Fantasies about someone other than your spouse

[former_Catholic]

Exactly.
Without working through one’s issues with some highly qualified female counselor in order to reclaim one’s female psyche and female body and some female consciousness of the female side of God in all of this issue, one can all too easily end up with a relationship with the priest (thank God if one has got a reasonable priest, an absolute necessity if one wishes to remain Catholic!), a relationship with the abuser (fantasy), and an ever-distancing relationship with one’s husband, because, exactly, one can end up never trusting any man as much as one trusts one’s priest.
and that is not a healthy relationship, a healthy state of affairs for a married woman to have.

 

[former_Catholic]

You missed MY point, I have already, with the grace of God, worked through the abuse that was done to me over many years when I was very young.

I am very sorry for writing the sloppy slang American English pronoun “you” instead of the proper English pronoun “one” in my above post. I was not referring to you at all. I was referring to a phenomenon that I have seen all too often of women who were abused as children, who ended up as extremely devout religious women having tremendous difficulty with having a conjugal relationship with their husbands exactly because the only man they will ever fully trust is a priest.

 

[allhers]

I am very sorry for writing the sloppy slang American English pronoun “you” instead of the proper English pronoun “one” in my above post. I was not referring to you at all. I was referring to a phenomenon that I have seen all too often of women who were abused as children, who ended up as extremely devout religious women having tremendous difficulty with having a conjugal relationship with their husbands exactly because the only man they will ever fully trust is a priest.

Well, I don’t know anything about that but I am an extremely devout religious women who has no difficulty with having a conjugal relationship with my husband and still, the only men I will ever fully trust are priest.

Perhaps those women ought to have been nuns instead and missed their calling? I don’t know. Just a suggestion. There were actually times in my past that I thought that were my case too, but I would have made a lousy nun I’m sure. I’m more like Maria in the Sound of Music.

 

[former_Catholic]

Perhaps those women ought to have been nuns instead and missed their calling?

I only know of one, severely traumatized, who could never again trust anyone but God, and who became a nun and that was her healing and her salvation, God bless her.
I have seen many marriages fall to ruin over the issue of childhood sexual abuse. It’s tragic. As soon as they have a child, or their child reaches the age they were when they were abused, or the abuser dies… the upwelling of the old forgotten trauma comes back into consciousness…
and not everyone manages to hang onto their marriage through that tidal wave when it hits.
Congratulations, cheers, and hearty applause to you, that you managed to hang on and surf the big one…
that has shattered so many other marriages onto the rocks.

 

[allhers]

I only know of one, severely traumatized, who could never again trust anyone but God, and who became a nun and that was her healing and her salvation, God bless her.
I have seen many marriages fall to ruin over the issue of childhood sexual abuse. It’s tragic. As soon as they have a child, or their child reaches the age they were when they were abused, or the abuser dies… the upwelling of the old forgotten trauma comes back into consciousness…
and not everyone manages to hang onto their marriage through that tidal wave when it hits.
Congratulations, cheers, and hearty applause to you, that you managed to hang on and surf the big one…
that has shattered so many other marriages onto the rocks.

But for the grace of God, go I. When the memories surfaced for me, the first person I told was my mother, she was a great prayer warrior and immediately took it to prayer. Then I took my husband to a small Chapel and there, just he and I and the Lord were, I quietly told him and he held me while I cried in his arms. He supported me through it all and it brought us both back to a Sacramental life.

There are still times where some little thing pops back into mind, but, we pray the Rosary together, go to Mass together, and go to Adoration together and I pray for the men who did those things to me. Jesus said to pray for our enemies and since I was such a small, little holy person, I believe that Satan tried to get to me through them. He failed miserably, thank God!!

I recently read that Blessed Teresa of Calcutta said “pray and forgive”. Amen to that.