Educational Workshops/Support Sessions for Survivors of Coercive Control or Abuse in Relationships, High Demand Groups or Cults (Including Those Born and Raised in Them)
Successful, Small, Personalized, and Secure Zoom Sessions Since 2010!
Alternate Saturdays, 10:00 AM to 12:00 Noon Pacific Time
(Please note the time zone)
Facilitator: Colleen Russell, Licensed Marriage & Family Therapist (LMFT) and Certified Group Psychotherapist (CGP), Licensed since 1992, Area of Expertise in Cult or High Demand Group and Relationship Education and Recovery, Trauma, and Loss; also a Former Member in my young adulthood.
We limit Participants to 10 Each Session, $50 Per Session, $100 for Two with No Refunds. If you inform me that you can't attend a session 48 hours ahead of time, I can forward your payment to the next workshop session.
These are educational workshops, not therapy groups.
Educational, supportive, interactive, offering participants opportunities to address issues you want to explore and which are relevant to your life. We gain support and learn from each other. Topics participants choose to discuss include:
- Cult or High Demand Group Definitions, Dynamics, Structure
- Characteristics of the Cult Leader or Dominant Partner (Observed Narcissistic/Anti-Social Traits)
- Thought Reform/Brainwashing/Grooming
- Healthy and Coercive relationships -- All kinds, including Family, Partner, Friends, Colleague, Work
- Who Am I? Identity Negotiation Prior, During, Post-Cult or High Demand Group/Relationship
- Boundaries, Communication, Personal Rights --and Other Tools for Living
- Betrayal Trauma and Betrayal Blindness
- Anxious/Secure Attachment Styles
- Communication with Parents or Other Family Members Still Involved -- or Still Maintaining the Beliefs
- Accessing Social Services
- Conflict Resolution/Win-Win Negotiation
- Intimacy and Trust
- Self-Loathing
- Loneliness
- Anger & Other Emotions
- Trauma and PTSD -- Symptoms, Triggers, and How to Navigate Through Them
- Traumatizing Narcissists -- in Families, Relationships, Groups, Cults & How to Recover & Avoid
- Traumatic Bonding
- How to be Less Vulnerable to Authority
- What Former Members have found Helpful to Recovery
- The Most Vulnerable Members -- Those Born &/or Raised
- Individual Strengths, Surviving Traumatic Situations, Post-Trauma Growth
- Rules and Dynamics of Dysfunctional Systems -- in Families, Relationships, Workplaces and Other Groups
- Ambiguous Loss and Disenfranchised Grief
- Shunning
- Disconfirming Inaccurate, Self-limiting Beliefs from Ideologies, Family of Origin, Other Relationships -- Key to Recovery via Better Outcomes
- Physical and Psychological Process of Leaving
- Self-Esteem and Self-Care
- Personal Goals, Challenges and Successes
Based on participant's requests and needs, each workshop will focus on specific topics participants address for in-depth exploration. I provide resources the day before the workshop to assist in the discussion and learning opportunity.
1)If I don't know you, please send me an email: [email protected] so I can review your brief history of the name of, and how you were affected by coercive control in a cult or high demand group or relationship for screening purposes. Please let me know the workshop you would like to attend. I will review your history and notify you with a welcome email. You can make a payment of $50 for one session or $100 for two to reserve your place via this website "Make a Payment" on the menu with PayPal or credit card. Please state your first/last name when you pay. If you cannot attend a workshop you've paid for, let me know at least 24-hours in advance so someone else may attend and I'll forward your payment to the next workshop session.
2) The day before the scheduled workshop, I will email PowerPoint resources including the workshop guidelines for your review. These resources are based on topics participants have addressed and explored.
3) On the morning of the workshop, I'll send you a secure link that will take you into the Zoom workshop/support session. Please arrive 5 minutes early so we can start on time.
Workshop Participants' Comments From Most Recent (4/2023) Listed First:
"I'd like to express my gratitude to you for the space you've created for everyone in the group and your thoughtful and caring attention to the ever shifting needs and personal dynamics. I've gotten so much from the support of both you and the group not just with cult recovery issues. Thank you for choosing to leverage your personal experience to help others, I admire that."
"The workshops are always so helpful! I get so much out of the materials you send and our discussion. I like the structure."
"In hearing others' experiences in a different cult, dysfunctional family or relationship, I'm learning more about my experience in the cult and dysfunctional family."
"I very much appreciated being in the group. Realizing I’ve been in a cult/high demand group for the last 47 years is new information for me... I feel so raw and lost and confused and also good. Listening to peoples experiences is helpful."
"I think I am learning in the group. It's as if we are all wrestle with the same things and imagine writing and fighting and teaching and prosecuting and maybe even erasing it from ourselves. But I think the way forward is with connection and probably just one intimate long term connection. One person who gets it, accepts us and loves us and accepts our love. I don't really think anything else matters more than human connection. We are social. It nurtures our brains. And I like the group because its a place where we see ourselves in others. Thank you for the group"
"I've had individual therapy, but after attending my first workshop I realize that what I need now is learning from the group of former members."
"These workshops are really helpful to me in understanding and processing my experiences in a cult."
"I don't feel like such an alien, and can openly talk to others who understand."
"I'm learning how others have survived 'outside' -- and how I can survive."
"I wasn't aware until listening to others in the workshop and reading the educational material you provide, how many relationships I've been involved in that have been coercive."
"These workshops have given me invaluable insights."
"Thanks again for last week's meeting. It was really powerful."
"By having compassion for others in the workshop, hearing their stories, I'm gaining compassion for myself."
"It's a relief in these workshops that we're not passively listening to an 'expert' -- we are all experts of our own experience."
I use secure Zoom. If you decide to participate, you will need a video camera and speakers for your laptop or desktop and a one-time download of the Zoom app. Downloading Zoom is easy and free, a one-time process. Some participants use their IPhones but this is a smaller view. I will send resources regarding the workshop prior to it for your review and reflection.
