by Rachel Perry There was a moment when I was 18 when I first discovered the power of the present moment. I was suffering from post-traumatic stress after having been raped by my boyfriend several months prior and couldn’t seem to escape the blast from panic attacks and intense fear of something bad happening again. [...]

by Rachel Perry

There was a moment when I was 18 when I first discovered the power of the present moment. I was suffering from post-traumatic stress after having been raped by my boyfriend several months prior and couldn’t seem to escape the blast from panic attacks and intense fear of something bad happening again. A counsellor at the sexual abuse crisis centre taught me a few strategies to “become present.” She told me about feeling the ground beneath the soles of my feet. She told me about breathing deeply and reassuring myself that the traumatic moment was in the past and I am safe now. These strategies reminded me of the relaxing way I had felt when doing pre-show meditations with my drama class 3 years prior, in which we would listen to relaxing music (Pachelbel’s Canon) and visualize white light surrounding us and all darkness and stress leaving us.

The powerful moment which I remember when I was 18 was in a bathroom. I had just had a panic attack that was so severe it had me laying on the ground feeling paralyzed as though I were pinned by an elephant and suffocating. But the idea came to my mind “You can become “grounded” in the present moment and you can feel safe now.” So I started breathing deeply. I started taking notice of my surroundings. I slowly could sit up. I sat on the edge of the tub and looked at my feet, wiggled them around in my socks. “I am safe,” I told myself. And I filled up with a gratitude of the present moment which was safe. And I started to feel free from the past. I calmed myself down and that was when I had the powerful realization that to be completely free from the past I need to be completely aware of the present. And a whole world opened up for me.

It took me several years to break free from the addictive cycle of using alcohol to numb the pain. But by the time I was 21 I was experiencing the victory of my attentive focus to living in the moment. I enrolled in Journalism, got my own apartment, and was dedicating all my free time to reading the Sacred Bahá’í texts and serving and volunteering in the community.

Becoming Present became the most important door to me to escape every trial, ordeal, and tribulation that I encountered after that. And now, more than a decade later, I have found there are even more divine bounties and gifts available in the present moment. Books such as “The Power of Now” have made this mantra mainstream and have given us a glimpse into the possibilities available to the seeker who desires to live deeply, and live truly.

Living in the moment, going with the flow, “being aware” is a very important step on the journey to our inner selves. Awareness is the key – but we need not to be aware of the past or the future, we need only to be aware of the moment. So we do ourselves an injustice if we desire healing by re-visiting the painful memories looking for clues and answers. We will actually heal in a more true and empowering way when we put our focus instead in becoming “experts” of our own present moment. We begin by being aware of our outer surroundings and being at peace with that as we notice our breath, notice the sights and sounds around us, notice the sensations of our bodies – but this is only the beginning. Awareness of our inner world, our inner space, is where we will discover the great treasures that await us if we desire to discover them.

The difficulty is that we have been trained to not pay much attention to our inner selves, our inner lives, our inner beings. And in fact, our feelings – which are a great clue as to the condition of our inner world – have been made out to be the “enemy.” So we have become disconnected from our inner self, our spirit, our soul, that when we do become aware of a prompting from our True Selves, which may come as a “gut feeling” or an intuition or even as a “coincidence” we find ourselves confused and we may even shrug it off as non-sense. We have been so trained not to trust ourselves we feel confused at the beginning when we are letting go of the old learning and trusting in a new way of being – A Way of Being True To Ourselves.

But I feel really strongly that the very beginning of a path of happiness and True Well-being begins with first an awareness of the outer world at the moment and then of the inner world in the moment. And when we will sit quietly and silently for a few moments we are sending a message to our spirit that we are “listening” and once we are listening you can bet there is a lot to be heard.

Awareness and Awakening will happen slowly, slowly, slowly if we are viewing it in a way that measures time and years and this is the great joy of life. However, a person with a mind practiced in sitting and listening will find themselves becoming aware of a part of the human condition which is not bound by time and that awareness generates patience to tolerate the seemingly slow outer progress.

So, whatever the goal, whatever the aim, whatever the crisis, whatever the fear – the first answer is always to “sit and listen.” Become Aware. When you can bring with you a prayer into that moment of sitting and listening you will increase your receptivity to the answers that are all available to you. When you can use the Divinely Inspired Words from a Divine Messenger of God then you will heighten your receptivity even more so. But the key to unlocking the door to awareness is to sit and listen. Because when we do that, we are taking a stand against the waves of crisis which want us to believe there is terror and hopelessness. When we sit and listen despite the appearances of crisis we are showing ourselves we are ready to acknowledge the victory in that moment –  and there is always, always a victory. All that is required is our little willingness to see it.

Recently someone asked me:  how did you unblock your memories? I would like to do that. I think I am ready. This is a great question! It was totally through the grace of God.  Every year of my son’s life, brought back everything that happened to me at the same age.  I don’t recommend it [...]

Recently someone asked me:  how did you unblock your memories? I would like to do that. I think I am ready.

This is a great question!

It was totally through the grace of God.  Every year of my son’s life, brought back everything that happened to me at the same age.  I don’t recommend it as an approach, since I had to live through it twice, at the expense of his childhood!

At the time, I had a very gifted therapist, who explained that memories come back 4 ways.  It’s called the BASK model.  It looks something like this:

Behaviour:  Sometimes you react to things in a way which is out of proportion to the situation – the classic one is a Vietnam vet diving for cover when a car backfires.  Tonight, for me, I reacted in a way that was over the top when I saw a child at the dinner table point a smoking pistol on his Blackberry towards his Dad.  It looked all the world like a real gun shooting his Dad.  It sent me into a full blown panic attack.  If I didn’t know  about my own childhood gun trauma, I wouldn’t understand why I react a certain way when I’m triggered.  Another example is that I wouldn’t wear a white wedding dress, because I had been defiled by the sexual abuse.  I didn’t understand it at the time, but once I got the memories back, it all made sense.

Affect:  Is when you feel feelings and you have no idea why.  For example, you might be filled with sadness or rage for no apparent reason.  You might cry easily, again for no apparent reason.  As a result of what happened to me tonight, I am feeling tremendous sadness and powerlessness; and rage at the father whose response was “boys will be boys”.  I’m feeling the feelings associated with my own childhood gun trauma; not the feelings of what happened tonight.  If I didn’t know what happened to me, I wouldn’t have a framework for dealing with the emotions.

Senses:  You might be triggered by something you see, hear, taste, touch or smell.  For example, my family used Ivory bar soap when I was growing up, so I associate the smell with them.  I can’t have it in my house, or use it if I’m at someone else’s house (well I can now, I just choose not to!).  For example, there’s been a lot of it at the food bank lately and I get it for my son, but I don’t use any of it.  Other people have told me they can’t eat anything white and creamy (rice pudding, tapioca pudding, ice cream . . . ) because of its obvious associations with semen.  For a long time I couldn’t give or receive a hug from a man or a woman because I believed “if you touch me, I have to have sex with you.”  I always avoided situations where people were hugging (and even now, when I have a context to put it in, I’m still often uncomfortable being touched).

Knowledge:  is the conscious knowledge of the memories.  For me, this was the last thing to come back and when it did, it explained so much, because I’d already had the experience with behaviour, affect and senses.  It helped me believe my story.

So if you’re experiencing behaviour, affect or sensory triggers, you’re already well on your way to recovering your memories!

Finally, even though I had all of that, I still had trouble believing what I know to be true.  I kept coming back to “maybe it didn’t happen”, because denial was a much easier place to be!  I found this quote from the Bahá’í Writings really helpful in keeping me grounded in my truth:

Consequently, it has become evident that the four criteria stan­dards of judgment by which the human mind reaches its conclusions (senses, intellect, traditional or scriptural and inspiration) are faulty and inaccurate. All of them are liable to mistake and error in conclu­sions. But a statement presented to the mind, accompanied by proofs which the senses can perceive to be correct, which the faculty of rea­son can accept, which is in accord with traditional authority and sanc­tioned by the promptings of the heart, can be adjudged and relied upon as perfectly correct, for it has been proved and tested by all the standards of judgment and found to be complete. When we apply but one test, there are possibilities of mistake. This is self-evident and manifest.  (‘Abdu’l-Bahá, Promulgation of Universal Peace, p. 255)

For me this is similar to the BASK model – it just goes a little further.

How have you unblocked your memories?  Post your comments here:

 

 

When I first discovered the Bahá’í Faith, Bahá’u’lláh’s version of a New World Order, with the family at the centre, as a nation in miniature was an exciting concept for me.  I understood instantly the importance of shaping such a unit, but being able to implement it was quite another thing. It made sense that [...]

When I first discovered the Bahá’í Faith, Bahá’u’lláh’s version of a New World Order, with the family at the centre, as a nation in miniature was an exciting concept for me.  I understood instantly the importance of shaping such a unit, but being able to implement it was quite another thing.

It made sense that many people who have experienced great injustice in their lives would be attracted to a Faith based on justice. However, once I became a Bahá’ís I noticed that no one talked about how to apply the Writings to personal problems or spoke aloud the questions which might arise from the deepest parts of their souls.

No one was saying out loud:

• My family didn’t look anything like the Bahá’í teachings and I don’t know how to implement these concepts

• I can’t trust so I can’t consult

• God has let me down – so why pray? – or Fast? _ or give to the Fund?

• Obeying loving parents resulted in injustice and oppression – so why should I obey laws that look oppressive?

• My behaviour is moderate, or acceptable under the law of the land, so surely this Bahá’í law doesn’t apply to me.

• I am angry and I can’t instantly forgive.

If these are questions you have pondered too, I want to honor you, and acknowledge your bravery for searching for answers.  I found all the answers I was looking for (and more), from the Bahá’í Teachings and I know you will too.

I have been through a significant amount of trauma in my life but have found solutions, hope and healing when turning to the Bahá’í Writings and striving to apply them in my life. I would like to share my story so that you will better understand where I am coming from and why this topic is so significant to me.   It originally appeared in “Parenting in the New World Order”, March 1993, and was published with the permission of the National Spiritual Assembly of the Bahá’ís of Canada.

I invite you to read it as a clear demonstration of the healing power of the Word of God and to witness the positive effects it has had in my life.  I apologize if it is too explicit and warn you that it may be triggering for some people. If you think this is you, please make sure you have some support when reading it.

My Story

I grew up in a middle class, professional family, in an environment of alcoholism, neglect and physical, emotional and sexual abuse. My father was an alcoholic but had a responsible position in a Western Canadian city. In his industry, he was highly renowned and respected for his integrity and high moral standards. At home, he was a very volatile, violent man, who beat his wife and children, sexually abused my brothers and I and took us on camping trips, which involved satanic cult activities including bestiality, murder, rape and cannibalism.

My mother also held senior positions in the companies she worked for. She was also extremely violent, sexually abusive and active in preparing me for participating in cult activities. I was terrified of both of them, all the time.

I was sent to religious private schools for my education and was sexually abused by the female teachers at two of the schools I attended. I was brought up in the . . . church and the “Church of Satan” simultaneously. It was very confusing because many of the same people were involved in both places.

I was also sexually abused by an uncle, a grandfather and the husband of one of our baby-sitters. In one way, I was fortunate because I grew up distrusting men and women equally. So now, as I heal, I can see the need for all of us to work together to overcome the effects of such oppression and abuse.

As is typical of people who have experiences such trauma, I developed many coping mechanisms which kept me alive through experiences which no adult could survive.

I’ve envied the martyrs in the Bahá’í Faith, whose torture was relatively short-lived and ended in death for something they believed in. The torture I endured lasted for seventeen years, but the effects have lingered another eighteen and will be with me for the rest of my life.

Rest assured in the protection of God. He will preserve His own children under all circumstances. Be ye not afraid nor be ye agitated. He holds the scepter of power in His hand, and like unto a hen He gathereth His chickens under His wings. (‘Abdul-Bahá, Star of the West, vol. 22, p. 248)

I was close to being killed at least three times – once in fact I had been bound and gagged and placed on a stone alter, “chosen” to be “fed to the fire.” I was only four years old, and had already been raped and violated by men and women many times. I was prepared to die. I was ready to die, but at the last minute, as the flames were getting closer, somebody came and I was thrown off and rolled away as the adults pretended they were picnicking and playing volleyball.

I married when I was eighteen, to a man who was thirty-seven; a man who brought his gun and knife collection into our bedroom. He never had to get angry with me – I always did what I thought he wanted. The guns and knives were a silent threat.

Having a family was always my dream. Having a marriage last was another I wanted more than anything else to be “normal”.

Several miracles occurred out of my experiences. When I was a child, I had a strong relationship with God, I prayed frequently – especially for the abuse to stop. When it didn’t, I stopped believing in God. God knows how I became a Bahá’í – I certainly don’t – but my son is now eight years old and I am raising him as a Bahá’í, and not in the cult, and I am not sexually abusing him. I’ve broken two multi-generational patterns, so my prayers were answered, just not in the way or in the time frame I had imagined.

I have been in therapy for many years trying to sort out my experiences and trying to use the Bahá’í teachings in my recovery. I struggle daily to bring my life into the standards of the Faith.

Concepts such as institutions as “loving parents” are difficult for me to understand (what is a loving parent?!) – but I’ve tested the concept twice and I’m beginning to learn. I went to the Bahá’í Local Spiritual Assembly of . . . to request their input into the terms of my divorce, and I wrote to the Universal House of Justice, asking what my obligations were to my family. Both consultations were very powerful, and have been tremendous forces in my personal growth.

I love ‘Abdul-Bahá’s writing:

My home is the home of peace . . .

And I try to use it as a guideline, but I’m not always successful. It’s hard to live life in the present when anything can trigger a frightening memory.

I’ve come to realize that I have lived most of my life from the perspective of a terrified four-year-old, whose turn it is to die, wanting to die, and now it’s time to choose to live. Reclaiming memories of my childhood, committing myself to live life consciously, recognizing oppression when it is happening and choosing to deal with it head on instead of avoiding it, are all part of my healing process.

Much of the time I felt that my son was being parented by an adult body with the feelings and experiences of a four year old.

Many times I am confronted with situations that my role models simply didn’t prepare me to deal with – so when my son was little and I wanted to take out my frustrations on him, I took him in my arms and held him close and said or sang the prayer:

Is there any remover of difficulties save God? Say: Praised be God! He is God! All are His servants and all abide by His bidding.  (The Báb, Bahá’í Prayers, p. 28)

over and over while the feeling passed and an opportunity presented itself – and it always did.

So often I feel that my son is teaching me how to parent. He often can see a solution that just makes sense. Sometimes, when my self-esteem is low, I remind myself that the Bahá’í Writings are very clear that the parent is to be in charge, but I always trust the Bahá’u’lláh is guiding my life on the right path, and is teaching me through my son.

I pray for him and with him often, and although he has always vigorously opposed prayer and reading the Writings and calling himself to account daily, I’m hoping that these things will stay with him.

Recently I decided to write to the Universal House of Justice for their guidance. Their response has had a profound effect on my healing and I thought it might be of assistance to others in similar situations.

Holidays have always been difficult times for me, but since I confronted my parents with the sexual abuse, they’ve been especially difficult. They have chosen to deny their involvement and I have been unwilling to engage in a relationship with them that is not based on truth. I have no contact with them and until I got a letter from the Universal House of Justice, I assumed this meant that I was being a bad daughter, and an unforgiving Bahá’í. The Universal House of Justice wrote:

. . . being prudent in deciding upon the appropriate amount of contact with your parents, in reaching your decision, you should be guided by such factors as:

• their degree of remorse over what they inflicted on you in the past

• the extent of their present involvement in practices which are so contrary to Bahá’í Teachings and

• the level of vulnerability you perceive within yourself to being influenced adversely by them.”

When I first started my healing journey, I went to the Bahá’í Writings for guidance and found:

Thy name is my healing . . .

God is sufficient . . .

Seek no other helper . . .

So I felt guilty looking for a therapist. God wasn’t sufficient in the sense I thought it meant, but He was sufficient in showing me the right people at the right time. The Universal House of Justice confirmed this in their letter, writing:

. . . you may well find it useful to seek the advice of experts such as your therapist.

I used to feel that I was a bad Bahá’í for not being able to instantly forgive my parents, but the Universal House of Justice wrote:

You are urged to strive to develop forgiveness in your heart toward your parents who have abused you in so disgraceful a manner, and to attain a level of insight which sees them as captives of their lower nature . . .

For me, this means that I may never get there, and as long as I continue to strive, I’m doing the right thing.

Nowhere in the letter from the Universal House of Justice does it say I should stop looking at the memories and dwelling on the past, as I have been told by many well-meaning friends. Instead, the Universal House of Justice writes:

You are truly blessed to have been enabled to accept Bahá’u’lláh as the Manifestation of God for this Age, and to have access to the limitless spiritual powers with which His life-giving Revelations is infused. You can draw on these powers by your prayers, as well as your participation in the work of the Faith and in the life of the Bahá’í community; through this effort and through your consultation with competent professionals having expertise in your area of need, you can promote your healing from the damaging effects of your past experiences, and can find happiness and tranquility.

So I’m not sure what this has to say to parents looking for ideas on raising their children – except I know that there are many people out there who are struggling with similar experiences and are wondering what the Bahá’í approach to recovery might be.

I’m sure that because of the shame and the need for perfectionism that many of us just struggle with, we will continue to find the Writings to “beat” ourselves with instead of the ones which will heal.

Having had such a clear letter from the Universal House of Justice has validated my struggle and helped me to know that I am on the right track – and I know that if I work on becoming a better person, my parenting sills are bound to improve too.

None of use grew up in the kind of families Bahá’u’lláh calls us to create, and as adults, we need to take a close look at who we are and where we came from. We need to make conscious decision to change the patterns we don’t like. And we need to trust the guidance we’ve been given in the Bahá’í Writings. Sometimes this may mean having to create a family of choice as we leave behind our family of anger. God will guide us and protect us on our parenting journey. All we have to do is ask.

I believe that all of the answers we need are in the Bahá’í Writings and that we just need to learn to use them to assist us. Particular assistance came to me from the letter from the Universal House of Justice, for example the ideas that:

• healing is not expected to be instantaneous or absolute, but can be “promoted”.

• I am not expected to instantly forgive my parents “To strive to develop forgiveness’ seems to acknowledge that it may never be achieved in this lifetime.

• I am not obligated to see, spend time with or take care of my parents in their old age. I am encouraged to be “prudent in the deciding upon the appropriate amount of contact with your parents.”

• It’s OK to feel vulnerable and “to seek the advice of experts such as your therapist”

The letter from the world Center closes with the following:

The House of Justice offers you its abundant sympathy at what you have suffered, it’s loving concern for your welfare, and its encouragement to you to look to the future with confidence and optimism. You are urged to ponder these reassuring words of Bahá’u’lláh: “O my Servants! Sorrow not if, in these days and on this earthly plane, things contrary to your wishes have been ordained and manifested by God, for days of blissful joy, of heavenly delight, are assuredly in store for you. Worlds, holy and spiritually glorious, will be unveiled to your eyes. You are destined by Him, in this world and hereafter, to partake of their benefits, to share in their joys, and to obtain a portion of their sustaining grace. To each and every one of them you will no doubt, attain.”

I am happy to send copies of the Universal House of Justice letter to anyone who wants it, and I’m happy to share my journey with anyone who needs to talk about being a Bahá’í and having less than ‘Abdul-Bahá-like responses to the injustices thy have had.

I’ve put together a compilation of all the quotes which helped me.  You can read more about it at:  http://susangammage.com/Abuse-and-Violence-Reasons-and-Remedies

Local Assemblies who require guidance in dealing with cases involving abuse should contact their National Spiritual Assembly.

There is a great document put out by the National Spiritual Assembly of the Baha’is of the United States, called:  Guidelines for Spiritual Assemblies on Domestic Violence which is helpful for anyone dealing with issues arising from violence and abuse of any kind.  You can download it from:  www.bahai.us/system/files/DVGuidelines.pdf

 

  Those of us who’ve experienced abuse as children often learn to expect that bad things are likely to happen in the future and that there is nothing that can be done to prevent or avoid them from happening.  This can lead to a lifetime of anxiety (waiting for it to happen) and depression (arising [...]

 

Those of us who’ve experienced abuse as children often learn to expect that bad things are likely to happen in the future and that there is nothing that can be done to prevent or avoid them from happening.  This can lead to a lifetime of anxiety (waiting for it to happen) and depression (arising from learned helplessness).

For many years the Bahá’í Faith was both my rescuer and my tormenter.  I totally believed that Baha’u'llah was who He said He was, and that He had a blueprint for humanity, (including me), so that we could get ourselves out of the mess we were in.  This is my primary reason for becoming a Bahá’í.

Over the years, I strove to put into practice the teachings, to the best of my ability, believing that if I did so, I would be transforming myself and contributing to the betterment of the world.  Doing this gave me my life back, for which I am grateful!

But the longer I was a Bahá’í, and the more I studied the Writings morning and night; and the more study circles I tutored and the more people I coached, the more the Writings became a giant “to do” list, and I eventually collapsed under the weight of trying to do it all.  It contributed to my deepening anxiety and depression and worsened my mental health.

I knew that this wasn’t the fault of the Teachings, but that somehow there was something I had failed to understand.  Recently I came across the term “akrasia” which means “weakness of will; acting in a way contrary to one’s sincerely held moral values”.  This described me perfectly!

My mental health problems had less to do with anxiety and depression and post traumatic stress disorder (most of which had been laid to rest years ago); but the failure to live up to my expectations of what I thought God wanted of me.  The judgements and torments with which I inflicted myself were beyond any of the abuse which had been perpetrated on me as a child; and worse, I was doing it to myself!  So I was delighted to find the right “diagnosis”!

I recently came across the work of Michael Penn, a Bahá’í professor and clinical psychologist, who conducted a study called “Akrasia and Mental Health”.  In it, he sought to explore the mental health problems that may be associated with akrasia in a cross-cultural sample.

He was interested in akrasia as defined by “an agent’s will is said to be weak if he or she acts, and acts intentionally, in ways that are contrary to his or her own best judgment. Under such circumstances it is sometimes said that the actor lacks “self-mastery” or the willpower to do what he or she knows or believes would be best, all things considered”;   and in the moral self-assessments and self-reflective judgments that centred upon what one has done or failed to do, resulting in guilt, shame, regret and remorse leading to anxiety, depression, substance abuse, and vulnerability to suicide.

His findings were as follows:

1)      When individuals act in ways that are contrary to their own values they may awaken moral emotions that are experienced as a form of self-induced trauma;

2)      as it is with other-induced trauma, the self-induced trauma associated with acts of akrasia should be correlated with mental distress and various states of psychopathology;

3)      the deleterious impact of akrasia is not culture specific but is universal.

Michael began to hypothesize that the only lasting remedy was for akratic patients to begin acting in ways that were more congruent with their own implicit or explicit values.

I turned to the world of nature and looked at the human body.  I came to realize that the big toenail (for example) has an important function and when it’s bent or broken, the whole body suffers.  It’s function is to protect the big toe and the surrounding soft tissues from injuries.  It doesn’t feel guilty for not being able to see, or taste.  It just does its job the best it knows how.

This was a revelation!  The Bahá’í Writings were written for all of humanity for the next 500,000 years; and not just for Susan Gammage on October 10 in any given year!  I didn’t have to do it all; and I didn’t have to do it all today.  I just had to make today better than yesterday.

If you want to read the whole study, email me at:  susan@susangammage.com

by Susan Gammage, Baha’i Life Coach The Bahá’í Network on AIDS, Sexuality, Addictions and Abuse (BNASAA) is holding its 20th anniversary celebrations on November 6-8, 2009 at Green Acre Bahá’í School.  They were asking for “transformation stories” in order to capture the impact of the BNASAA process in the last 20 years.  What follows is [...]

by Susan Gammage, Baha'i Life Coach

The Bahá’í Network on AIDS, Sexuality, Addictions and Abuse (BNASAA) is holding its 20th anniversary celebrations on November 6-8, 2009 at Green Acre Bahá’í School.  They were asking for “transformation stories” in order to capture the impact of the BNASAA process in the last 20 years.  What follows is my story.

I didn’t go to the first BNASAA conference.  I could have.  I saw the ad in Bahá’í Canada and even called Marjorie for more information.  The first man I ever loved had AIDS at the time, and he died in December 1989, a year after his diagnosis.  Although I was married to somebody else, I helped him die that year.  So it would have made sense to go, but I thought I was strong enough on my own and didn’t need a group.  How wrong I was.

My marriage ended shortly after and a year and a half into my year of patience, I fell in love with a woman.  I’d read all the Writings.  I knew it was wrong.  I just couldn’t make it stop – so when BNASAA held its second conference on homosexuality, at Green Acre, I went.  I knew that the purpose wasn’t to challenge the law, but I hoped I’d meet other gay Bahá’ís who’d found a loophole that would make it all right.  I really thought we’d talk about being gay and about being Bahá’í, but informally we talked about using sex as an addiction (a new concept for me), and formally we heard about being created noble and then abasing ourselves.  It all made sense – and I became a BNASAA groupie.

Since BNASAA didn’t have the loopholes I was looking for, I wrote to the House of Justice – looking for their approval and I got it.  They told me it was OK to love someone of the same sex, and they told me I was living in a society that sexualized everything, so it was no wonder that so many people confused love and sex.  It was hard to hear that sex belonged to a married heterosexual couple, and that there was no way for this law to change, but the letter was full of love and although I didn’t like it, I knew that this Faith was bigger than my likes and dislikes, so with the help of 2 Local Spiritual Assemblies I left the relationship, willing to align with the will of God.

It wasn’t easy.  We owned a house together and I had to sell my interest, losing my entire investment in the process.  The stress precipitated a major depressive episode and I wasn’t able to work.  I went onto long term disability and stayed there for many years.  I lost the remainder of my life savings and moved into a one room shack in the woods with my 8 year old son, where we lived for 2 years.

Of course, the depression wasn’t all because of my decision to leave.  The third BNASAA conference focused on Addictions, but what everyone wanted to talk about was the abuse that fed into the addictions.  I’d been working through my abuse issues for several years, which were triggered by Randy’s diagnosis of AIDS, and made worse with every loss.  This series of losses was just the final straw.

The BNASAA conferences raised more questions than answers, and I often left, writing more letters to the House asking for clarity and sharing their answers with each subsequent conference.

I never would have been able to attend the BNASAA conferences without the generous subsidies from the scholarship fund, so if you are one of the angels who paid my way over the years, please know that I am eternally grateful.

Each conference left me more determined than ever to align with the teachings of the Bahá’í Faith.  As instructed, I read the Writings morning and night, and almost always found a quote that gave me insights into my struggle.  I collected the quotes, and in 1996 was invited to share them with a conference at LouHelen.  Up till that point, they were all in a file drawer, and I didn’t know what I had till I grouped them together, and a book was born.

I didn’t like telling my story and being the centre of attention (my abusers told me that if I talked about what happened to me, I would be killed, and since I’d watched it happen to others, I knew it to be true), and at several conferences, I was unable to function and needed the support of the on-call therapist.

I owe another debt of gratitude to Pat Romano McGraw, who understood triggers and dissociative disorders and post traumatic stress and was able to get me though some tough situations.

It was hard having all these writings at my disposal, and not living up to them.  As it says in the Tablet of Ahmad:  “the wisdom of every command shall be tested” and I was testing most of them!  I was back into another relationship, unable to live up to the standards of the Faith, about to become a household name when the book came out, and I wasn’t doing what it said to do.  All of the quotes were nothing but “shoulds” and I was sinking under the weight.

But I kept going to the conferences and I kept trying to bring my life into alignment with the Writings, and I guess it must have had some effect, because at the last conference, I met some people I hadn’t seen for several years, and they called me a poster child for BNASAA transformation, and I am grateful for this yardstick by which to measure my progress.  I think what they saw was my smile, and my willingness to make eye-contact, two things I hadn’t done at the earlier conferences.

I still have a long way to go.  I still struggle with anxiety and depression, and still live under a cloud of despair from time to time, but I do have hope, and most days, I can see light at the end of the tunnel.

At the beginning of the journey I wanted to talk to others who’d made it through, and I couldn’t find anyone.  I promised that if I made it through, I’d show others it’s possible.  So now the book is out in the world (Abuse and Violence:  Reasons and Remedies, Bahá’í Publishing Trust India, 2009), taking on a life of its own, and I’ve started a Bahá’í-inspired life coaching practice, with a strong presence on the web, sharing the quotes with others and helping people apply the Writings to their everyday life situations.

It was a real step, breaking the silence imposed on me by my abusers, putting my story out there on the internet.  You can find it if you look deeply enough, at www.susangammage.com

I know these stories are meant to be anonymous, but sharing my story publically is part of my healing.

I’m proud to be affiliated with BNASAA and 10% of the royalties from the book are going back into the scholarship fund.  Thank you God, for BNASAA and all the selfless steadfast sacrifices of its organizers!  May we have 20 more good years, and 20 more after that.  The world is waiting!  Yá Bahá’u’l-Abhá!

Have you ever been to a BNASAA conference?  Share your experiences here: