- 3 hours ago
John Collins welcomes Dr. Amanda Thompson back to discuss how trauma develops in high-control religious environments and why its effects often continue long after someone leaves. Together they explore how chronic fear, identity disruption, and spiritual pressure shape the nervous system and influence both mental and physical health.
The conversation examines symptoms such as hypervigilance, dissociation, sleep disruption, anxiety, chronic pain, autoimmune conditions, and self-medicating behaviors. Drawing from clinical research and lived experience, John and Amanda explain how trauma differs from everyday stress, why survivors respond differently, and what practical steps can help begin recovery and long-term healing.
00:00 Introduction
02:27 Defining trauma vs stress
06:18 Identity loss and complex PTSD
10:58 Trauma, the nervous system, and hypervigilance
17:29 Recognizing trauma symptoms
23:30 Dissociation, numbness, and brain fog
26:26 Trauma, sleep deprivation, and health consequences
31:16 Autoimmune disease and chronic stress
35:51 Self-medication and addiction risks
39:51 Trauma and unexplained physical pain
46:52 Healing, therapy, and retraining the brain
50:37 Getting help and next steps
______________________
Weaponized Religion: From Christian Identity to the NAR:
Paperback: https://www.amazon.com/dp/1735160962
Kindle: https://www.amazon.com/dp/B0DCGGZX3K
______________________
– Support the channel: https://www.patreon.com/branham
– Subscribe to the channel: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCBSpezVG15TVG-lOYMRXuyQ
– Visit the website: https://william-branham.org
– Follow on Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/WilliamBranhamOrg
– Follow on TikTok: https://www.tiktok.com/@william.m.branham
– Follow on Twitter: https://twitter.com/wmbhr
– Buy the books: https://william-branham.org/site/books
The conversation examines symptoms such as hypervigilance, dissociation, sleep disruption, anxiety, chronic pain, autoimmune conditions, and self-medicating behaviors. Drawing from clinical research and lived experience, John and Amanda explain how trauma differs from everyday stress, why survivors respond differently, and what practical steps can help begin recovery and long-term healing.
00:00 Introduction
02:27 Defining trauma vs stress
06:18 Identity loss and complex PTSD
10:58 Trauma, the nervous system, and hypervigilance
17:29 Recognizing trauma symptoms
23:30 Dissociation, numbness, and brain fog
26:26 Trauma, sleep deprivation, and health consequences
31:16 Autoimmune disease and chronic stress
35:51 Self-medication and addiction risks
39:51 Trauma and unexplained physical pain
46:52 Healing, therapy, and retraining the brain
50:37 Getting help and next steps
______________________
Weaponized Religion: From Christian Identity to the NAR:
Paperback: https://www.amazon.com/dp/1735160962
Kindle: https://www.amazon.com/dp/B0DCGGZX3K
______________________
– Support the channel: https://www.patreon.com/branham
– Subscribe to the channel: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCBSpezVG15TVG-lOYMRXuyQ
– Visit the website: https://william-branham.org
– Follow on Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/WilliamBranhamOrg
– Follow on TikTok: https://www.tiktok.com/@william.m.branham
– Follow on Twitter: https://twitter.com/wmbhr
– Buy the books: https://william-branham.org/site/books
Category
📚
LearningTranscript
00:30Hello, and welcome to another episode of the William Branham Historical Research Podcast.
00:36I'm your host, John Collins, the author and founder of William Branham Historical Research at william-branham.org.
00:42And with me, I have my very special guest, Dr. Amanda Thompson, former member of The Message.
00:48Amanda, it's good to have you back.
00:50We had great success with the first one we did.
00:53There were a lot of comments asking for more from you, and I saw your husband even got involved in the comments.
01:00So it was really good, and I was wanting to talk more.
01:03Last time we spoke, we got towards the end of it, and I was thinking, man, there's so many other topics I would love to talk through.
01:10Anyway, the first one I wanted to talk through has to do with cult trauma, but I'm going to let you take lead.
01:17And let's explore the link between cult trauma and all of the various things that go with it.
01:23So I love that you mentioned that you caught when my husband watched our video.
01:27So he actually asked what we were going to discuss today, and I told him the topic would be trauma and health.
01:33And he said, oh, you're going to talk about orchids and dandelions.
01:35And I said, oh, you could give my talk for me.
01:37So you know how much my husband is involved in my work, so I appreciate you having me back on.
01:44So I'm definitely really excited to talk about what is trauma and how that's different from stress and how we can recognize it better
01:52and how that's related to our health, both mental and physical health, and how we can kind of destigmatize that and get help.
02:00And so we'll talk about trauma within cults, but trauma can be within a cult, but also within families within a cult,
02:08and then it can trickle outside of that as well.
02:11So you're not just limited to cult trauma, and they probably interact both within a cult-related environment and outside of that.
02:18So, yeah.
02:19Absolutely.
02:20And there's a lot that goes with that.
02:21You'll experience cult trauma, and that will put you into a state of trauma,
02:25and then you'll do other things that will augment or cause additional traumas.
02:29And so it turns into this widely repeating thing that turns into a mess, and I don't talk much about myself.
02:36I try to avoid it, but in the few times that I have gotten to explore trauma with my therapist,
02:43that's something that I have to work through, and largely because I was experiencing cult trauma.
02:49Then when I left, all of the trauma that goes with leaving, which is excessive, traumatic,
02:55I can't even tell you how traumatic that was, leaving.
02:59So you experience all of that, but from what I have been able to tell from not only myself,
03:05but from all of the people who I talk to, you leave, you were in trauma, so you did leave.
03:12You go through the trauma of leaving, and then what happens is it affects you so strongly
03:18that the first thing that hits you is, oh, my gosh, did I make the right decision?
03:23So you go through all of that baggage, and that causes additional traumas.
03:27And for us who have escaped the message cult, it gets a little bit worse
03:31because we were in this divine healing cult.
03:34So when something happens to your health, number one, you're scared half to death,
03:39but number two, everybody in it who's watching you leave starts pointing fingers,
03:43and that even causes more trauma.
03:46And trauma, from what I've been able to tell myself, and I'm no psychologist.
03:52I'll let you, the expert, talk through this, but I have studied psychology quite a bit.
03:57Trauma lives in the body in so many different places that people can't imagine.
04:02The stress hormones, the immune responses.
04:05You can actually catch more sickness whenever you're in trauma.
04:09Trauma, digestion, sleep, pain perception, pain.
04:14There are people who just experience pain all through the body.
04:16So there's a lot we can talk through, and I don't know that we could even cover it in one single podcast.
04:22Oh, man, you're speaking my language.
04:24So, like, behind me and all around the office, I have books,
04:27and one of my favorite of which is by Robert Sapolsky, and it's called Why Zebras Don't Get Ulcers.
04:32Highly recommend this book.
04:33It is a little bit technical, but it's also written from a comedic perspective.
04:37So definitely read it if you want to understand, you know, how that affects your body
04:41and the multiple systems that keep us running every day.
04:44But you're right when you mentioned when you are in a high-control group or a cult,
04:50you are experiencing trauma, likely, and they also tend to breed environments in which,
04:57particularly if you are a young individual or a marginalized individual or a woman
05:01or just someone who might be more susceptible to be taken advantage of,
05:06but you are in an environment such that you are more at risk for aggressions towards you
05:12or abuse, maltreatment, neglect.
05:15And so in the message that's equally true,
05:18you might be struggling to develop a strong sense of self or identity,
05:23and all of these things kind of compound on each other.
05:26And so then when you leave,
05:27you didn't develop the skills to really navigate difficult stressors in the world,
05:32and you have this difficult time, which I'm kind of picking up on you describing as well.
05:38There's a really lovely article called Living in the In-Between or in the Gray.
05:42It's like, do I, I don't have a sense of self anymore.
05:44My identity is completely tied to my cult.
05:47And so who am I now?
05:49And when you really have attacks on your identity development,
05:53so we have lots of literature related to gender, race, sexuality, etc.,
05:57on how when someone really attacks you for your identity,
06:00it can be really, really harmful to your mental health.
06:04And so when your identity has just been kind of ripped out from under you,
06:09it really is bad for your mental health.
06:11And another great example is our military,
06:13because we're going to talk about trauma.
06:15I think we typically associate war trauma as being the only thing that can cause PTSD.
06:19And that's totally not true.
06:22I'd love to talk about that.
06:23But actually, a lot of individuals miss, you know,
06:28they kind of miscontribute that only PTSD in war veterans
06:33is from being exposed to really high intense combat situations.
06:38But actually, the highest peak of vulnerability for PTSD is during retirement.
06:43And this is actually found to be true in research related to police officers as well.
06:47And I actually think some of the research supports
06:50it's because their identity is changing when you retire.
06:53When you retire, you're not your profession anymore.
06:56So who are you and what do you do?
06:58And I think that's really key to take home.
07:00So it's not just attacks on your identity.
07:02It's when your identity is kind of threatened.
07:04When you leave a cult, your identity is definitely threatened.
07:06When you retire and your life is your profession, it's threatened.
07:10So I just I hear you saying these things and want to validate.
07:13Yeah, that makes sense.
07:15Probably wasn't fun.
07:16Been there.
07:16Well, and I know from experience, whenever we left, I honestly, I didn't think I had PTSD.
07:23And I've never actually been diagnosed.
07:25I am one of these stubborn people.
07:27And I just refused to go take the test.
07:29And I probably need to get over that.
07:31But it really hit me the first time whenever we had left.
07:36Everybody was pointing finger at us, especially me, because of what I do.
07:40But I was going through all of that trauma.
07:42And then my boys and I went and watched this movie.
07:46I'm not going to name the movie, but it was a it was a war movie and it was about a person and their experiences after the war.
07:52And yes, it was PTSD that they were talking about.
07:55And they started showing the emotional signs that he was having, the struggles he was having.
08:03Literally just laid PTSD out in the movie.
08:06And I'm sitting there bawling like a baby.
08:09My son just looked at me like, John or dad, what are you doing?
08:11And I was crying, trying not to cry loudly in the theater, but I was crying because I could relate to every single aspect of PTSD that the war veteran was having.
08:23So it was painful for me.
08:25I knew exactly what what he was going through because I was going through it.
08:29And like I said, for us, for us who escaped the message, we were in a doomsday cult, a destructive cult we were in.
08:39It's much deeper than a high control group.
08:42The programming in our head was I would liken it more to if the if the guy in the movie had escaped a POW camp in, I don't know, in Korea and he had been brainwashed and gone through all the trauma of PTSD from the war and the PTSD from the brainwashing because we had literally that combination.
09:03And the thing that I came to understand is you can leave a high control group, but your nervous system may still think you're in danger after you leave.
09:11So I was struggling with that.
09:14And, you know, the chronic fear that we had from the judgment, the punishment, the apocalypse, all of that's in the back of your head.
09:23And like you said, the identity crisis, we had the cult identity that was forced in us.
09:29The term that I've used, and it's my own, it's not anything I've read, I just say basically our identities were hijacked because they ripped ours out.
09:38They imprinted the cult identity and literally our identities, those who came in later after they had formed an identity, their identities were erased.
09:48Mine was just hijacked from me and it developed because I was born and raised in it.
09:53So your thoughts, your instincts, nothing can be trusted.
09:58You don't know what parts of your identity came from the cult, what parts of your identity is authentic.
10:03There are so many things that cause trauma, but it all, for me, it all goes back to the central theme that trauma can sometimes cause other traumas.
10:14And the root cause, if you can understand what that root cause is and start addressing that, you can start to slow down all of the other traumas and work through them.
10:23Yeah, I appreciate you sharing your story.
10:26It's a beautiful story of you being vulnerable to others who might also struggle to be a little bit more open and vulnerable about their lived experiences,
10:36which people who struggle with post-traumatic symptoms or trauma themselves tend to not want to be very vulnerable because we're afraid of being hurt, right?
10:44So I think it might be nice to start out with a little bit of shared vocabulary because I know some of your audience may not have a lot of, you know, education on what it is, what it looks like.
10:55And they may not have had that experience of watching this movie that I'm not sure what it is, but now I'm curious.
11:01But I think it's important that we have this stigma of trauma is only for severe like war or assault kind of type events.
11:16And we've actually learned through research that that is not true.
11:20And we often tend to conflate the event or the stressor with the trauma.
11:27And so we have stress and we have stressors and stressors are the event.
11:32So for a person experiencing a stressor, that might be a car accident.
11:37It might be a shark attack, a hurricane, an actual disaster, which is becoming more and more common.
11:42And we might have things like repeated stressors, repeated traumatic events or potentially traumatic events.
11:49So that could be abuse, neglect, maltreatment, cruelty from a parent, you know, discriminatory actions, things like that.
12:00Things that you would see in a cult quite regularly, excessively enforcing guilt or shame on someone, excessive punishment that does not fit the crime, especially for children.
12:12And there's something to be said for that, because we tend to think the event is what causes PTSD.
12:20And when you think about PTSD, there usually is an event associated with it.
12:24It has a start and it has an end date and, you know, not necessarily concrete.
12:29Let me put a little stopper here and there.
12:31But there's research to say there's something called complex PTSD.
12:34And this is a little bit different in that it's more associated with repeated trauma, repeated events.
12:42So that is more likely what's going on with individuals who come out of a cult.
12:46And it's particularly common to start in childhood.
12:50And that has really profound, complex effects on our biology, our brain, our neuroendocrine system.
12:58All of the systems that are built to help us survive are being pressure cooked in this environment that tells us Doomsday is coming tomorrow.
13:08Branham said the day of, you know, in times is tomorrow.
13:11So our biology starts to adapt to that, getting us prepared in ways that might not be so adaptive outside of the cult.
13:17It's really not adaptive in general.
13:19So I think it's just important to teach everyone that the stressor is not the stress.
13:25The traumatic event is not the trauma.
13:27And everyone is different.
13:29Not everyone will have the same response.
13:32So you can have a whole platoon of soldiers exposed to the same war event.
13:37And not all of them are going to come home with PTSD.
13:40And I think that's just important for everyone to recognize.
13:42So if you experience a level of symptoms that is different than someone else in your family who escaped the cult, that's okay.
13:50Everyone's different.
13:51And we talk about that.
13:52It's the complexity that I really want to dive deeper into.
13:57Maybe not in this podcast because I know we have a specific subject.
14:00But there's so many things that go with it that people don't think about.
14:04There is – and there's probably a better term for this than what I'm coming up with off the fly.
14:09But there is like an authority trauma.
14:12You have this picture of what God is.
14:16And they have created this vision of God that is this just God of vengeance, God of wrath.
14:23It's not the God of the Bible.
14:24But they have linked that to the leadership.
14:29And so when you think about the leaders, you're thinking about their version of God.
14:32And you associate that same type of vengeance and wrath in the leader.
14:39And you can hear it verbally almost every Sunday if you're going to these churches, right?
14:44And yet at the same time, that wrath and that vengeance is tied to what you consider to be your safety and your safety net, your shield, right?
14:53So this – when you leave, this creates this long-term, I don't know, hypervigilance to try to escape all of this.
15:02And it brings you into a state of trauma just thinking about all of the things that might happen because of the way the world has been shaped in your head.
15:11And it takes a long time to unshape that version of the world from your head.
15:17So all of that is – it's related to complex PTSD.
15:22It's just one attribute.
15:23Yeah.
15:24You're touching on a lot of important things, one of which is you do change in response to this constant fear.
15:31And that hypervigilance isn't just in your head in the way that we say, oh, that's just in your head.
15:36Like in our culture, we tend to say, oh, that's just in your head.
15:38It's just made up.
15:38It is legitimately in your head as in – it's in your brain.
15:42Your brain is adapting to prioritize hypervigilance in such a way that you grew up in a world where fear was the norm.
15:51Anxiety was the norm.
15:53And so your body said, I must live in a state of hypervigilance so that at any given notice, I can mobilize resources to parts of my body to get me up out of here to survive.
16:05Like your fight-and-flight response systems are constantly activated.
16:09And you, over time, develop a predisposition to live in that state of hypervigilance.
16:14And in turn, the part of your brain that processes what stressor is triggering it starts to kind of take a back seat.
16:21And the part of your body that says, press the gas and mobilize resources and live in a chronic state of being able to mobilize resources is the one that's in the driver's seat.
16:32And it's pressing on the gas.
16:33And that does take a toll on your body.
16:36And it starts to become the norm for your brain.
16:39And we have lots of research to support that.
16:41And I love that stuff.
16:42That's nerdy.
16:43But some of us are more likely than others to adapt to this.
16:47And I think it's important to, we can touch on it a little bit, however much you want, to let everyone know that those of us who are more likely to change to our environment are more likely to change for the good and the bad.
17:00So you're more likely to be affected by the negative events in your life as much as you are the positive.
17:05So if anyone out there is listening and you're like, oh, I am one of many children in my home who grew up in the message and I'm the only one who suffers with major depression and PTSD and all of these horrible things and no one else seems to suffer.
17:18Well, just so you know, you're more sensitive.
17:20You're not more vulnerable.
17:21You're not, you know, suffering a greater deficit.
17:25You're just more sensitive.
17:26And so I think that's just something for the audience to take away.
17:29You're just more malleable to the environment.
17:31You just need the right soil to put your roots down in.
17:34Absolutely.
17:35So let's talk a little bit about recognizing it because a lot of people don't, they don't even know they have these struggles, right?
17:43I will, I've got hit with, with something that was shocking to me.
17:49I do all of my own mechanical work on my vehicles.
17:53So among all of the other tech stuff I do in the music, I'm also an auto mechanic, believe it or not.
17:58And I've, I've changed, I don't know how many hundreds of times I've changed brakes of myself, my other cars, my
18:04cars we've sold.
18:06And I changed the brakes one day of changing the pads and I put the pads on inside out, which causes a huge problem, right?
18:14Because the part that's supposed to squeeze the disc doesn't squeeze it.
18:17And I always check it before I call it done.
18:21So I drove around the block and it made the most awful noise, jacked it up.
18:24I took the brakes back apart and I could see that I did it wrong.
18:28I will, I, and I felt like my, my head must've been numb because I did not really, this is something I would never do.
18:35Right?
18:36So put it all back together, drove it around the road, uh, drove around the block, did the same exact thing again.
18:44And I knew then something is bad wrong.
18:47And I started thinking, well, I'm losing my mental faculties.
18:50That's the first thought that goes in your head.
18:52Right?
18:53Well, long story short, I'm suffering trauma so badly that I'm starting to disassociate a little bit.
19:00I'm starting to feel numb in the head.
19:02I can't think clearly.
19:04People that I've talked to that are experiencing this, they say things like, I felt like I was watching my body from the outside and everything that I was doing.
19:13I was, I was somewhere else just looking at it or they say, I feel like, um, I don't know, nothing, none of the emotions are stinging.
19:23Like they used to sting whenever I'm angry.
19:25I'm not as, not as angry as I was.
19:27I'm not as happy as I was.
19:29I'm just kind of numb.
19:30And there are many things psychologically that can cause this, but the cult PTSD is definitely one that can cause this.
19:38So there are several symptoms like this.
19:41Let's, let's talk through some of the symptoms.
19:42Yeah.
19:43And so, um, I like that you're pointing out that there's a lot of things that can cause different symptoms.
19:49And I just, as a scientist want to pick on the fact that diagnoses are kind of arbitrary.
19:56We treat symptoms and we treat people who don't treat diagnoses.
20:00So just kind of picking on that and fun fact, um, there are several hundred different diagnostic combinations from the current version of the DSM that can give you a diagnosis for PTSD.
20:10And it would simultaneously give you one for major depressive disorder.
20:14So just keeping that in mind, you are exactly right.
20:16And that's why it's really hard to kind of figure out what's going on.
20:19And I just want everyone to keep in mind that that doesn't matter.
20:22Just remembering your symptoms and that you deserve treatment is what's really important.
20:25Some things that tend to be really characteristic of individuals who might be struggling with trauma, you're kind of picking up on.
20:31And one is brain fog or memory, memory issues, right?
20:35And if you talk, if you think about that hypervigilance and how it takes a toll on your body, in your brain, it impacts your ability to actually form memories.
20:44And one way in which it's doing that is it impacts your sleep.
20:48Individuals with trauma tend to not have great sleep.
20:50They tend to have insomnia.
20:52They tend to also have nightmares or night terrors.
20:55And that is one of the things that is pretty characteristic.
20:58But mood dysregulation, so you might have this flattened affect or this kind of numbness.
21:06But then you also might be very easily frustrated or very easily aroused because you live in this state of hypervigilance.
21:13It doesn't take very much to get a person who's struggling with trauma to a state of high levels of anger.
21:20So what might make someone like my husband, who I characterize as very much happy-go-lucky dandelion, it's really hard to make him mad.
21:27It might take him like a whole bucket of stress to get to a level 5, and it can take me a drop in the bucket, and I'm at a level 12.
21:35I'm like, sorry, husband.
21:36I'm so sorry.
21:39That's what the difference is.
21:41They live up here in this state of stress.
21:43So it doesn't take much to go from their baseline to this really high state of emotional expression.
21:51And it could be anger or sadness, but it's usually not a comfortable emotion.
21:55I like to say comfortable instead of negative because all emotions are welcome.
21:59In my world, they're adaptive.
22:01They have a place.
22:02You're like, man, she's springing in all the therapy speak.
22:04Yes, I am.
22:06But it's true.
22:08So those are some.
22:09Fearfulness, avoidance.
22:12Typically, you'll tend to also really want to avoid things that are distressing or upsetting and remind you of some of your past traumas.
22:19I know for me, and having lived in the message, it's been a really long time before I was comfortable revisiting Christianity and spirituality from, you know, more than just a research history type of perspective and revisiting what that looks to me.
22:34Because I've always felt like my God was taken from me, and that's not fair.
22:37But that sort of avoidance is typical.
22:40Or you might have certain sounds that remind you of certain events in your life that you don't like, certain smells, or emotions are really common to be revisited.
22:52Or you might revisit those memories cognitively as well.
22:55So it's almost like a flashback.
22:56You replay those things.
22:58You might want to just practice something that my own therapist teaches me.
23:01We revisit.
23:02We do not live there.
23:03So when you catch yourself getting stuck in those thoughts, you want to try and not unpack your bags.
23:09It's like Hotel California.
23:10Once you unpack your bags, you're never leaving.
23:12You can't check out.
23:13So we don't want to live in these memories.
23:15We want to try and, you know, acknowledge that they're there and move on to the best that you can, which often requires getting help and support.
23:22But yeah, those are some pretty characteristic things.
23:25If you're seeing these tick in a couple of boxes, it might be time to reach out and get some support.
23:30Yeah.
23:31I don't know if any of that resonates for you, John.
23:33Absolutely.
23:34Yeah.
23:35And so I'll give the example of what not to do.
23:38And I can give it because I did it.
23:40There are people.
23:41So with what's a good example?
23:43Bipolar disorder.
23:45There are people that when they get in the manic state, they love it because they are just blazingly on fire.
23:52They're bouncing off the walls with energy.
23:54They're getting 10 to 15 times the things done that they normally do.
23:59And then they go to the depressive state and everything stops and they just, their world ends.
24:05And then they go back to the manic phase and their, Steve Jobs was a, was bipolar.
24:11And so many of the things that we take for granted from Apple came because of his high energy moments and the things that he did.
24:19Well, whenever you have this kind of trauma and it puts you in this state, there are attributes of that state that kind of resemble that.
24:28And I can say surely, you know, clearly I can say I'm not bipolar, but whenever I got to the point where the trauma was causing me to lose sleep,
24:37I was at the point where I would get two hours of sleep, whether I needed it or not.
24:43And then the whole rest of the time I was dumping it into all of this research and building the website and the platforms and the books and the, you can't even imagine all of the things that I did.
24:55There are, there are things that I did technologically to make all of this happen that most people would never even consider.
25:01And I did it because I didn't need sleep.
25:05Well, that's not the right, not the right way to handle that.
25:08I can tell you that, but there are health consequences that come with doing that.
25:13And a lot of people who are in this trauma and, and realize, Hey, I don't need sleep.
25:17I look at all of the things I can do.
25:20Well, your cortisol stays high.
25:22I have diabetes.
25:23Now I, many of the things that are caused by the trauma can also cause diabetes.
25:29I have a family history as well, but I did not have any of this until the trauma hit me.
25:35So your immune system weakens over time because you're not getting enough sleep.
25:39Your inflammation increases.
25:42There are people who leave and they get into trauma.
25:44They have pain all over the body and they can't explain what it is.
25:47What is this pain I've got, right?
25:49Your digestion starts to break down your, the sleep causes a whole array of different things, different problems in your body.
25:57But for me, the biggest one was really the digestion because that's the root cause of all of the other pains that you have in your body.
26:05So if you are like me and you realize, Hey, I don't need sleep, but you're in this trauma and you're angry of what they have done to you, you can channel that anger and you can do a million things that you never thought you'd be able to do.
26:18So it's not that healthy.
26:21It's better to go get some help.
26:23Yeah.
26:24So we can get real nerdy here.
26:27You brought scientists on your podcast.
26:28We can get real nerdy here.
26:29Um, I love that you're bringing up, um, and sharing your personal experiences with diabetes.
26:34That is actually really related to your stress response systems.
26:37And, um, I have loved ones who, who do experience diabetes and when their stress levels are high.
26:43So their blood sugar is also struggling despite they're not having any lifestyle or behavioral changes.
26:48And that's really frustrating for them.
26:50But you, um, your body has kind of a long-term response system for handling stress.
26:56And then it's got a quicker one, um, the quicker one being a neurotransmitter one and the longer
27:01response one being more glucocorticoids or stress response hormones.
27:05And so, uh, we'd like to think of cortisol as the bad guy, but I like to reframe that as it's
27:10someone that's keeping you going.
27:11It's keeping you alive.
27:12It does a lot more than just, you know, activate your fight or flight response, but you have within
27:17your stress response system, you've got a parasympathetic nervous system and a sympathetic
27:21nervous system.
27:22And this is just keeping it kind of gerated, but you know, a little bit blunt.
27:26But one likes to be the brakes and one likes to be the gas and your brake system.
27:30I like to affectionately describe as your biological self-care system.
27:33It makes sure that your stomach lining is well maintained so that you don't as likely
27:38get infections or ulcers.
27:39That's why zebras don't get ulcers.
27:41Um, love that Robert Sapolsky book.
27:42Just don't drop a little seed there.
27:44Um, but your, your sympathetic nervous system is pressing on the gas.
27:47It's saying, nope, forget digestion.
27:50It's saying dilate the pupils.
27:52It's saying make our lungs pump harder so we can get oxygen to our muscles, get glucose
27:57going to our muscles.
27:58Hence, diabetes is affected, right?
28:01Um, so your sympathetic nervous system is activated.
28:03It's pressing on the gas.
28:05This comes at a cost because you're not devoting biological resources to your biological self-care.
28:12This also is something that undermines reproductive success for women.
28:16I don't want to say success.
28:17That sounds a little bit, um, barbaric, but it makes it difficult to conceive when you're
28:22in a high state of stress.
28:24And this is true for women and men or those of us with uteruses.
28:28So you have to remember that when you live in a high state of stress, your body is devoting
28:33resources to keeping you alive and being in a state of preparedness for fight or flight.
28:38And that means you're right.
28:41Inflammation is up.
28:42Inflammation is meant to protect you from infection.
28:44It's not necessarily a bad thing, but when you live in a state of inflammation, that's
28:49when we have a problem.
28:51That's when we see cellular degradation.
28:52We see telemetric breakdown.
28:55Um, and I like that you also brought up pain to go off on a little side tangent.
28:59So we're seeing a lot of really interesting research come out of the genetics literature.
29:04And it seems like something that is really associated with, um, self-harm, which is my
29:09background is pain, chronic pain, um, from a genetics point.
29:13Like those of us with a genetic predisposition to have higher, um, experiences with pain are
29:18more likely to struggle with those, um, behavioral tendencies of self-harm.
29:22So it's interesting.
29:24Blood work also seems to differ in ways that we don't really understand from a scientific
29:29perspective.
29:29And it's kind of suggested that there might be something going on in the realm of our
29:34sensitivity and reactivity to stress.
29:37So something that we haven't really talked about is it's not just whether or not you're
29:41likely to respond to the stress and how you respond, but how long it takes you to come
29:46back down to baseline.
29:48So many of us with trauma, we stay in that hypervigilance.
29:52Whereas those who don't, they have a system that helps them come back down to normal levels
29:58of whatever their normal levels of, um, alpha amylase and cortisol and all the good things
30:02are that help keep us regulated.
30:04So that is really bad for your health.
30:06If you live in that state, but you can, you can get, you know, some supports to help you
30:10adjust that.
30:11And it is actually true.
30:12Just so you know, have you ever wondered how the Pentecostal movement started or how the
30:18progression of modern Pentecostalism transitioned through the latter reign, charismatic and other
30:23fringe movements into the new apostolic reformation.
30:26You can learn this and more on William Branham Historical Research's website,
30:32william-branham.org.
30:34On the books page of the website, you can find the compiled research of John Collins,
30:39Charles Paisley, Stephen Montgomery, John McKinnon, and others with links to the paper,
30:45audio, and digital versions of each book.
30:48You can also find resources and documentation on various people and topics related to those
30:54movements.
30:54If you want to contribute to the cause, you can support the podcast by clicking the contribute
31:00button at the top.
31:01And as always, be sure to like and subscribe to the audio or video version that you're listening
31:07to or watching.
31:08On behalf of William Branham Historical Research, we want to thank you for your support.
31:12So part of the reason why I wanted to have this particular discussion, I have family members
31:18who have autoimmune disorders, and I have friends who do.
31:22Lupus was a common thing.
31:23I don't know if it was in the message where you were, but I can count several people that
31:28I know of who have lupus.
31:30And I was thinking after leaving, why is this?
31:34They weren't related, but yet it seemed to be more widespread.
31:38And so I began to study lupus and I began to study some of the, you know, you can't really
31:43find a root cause with that type of disease, but you can find correlations.
31:47And one of the correlations that I found was trauma and cult trauma is within the range
31:53of trauma.
31:55So there's a lot of problems that exist with relation to cult trauma.
32:01Before we go there, however, I want to also talk about another problem that the cult trauma
32:06causes.
32:07When people are in this experience, especially in the pain, they tend to want to self-medicate.
32:13And when you try to self-medicate, that's a whole array of problems that people don't
32:18really think about, and they don't associate them with the trauma.
32:22Drinking, you can become an alcoholic if you have cult trauma, if you have pain, if you have
32:27any trauma or any pain, if you're not careful.
32:29And if you start abusing any substance that you overdo, you can start abusing it.
32:35One of the interesting things for me, like I said, I've studied psychology like crazy after
32:40leaving the message, and there came a point where I recognized that I had high anxiety
32:46disorders, and it was worse after leaving.
32:50And I recognized after leaving that I had it all along and didn't realize that.
32:55I think we talked about this.
32:57But after leaving, I started to recognize that not only had I had it in the cult, it's
33:02now getting worse after I've left the cult.
33:04Why is this?
33:04And that's what really drove me down the path of studying psychology as much as I could.
33:09And I just happened to be at a business meeting.
33:13I don't know if it was you I shared this story with or somebody else, but they had an open
33:18bar I'd never drank in my life.
33:21In the message, it was wrong.
33:22We were teetotalers.
33:24And they had an open bar with nothing but top shelf liquor.
33:28And I'm sitting here drinking a glass of water in this business meeting.
33:32And the lady next to me said, why aren't you drinking, John?
33:34This is like the best stuff you can get anywhere.
33:37And it's all open bar.
33:39And for the first time in my life, I couldn't say I don't drink for religious purposes.
33:44And I didn't know what to say other than I just simply don't do it.
33:47And then the waiter came and they didn't pour just water at your table.
33:52They poured water and top shelf white wine.
33:56And so here I am with white wine in front of me.
33:58I've never drank it before.
33:59And the anxiety was so bad for me at that point, this was around 2013, it felt like needles
34:07were going in my head, in and out, in and out, constantly.
34:11So I was suffering with pain, unbelievable pain, in my head.
34:16Well, long story short, I thought I would try just a little bit of the wine and see,
34:21because I'd never tried it before.
34:22And I drank just a little bit, not the whole glass, but it was just enough to take the edge
34:28off a little bit.
34:30And then the pain that I felt going in and out of my head stopped.
34:34So in the hotel that night, I'm thinking, there's no way that was the wine.
34:38The whole next day of the meeting, I couldn't think of anything else.
34:42And I'm there on business, right?
34:43So I'm struggling.
34:44I wanted to know, I want to try that again and see, was that really what happened?
34:49So my scientific mind kicked in, and I did my own scientific experiment, and I drank probably
34:56a fourth of the glass, not that much.
34:59And sure enough, it took the edge off, my anxiety went down.
35:02I was on depression meds for the anxiety.
35:06I didn't realize that the anxiety was the root cause.
35:10And I got back, I started drinking just one glass a week.
35:13That's all I drank.
35:14I don't like to drink that much.
35:16But after about, I don't know, two, three months, I was able to come off my depression
35:20meds because the anxiety was cut.
35:23Now, I could have went, without having studying and known that people will abuse, I could have
35:29went just wild with this.
35:31Let's have it every night.
35:32Let's drink two or three glasses and try to overdo it.
35:35And that would have actually made things worse for me instead of better.
35:39So self-medication is a problem.
35:41And alcohol is just one example.
35:43There are an array of things that people do from pornography to alcohol to drugs, et cetera.
35:51But it's this idea that you're self-medicating to solve the problem that you don't even recognize
35:57what is.
35:58Wow.
35:59You're opening up Pandora's box.
36:00Like, just rip off the Band-Aid.
36:02I love this.
36:03Okay.
36:03Hey, that was really, like, I'm really proud of you for opening up that because I know
36:09that in our culture, there are some behaviors that are not healthy that we love to praise
36:14and reinforce.
36:15And I'm actually going to open that Pandora's box next.
36:18But substance misuse is not one of them.
36:21We tend to highly stigmatize alcohol misuse.
36:24And you're right to call that one out.
36:27So my understanding of the literature from those who have left cults, they have a high
36:35rate of substance misuse and addiction, be that for alcohol or other substances like
36:41marijuana or illicit drugs.
36:43You are exactly right.
36:44You are hitting a nail on the head.
36:45And those are things that can be addressed and treated first and foremost.
36:49And so, fun fact, I don't know if you know this, they actually have drugs that make alcohol
36:53not so fun.
36:54It helps you actually not want to drink.
36:56Most people don't know that it's out there and it's actually very affordable.
36:59I love science, right?
37:00This is why we need to invest in science.
37:02We can literally give you a drug that if you're struggling with alcohol use and misuse
37:05and you feel like you can't stop, we can give you a drug that actually goes, huh,
37:09I don't like this anymore.
37:10Fun, right?
37:11So science, good stuff.
37:13But that is not true for everyone.
37:15Anyway, there are other things that are associated with cult trauma as well.
37:20Particularly religious trauma.
37:21And that is, I'm going to tiptoe around this because if you're going to get flagged on YouTube
37:26for one thing, it's going to be this one.
37:28Disordered behaviors relating to how you give yourself nutrition.
37:32So that's my nice way of saying ED and I'm not talking about sexual dysfunction.
37:35Funny, they won't flag you for that one, but they'll flag you for ED.
37:38And I'm talking about ANA or BN.
37:40So anorexia or bulimia.
37:42So these things are actually really common.
37:45And they have a high rate of co-occurrence with substance misuse, particularly alcohol.
37:52So that is just something to be aware of.
37:54If you are struggling with these things and you've left the cult or a cult in general,
38:00that if you're struggling with these things, please seek help.
38:02Those things are extremely dangerous.
38:05And in fact, of all of the mental health disorders out there,
38:08the one with the highest mortality rates is actually eating disorders.
38:12So do not struggle alone.
38:14And if you are struggling with both that and alcohol misuse, please get help.
38:18You're not alone.
38:20Yeah, just want to make sure that that is out there.
38:23But it's funny that you talk about how it just takes the edge off.
38:27And it's so easy compared to what you are getting as a medication.
38:31And it's because it's an immediate reward.
38:33It immediately takes the edge off because your dopamine response system is like,
38:38oh, I like this.
38:39This is great.
38:40I always joke when people feel so, it's not a joke,
38:43but when people feel so stigmatized about struggling with alcohol,
38:46I'm like, if you give me an animal in a lab, which I would never do.
38:49I'm a vegetarian.
38:50I would never do this.
38:50I hate animal research, but it's true.
38:52You can get an animal addicted to anything.
38:54If you gave me a person and I gave them alcohol and they've never had it before,
38:59I can almost guarantee you that they're going to like it.
39:01So I am not at all surprised.
39:03And you are exactly right.
39:04When I was growing up, alcohol was an absolute no, no, no, no, no.
39:07I did not try alcohol until I was in college.
39:09So, yeah, I'm not at all surprised that John in his business meeting was like,
39:15oh, this is nice.
39:16Oh, of course it was, especially it was top shelf.
39:20Yeah.
39:21And the funny part is, you know, after leaving, I've watched my friends who have left
39:25and they're just, you know, they really, really like their alcohol.
39:29I actually don't like it.
39:31But I do for medicinal purposes and like if I have a cold or something, I'll drink it
39:36with honey.
39:37And there are ways that I use it that are helpful, but I just, I'm not that big of a fan.
39:41It's, I like to be in control and it doesn't let me stay in control.
39:45And that's, that's really the big thing.
39:47But so let's talk about the, the autoimmune disorders and the other, the health issues
39:53that are related to trauma, because I don't think people recognize this.
39:57I knew a lot of people who had migraines, for example.
40:00And it seemed like, you know, growing up, it seemed like, well, that's the thing that
40:04everybody's going to get when they get to be an adult.
40:07And I came to realize after leaving, no, not everybody suffered.
40:10Yes, people do, but not everybody suffers with it.
40:14And it just simply goes back to the unexplained pains.
40:18There are things that happen when you're in trauma that you just can't explain.
40:22Your body starts doing it and all of the treatments that exist for migraines, they'll say, well,
40:27that just doesn't work.
40:28This medicine, it's no good for me.
40:30What's because they're treating the wrong thing.
40:32You treat the trauma to get rid of these pains that are plaguing your body.
40:38And they're, that's just one example.
40:40There's several other examples that I'll let you talk through, but it's all back to cult trauma.
40:46It's funny.
40:46I'm learning something from you.
40:48And so I want to be mindful of my lived experience and those in my life who are not here to consent
40:54to this information being given.
40:55But it's funny that you mentioned lupus because this is news to me.
40:59And yet lupus runs in my family amongst individuals who were also in the message.
41:03And I spent quite a long time and it was quite stressful during graduate school at a cancer
41:10doctor, a hematologist, and even had to go back recently.
41:14And we cannot figure out what's wrong with me.
41:17And so that's my lived experience that I am permitted to share.
41:20I do not have lupus, but it does seem like my blood work tends to look like I might have
41:25it, but I don't.
41:26So it's just interesting.
41:28We do have a lot of science to show that individuals with mental health conditions that are pretty
41:33severe tend to have different inflammatory markers.
41:37And they also have different blood markers that aren't related to inflammation.
41:41And then the reverse is true.
41:42More inflammation, you have, or sorry, more trauma, more inflammatory markers, and more
41:48differences in your blood work.
41:50So both mental health conditions, even without trauma, your blood work tends to look different.
41:54And then lots of trauma, your blood work tends to look different.
41:58So what also might be going on that I think is important to talk about is a lot of times I
42:03hear individuals just with this assumption that trauma equals Y.
42:06X predicts Y, trauma predicts lupus, or, you know, or schizophrenia, or I've even heard
42:13the word like shared religious psychosis.
42:16And I always go, that's not how this works.
42:18So there is DNA, you have a genetic predisposition, for example, to lupus, right?
42:24But you have what we call in your DNA, DNA methylation.
42:29So you want to think of like your genome being covered by soil, and your environment is constantly
42:34digging at that soil, and it's digging at it in certain areas, and it's going to make
42:38it more or less likely that something pops up and expresses itself.
42:42Is this the seed that's going to pop up through the soil?
42:45And so that might be what's going on for individuals with autoimmune disorders.
42:49If you are exposed to an environment that is shaping your stress response system to be
42:54more active and triggering this genetic predisposition to express itself, that's what we call phenotype.
43:01But that might be what's going on.
43:03And I had never thought about this in relation to, you know, cult trauma, but I'm also not
43:08like a geneticist.
43:10Well, so they're not, not a geneticist, but that might be going on there.
43:15I know there's also some really interesting research since you talked on individuals with
43:19bipolar and psychosis and substance misuse.
43:23There's some really interesting genomic research going on that shows individuals with a genetic
43:28predisposition towards these conditions who are exposed chronically to high THC levels are
43:36at greater risk for first episode psychosis.
43:39And that is through DNA methylation.
43:41It's digging at that soil to make it more likely that that genetic predisposition is expressed.
43:46So I think it's a little bit of both.
43:48You're never doomed just because you got X and Y or whatever from mom and dad.
43:52But if it is such that you got that and then you're put in this environment, you are more
43:57likely to have that expressed.
43:59So that might be what's going on there with lupus.
44:01That's an interesting, you know, thing you've picked up on there.
44:04And then it just so happens that that runs in my family too.
44:07So, huh, go figure.
44:09Yeah.
44:10And the science aspect of this, that's actually why I wanted to talk through this with you
44:14because there, like I said, it is not something that's directly caused by the cult trauma, but there
44:21is a correlation and the correlation is through the trauma.
44:24To be clear, it's not specifically cult trauma.
44:27It is through the trauma.
44:28If I remember correctly, the study that I found, it was, the study began basically with some
44:35nurses study on high levels.
44:38What was it?
44:39Childhood, childhood emotional abuse.
44:43There's a correlation between childhood emotional abuse and lupus and other autoimmune
44:48diseases.
44:48And so I started digging into this and I found the relationship between the trauma, which
44:55would include cult trauma, and the autoimmune risks that come with it, which would include
45:00lupus, the autoimmune disease.
45:01So I started to notice all of these correlations.
45:05And then I was thinking through all of my family that had not only lupus, but other autoimmune
45:10diseases.
45:10And that's really what set this off.
45:12Now, an interesting side tidbit, you mentioned bipolar and I did earlier, Dr. Stephen Hassan
45:20gave a, I think it was a TED talk, but he was talking about a person who had been diagnosed
45:25with bipolar disorder and was taking, I don't know what it was, lithium or whatever is the
45:31bipolar medication.
45:33It wasn't working.
45:34It wasn't helping.
45:35And he was able to identify that it was actually the cult complex PTSD and trauma that
45:42they were seeing the same symptoms as bipolar disorder, but it was actually cult related.
45:47It wasn't bipolar disorder.
45:49And so they were able to get off of their, those meds and get, I guess, different meds,
45:54but it's a correlation between the symptoms and the trauma is really what I'm trying to
45:59say.
45:59And the autoimmune response, it's also a correlation to the trauma.
46:03So when I found this, I'm like, well, it's suddenly starts to make sense.
46:07I remember talking to people who, and seeing photographs of people when they were in the
46:13cult, you see the cult photograph and you see the one after, and they look healthier.
46:18And why is this?
46:19They actually are healthier in many cases because they were under such stress and trauma that
46:24the body is showing this physical trauma response while they're in the cult.
46:28Then they leave.
46:29If they can break free from the cult PTSD that they have, then they start to blossom and
46:35you can see it even in their photographs.
46:37Yeah.
46:37I love that example that you gave and you are exactly right.
46:40When you aren't living in that state of hypervigilance, your biological self-care side can start to
46:46take more precedence.
46:48That is something that might be a nice kind of way to move in the direction, you know, how,
46:55all right, so we've given you all this info.
46:56Now, what do you do with it?
46:57So you do have your prefrontal cortex and that is how you appraise stressors.
47:03And that tends to take a back seat to our stress response system, like your amygdala.
47:09When you do experience trauma, particularly chronic trauma, it tends to say, nope, we're
47:14just going to live in a state of hypervigilance that undermines our health.
47:17But if you can get out of that and start to learn to think differently, reappraise situations
47:22differently, then you have the advantage of not seeing the world as, as, you know,
47:27as scary, as frightful, as anxiety inducing.
47:30And so that's when your biological self-care system can start to come into play.
47:34I think it's important to talk about how, you know, those who are grown up and raised in
47:42these environments, that can become especially more difficult to do compared to someone who
47:47has a much more time-limited stressful event like PTSD that's more time-limited as opposed
47:53to complex or childhood PTSD or these symptoms that are more chronic because you don't really
48:00have, like, these skills to go back to.
48:04That prefrontal cortex does change in response to these chronic stressors.
48:09So it's just kind of important to think about that.
48:11But you can, through things like cognitive behavioral therapy or CBT, learn to appraise things differently.
48:18And so individuals who are a little bit less sensitive to their environment, like my husband,
48:23I tell him he's a dandelion, you can mow him over in the hot Georgia heat with a lawnmower
48:26and he'd hop right back up.
48:28They are usually a little bit better at reappraising the world.
48:31Things seem to be a lot less stressful.
48:33They see the silver lining in a lot of things.
48:36And you can teach yourself, especially with help, how to do that.
48:38And that is actually a helpful way to adjust your stress response system's reaction to the world
48:45and help you to bring back yourself to baseline.
48:49I'm going to, like, hijack in the conversation.
48:51But those of us who are a little bit more sensitive were more like orchids.
48:54And if you've ever had one and you put more than three ice cubes in it, it's dead.
48:58It's done.
48:59If you put it too close to the air conditioner, it's done.
49:01It's wilted.
49:01Or you didn't give it enough light.
49:03Now it's leaves are yellow and it's done.
49:04But if you give it exactly what it needs, it is beautiful, it's exceptional, it's extraordinary.
49:10So if you find that you tend to react more easily or more sensitively, like, to your environment,
49:17you just need the right tools and then you will be okay.
49:20So don't feel doom and gloom.
49:23I'm definitely more of an orchid person.
49:25It does not take much to get me aroused and I will react very strongly.
49:28But I have gotten more tools in my toolbox to make sure I react to the things I want to
49:32and react in, like, the level I want to compared to what I used to.
49:38But, yeah, hijacked your conversation there.
49:40Sorry.
49:41No, that's fine.
49:42I think we should probably talk some about what people should do if they have listened to this
49:48and they found some of those symptoms in their daily life because I'm certain that there are people that have.
49:53But before we go there, and I'll let you take that one,
49:56but before we go there, I want to also address the fact that when people have these kind of things,
50:03they tend to blame themselves, especially if you've escaped a cult,
50:07because cults train people to self-police or police others.
50:12And there's a whole cult dynamic that comes to play,
50:15but you start to feel like if you can't get over this yourself, you're a moral failure.
50:21And that's simply not the case.
50:23There are times where the complex PTSD is so severe, you actually have to get help,
50:29or you may struggle with it for years and years,
50:32and may struggle with it forever if you don't get help.
50:35So let's talk about what we do if we've recognized that we may have this.
50:41Where do we go?
50:42How do we get help?
50:43What steps do we take?
50:44Yeah, I think that's a great way to kind of conclude on, like, all right, next steps, folks,
50:48because I know someone out there is listening and says,
50:51oh, I identify with a lot of these little check marks.
50:53That excessive guilt that you mentioned, too,
50:56I think is born out of a lot of individuals with complex PTSD have a negative sense of self
51:01or a disorganized self, or it's like a, there's different types of symptoms.
51:06And a lot of symptoms with complex PTSD actually overlap with borderline personality disorder,
51:11but they are different, but they're very similar.
51:14And so it's not quite the same thing as emotion dysregulation,
51:16but they do tend to have a lower sense of self, lower self-esteem,
51:21a lower self-worth and self-value, which me as a, you know,
51:25self-harm and suicide prevention researcher is big red flag.
51:28We want to boost that.
51:29You need reasons for living, hope.
51:31You need a strong sense of self.
51:33But if you're recognizing some of these things ring true for you,
51:36I want to acknowledge that there is help out there for you,
51:39and it is efficacious, meaning it works.
51:42However, I also want to acknowledge that sometimes it's hard, it's expensive, it's time consuming.
51:48The first place to start, I think, might be if you have a primary care physician,
51:52you can reach out to them and tell them that you are experiencing these symptoms.
51:56A lot of them are trained to give you some tools to take home with you while you wait to get in
52:01with a therapist or a mental health care practitioner because I do know and acknowledge,
52:06depending on where you live or the resources you have,
52:08the wait list can be long and it can be very frustrating.
52:11So that's a nice first step.
52:13I know a lot of apps now, like ZocDoc or your insurance app,
52:17you can a lot of times type in what you're looking for,
52:20like a therapist, a psychologist, they'll even let you pick the gender.
52:23Or if you want someone who's trained to bring in religion into your therapy,
52:27there's a lot of APA, American Psychological Association, accredited therapists who also
52:33are trained to bring in spirituality as a strength into the therapeutic alliance,
52:37not just as, you know, a stressor because some of that, that is true for us.
52:41So it can be something to be supplemental and not be, you know, a stressor.
52:47But that's another place to start.
52:50The APA also has like a website where you can look up accredited therapists in your area.
52:55That's another way to go.
52:57And then there's also, many people don't know this,
53:00but if you live near a university with an accredited psychological program
53:04where they're training clinical psychologists,
53:07sometimes they have what's called a sliding scale,
53:09which means you can pay based on your income because therapy is expensive
53:13and insurances don't cover it as well as they should.
53:16And this would be you going and getting therapy from an individual who's still in training,
53:22but they are supervised from a much more experienced licensed professional.
53:25So that's also something to look into.
53:27So these are all great places to start.
53:30And the internet's also, you know, a wealth of information.
53:33I would say stay away from TikTok.
53:35TikTok's great, but not for this.
53:37But yeah, that would be a good one.
53:39But definitely reach out and get help.
53:41Yeah.
53:41And the only thing I'll add to that is also stay away from AI
53:43because AI, if you have mental health disorders,
53:46it tailors its responses to you to appease you,
53:48and it will lead you into a path of no return.
53:52It really will if you're not careful with how you use AI.
53:55So avoid it if you're struggling.
53:57But thank you so much for doing this.
53:59No, it was a pleasure.
54:00I hope this was helpful for someone.
54:02Well, if you've enjoyed our show and you want more information,
54:04you can check us out on the web.
54:06You can find us at william-branham.org.
54:08For more about the dark side of the New Apostolic Reformation,
54:10you can read Weaponized Religion from Christian Identity to the NAR.
54:14Available on Amazon, Kindle, and Audible.
54:44Available on Amazon, Kindle, and Audible.
55:15You can find us at william-branham.org.
55:17And we'll see you next time.
55:18Bye.
55:21Bye.
55:36Bye.
55:43Bye.
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