Leaving the Cult

Last month I wrote about family estrangement, something I’ve become intimately familiar with and am still working hard to accept. While watching a documentary recently, I had the thought that maybe leaving a cult has similarities to leaving behind (or being left behind by) a family that is no longer healthy or safe.

So, I did a little research, and here are some of my findings.

-Some of the most common issues faced by ex-cult members are:

a sense of purposelessness or disconnection

depression

grieving for other group members

guilt

anger (toward the groups, its leaders, and themselves)

alienation

isolation

distrust (of others and their own discernment)

black-or-white thinking

fear of consequences prescribed by the cult

low self-esteem

indecisiveness (due to dependency)

dissociation

flashbacks

poor concentration and/or short-term memory loss

survivor’s guilt

-Those who either walk away or are expelled from the cult (vs. those who are rescued) have the most difficult time as they seem to have double the guilt and shame.

-Many former members exhibit residual effects of mind control for a while.

Holy shit. I didn’t expect my random musings to be such a bullseye. My research perfectly articulated what I couldn’t. At some point, I’ve experienced every single one of the common issues listed. Many of them were amplified during my mother’s final illness and its aftermath. As for residual effects of mind control (or in this case, group think or family mythology), these are evident in my unceasing efforts to determine which came first: my pulling away or my effective banishment. And in the little whispers that persist: the ones that tell me that maybe I am a bad person; that maybe I deserve censure.

While I was at it, I also did a little research on family estrangement. Key findings:

-Family estrangement is actually common when there are differing interpretations of what transpired in childhood. For those who had a traumatic childhood, family estrangement is an additional trauma.

-Lack of flexibility and resilience within a family to handle stressful events, like the death of a family member, often results in estrangements.

-Sometimes estrangements can result simply from different values and different expectations about roles.

Again, holy shit. A trifecta.

So, does knowing all this help? Only intellectually. I still struggle with feeling discarded and vilified. With frustration at not being able to fix it. With being considered abnormal by much of society (“but they’re your family”). I still get on the circular train of trying to think my way out of it. And I often feel some guilt about the profound relief of finally giving up.

It’s no surprise to me that the number one recommendation of the experts is that pain in the ass, acceptance. Acceptance of what occurred, what you lost, and where you are now. Rumor has it that you get there, eventually, by moving forward, living your best life, and reframing how you think of the estrangement.

Having had to reframe at least 90% of my thoughts over the past ten years, I’m confident I can do this. Here’s my first pass at it: My resolve to put myself at the center of my life and speak my truth is startling to people who were indoctrinated otherwise. My resolve to heal and grow is threatening to people who choose to remain unconscious. I can have compassion for those people, and I can only control my own thoughts and behaviors.

As I’ve learned throughout my life, grief is not linear. Time does not heal grief but transmutes it. I suspect that the grief of no longer belonging to my tribe will surge and recede periodically. Meanwhile, I’ll be forging ahead.

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Thanks for reading.

And speaking of cults, I’ve almost finished reading Men Who Hate Women by Laura Bates. It is a truly eye-opening, stomach-churning examination of the indoctrination of men and boys into a variety of interrelated extremist movements, some violent, whose core tenet is misogyny. I picked it up after watching Adolescence (Netflix), which highlights how these groups have infiltrated social media and are attracting boys at an alarming rate. Not my preferred reading at a time when I’d generally prefer to be hiding under the bed, but important to know about as the first step toward change is always awareness.