Since today is Sunday and once again I did not go to church, I decided to address some more aspects to the spiritual abuse I experienced in my home growing up. Maybe if I get it out in writing it will be one less thing swimming around in my head.
As I mentioned in my previous post here, I grew up in a community that was almost exclusively the religion I was brought up in. Because of this, everything revolved around the structure the church provided in regards to church on Sunday, activities during the week, etc. As I've looked back on that experience I've been so struck by the fact that the most important thing to both of my parents truly was how their children made them look. I was told on numerous occasions that how I acted would make an impression to everyone I came in contact with as to what kind of parents they were. I was expected to act, look and perform a certain way. I frequently heard remarks like, "What do people at church think of us now?" and it was usually over really petty, stupid things. This was such a pervasive thing that I really didn't act like a normal kid. I became a very compliant, good little girl who could never do enough to please and who was extremely hungry for adult approval. So little positive reinforcement was given to me at home that when a compliment was given to me by a teacher or any adult, for that matter, it meant so much to me that getting compliments became the basis of my self-esteem. If I didn't get compliments I felt terrible about myself.
My parents were both raised in poverty and they both experienced abuse in their homes. My father was raised in the religion I was brought up in. My mother was raised in a small mining community that was more diverse and although her dad was a member of this church, he was not a practicing member and my maternal grandmother belonged to a different denomination. She and the kids were baptized into the church when my mom was ten. In listening to my mother over the years, it is very apparent to me that as she looked around her, coming from poor financial circumstance, she wanted the kind of lifestyle that she saw in others around her. For whatever reason, the members of this church were more affluent and had nice things. They functioned better as families. I really feel that my mom's decision to be an active church member was because she wanted to LOOK LIKE those people.
An experience that illustrates the need they had for trying to impress other people to the extent that they did happened the day after I was baptized. I was baptized at the age of eight on Saturday and was confirmed a member the next day at church. The confirmation is done in the form of hands placed on the person's head and a blessing being given. We had Sunday School before the general congregational service, and after I picked up my younger brothers, ages 5 and 3 1/2, from their classes, we went to the chapel to sit with our parents. Our parents weren't there. As we stood waiting and looking for them, our ecclesiastical leader noticed that we were feeling worried, came over to us and told us we could come up and sit by him on the stand and watch for them. Right before the service started my parents showed up at the door. My brothers and I were so relieved that we excitedly jumped out of the seats we were in and ran off the stand and up the aisle to them. My parents were furious because we ran through the chapel in front of everyone and embarrassed them. They found seats for the service and during the service I was confirmed as planned. When we got home my parents yelled at us about the fact that we ran in the chapel and what must everyone think of them for their children to be so irreverent. Not one acknowledgment of the fact that we were SCARED that our parents weren't there and church was getting ready to start, or that we were relieved and happy to see them. They could have seen it as humorous, or allowed themselves to feel very loved as they saw their children racing over to them. They lost sight of the fact that this was supposed to be a special day for me. I should have been hearing, "We're so proud of you. This is such a special day for you. We're thankful for the kind of girl you are," but instead I was shamed and belittled and by the time the night was over I was convinced that every other person we went to church with had been completely horrified by my terrible behavior. During episodes like this, the only solace I had was to go to my room where it was quiet and hug one of my dolls.
This experience did so much damage to my perception of how others saw me. I am sure that there were amused smiles as people saw these three cute little kids rushing to greet their parents and that that's all it was. I seriously doubt that anyone was scandalized and I don't think people saw me as a stain on the family name, but I thought that was the case. This also affected my spontaneity and fueled my need to second-guess my actions all the time. I was so self-conscious after this episode; I hadn't realized I was doing anything wrong (which I wasn't) and so it really made me feel like I must naturally be a bad person to have not thought through the fact that running in the chapel was irreverent; I knew this but I was so scared that my parents weren't there that my relief at seeing them made my feet fly. I was one of two or three children being confirmed that day, and when it was my turn to go up to the stand I felt that everyone looking at me was thinking how embarrassing my conduct had been as the meeting was starting.
As an adult, one of the ways this comes back to haunt me is when I see children on these occasions being treated with love and tenderness, and see the approval and pride on their parents' faces. Which is how it is supposed to be; I'm not resentful of the child being treated that way. Sometimes these things trigger back the bad memory and I feel that humiliation and rejection all over again.
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