When the Trauma is From God

TRIGGER WARNING. This episode details one woman’s story of religious trauma and emotional abuse and may be triggering for some.  Please proceed with caution.

Religious trauma is a condition experienced by those who are struggling with leaving an authoritarian religion and coping with the mental and emotional damage of indoctrination. 

Janine Maryland is included in that number.  She stopped by the virtual studio to share her story with the SOS and fam, and it is by far one of the most most real and raw journeys I’ve heard to date. 

She bore her soul with the hopes that her story would encourage and inspire others who may be or have been on a similar journey.

Janine gets super real about how she’s been excommunicated from the religion she grew up in, as well has how she’s being involuntarily forced to distance herself (physically, verbally and socially) from her family, including her mom.

She also shares details of suicide ideations, her struggle with mental illness, how she’s now rebuilding her life piece by piece and learning to live in between the tears.  

Tune in now.

Janine Danielle Maryland is a Nashville, Tennessee native, with a creative soul.  Her love for poetry was implanted in her DNA.  Janine’s grandmother and mother both wrote poetry their entire lives.  This love was further reinforced when her mother took it upon herself to write a poem for each stage of her life.  However, surprisingly, Janine didn’t embrace this hidden talent until her young adulthood.  Each tragic event in her life moved her to express her emotions through poetry.  It gave her a sense of closure from various situations.

Although in Janine’s mid-twenties, she took a detour to pursue the field of Graphic Design, poetry constantly tugged at her heart.  She incorporated personal poems in every graduation and wedding invitation she designed, yet she still was not filling her inner desire to help others.

Granny’s Conversations,® LLC, Greeting Cards for the Soul, was born after Janine spent ten years in the field of Graphic Design.  She decided it was time to embark on a journey that combined her first passion—poetry—with her love for design; this time to save lives.  In a world where we are constantly weighed down with depressing news stories, family issues, health issues and economic woes, just to name a few, we have an urgent need for encouragement, which is the mission of Granny’s Conversations,® LLC.

Although technology has allowed mankind to achieve the impossible, along the way it has caused us to loose sight of the simplicity and comfort received through the written word.  A personal note from a loved one has a way of slowing us down to remember what our hearts truly need, to make it just one more day!

You can find Janine in the following online spaces:

Facebook: : https://www.facebook.com/grannysconversations/

Instagram: @grannyconvo

Twitter:  @grannysconvo

If you need support as you start to peel back the layers of your own emotional trauma, head over to  Shades of Strong and leave us a voice message and we’ll reach out to set up a time to chat.

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