A God Called Father
One Woman's Recovery from Incest and Multiple Personality Disorder
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November 27, 1995 -- She curled up in a ball, knees to her chest, hands held in tight fists in front of her mouth, mewing like a kitten and crying out "I want my Mommy! I want my Mommy!" An agony of longing knotted her stomach. Fear and panic caused her arm muscles to tense painfully and her hands to tremble. She was two-and-a-half years old. Shivering on the floor of a dark room, she hurt everywhere, inside and out. So little, so alone, so lost and confused and so longing to be rescued, she desperately needed comforting arms to enfold her and soothing words to reassure her. Her mind struggled to understand: "Where is Mommy? Why did Daddy do this to me?" As terrifying images filled her mind, jagged-edged sobs spilled over one another in an endless cry of despair. She had no words to describe her sense of rejection and abandonment. She could only feel--and what she felt was unbearable. Her hands reached up to cover her eyes and she shook her head "no" in an effort to chase away the face of her attacker from her mind... Seeing the panic in her eyes, Jan reminded her, "The bad man is long gone now. It will never happen again." His words wrapped around her like loving arms. "You're safe now. You're here with me. It's just a memory. You were a very brave girl." She followed his soothing voice back to the present, to the room with the couch and the kind man she was beginning to trust. Slowly her breathing returned to normal and she began to relax. She was six years old again, though she lived in the body of a 43-year-old woman. She admitted she wanted him to adopt her and take her home to his house. He helped her to see that it wasn't possible for him to make up for the past--that he could help her but he couldn't be her Daddy. He told her only God could be her Daddy now. She wrestled with her feelings of fear and anger as he reminded her that God would always be with her, too. She need never be alone again. Listening to a voice within, dropping her eyes, she nodded her head and was gone. In her place, I appeared. Touching my face with my fingertips to ground myself to my surroundings, I sat in silent reflection, allowing the feelings and the memories to rise within me. The overwhelming desire for a loving father, and the grief in knowing that desire must go unfulfilled in the human realm, flooded over my body, soul and spirit. Racking sobs rose in my throat and I let them come without resistance. I faced the feelings and I owned them. The deep well of rejection and abandonment, of love-hunger and endless longing, belonged to me. There was no running away from it now, no blessed relief of dissociation. The little girl had carried the pain without me for many years, and in recent months, I had been able to feel deep empathy for her, but today it became my burden, my reality. I felt it as deeply as I would have felt it 40 years ago if I hadn't run away in my mind. Today I stayed. Today I, too, was a brave girl. Today I took one more significant step toward healing and wholeness. Today I began to mourn. As I attend to every painful thought, feeling and sensation, as I look intently into each one, I mourn. I mourn the loss of innocence. I mourn the carefree childhood I never had. I mourn the fantasy mother and father. I mourn the wasted years, the chaos and confusion of my life. I enter the swirling vortex of darkness and pain, embrace the truth I find there, and I mourn. To my surprise I discover at the farthest corner of the black tomb, beyond the Pit of Loneliness, the Cave of Anger and the River of Shame, is a fountain. Buried behind the layers of previously unacknowledged, unmourned pain is a fountain of life and hope and joy and laughter that also belongs to me--a hidden treasure. Somehow learning how to feel the sadness, to mourn the tragedy in my life, is setting me free to feel the hope and experience the laughter in my life. I can rejoice in the midst of such suffering because I have discovered that joy comes in the mourning.
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About the Book
This book is the story of a little girl severely betrayed by her earthly father and a woman who must learn at last to trust in a heavenly Father to find the love and safety she always longed for but never knew. There are no easy answers here. No formulas to follow. The path to recovery was not neatly groomed and manicured nor well sign-posted. This is not a step-by-step, how-to book. It's a frightening, frustrating and sometimes seemingly impossible journey into and through a tomb of darkness and despair to find at the very darkest place at the back of the tomb a fountain of life and joy. It's my own resurrection story. Incest is ugly. The incest I suffered was severe and spanned many years of my childhood. The damage to body, soul and spirit was extensive. The ability to dissociate from the terrifying experiences of my childhood was a gift from God that allowed me to survive. But when combined with a creative child's ability to pretend the abuse was happening to someone else, it also fostered the development of separate identities within me – Multiple Personality Disorder. This made life as an adult confusing and stressful and the path to recovery even more complex. In this book, I openly expose the ugliness and the confusion I have experienced. I do not pretend, but tell the whole truth about my failures and about my pain. I also share the beauty and the clarity that came over time and I tell the holy truth about my victories and my joy. If you have been a victim, whether you specifically remember the abuse or not, you may find yourself being triggered by the images of sexual and emotional betrayal in this book. Take a break, breathe deeply, set the book aside for a while and call a friend. Don't force yourself to read on. Wait until you're ready. You have a right to set your own pace. You deserve to be treated gently and with respect. If you have been abused, whether sexually, physically or emotionally, I hope my story will be a signpost along your path to healing. If you are a supportive friend, family member, pastor or counselor of an abused person (and given current statistics of abuse, you are!) I hope my story will deepen your understanding of the challenges survivors face in coming to terms with a God called Father. This book was originally translated into the Dutch language and published in Europe under the title "Ik Zal een Vader voor je zijn--" (I Will Be a Father for You).
About the Author
Judith has no memories of her childhood and for many years she is not conscious of the fact that she had to split into multiple personalities as a way of coping with traumatic events in her childhood. In her adult life, when this survival technique begins to work against her, she begins a journey of discovery into her past and her inner world. Supported by faith that Jesus will help her on this difficult path of remembering, she comes up against a reality that causes her anguish, terror and rage, but she no longer pushes the truth away. She begins to feel and, in the feeling, becomes more whole and complete, and more honest with herself and those around her. She describes in a powerful, truthful and gripping way the memories of childhood sexual abuse that begin to surface once she stands open to receive them. Doubt, fear, shame, fury and all the other feelings that have been hidden behind the barricades of her multiple personalities must find a place in her life in order for her to find healing. This is a book of hope. Judith's prayers and fragments of her journal are woven together in this story so that the reader can look over her shoulder and live with her through the pain she previously buried and the victories she eventually gains. And we experience hope and joy with her as she takes each step further along the path toward truth and freedom. In the process, we discover the power of the love of Jesus in her life and her growing trust in a God called Father.