Born in Toronto, Canada in 1952, I lived with my parents and three younger brothers until I was ten years old. There was a lot of violence in our home. My father was an abusive, rageful man who took out all his frustrations on his family. My mother, in the guise of "protecting" us from him, frequently inflicted her own version of abuse on us. And when they weren't busy letting their frustrations out on us, they let it out on each other. By six years old, I was frequently depressed and fearful.
When I was ten, my parents separated, and the two youngest boys went to live with my mother, while the oldest of the boys and I stayed in Toronto to live with my father. My earliest memories of sexual abuse start around this time and the abuse continued for almost three years before he was reported to the police. After a court case, my mother was granted custody of all four children and along with her common-law husband and their daughter we went to live in Montreal.
It was during this time that she began studying with the Jehovah's Witnesses. All five children were taken to meetings and expected to participate in the door-to-door ministry. At seventeen I was baptized as a Witness and at nineteen I was pushed into marriage with a "new brother" in the congregation. After two weeks of marriage I knew that it was a terrible mistake but felt trapped into trying to make it work since divorce was not accepted by the Watchtower organization.
We had two children during our fifteen years together. He became an elder in the congregation. Although other people thought we had a wonderful marriage, inside I was dying and on the outside busy pretending that all we were happy. My husband was emotionally abusive to both the children and myself. He used scripture to coerce us into "acceptable" behavior. He also used scripture to get his deviant sexual needs met, stating that if I did not submit to his sexual demands, I would be responsible for "blood-guilt" if he committed adultery.
After the years of childhood abuse, and fourteen years of abuse in the marriage, I had a breakdown and started therapy. Initially dealt with the childhood abuse but there were so many similar abuse issues in the marriage that before long the full impact of reliving the abuse of my childhood overwhelmed me. I became very suicidal and realized that I had to either leave the marriage (and the Witnesses too) or I would die.
It took about a year for me to finally get my divorce and to rebuild my life. I went back to school, worked part-time, and raised my two daughters. My mother who is still a Witness rarely talks to me. None of my old Witness friends speak to me. Extended family who are Witnesses never call. I am never invited to any family gatherings.
But I have two daughters and a grand-daughter that I love. For the last twelve years I have been working with adult survivors of abuse, a career which I find extremely rewarding. I am the first person in my family to go to and graduate from college or university. I have close friends who love me for who I am. And I am still growing. Learning to live well really is the best revenge.
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Professional Profile
I studied in a three-year professional program in Social Counseling at Dawson College and graduated in 1988. I also have a BA in Applied Social Science (Focus on group counseling and facilitation).
In 1987 I began a non-profit organization "The Centre for Incest Healing" which provided counseling to adult survivors of childhood sexual abuse and their families, provided information and referral for survivors, and provided information and guest lecturers for the community. The Center provided services for over six hundred individuals during the seven years before it was shut down due to lack of funding.
Since 1988, I have worked in private practice, providing counseling to adult survivors of childhood abuse and their families and in the last three years have provided information and support to recovering ex-Jehovah's Witnesses.