviously therapist too, but even just as a human being holding space for any other human being, we could all encounter that, not just therapists. How do you release what's not yours to carry? Do you have a daily practice or do you have a ritual or do you have anything that you like to go to to help you with that?

SPEAKER_00 1:09:56

Um, well, over the years, I've learned to have um really good boundaries where I can still be compassionate, but learning to not take on people's emotions. Uh, but there's always that one person that unloads something and you weren't ready for it. Um, and what I do is I have somebody that I can talk to and process with. I can get it out. Um, and that's probably the best, is a safe person. Obviously, I don't disclose names or anything, but I just get out what's underneath why I'm triggered or why I'm hurting or why I took on their pain. And usually it's severe trauma. It's something that is just so horrific that I can't believe they're still alive. Yeah. And I have to offload it. Like I'll feel it somatically, I'll feel it grab a hold of me and it's heavy. And so I just release it that same day by talking with somebody. Um, I'm also a health and fitness junkie. So I I go to the gym, I I I'm I eat healthy, I I do things to be kind to myself. Um, sauna, cold plunge. I do, I'm all into that kind of stuff. So um, I do a lot of just um stuff like that. But I think the number one thing is I I have one person that I can just download. And I usually just leave it there and it goes away, that heaviness or what I caught. And it helps me get perspective to stay more present and not take it on if I meet with them again.

Valerie 1:11:31

Yeah. Yeah, that's good. That's really good and good for you to do too. So I'm glad that you take that for yourself. Um last but not least, uh, I just want to ask you one last thing before we go. If there's one thing that you would like to share with somebody who may be coming out of, say, church hurt, um, what's one thing you would want to say to them right now?

SPEAKER_00 1:11:55

Oh boy. Um it is possible to come out. Um when we're in the struggle, we can't see the other side. We feel so swallowed up because we're in this reality that we're trying to come out of. And if they're persevering and pursuing coming out, and when I say coming out, I'm not saying leaving a marriage, you can get out of it. It it is you're in such a vacuum when you're in the environment every day that you don't see that there's hope to come out of it. But if you keep persevering and keep looking for resources and connections and other shape, other people that can help ground you in your new reality, um, you will be able to wear new glasses and have a new lens about the world.

Valerie 1:12:50

I love that. I love that. Um, I would like to just take a moment, Brenda, to thank you so much for your courage and your presence and your wisdom and all the things that you brought for our listeners today. There were so many look I have so many notes over here and so many rabbit trails we could have gone down. So maybe

Hope, Boundaries, And A Gentle Closing

Valerie 1:13:10

sometime you'll have to come back and we can talk some more. I really loved this conversation with you. And as always, to our witnesses, I would like to just take a moment and we're gonna release anything that we aren't supposed to carry. So we'll just take a deep breath in. Palms up, push those up to the sky, breathe it out, let it go. You did it. Thank you so much, Miss Brenda. You're welcome. Thank you for having me. Thank you for listening to that conversation, you guys. Brenda is like the smartest, and I've known her for a long time, and I'm so thankful that we reconnected and were able to have this conversation. If this episode resonated with you, you don't have to figure it all out today. Just know that healing is not about having all the answers. Sometimes simply giving yourself permission to ask honest questions and to grieve what was lost, and to trust that love is spacious enough to hold both you, your faith, and your curiosity. That's something I'm navigating. Thank you for witnessing this conversation. Thank you for witnessing me and acknowledging some of my own grief on this topic. I wasn't expecting that to come up, but that's how it works, guys. That's how it works, and it means so much that you were here to witness that. So until next time, know that you are deeply loved, worthy of being witnessed, and that healing doesn't ask you to perform, it simply invites you to tell the truth.