Because I have a lot of energy and get bored easily, I wear many hats. Some are old and a bit worn, but all are important to me.
 | In 1989, I started my healing journey as a survivor of extreme abuse. |
| In 1992, I became an outspoken advocate for the extreme abuse survivor community. |
| In 1996, I became the founder and president of a nonprofit organization. The North American Freedom Foundation (NAFF) helps to educate the public about the special needs of extreme abuse survivors, and also honors and memorialize survivors' unique experiences through NAFF's website and Garden of Healing in Soddy Daisy, Tennessee. |
| In the early 2000s, I became a social worker. |
| In 2002, I became a published author. My educational autobiography, Unshackled, was published to help people to support survivors of extreme abuse more effectively. |
| In 2008, I joined Alternatives Counseling Associates (ACA) in Chattanooga, Tennessee as an expressive arts therapist. |
| I'm also a webmaster. Although I've designed about eight websites thus far, this is the first one that I created to help survivors of trauma and grief cope more effectively with specific recovery issues. |
| In my private life, I'm the proud wife of a recovering Vietnam veteran. I'm also a pet owner, nature lover, gardener, and avid book reader. I enjoy relaxing, and I like to learn new things. I love nature walks. I'm a thrift store junkie. I adore Sudoku. My favorite vacations are at the Atlantic ocean. I love comedy and I always enjoy a good belly laugh. |
| Although I would like to believe I'm a healer, I know better...people heal themselves. And that's the way I think it should be. |
| During my 20+ years of recovery, I've graduated from victim to survivor to thriver. I'm deeply grateful for the life I now live, and appreciate every new day that I can spend with the people I love. |
My recovery
storyIn 2002, I wrote about my personal recovery story in Unshackled, my educational autobiography.
Although my history isn't something to brag about, I've recovered enough to accept it as it was. Like most survivors of extreme abuse, I wouldn't choose to live such a harsh life again. And I wouldn't choose to do what I had to do in the past to keep myself and my loved ones alive. Now, I have many more choices. My choices were limited then, because I was in a lot of danger, and because I hadn't yet learned basic life and social skills.
Since my recovery, which started in 1985, I've received a lot of help to develop those skills. Now I have a much larger "tool kit" of life and social skills I can choose from, every day. I've used many of those new tools to build a healthy new life from the rubble of my past. I've learned how to successfully live in the more normal world with all its written and unwritten rules, laws, and moral codes that are trampled upon in the world of criminal sociopathy that I lived in, for most of my first three decades of life.
One of my biggest challenges, after breaking free from that dangerous world, has been to figure out who I really am. So many people in the criminal world seemed determined to forcibly make me into their very own mini-me. Because I depended on some of them for my survival, I gave-in and became what they wanted me to be, whenever I was with them. Decades later, when I began to break free of their control, new people came into my life. Most of them meant well, but some of them tried to reform me into their ideal: an ultramoral, doctrinally rigid, judgmental Christian.
I needed a lot more therapy, serious introspection, and just plain growing up to realize that as long as I try to be someone else instead of just plain being myself, I'll never feel good about me. I'll never be happy.
So now, I choose to be a WYSIWYG; I'm just plain myself. Even as a therapist, I choose not to pretend to be wiser or better than my clients. Instead, I choose to value and respect each client, and their family members, the same way I would want a therapist to value and respect me: as a fellow human being who is accepted, warts and all.
I've grown up enough now to understand and accept that people are not born abusive and cruel and hurtful. Life makes them that way. I believe that most people who choose to hurt others do so because they haven't yet learned basic life and social skills that can equip them to make safer and more healthy choices for themselves and others.
I'm one of the lucky ones. People noticed me and sensed - in me - qualities that I couldn't see in myself at that time. They believed in me and chose to help me get free, and to start recovering from 30 years of abuse and trauma. Gradually, they helped me discard all the false facades I'd hidden behind and helped me feel valued as a fellow human being. By being consistently trustworthy towards me, they helped me to trust them and connect with them.
Although I wanted to die many times because I was so filled with pain, rage and shame, now I'm glad that they helped me stay alive until I found reasons to want to live. I'm grateful for what I've successfully built out of the rubble of my past. Recovery from extreme abuse is very hard work. Many of my soul-wounds were so deep that I needed lots of help from many caring people to survive those wounds and heal. Although some of the wounds still throb once in a while, they do not slam me to the floor anymore.
Occasionally during my long recovery journey, I experienced a series of long droughts - like treks through barren deserts - when I had nobody to help me. During those difficult seasons, I had to learn to rely on whatever was available to get me through. These barren treks happened because, as a survivor of extreme abuse, my story was too harsh and upsetting to share about in support groups, and I couldn't find a therapist or minister who could mentally and emotionally stay in the room while I shared the most horrific parts of my past. Although I didn't want to be alone with the awful pain, shame and horror anymore, sometimes there weren't any therapists or ministers who were willing, or able, to help me do it.
This is why I chose to become a therapist. Although I still can only do so much as one person, at least I can do something to help one less extreme abuse survivor feel so alone and hopeless. At first I wanted to be a psychologist, but then I chose to be a clinical social worker because social workers focus more on helping clients to connect with lots of other resources that are outside the therapist's office. This is important to me because most survivors of extreme abuse have lots and lots of needs, and they often need extra encouragement to build their self-esteem and resourcefulness.
In the Healing Journey website I included information about resources that can help survivors of grief, abuse and trauma. More resources are listed in the North American Freedom Foundation (NAFF) website at http://naffoundation.org. NAFF is a private nonprofit foundation that I developed, in part, to provide extra support for extreme abuse survivors and the people who care about them.
If you are a survivor of trauma or abuse or both, please don't ever give up. Even if you have to experience occasional soul-droughts, please keep trying to connect with others. My experience has been that if I don't give up, eventually I do find people who do care and can help me to know and love myself more, and to connect with and enjoy the healthier and safer parts of the world around me. Sometimes I have to humble down a little, admit to myself and my higher power that I'm terrified, and then risk trusting - just a tiny bit - that not everyone in the world is out to hurt me. Even though some people do choose to do evil things, I'm discovering that most people choose to do what is right and good. That gives me a lot of hope for our world.
Take gentle care,
Kathleen Sullivan
Disclaimer
No part of the Healing Journey recovery website is to be used as a substitute for professional therapy. If you need professional support, please contact a qualified ministerial or mental health professional. Materials in this website may be printed or copied for personal use only. Readers are welcome to agree or disagree with any statements made in this website, and may benefit from sharing and discussing them with support persons.