Religious Trauma Recovery: When Faith Harms

What You Are Experiencing Has a Name

If faith became a place of fear, control, shame, or spiritual manipulation, you are not imagining it. Many people do not only leave a belief system. They lose community, identity, continuity, and the language that once organized their world.

For many survivors, the aftermath feels like living between worlds. Not who you were. Not yet sure who you are becoming. In Finding Everland, I call this Third Space.

Schedule Appointment

You may be carrying RTS if you are living with:

persistent guilt, shame, or fear-based thinking
grief, isolation, or identity disruption after leaving
difficulty trusting your perceptions, body, or instincts
spiritual disorientation, including meaning collapse

I guide people in what I call Third Space, the territory between what harmed you and what heals you. I will not rush you toward false arrival.

Your first session is free (30 minutes). This is a calm, structured conversation to assess fit. You will leave knowing whether I understand your terrain and what a next step could be.

What is Religious Trauma Syndrome?

Religious Trauma Syndrome (RTS) is a framework used to describe patterns of distress that can emerge after harm in religious contexts, especially in high-control environments. RTS is not currently listed in the DSM-5, but it is increasingly recognized in clinical and academic conversations as a way to name a specific kind of injury.

RTS may include:

Fear-based thinking: black-and-white reasoning, persistent dread, difficulty trusting your own perceptions
Shame and guilt: anxiety, depression, self-condemnation, and chronic second-guessing
Relational loss: isolation, grief, identity disruption, and difficulty building new belonging
Spiritual disorientation: meaning collapse, fear of divine punishment, difficulty rebuilding a coherent inner framework

How I Work

I do not rush you toward false arrival. I help you name what happened without requiring you to minimize it or excuse it.

My approach is:

Trauma-informed: your pace matters, your nervous system matters, and your boundaries matter
Salutogenic: we focus on what supports the origins of health, not on labels that reduce you
Third-space grounded: you do not need to pick extremes, isolation or replacement certainty. There is a third way.

This Is For You If

You are recovering from spiritual abuse or religious control
You are deconstructing and grieving what was lost
You want support that does not demand performance, certainty, or conformity

This Is Not

A debate space
An apologetics project
A place where you must adopt my beliefs to be respected

Your First Session Is Free

If you want a calm, structured conversation to assess belonging, I offer a complimentary 30-minute consultation. You will leave knowing whether I understand your terrain and what a next step could be.