Christine Therriault-Merkel Joins Clifton Pettyjohn on TRANSFORMATION RADIO

Her credentials might not appear at all exciting through the naked eye. As Christine puts it, "I call myself an amateur expert because most of what I know comes from experiencing trauma and living through it". Christine is an advent writer, with most of her writings featured on the Medium platform and in church publications. She is a Lutheran pastor who is not afraid to speak about her personal experience with mental illnesses nor the stigmas attached to them. As a domestic violence survivor she was blacklisted by her Bishop; because she spoke out, which led to her and her family relocating to DE. Her new Bishop is an ally who not only supports her telling my story, he encourages her to do so. Christine is the mother of two children, a 20-year-old daughter who just finished her 2nd year of college/nursing school and a 17-year-old severely autistic son, who is non-verbal and needs to be monitored at all times. He was 3 yrs old when they received his autism diagnosis. This was shortly after finding out he had lead poisoning - the people who treated him at the told us they had never seen numbers as high as his. Racism played a big role in doctors initially dismissing the symptoms of lead poisoning because we were white, middle class and only poor, black children get lead poisoning. Christine is passionate about lifting up other women - especially women of color and trans-women. She can talk for hours about domestic violence, why misogyny (just like racism) is a cancer to the human race, and how we - as a society - need to face the realities of our illness and get the treatments necessary to heal.