About ritual abuse

 

Ritual abuse is ..

 

…organized abuse carried out by a group for the purpose of achieving power. The abuse aims to break a victim’s spirit and to gain the ultimate in power – absolute control over another human being. Here, abuse is systematically rather than randomly applied. (Safe Passage to Healing see BOOKS, ARTICLES)

 

 

Many times ritual abuse is multigenerational.

The perpetrator might tell the child he wants to be hurt. The child might be told he is bad and he belongs with bad people. The perpetrator tries to make the child feel isolated from other people.

Perpetrators of ritual abuse brainwash children in order to force them to commit acts of violence.

Cults can train alter personalities to emerge when triggered by cues – told certain words or shown certain images. Once the child is given the trigger she switches personalities and does what the cult wants.

Many multiples may not be aware they are being abused by a cult. Only some of their personalities may know. Cults can program these personalities to keep secret the abuse and to never emerge in the person’s daily life. This keeps the person from telling other people about the ritual abuse.

 

Many people do not believe ritual abuse survivors. People are more concerned with evidence or proof of abuse than with the feelings of the victims. Many people think survivors are crazy, others blame survivors for their own pain. There is a great deal of revictimization of ritual abuse survivors. The sad truth is that survivors today must be cautious about opening up the old wound. (Understanding Multiple Personality Disorder)

 

 

A final word about healing

Although I have laid out an example of a step-by-step process of healing, therapy can be quite different depending on the person and also how severe their illness is.

 

There are some with MPD/DID who are fairly high functioning and highly motivated to heal. They may have fewer problems such as other mental illnesses and have reasonably good support. Their treatment may be relatively rapid and straightforward.

 

At the other end are those who are very ill. They may have many other illnesses such as severe substance abuse, eating disorders, severe depression and anxiety and possibly multiple medical problems. In this group may also be those who are violent and/or abusive towards other victims. Some of these may be hospitalized in psychiatric departments or in jail.