Survivor's Guilt and PTSD...is it real?

Understanding the link between survivor’s guilt, PTSD, and when others reinforce the beliefs in you

I read a great blog post from Amen University where I got my Brain Health Coaching certification from. In it, it talks about survivor’s guilt and what people go through after coming out of a tragic experience better than others.

According to Amen University, survivor’s guilt is often considered a serious symptom of PTSD. They say:

“While not everyone who endures a traumatic event will develop PTSD, some research estimates that as many as 90% of people who lived through events where others died experience feelings of guilt. They may question their own survival and feel a sense of responsibility for what happened:

• Why did my buddy get killed, but not me?

• Why did I run away from it?

• Why didn’t I do more to save others?

• What could I have done to prevent this tragedy?”

This one hits home to me all the time and really for anyone who has survived a tragic event when others didn't, or your experiences were different than others who survived the same tragedy.

For my personal experience growing up in the cult, I'm constantly attacked and demonized for talking about my experiences, sometimes from people very close to me. The accusations are always the same:

• "You didn't have it as bad as me!" (indicating my trauma and experiences don't count because theirs were "worse" in their mind)

• "You're a liar!" (indicating because my experiences were different, then I certainly must be lying)

• "You're embellishing!" (exaggerating my trauma to make is seem worse, but it can't be worse, cause theirs is worse)

• "You're a narcissist!" (indicating that because I'm talking about myself, I must not care about anyone else. Hint for this one: only narcissists call other people narcissists)

These words are not only deeply harmful to survivors but dangers and divisive. Rather than supporting those who are coming out to speak about their experiences, we're quick to blame, point the finger, and shut them down.

I was attacked so much from this that I actually began to believe it. This led to so much guilt that I had nothing to complain about because "so and so had it worse than me". This led me down a dark path of shame, silence, depression, and repressed anger.

Now that I'm speaking up about my life, these attacks are old news and SO 2019. But survivors guilt is real, ya'll. From war, to abuse, to car wrecks, to natural disasters, we CANNOT control what happens in our life or how we survive (or don't survive) it.

This article from Amen Clinics explains the link to survivor's guilt and PTSD, the common symptoms and how to heal from it. This was key in my path to recovery, and I know it can help others.

https://www.amenclinics.com/blog/understanding-the-relationship-between-survivors-guilt-and-ptsd/

"Evil always looks good"

Below is a video from my YouTube channel where I talk about the arrest of Peter Daglish, listening to your intuition and the importance of doing your research! Things are not always as they seem.

One ring to rule them all… My child bride cult ring.

I was born as a child celebrity in the cult founder David Berg’s compound. He named me, wrote stories about me and I grew up basically promised to him from birth.

At 3 I was taken to David Berg by my own mother and presented as his child bride. Berg gave me a heart shaped ring way too big for my 3 yr old finger. He wrapped tape around the band until it fit, saying the ring was big on purpose so I could wear it forever. I still have the ring to this day and it fits on my pinkie finger.

That is sick. He put that much thought into how he could possess me for the rest of my life, and how he could ensure that the ring would fit me through adulthood. I still have it, and it still does.

The first photo at the top of the page is me wearing that ring as an adult.

Berg systematically broke down children, abused and trafficked them, then had his followers do the same. This was his way to control, a way to satiate his perverted mind that had also been control and abused as a child himself, by his own nanny. His mind was so far gone and so fucked up that he continued to inflict pain on thousands of people, the way pain was inflicted on him in his childhood.

What’s that saying again…hurt people hurt people, healed people heal people.

I still have the ring, yes. I keep in my possession, no one will ever know where, I don’t wear it but I also don’t feel the need to burn it. This ring is part of my story now, it’s part of my power and part of my path. It’s not Berg’s, and it never will be.

In the video on my previous post, I talk about being trafficked as a child in the infamous sex cult The Children of God, aka The Family.

Yes, trafficking is a harsh word. We think of children being grabbed off the street and chained to a bed and all kinds of horrible things happening to them. But if you look at the definition of child trafficking online, it paints a different picture.

The definition of child trafficking is the illegal movement of children for forced labor or sexual exploitation.

When I first read this definition, I was floored, because that literally described my life. If I could sum up my life in one sentence, it would literally be that.

So, I embarked on an even deeper healing journey, to learn more about child trafficking and all its nuances that we typically wouldn’t associate it with. Since then, I’ve talked to many of my fellow survivors about our childhood, and we’ve all slowly come to terms with the fact that yes, we were in fact, trafficked. It’s a hard pill to swallow at first, but something important when to acknowledge about our lives.

Photo info:

1. To the left is a photO of me at two years old, shortly before I received the ring on my 3rd birthday.

2. Below, you can see a photo of Berg, laying a hand on my pregnant mother’s belly, and inside that belly is me.

3. Second to the bottom is a picture of Berg’s cousin Mary Dear. He wrote a personal note to my mother about naming me after his cousin he was in love with. Mary Dear became my celebrity cult name and it’s in the cult publications.

4. A recent photo of me now, living life to the fullest and loving every second

Child trafficking is not always forcibly grabbing someone off the street, throwing them into a van and hiding them in a warehouse. Most of the time it’s far more covert and insidious. It’s low income families exchanging sexual favors for money. It’s sex cults who separate families & travel in the middle of the night to escape authorities looking for them. It’s the family down the street with the creepy uncle who always comes by when the parents are away but the kids are home. Or the family friend who brings money for the kids and the parents let them have special play time with. Or the masked kid walking down the street with the man grabbing their arm just a bit too forcefully.

These things are happening today all around us. Maybe to you or someone you know. This is a pandemic in our country of massive proportions and it’s only getting worse through generations. Research child trafficking in your area. The results may shock you.

Child Trafficking and why I'm talking about it

Child Trafficking and why I'm talking about it

In this video I explain why I'm talking about child trafficking, provide stats, why we should care, and my personal experience being trafficked in the sex cult The Children of God, something I've never talked about publicly before.

I'll continue to speak about this topic and supply as much credible information I can, and tips on how to look out for trafficked children and what you can do about it.

Child Marriage is LEGAL in the USA!

Whey are more people not talking about this? Where is the outrage?

In the image above, pay attention to the gray states. NO legal minimum age for child marriage! That means with parental consent a child can marry at 8 or 18.

When activists have sought to eliminate those exceptions and ban marriage prior to age 18, as they are attempting to do in about 10 states nationwide, they are met with substantial pushback. Take the last slide, for example. In California--a very liberal state--a bill to set the minimum marriage age at 18 failed in 2017 after objections from lawmakers and LIBERAL groups such as the state's American Civil Liberties Union. The state STILL currently has no minimum marriage age. Why?

The ACLU argued that the bill "unnecessarily and unduly intrudes on the fundamental rights of marriage without sufficient cause," saying that banning underage marriage without evidence regarding the nature and severity of the problem "puts the cart before the horse." Evidence? Seriously? Even just one case should be enough to pass a bill.

The minimum marriage age in Alabama today is 16, though for most of the state’s history girls could marry at 14 and boys at 17. Don't take my research for it. Look it up yourself.

In Louisiana, Republicans and Democrats actually debated last over whether to set a minimum marriage age in the state. They finally settled on the marriage age at 16 with no more than 3 years age difference.

Why are politicians debating over this? Why isn't this a clear cut issue? I'll tell you why. Because we have a pandemic going on called child trafficking and pedophilia, not COVID-19. It's that people want to harm your children and get away with it.

This is not a partisan issue, this is left AND right. But please don't kid yourself thinking this is a southern or conservative issue, it's not. The issue is that a lot of us just don't care or don't bother to look into something that doesn't directly affect us. I did the same thing. But once I started researching a lot of things started making sense, and the fact that so many politicians have been arrested and charged with child pornography.

Ghislane Maxwell and Jeffrey Epstein are only the beginning. But the more we shine a light on this issue, the more we'll put a stop to it!