I recently had a dream that left my pillow soaked with tears.
In this dream, I was in a classroom where a professor had said something about not letting our lives be controlled by fear. I had a breakdown and started crying in class. Eventually she stopped class and asked if I wanted to go get a drink of water. I declined and she continued on with class. Still crying and not able to pay attention, I wasn’t able to absorb any of the material being gone over. Noticing that I was distracting other students, the teacher addressed me a for a second time, insisting that I leave the classroom and collect myself. I wander out into the hallway, grab a drink of water, and just start pacing the hallway, wanting to physically remove myself from the situation. Feeling as though continuing the lecture was an insurmountable task, I walked outside.
Observing a stranger crying, an unknown SUV rolls up next to next to me. I am still beside myself. The kind of hysterical where I am absent minded – where I’m unaware of what’s going on around me. Simply wanting to run away from these feelings, I listen to strangers ushering me to get into the rear of the SUV with my school gear. I am still crying while they abscond me away, not really aware of what’s going on around me.
Still overwhelmed, I was not paying to attention to where the SUV was headed. I just knew I was fleeing from the environment where the emotional turmoil had occurred. When I finally became cognizant of my surroundings, I had a moment of realization as they drove down a big hill in my hometown. My muscles clenched as a looming sense of trepidation grew. I asked where they were taking me. Unbeknownst to me this whole time, they were taking me to their church to help me. From an outsider’s point of view, maybe this was considered helpful; however, going down this particular big hill and speaking about taking me to a church, I had realized they were taking me to the same church I went to as a child.
At this point a sense of panic overwhelmed me. I just wanted to get away – I did not want to go back. I screeched at them to stop the car. They responded by saying they “were almost there” and that the pastor would help me. Not getting the hint, I opened the door of the moving SUV to make my point that I wanted to leave. This made the group of do-gooders understand that I wasn’t going back to their church – I did not want to go back to my church I went to long ago. Still panicked and overwhelmed, I exit the vehicle and start walking away. Once again, I am not cognizant of my surroundings.
It was at this time that I wake up overwhelmed, taking stuttered breaths, and crying. I find my pillow soaked from tears.
As a kid, I was baptized, received my first holy communion, and even went to church … until one day we just stopped going. When I asked my mom why, she told me that they had started cutting back on mass hours, they kept asking for more and more money in mailers, and that they wouldn’t fix the air conditioning.
Since I stopped going as a kid, I’ve been in church very few times. I’ve sat through mass a handful of times after a friend passed on, but haven’t been otherwise. While visiting my sister a few months ago, my sister invited me to her church for the first time. Saying I was anxious was an understatement. I requested to sit by the door so I could escape if I felt the need to. When we actually went to my sister’s church for mass, the pastor stood close by, between where we were seated and the exit. I could feel my heart racing and started to hold my breath unconsciously, my sympathetic nervous system detecting danger. I completely lost a sense of presence and I could only think of how badly I wanted to get away.
A few years ago I learned something unexpected while my partner and I were visiting my sister. I learned that my biological mother had lied to me as a child. We hadn’t stopped going to church because of the air conditioning. We didn’t stop going because they kept asking for money in mailers, or because of mass hours. We stopped going because the pastor was sexually abusing children. My sister told me that I must have been “too young to remember” and refused to elaborate.
Since this knowledge was uncovered, I’ve done some research on him. I’ve learned that he appeared in a memo to catalog sexual abuse allegations in the Archdiocese Secret Archives, he was suspended from the ministry and was removed from the priesthood by the Vatican. I’ve also unsurfaced what I would describe as a “half memory” of something happening with my pastor. I remember a feeling that something very wrong just happened and feeling really uncomfortable; however, the rest of the details are fuzzy. I just know there was a time where I started feeling really uncomfortable going to church.
I still do.
Feed The Good Wolf 
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