In the last few months I’ve been very triggered. I watched as someone I cared about was ostracized, gossiped and lied about. I watched as others participated in the gossip. I warned people, knowing doing so would likely not end well for me. I lost friends, felt judged… and relived a lot of past church trauma.
I made some different choices this time than I would have in the past. I did what I thought was right, and some of that may not have been what was best and some that I thought in the past would have been better to have done didn’t work, after all. There are just some situations that no matter what we do will not end well. I learned one thing: no matter what we do, we can’t usually stop some large entity intent on hurtling toward a bad end. At least that relieves me of some guilt or self-doubt from the past. And I’ve learned sometimes the only thing we can do is what we think will be best for ourselves – and that that’s not selfish, it’s just life.
Healing is an ongoing journey. It’s not linear. We take a step forward, sometimes three steps back. We move forward, then end up triggered by something and end up cycling back through everything all over again. Or – ugh – we end up in a situation that’s eerily similar to what hurt us to begin with, parallel on parallel, and we have to somehow navigate that AND all the memories and past hurts at the same time.
It’s OK to do that. And the fact that we can demonstrates that we really ARE healing, even if it doesn’t feel like it at the time.
A year ago I had an experience that brought major healing to an old hurt. It was sudden and unexpected. In the process I learned I could play the piano again. I didn’t think I ever would. After the triggers though, my playing gradually stopped. I haven’t played for close to three months, and haven’t played joyfully or for long for maybe twice that time.
Today brought some closure. Several surprises, several opportunities to remember good things that have happened, past healing moments. And somehow through today, I know the music is back again. I haven’t played yet, but the sadness that blocked the music isn’t blocking anymore. Nothing major happened today. Just memories, just acceptance, just love. And it was enough. And that’s healing, too.
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Editorial Note: The following is reprinted with permission from Eleanor Skelton’s blog. It was originally published on February 15, 2015.
Homeschool alumni Alecia Faith Pennington’s Help Me Prove It campaign went viral on social media this last week.
She explained that she can’t vote, can’t get a job and can’t get a driver’s license, all because she can’t prove that she was born in the United States.
Because she was born at home and her parents allegedly never filed for a birth certificate, she said she cannot prove her US citizenship. Her parents also never filed for a Social Security number and never took her to a hospital, and she has no school records because she was homeschooled, according to her now-viral YouTube video.
“This leaves me with nothing to prove my identity or citizenship,” Alecia said in the video. “I am now 19 years old and I’m unable to get a driver’s license, get a job, go to college, get on a plane, get a bank account, or vote.”
But as the survey conducted by Homeschool Alumni Reaching Out (HARO) a few days ago demonstrates, she is not alone.
And the majority of survey respondents whose parents denied them their identifying documentation were also members of the Homeschool Legal Defense Association (HSLDA), which is an interesting correlation.
Source: HARO.
My parents were members of HSLDA.
They kept a card with HSLDA’s hotline number taped beside our front door when we first started homeschooling in the early 90s. (I’m the oldest child in my family.)
My parents told me if anyone from Child Protective Services showed up at the door, we needed to call that number right away and not answer any questions until we talked to their legal representatives. They taught me that our ungodly government was looking for reasons to persecute good Christian families who just wanted to raise their children according to Biblical teachings.
They said spanking wasn’t abuse, even if it left marks, because it was all part of the plan to raise children to fear God and obey authority. If anyone asked if my parents spanked, we were to lie and say they didn’t.
When my parents gave me an ultimatum between moving out and transferring colleges to Bob Jones University summer 2012, I left with only my driver’s license.
Earlier that year, my mom gave me a folder marked “Eleanor.” She kept one for me and each of my siblings that she planned to give to us when we turned 18.
This folder had everything from baby footprints and my birth certificate to my social security card and passport to x-rays and health records for my growth hormone treatment as a teenager.
But the one of the most destructive wildfires in Colorado’s history, the Waldo Canyon Fire, started one sleepy Saturday in June 2012. By the next Tuesday, the winds rolled it down the mountain into the city, destroying around 300 homes, and my family and neighbors were planning to evacuate.
My dad took the folder with all my identifying documents for safekeeping in a safe deposit box. I reminded him I would need it later.
I moved out on August 1, 2012. Before and after moving out, I asked for that folder and my documentation over and over.
I applied for jobs off-campus for additional income, but could only provide my drivers’ license for the I-9 documentation for employment to prove my US citizenship and ability to work legally, which wasn’t enough since the document requires two forms of identification.
My mom finally gave me a few copies of my social security card and passport. But not before I’d already been denied one tutoring job after an interview because I couldn’t produce proper identification.
They kept telling me they were holding my documentation in safekeeping for when I changed my mind and decided to go to Bob Jones University instead of “rebelling” and moving out on my own,
About six months after I left home, they finally gave me my social security card.
I continued asking them for my passport.
Text messages from 11/17/2013: Me: May I please pretty please have my passport? Mom: Passport applications are available at the post office. […] I will continue to pray for you. Goodbye.
Later, my dad said I had to repay large amounts of money that he claimed I owed him before he would give me my passport. As a college student with part-time employment, I didn’t have extra money to replace my passport or my other identifying documents.
I didn’t get my passport back until October 2014.
So this week, the Help Me Prove It campaign reminded me that I still don’t have my birth certificate or health records.
I emailed my parents again two days ago.
My dad replied the same day:
Have not seen your BC (birth certificate) for quite some time. Your best bet there is to contact Jefferson County in Texas. They can likely give you a copy. Very busy these days. Best regards, TS
Mom answered the next day:
Dad and I had to request birth certificates when we first applied for passports. It was not something that [your grandparents] had. We wrote Harris County and Duchess County for our birth certificates. You won’t need one to renew your driver’s license. Just proof of address and take the eye test. Mom.
No answer about my health records.
At least I’m registered in the county system, so I can get another birth certificate if I need to get a driver’s license in another state, and I can request copies of my health records from my doctors.
Alecia Pennington can’t.
So yes, some of us (story 1) (story 2) who moved out years ago are still fighting to get our documentation.
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Gissel dyed her hair red for the first time during the first week after she left home.Editorial Note: The following is reprinted with permission from Eleanor Skelton’s blog. It was originally published on March 12, 2015 as part of a series.
In July 2014, Ashley came over to my apartment to visit one Saturday morning.
While we were talking, Ashley got a text message from Gissel, one of her friends from the First United Pentecostal Church of Colorado Springs (now known as Heritage Pentecostal Church), that she’d left six months before.
“Hey, can you come pick me up? My dad kinda went crazy and kicked me out. I don’t have anywhere to go… can I stay with you?”
Gissel was on her lunch break at work, so Ashley and I drove over to meet her and help her get her belongings out of her father’s house.
On the way to her dad’s house, Gissel explained she already planned on going to live with her grandmother in Texas.
The night before, she’d stayed out with her boyfriend and a group of other friends until past midnight. She discovered her dad had locked her out when she tried to come home, even though he’d never enforced the curfew he set for her older brother and his girlfriend.
Gissel kept asking why it was different for her as a girl, why she was being punished.
One of Gissel’s younger sisters let her in the house so she could get her suitcases already packed for her move. We put them in the trunk and drove to where Racquel and Ashley were living so Gissel could stay with them temporarily.
The rest of her siblings watched us from the window, huddled together.
Ashley told Racquel what had happened and that Gissel would be staying over for the rest of the week until she flew out of town. Gissel went back to work for the day, and we picked her up that evening.
She was quiet. Reality set in.
Silent tears slipped down her cheeks. There was no home to go back to now.
We hugged her, asked her if she was ok or needed to talk. Told her it was ok to be sad, ok to cry.
Later that night, she sat next to Ashley on the couch while we watched anime and the first Pirates of the Carribean movie. Watching television isn’t allowed in most United Pentecostal churches like the one she grew up in.
Ashley helped her dye her hair that week, another thing that the church deemed sinful.
Gissel started wearing a crucifix that her dad gave her. Her dad told her if she was going to leave the church and wear jewelry now, she might as well wear that. It was a religious guilt trip, since their church doctrine forbade wearing jewelry, and typically Pentecostal churches do not agree with Catholic doctrine.
After Gissel left for Texas, we kept in touch.
I asked her last fall how she was doing and if she would like to share her story.
Now she is free to live outside the cage of Christian fundamentalism and legalism.
I thought once Racquel and Ashley and the others that we’d moved out were free, that everything would start to go back to normal. That our little network wouldn’t need to keep helping people.
But Gissell reminded me that so many more are out there, waiting.
Gissel studied social work at community college and works in a healthcare center in Texas. She also cohosts a YouTube channel called Gen and Gigi.
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Editorial Note: The following is reprinted with permission from Eleanor Skelton’s blog. It was originally published on March 7, 2015 as part of a series.
Content Note: religious manipulation, forced starvation
Eleanor and Racquel hiking the Incline near Colorado Springs in fall 2013. | Photo: Eleanor Skelton
Racquel grew up attending the First United Pentecostal Church of Colorado Springs, now known as Heritage Pentecostal Church. This is Racquel’s story, in her own words.
Somehow I never imagined that the inner peace and joy I felt as a 5-year-old girl after being filled with the Holy Ghost would later disgust and scare me.
I am writing this because I believe my voice should be heard. I hope that by telling my story it will help my healing and others with similar stories as well as prevent more stories like mine from happening.
The music was loud, and the atmosphere was pulsing with energy.
I wanted to show how much I loved God, so I went up to the front of the sanctuary and danced with all my might, letting my tears flow. I had been taught that I should dance before the Lord and not let anyone’s opinion stop me.
Often, I was the first one or the only one at the front of the church.
This was good. It meant I was a leader, and that I was fighting spiritual warfare. It would also show my pastor, who was God’s voice in my life, how my walk with God was and what a good apostolic young person I was.
I remember night after night where this was my mindset.
Racquel (far left, wearing an orange dress) speaks in tongues on the front row during Heritage Youth Conference, fall 2011. | Photo: First United Pentecostal Church of Colorado Springs
I was isolated from other members of the youth group because I would refuse to do things that the pastor had commanded us not to, like riding in a car with a guy unless it was approved or unless a married approved chaperone was in the car.
However, there were also the many, many times where I sat or knelt at the altar, weeping and feeling the guilt of my many sins when I simply failed to uphold the standards because I had listened to unchristian music, watched a TV show, or could not stick to a daily prayer life.
For years, I went through a cycle of getting in trouble with my best friend, Ashley, for questioning the pastoral authority and why we held to some of our standards, sometimes completely disregarding the rules, and then being told that my best friend and I should not talk or hang out because our personalities did not complement each other.
Meanwhile, I stood by as she was abused in so many ways by both the pastoral authority and her parents. The only thing I could do was be there for her.
In January 2013, my best friend and I had come to the conclusion that we did not and could not agree with the church. However, we were discovered yet again and ripped apart.
This time, the pastor lied to both of us, trying to turn us against each other by saying that the other one had ratted us out.
At the direction and guidance of the pastor, Ashley’s parents were punishing her for not losing weight because it was said that God could not use her unless she lost the weight. Because of her inability to meet their demands, she had begun starving herself.
I texted her one night in compassion and frustration that she should “F*** (written politely as $@##) what they think” to drive home to Ashley that starving herself was not the answer, and that her parents and pastor were wrong.
During one of the long sessions in the pastor’s office after getting caught, I discovered the pastor had hacked into my best friend’s phone and found my text.
I was questioned about my lack of respect for authority.
My hands were tied as I seethed in anger not able to tell the pastor the context of the text, lest the abuse she suffered would increase, because the pastor was part the abuse.
Back then, Ashley was too scared of losing her parents and being kicked out to do anything other than play along with them. When she was 19 years old, her parents and the pastor stripped every form of communication, transportation and even her ability to go to college from her.
She was not even allowed to be alone in her own home at any time.
Racquel (far right) singing in the choir. Apostolic churches consider leading worship to be a privilege called being “on the platform.” Anyone who questions authority or church beliefs may be removed from the platform as form of social shaming. |Photo: First United Pentecostal Church of Colorado Springs
In March, the deception worked, and the pressure finally broke me to the point that I gave in and did exactly as the church and the pastor wanted me to do. I felt helpless and that the reason for these crazy feelings must be because I was not submitted to them.
I continued to not talk to my best friend and tried to force myself into the mold they had created for me with my approved Christian friends and guilt-ridden prayer life.
I still had all of the same questions.
Why must a man my pastor dictate to me what God wants and God not talk to me directly? Why must I not be allowed to talk to my best friend who was still the most important person in my life?
How could so many injustices and abuse be what a loving god wanted?
So when my little sister decided to leave suddenly and move in with a guy I had never met, and I had no idea were she was or if she was safe, when my approved friends failed, I reached out to the one person I knew who would be there: Ashley.
Within two weeks of resuming secret communication, we had both discussed in detail what we saw wrong with the church, and had stated that no matter what we were going to keep communicating, even if it had to be hidden.
Ashley, Eleanor and Racquel in August 2013 | Photo: Eleanor Skelton
Almost immediately, she started to date a coworker.
On December 15, 2013, her dad followed her to her boyfriend’s house, and that night he kicked her out.
I received a text that said: “They know everything can you come and get me.” I immediately drove to her house and picked her up.
After that, we stayed in Eleanor’s apartment. She had also recently escaped an abusive fundamentalist home.
There has been a lot of healing and learning since then and now. Learning to live outside of the box has not been easy, nor do I think it ever will.
I now have the wonderful freedom of choice, and with that comes what I would describe as both the beauty of a rainbow and the burden of the rain cloud.
Making these choices is the scariest and most exhilarating thing that I have ever done. I have learned and accepted more of who I am.
I can only hope that healing will come in time, and the scars will become less painful.
Racquel graduated with a bachelor’s in psychology from the University of Colorado at Colorado Springs in May 2014. She struggled with undereducation from inadequate homeschooling and Christian private education in her church throughout her time in college. Racquel hopes to pursue a graduate degree in counseling and mental health, and her current job involves assisting troubled teens.
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I recently received word a man I knew from my former church passed away after battling a long illness for years. While the details of his illness are not known, the part that stands out to me is whether or not the individual made peace with his family as well as with his Maker.
I attended and worshiped at the same church with him for over 16 years. We sat in the same lectures from the pulpit about how we were to place our “calling” above all other relationships, including those with our loved ones. Some of us had intimate relationships with a significant other (I had a girlfriend when I joined the church, and still maintain my involvement ended our relationship). One of the Scriptures used to teach us the priority of our ministerial calling was found in Matthew.
Matthew 19:29 (KJV) – And every one that hath forsaken houses, or brethren, or sisters, or father, or mother, or wife, or children, or lands, for my name’s sake, shall receive an hundredfold, and shall inherit everlasting life.
We were told for the longest time that if we spent more of our vacation/leave time with our families instead of the church, we were wrong. Some of my friends in the church admitted they completely ruined their relationships with parents and siblings all in the name of obedience to the church and its teachings. I was fortunate not to have done this, but nonetheless my own family relations were strained.
My friend who passed recently was one of those whose devotion to what he felt was God’s calling – remaining single, forsaking family, and devoting every waking moment to the ministry – took a serious toll on him over the years. As his health deteriorated, the one question unanswered is this: did he reconsider some of his decisions and make amends with loved ones who weren’t part of the church? I pray he did, but will never know.
Some of the men who still attend are in similar straits. Their only family is in the church; their natural family relationships are strained almost beyond repair. A couple of them are left with no option as they have no surviving family members left. That is just as bad, as they have no one to turn to outside the church.
I still believe Jesus wants us to place Him first, but not completely sever family ties in doing so. How can destroying a relationship with one’s parents fulfill this Scripture?
Exodus 20:12 (KJV) – Honour thy father and thy mother: that thy days may be long upon the land which the Lord thy God giveth thee.
