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Posted by Charlie on September 21, 2010 at 15:53:22
Minirth-Meirers, Christian doctors in Richardson Texas, have written quite a number of books dealing with personal and family dysfunction, such as was Berg's and ours. Books such as: Love is Choice, Happiness is a Choice, Worry Free Living, Getting Over The Past, The Anger Work Book, Kid's Who Carry Our Pain, etc.
The books thoroughly explain the grief process: the final step being that 'gem of peace' (forgiveness) which you say you want to reach. The books are full of real life cases dealing with all kinds of dysfunction.
One testimony that stood out to me was how a woman pretty much gave up her own life to please her husband's life (for years and years and years) only to end up at the Richardson Clinic near death. She had been diagnosed as having this disease and that disease, and whatever, throughout the years and, of course, nothing helped. In truth she had been stuffing her anger about her unaddressed needs within the marriage throughout the years and had come down with severe anxiety and depression manifesting itself in all kinds of symptoms that were leading to her death - kinda like me when I first came out of the Fam. My anger went inward and manifested itself in internal bleeding and severe back problems for 10 years and it was SHUTTING ME DOWN. Once the anger was properly addressed and rooted out, those sypmtoms went away, as did the symptoms for the woman. She went on to live a much healthier life sans her abusive hubby and the joy that was her, internally, returned. Not only that, she now had a thorough understanding of dysfunction and the grief process and how they worked and was able to go on living out her life fully capable of dealing with whatever life had to send her way - a wise, mature woman.
You can find these therapuetic books at Amazon for peanuts. If you can't afford the peanuts, I'll buy some of them for you. You can also avail yourself of all the free advice available to you via the Dr. Phil Archives. There's lots of good stuff in there. The memories of your past won't go away, but they don't have to affect your present.
Support groups? As per what others have posted, they are all over. Specific support as per your 'Family Journey?' Hmmn! The boards, here, can be helpful. The folks here can be journeymates until such time as you don't need journeymates anymore. I'm not all that up to date as per 2nd Gen Boards. Perhaps there are others here who can direct you to some.
It was years before I joined a Bible Study Group as a part of my 'coming out of the Family.' I was 'too sick' to do so sooner. And then, when I did, I had to fight off their wanting me to 'serve, serve, serve.' Good God! That's all I had ever done in the Fam. I was there for the fellowship, the singing of songs, the sharing of testimonies, the reading of the scriptures, the worshipping of God in community - the things they had advertized. The Min - Meirers books helped me tremendously in that respect. They said that we codependents don't need another job. We need to be nourished. There comes a time soon enough when we can serve again, this time out of love rather than out of need.
Wishing you all the best. Glad to hear that you have had some personal and personal family successes (hubby/kids) since leaving the Fam inspite of all that went down.
Let me know if I am buying you the books.
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