Looking away from trauma survivors comes with a deadly cost. This is a call for the church to create genuinely safe, trauma-informed spaces.

Counting the cost. One of the goals I have for this blog is to bring awareness to the cost of both abuse and its close partner in crime ‘looking away’. I just finished my Crisis and Trauma specialization training. I had to work through triggers and meltdowns to finish. It brought to light what I innately and experientially knew. It is the looking away that causes PTSD. And if you have experienced a lifetime of others looking away starting in early childhood, you, like me, likely know that bigger beast that devours all your worth living in survival mode waiting for the day it will swallow you whole, Complex PTSD.

If care and support is provided through intervening, validating psychological first aid and ministry of Presence within the first 72 hours of the critical incident, the likelihood of PTSD developing is greatly reduced, diminished. If no support is given comorbid major depression takes hold at four months in 45% of those with single incident induced PTSD. How long, O Lord, until Complex PTSD is given its due, significant place in the DSM? Those statistics would blow these statistics out of the water. I’ll save that whole, worthy tangent for another post.

I am passionate about Childhood Emotional Neglect (CEN), Attachment Theory, Childhood Narcissistic Abuse by multi-generational Narcissistic Personality Disorder (NPD) also aptly called living in an Invisible War Zone. See Abuse and Trauma Terms for more references and terminology. Sexual Trauma and Church Abuse. Newly added, like a big light switch to my experience with all the above, Neurodivergence. You can consider these my special interests along with healing modalities that have helped me overcome and slay the beast, CPTSD.

Back to counting the cost. To get to this post in this writing ministry on the other side of the chronic ideation that plagued me for ten years after an IED explosion pierced my heart and blew off my limbs inside God’s House where I thought I was finally safe with people I loved and called my forever family and no tourniquets offered, I have had:

184 Therapy Sessions, 12 Months in a weekly Recovery Step Study, 36 Months in Celebrate Recovery, 12 Weeks in DBT Group Therapy, 56 Life Coaching Sessions, 2 Years Deep Diving to make cognitive sense of psychological warfare that is NPD abuse both childhood and institutional, countless hours reading Survivor stories, listening to podcasts, audiobooks, 36 INF Gifted Neurodivergent classes to understand how I am wired, 500 written pages of my memoir to help process, 132 Training Modules to become a Life and Master Mental Health Coach to help myself and others.

To recover from people looking away.

And before all that, a 2.5 Year study program to earn my Foundations in Biblical Counseling certificate while simultaneously trying to heal my own crisis of faith still linked to my abusers that left me for dead and led me to a six month failed one-sided biblical restoration returning to the place of my IED explosion in a death defying healing fantasy years into my chronic, activated CPTSD, acute stress and complicated grief, spiritual homelessness.

Returning that almost cost me my life. But, God, whispering, “You don’t go to church to die.” The day I knew I would never go back, I braved finding a licensed therapist who diagnosed me with Complex PTSD. Leading to my passion advocating for legitimate, licensed, trauma informed therapy for Survivors of abuse. And, Jesus plus support as triage care is why I am here on this earth writing you now not fully devoured by the beast, but alive.

The beauty I am discovering is available to us all: Post Trauma Growth after counting the cost.

If you or a loved one is suffering in silence, isolated, from one critical incident or a lifetime, God sees you, El Roi, and He never looks away. Jesus wants to breathe life into you, and He wants you to get help. Seek trauma informed Licensed care. Let’s heal. You are not alone. You are loved.

And, Church, for the love of God and all whom He loves, the abused and the oppressed, let us who claim His Presence, do better. Let us stop looking away. Let us be the first to offer a tourniquet. Let us offer the love we profess. John 13:35 Faith without works is dead. James 2

Love,

Raya

Your Seat At The Table