My Story

It has taken me many years to understand something: the churches I grew up in were filled with genuinely loving people, and at the same time, they were embedded within a system shaped by fear, control, and power.

I was raised in fundamentalist Christianity, and much of what I experienced there felt real and meaningful. I was known. I belonged. I felt cared for by the community, and at times I truly sensed the presence and love of something greater than myself. Those experiences mattered. They were not imagined, and they were not meaningless.

And yet, woven quietly into that warmth was a powerful system designed to regulate behavior through fear. Love and belonging were offered, but they were conditional. The message that “Jesus loves you” often came paired with graphic warnings of hell, eternal punishment, and separation. Devotion and terror lived side by side.

The same community that embraced me also demanded conformity. Questioning was framed as rebellion. Doubt was treated as danger. Over time, I learned that safety came not from authenticity, but from obedience.

Looking back, I now understand how these contradictions created what clinicians call trauma bonding—a cycle where care and threat coexist, binding a person emotionally to the very system that causes harm. The warmth felt like love, while shame, anxiety, and hypervigilance quietly accumulated in my body, eventually emerging as panic attacks.

What became clearer with time is that religious fundamentalism, as a system, is structured to protect itself. Individuals are secondary. Authority is elevated above vulnerability. In the churches I knew, leadership was exclusively male, and sermons emphasized certainty and moral clarity, while personal struggle remained hidden. Humanity was replaced with hierarchy.

My family, like many others, carried unspoken pain. We were subtly encouraged to keep that pain private in order to preserve the image of being a “good Christian family.” Appearance mattered more than healing. Generational trauma went unnamed, while righteousness was performed.

The system was especially effective because it recognized and utilized my kindness, my empathy, and my desire to serve. I gave my youth to missionary work, shaping my inner world—my thoughts, emotions, and instincts—to align with what I was told was “God’s truth.” Over time, it became clear that the system’s deepest loyalty was not to love, healing, or human flourishing, but to its own preservation.

Eventually, I reached a painful crossroads: remain within the system and slowly disappear from myself, or begin the long process of deconstructing what I had been taught—about God, family, worth, and obedience—in order to survive.

Leaving did feel like everything burned down. Relationships changed. Certainty dissolved. Identity shattered. And yet, in the quiet aftermath, something unexpected emerged: space. Breath. The slow rediscovery of who I am beneath fear.

After a long and deeply personal journey of healing from religious, emotional, and physical abuse, I now serve as a Level 2 Internal Family Systems (IFS) Practitioner. It has been an honor to walk alongside hundreds of people as they untangle trauma, anxiety, and depression—helping them reconnect with their inner wisdom, cultivate self-compassion, and reclaim the parts of themselves that were once silenced.

I no longer believe love and fear need to coexist.
And I believe healing begins when systems of control are named—without hatred, but with truth.